Spending truth in dispute

A man takes his crusade over government waste on the road. Officials say his message is distorted.

By BARBARA BEHRENDT, Times Staff Writer
Published August 12, 2007

SPRING HILL - The room was full of businesspeople fatigued by the triple whammy of a stagnant economy, high insurance rates and a heavy property tax burden.

They needed hope, and Blaise Ingoglia was there to inspire them.

For more than an hour Friday night, the Spring Hill home builder and businessman - who recently started a Web site, governmentgonewild.org - hammered home a detail-packed message of what he purported to be county government's expensive spending mistakes.

Ingoglia said the figures came from the county and other places where the county prints information. But many of they key points have been disputed by county officials for months now.

Ingoglia several times referenced details from a series on government waste in Hernando Today that county officials have taken exception with in letters to the editor and memos, and even during County Commission meetings.

No questions were taken at the end of the session at Silverthorn Country Club, attended by about 250 people. Ingoglia said he was just passing along information.

Earlier in the session, he quipped that he was not an expert at government, "but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night."

He used that humor and a rapid-fire speaking style to deliver his message.

"We want to make a difference," Ingoglia said, working to stir the audience - made up largely of builders, Realtors and business owners - into a lively exchange.

"The direction of this county has turned," he said. "We need to get this county back on track."

With a PowerPoint presentation projected on the screen behind him, he began his case with a primer in how government collects and spends money, then flashed a number on the screen and asked what the figure might be.

$148,000,000.

After several wrong guesses, he explained that it was the amount the county currently had in its investment accounts.

"That's a lot of money," Ingoglia said.

Then he showed more numbers. The county's Utilities Department had $43.7-million in what amounted to "profit," if government were a private business, he said. The building department had $3.4-million.

But here is where county officials say more explanation is needed. The utilities fund, and others like it, are enterprise funds. They collect fees and pay costs. Any money beyond those operational costs is in the fund for future projects, County Administrator Gary Kuhl said.

The $148-million is the county's operating money. While it is in the county's hands, Kuhl said, the county wants the money to earn interest. Those funds are used to pay the day-to-day bills of running the county - just like someone's checking account.

Kuhl said county officials have been trying to arrange a meeting with Hernando Today to explain how those funds are used. But the meeting, slated for late last week, was canceled by the paper.

Another major point in Ingoglia's talk was that county government workers make much more money on average than workers in the private sector.

A report published in July about the salary gap indicated that the average wage for local government employees is $40,467. Ingoglia quoted those same figures.

But a St. Petersburg Times analysis of statewide wage data indicates the average annual salary for county and municipal employees is actually $35,144. That compares with an average salary of $27,650 in the private sector, which includes a wide range of part-time and low-paying, service-level positions.

The analysis indicates that the previously published report used incorrect data to calculate the average wage - an assertion that was confirmed by a spokesman for the state's Agency for Workforce Innovation, which tabulates the Florida figures.

The $40,467 figure includes only local government jobs classified as "public administration" and does not include those in service jobs, finance positions or the Health Department, AWI officials told the Times.

Another incorrect fact repeated by Ingoglia from previous reports involved the county's fleet audit, in which numerous county vehicles were identified as being underutilized.

Ingoglia said that one vehicle purchased had no miles on it, indicating that the county had bought but never used it. In fact, the figure was a mistake on a log sheet that was easily explained had someone asked about it, county officials said in a recent commission meeting.

Ingoglia also stirred up the crowd by showing them that the county has given pay raises as high as 10 percent in recent years. The plan this year is to give raises of 5 to 9 percent, he added, and "that could go higher."

"That's not true at all. Period," Kuhl said.

The county's plan is to give raises up to 3 percent in the coming year, he said. Two percent is a cost-of-living increase; the remainder is available for employees who earn a merit raise.

County officials don't dispute that past pay raises have been generous in recent years.

Ingoglia listed a variety of capital projects, showing how much money the county had budgeted for them over the years, with the price tag growing each year. The county has to make up those price differences because it has waited so long to finish projects, he said, and still the projects aren't complete.

But county officials have said before, and Kuhl confirmed Saturday, that budgeting the same project for several years is simply how the county accomplishes major projects such as road improvements.

One year, the money budgeted might pay for design. The next year might include buying property. Construction might not start until the following year.

Among Ingoglia's other assertions: It could be cheaper to transport people by taxi than to keep the county's mass-transit system, THE Bus, in business.

He also said the county has a "law firm" of six attorneys, but still needs to hire outside counsel for specialty areas.

The county has five full-time attorneys, according to Commissioner Diane Rowden and the county's Web site.

Ingoglia told audience members there are several options they could explore to make their government more accountable, including charter government, in which residents have more to say about how local government is structured.

He also asked people to examine their own conscience about the county's spending habits.

"Whose fault is it?" he asked. "It's my fault and yours and yours and yours. We let this happen."

He urged people to take the information and encourage friends and co-workers to attend one of the six upcoming "Government Gone Wild" seminars, beginning on Friday.

Ingoglia also urged everyone to sign a pledge to come to the county's budget hearings to ask for lower taxes. Those hearings are set for Sept. 13 and 27. And he reminded people to take what they had learned to the polls in the next election.

"Apathy must end," he said. "We cannot be apathetic anymore. We have to be informed citizens. We have to make informed choices from here on out."

Barbara Behrendt can be reached at behrendt@sptimes.com or 352 848-1434.

[Last modified August 11, 2007, 20:48:12]