Arpie: No Dancin’ Bears @ Spencer-DanG Show

I just got back from Spencer’s Forum. There were no dancing bears, unless you count Dang. They did sell popcorn though. There were about a hundred folks there. Most attendees seemed to be true believers. There was a lot of preaching to the choir going on.

Dang did a good job of laying out the URD problem. It was heartening to hear that legislators are already looking at making changes. The clearest part of his presentation was that these URDs are costing the rest of us money in increased taxes. That is a drum that is worth beating.

I respect that Larry is willing to spend his time and money to hold forums like this. That said, it was hard to sit through an evening of listening to him endorse candidates and urge votes on propositions that I disagree with 100%.

I did find one area of agreement, I think. Larry spoke of the need to increase impact fees on new development so that they truly pay for themselves. I sure would like to see that happen. The first step, I believe is for the legislature to okay an increase in the way these laws can be used.

Anyway, I introduced myself to Larry and Dang. It’s nice to put faces to blog folks. Spencer, you spoke clearly, with humbleness and humor. You did a good job of speaking up for your beliefs. The carpetbagger from Michigan did a good job speaking for prop 2. Democracy sure is fun.

Arpie

DFO: As I said last night, I admire Larry Spencer for putting his time and money into the causes in which he believes. Having said that, I’ve rarely encountered an individual who’s so uniformly wrong in what he believes. Proposition 2 is a stinker. Ditto for the Bonner County political candidates Bud Mueller and Louie Rich, who should make their county the laughing stock of Idaho again. On the other hand, it would be interesting to see DanG’s URData.