Posted by sigh on October 16, 2001 at 11:39:00:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Bad News posted by Scott on October 16, 2001 at 11:11:18:
its not a direct line to "cause", more like a domino effect:
1) no one likes to pay taxes
2) prop 13 freezes assessed property tax levels for people who don't move
3) everything is more expensive
4) tax revenues don't keep up because of #2 above,
5) so local gov't income from revenues doesn't match increased $$ demands
6) local gov't opts to support redevelopment enterprise, and their employees
and cut funding to the Arts...orgs like the SJS
Now before you "no-tax-funding-for-the-arts" nazis go spinning off,
my understanding is the SJS symphony running deficit was about 2.5 million dollars.
In Silicon Valley, EVEN in the current financial slump, that amount
is next to NOTHING! Compared to the cost of running the orchestra the monies managed and beeing spent now by local industries and bay area governments is obscenely huge!
Examples, our local San Jose city government is trying to do things
like replace/relocate it's 35-year old city hall with a new one at a stated cost of 50-60 million (expect it to double after approval but before ground is broken, and triple before they move into the new building) Remember this is the same city government that squandered 60 million on investments back when the rest of the world was pulling triple-digit profits outta the market. This is the same city government that provides multi-million dollar incentives to build the shark tank arena and the adobe world HQ and on-and-on, yet they are cutting their support to the oldest continuous-running orchestra
on the coast! I could go on and on but these are just a coupla examples of why I sign this post ... "sigh"