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YOU GOT NOTHING COMING!

How is it that Lake Geneva’s leadership has seemed to shift toward mean-spiritedness?  The city adds more than a million dollars to its coffers for 2023 over 2022 but wants to ‘stiff’ the non-profits and charge them for parking at their events on into the future after nearly sixty years of free permits.

What gives here and why has the city council turned into the Ebenezer Scrooge council for Christmas?  What did the non-profits do to deserve this?  The Jaycees do so much and put on so much that not only everyone local enjoys but also attract so many from down south.  Venetian Days is the biggest event, of course, but nobody in the Midwest has a carnival event like that one, a throwback to when things were different across the USA.  Now, local carnivals are very uncommon, and one’s run as well as the Lake Geneva Venetian Days are almost unknown.

Give them a break and stop being Scroogely penny-pinching, Lake Geneva leadership.

What are some of the other non-profit experiences Lake Geneva has offered?  Art in the park is a big one, and well attended.  Amazingly, nobody wants to reflect on the fact that non-profits operate using almost all volunteers.  The American Legion Auxiliary is a nonprofit and what a wonderful group of women they are.  The Rotary and Lion Club are both non-profits.  They work tirelessly, not only in Lake Geneva, volunteering their services to nearly one and all, while profit-making operations, many related to alcohol service, enjoy the benefits.

But it’s the entire community that benefits the most. In the final analysis, the city council decided to reverse directions and voted to approve of not charging the non-profits for their space when using city-owned property for events or parking near those events.  The supposed reason that generated the potential Scrooge behavior was unspoken but revolved around some of the non-profits not being worthy of such financial assistance.

This is the same argument used by the City of Chicago to make handicapped parking so restrictive that it’s almost impossible to get a placard to enjoy what used to be a great benefit for disabled people.  Chicago felt too many people weren’t truly disabled so they changed it all.  Now, many disabled people have no benefit.  The argument was bogus, but parking revenue was increased, which was the point all along.  The lies in big city government to get money are no bigger than those told nationally or right in downtown Lake Geneva.

Fortunately, the non-profits have a whole lot more supporters and participants than disabled people so the city council, on Monday night, was ‘taken out back to the shed’ and threatened to be paddled very painfully. Like bad children, however, they gave in so that there would be no coal in their stockings, not that they didn’t deserve to have such a Christmas gift.  The elections for four city council members and Mayor Mayor are coming in February of 2024 and the public should think sincerely and examine closely just how many of the current ‘crop’ of leaders they should replace and with whom.  Elections only have consequences when the public chooses to pay attention, consider, and then take its opinions straight to the polls.