From Escambia County Commissioner Grover Robinson:
What is the value of local government? The answer is that today a vast majority of Escambia County residents will drive on local roads, comply with local ordinances and coordinate with local agencies multiple times mores that they will either State and Federal combined.
However, our collective interests and focus is often much more what happens in Tallahassee and Washington. I am often confronted personally with this issue when people ask me when I am going to run for a higher office. Personally, I cannot think of anything more important to Escambia County residents, Floridians or even Americans than local government.
Still, the importance of local government is often lost on many citizens. A prime example is a month ago when the Editorial Board labeled local government as liars for doing their job relative to the 2012/13 budget.
At no time during the recent Medicaid discussion did County Commissioners or local government ever say they would not be able to balance the budget. What they did say is there would be consequences to the local government services and the missions that they provide.
Yes, the Escambia County commissioners did work with County staff to present a balanced budget last week. However, embedded in that budget is an allowable change to take $1million dollars annually from L.O.S.T to assist with operations of assets created with L.O.S.T funding. In addition, there is another $1million comprised of a Federal Mass Transit grant that will expire causing a shortfall in future budgets. Just because the Escambia BCC has a balanced budget does not mean the mission and services of the County have not been impacted.
Fortunately, it looks like the work between the Florida Association of Counties and the Executive Office of the State of Florida will pay dividends and reduce the amount of past due payments. This will enable the Board to ease some of the challenges created by the state Medicaid mandate. However, at this time, there continue to be ongoing problems resulting from erroneous billings as we move forward.
In these challenging economic times, it is my hope that the State of Florida will realize that cooperation and true dialog between the State and local officials will create a better environment for all Floridians, regardless of which of the 67 counties they live in.
Simply burdening counties with obligations to Medicaid because you legally can is not a viable option to creating a better Florida. It is for this specific reason that I chose to run for the Florida Association of Counties Leadership, and it is for this reason that I plan to diligently work with State lawmakers over the next several years to ensure that local and state governments work together for the betterment of their citizens.
Granted there will be times when we disagree and we have to make separate decisions; however, we must diligently work together and be committed to a consistent dialog and exchange of ideas. Our common constituencies should demand this.
Nothing I have mentioned is necessarily earth-shattering. However, it can be more productive than the current system for finding opportunities for local and state government to create a better environment for Floridians to live, work, and play.