City council passes resolution to oppose Trump budget

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (NEWSPLEX) — Charlottesville city council held a busy meeting Monday night, which included decisions on deer hunting solutions and proposals for the next city budget.

City officials presented the proposal for the fiscal year 2018 city budget, which addressed many of the concerns people around the area had with the current years budget.

“We’ve been having very austere budgets. We had drastic drops in property values with the recession and so we’ve been tightening and tightening and now we are loosening so that’s nice,” said Kristin Szakos, a city council member.

Residents who spoke at the public comment section say they weren’t happy with the hike in property assessment values from last year. City officials addressed the hike with cuts to property fees and no change to property tax rates. The proposed budget increased by 5 percent, with most of the money going towards education. The proposed budget designated an additional two million dollars towards schools.

“Atleast we now are at a place where some real needs can be addressed,” said Szakos.

 Council also addressed the national budget proposed by President Trump’s administration. They passed a resolution to show their opposition of the budget, and urged local lawmakers to oppose the budget as well.

“We were first brought to the attention of the issue through a local petition presented last week. The petition opposed the budget because of a large increase in military spending. It doesn’t make us safer to reduce the quality of life for Americans while increasing military budget,” said Szakos.

Other councilors agreed.

“I have a military background. Enough is enough. I think we’ve had 12 months of continual war, and we don’t need more war,” said Bob Fenwick, a Charlottesville city councilor.

The only person to not vote in favor of the resolution was Mayor Mike Signer, who said that he chose to abstain because he didn’t think this was the right way to address this issue.

Vice Mayor Wes Bellamy questioned the mayor’s decision to abstain, saying that he was confused that this resolution was too hard to vote on, but the mayor’s decision to “declare the city the capital of the resistance” against the Trump administration was okay.

Another issue discussed on Monday was the over population of deer in Charlottesville. It was the fourth time in 8 months the issue was brought before council.

Council voted unanimously to move $50,000 towards a project that would enlist both bowhunters and rifleman to control the deer population.

Councilors say they don’t expect all $50,000 to be used, and will move whatever money is leftover.

5 Responses

    1. …the only “victorious” ones are the contractors and politicians involved in the Military Industrial Congressional Complex. Ike warned us about the threat the MICC posed 58 years ago but nobody listened. Over the last half century it’s been allowed to grow into a monolithic beast we have today that is almost impossible to defeat.

    2. You hit that nail on the head! It’s called OLD Testament, eye for an eye, makes the whole world blind. Get with the NEW, LOVE the neighbor as thyself, turn the other cheek, forgive for they know not what they do. Someone has to take that stance, arm outstretched with open hand, to shake, not grab, this is first step towards understanding. We all SHARE the same planet, as JFK said, breathe the same air….Love our children….

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