Wed, Nov 25 2009
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Ashtabula, Conneaut may lead economic changes ROBERT LEBZELTER for July 5, 2009 Star BeaconAttention National Geographic, Newsweek, Consumer Reports or even the Star Beacon: Is it not possible when a subscriber is finished with your magazine or newspaper, that person might give it to a neighbor to read? Wouldn't that neighbor then benefit without paying? Better send bills out to everyone, just in case. Wow! The city of Conneaut could spark a real trend and help businesses improve their bottom lines. Of course, the people end up getting ripped off, but we are already used to that. But Conneaut isn't the only city that may be starting a trend. Consider Ashtabula, where some employees who already are making up to twice what they would get in the private sector now want a $450 per month clothing allowance. Maybe, just maybe, this has all been misinterpreted. Maybe these people are having a hard time budgeting their money and want the city to do it. So yes, they want the clothing allowance, but maybe it is so they know how much to spend each year on clothes. Then they would get a food allowance, a housing allowance, a utility-bill allowance, a car maintenance and fuel allowance, a leisure and recreation allowance, an emergency allowance, a miscellaneous allowance, a savings allowance. And they get all of this in lieu of regular pay. I've been told (I don't know from actual experience) that when you budget your money, you find you have more than enough. You just don't go beyond the budget. Without a budget, when you just pay as you go, you come up short. So by compensating these people with "allowances" rather than straight pay, maybe City Auditor Michael Zullo wouldn't need $76,000 per year to live on and Council Clerk LaVette Hennigan wouldn't need $53,612. Paying her with "allowances" should cut that down considerably. Compare her salary to Conneaut's clerk at $5,500 per year. Yes, Ashtabula is a bit bigger, but not THAT much bigger. Hey, in these hard economic times, we are told to think outside the box and that's what it looks like these communities are doing. If these ideas catch on, maybe they will some day be referred to in an economics textbook as the Ashtabula Model or the Conneaut Plan. Why not take this column over to your neighbor to see what he thinks? Just charge him 50 cents for reading it and send me a quarter. Lebzelter is special sections editor. E-mail him at bobleb@starbeacon.com, only if you are using your own Internet connection. 
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