For Immediate Release: Thursday, March 12, 2009
Montgomery County Councilmember Leventhal Expresses Disappointment
at Public Safety Committee’s Failure to Cut Spending
ROCKVILLE, March 12, 2009—Montgomery County Councilmember George Leventhal expressed his strong disappointment today after the County Council’s Committee on Public Safety failed to recommend passage of a bill he sponsored to eliminate unnecessary government spending.
Bill 38-08 would abolish the Fire and Rescue Commission, an advisory group formed in 1979 that has had greatly diminished responsibilities since the 2004 reorganization of the County’s Fire and Rescue Service. While the group’s responsibilities have sharply declined, it remains one of the only County advisory groups to maintain stipends for members. Each of the nine commissioners receives about $12,000 per year to attend monthly meetings, essentially compensating them $1,000 per meeting.
“In a time when Councilmembers should be taking advantage of every opportunity to identify systemic, long-term budget reductions, the Public Safety Committee, by its 2-1 vote, has failed to shoulder that responsibility by eliminating either the commission or its stipends,” Councilmember Leventhal said.
“Instead committee members said that they will allow commissioners to continue to receive stipends through the end of each commissioner’s term. At this rate we will continue paying commissioners $1,000 per meeting – and some of the meetings only last half an hour – for at least two more years. This issue was brought to the attention of the Public Safety Committee one year ago when the County Executive’s budget proposed eliminating these stipends. Since then, the Public Safety Committee has discussed these wasteful stipends four times and has failed to act on them.”
Councilmember Leventhal was unable to attend today’s committee meeting because he is en route to El Salvador, at his own personal expense, to serve as an election monitor in that country’s presidential elections, which will take place on Sunday.