Reader: Time for city’s annual beg

Jan 14, 2024

It's that time of year again, folks, when some of the city's "sacred cow" organizations round-up their well-heeled supporters, frenzied employees, and irrelevant out-of-towners to attend a public hearing to beg for city tax dollars to help fund their operations [see "City has given millions to local groups" in the May 23 issue of The Mount Airy News].

Without a doubt, there is a symbiotic relationship between a city and its cultural organizations, but that relationship does not negate the responsibility of those organizations to support themselves financially – without a need or expectation of hefty "corporate welfare" checks every year from the city.

As has become tradition, the Surry Arts Council was front-and-center at the city trough to get its "expected" taxpayer dollars.

However, in a surprising and welcomed twist this year, City Manager Stan Farmer had prepared a detailed, eye-opening, five-year summary of the significant financial aid the city has provided to such local organizations, including the Surry Arts Council. All of these "expected" handouts – to the tune of nearly $1.5 million — were approved by prior councils.

I hope the financial realities unleashed by Mr. Farmer's analysis will help remind city commissioners that, especially in these economically challenging times, their first priority is to use taxpayer monies to fund vital public services to which city taxpayers are fully entitled – including police, fire, emergency medical services, public works, and parks and recreation services. It is not the city's job to pad the budgets of organizations that seemingly refuse or are incapable of managing their own operations responsibly. Only after the city has met its priority commitments to taxpayers should it consider giving reasonable (as opposed to outrageously excessive) amounts of financial support to cultural and/or charitable entities whose missions align with the city's vision and goals.

And, finally, kudos to City Commissioner Tom Koch, who appropriately asked the executive director of the Surry Arts Council to be specific about its surpluses. Perhaps a transparent accounting of the arts council's finances could help that nonprofit identify a number of ways to enhance revenues while decreasing expenses so that it may become financially self-sufficient and sustainable At the very least, it could eliminate the need for the Surry Arts Council to stage an annual performance in which wailing mothers and other passionate speakers proclaim that the city's historically excessive financial contributions are necessary to, in effect, save the children. Really?

Rebecca Harmon

Mount Airy