Financial martial law

[kiryan]

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/51396.html

Basically allows the states to step in and delcare a financial emergency for cities and school districts (not sure why not counties, may have a larger scope than reported). Under financial martial law, they can basically bust the union contracts.

They already had the emergency financial management authority, this appears just to give them expanded powers... specifically contract breaking powers.

Now I don't know how to feel about this. giving the state more power... would I support this if the fed's passed a similar law? fuk no. if they can have the power to break contracts to tackle financial problems, why not also the power to raise taxes without a vote?

No this feels dangerous.. despite its focus on public union busting in the short term.

[Teflor Lyorian]

Yeah, they should have put the consent of the city or local school district in there.

[kiryan]

I don't think that would make any sense to get the consent of the people who got themselves into the predicament in the first place... they've already shown an institutional inability to govern their finances...

If you reserve the right to step in... do you wait for a complete break down? or do you step in when you can unquestionably see that the path leads to ruin? I'd say you step in earlier (although I disagree with the whole notion).

[Teflor Lyorian]

I'd wait for a breakdown. Local governments are relatively isolated.