Quality of Government - David Billings

Greetings from the campaign trail…

One of my three campaign themes is Quality of Government. So, what is Quality of Government? In my mind, Quality of Government has three basic components. First, a candidate for public office should have the highest level of integrity. Second, we need to have an open access policy. Finally, proactively reach out to the public on critical issues and seek diverse ideas while formulating public policy.

In my opinion, public servants need to demonstrate the highest level of integrity and honesty. I believe that public servants have a deep moral obligation to maintain the public trust and set a moral example for our community.

Open access is the ability of our township residents to have easy access to our local leadership, critical documents, and how our township operates on a daily basis. In other words, create a level of transparency between the Board of Supervisors, township operations and our residents. For example, a Government that practices open access requires having all public documents on our web site, providing a free copy of the Comprehensive plan to our residents, easy access to developers’ proposals that affect our way of life, public display of all traffic studies, and access to the 2007 budget in a timely manner.

Each of the critical service organizations (Police, Fire, and EMS) should make a yearly report to the township residents to improve our understanding of these critical services and how we benefit as a community from these dedicated professionals. Yes, I will broach the unthinkable -- broadcasting our Board of Supervisor meetings on the local cable community outlet channels.

Additionally, I believe we should have occasional Board of Supervisor, Planning Commission, and Zoning meetings on Saturdays to increase the visibility of these critical boards and commissions to our community. Town hall meetings should become a norm in our township not just a campaign slogan.

It is very important that we proactively reach out to residents to get ideas on critical township issues. If you have any ideas or comments about critical issues facing Forks Township, please share your ideas via our blog or email at billings2007@att.net.

Get Involved – Your Vote Counts!

Sincerely,


David Billings
billings2007@att.net