One of the most glaring things about President Trump’s efforts to weed out wasteful spending is the fact that our government went well beyond being wasteful and appeared to spend for the sake of just spending (our tax dollars). Government was not a good steward; in fact, government departments acted like they were competing to be the worst spenders. Government knew of their waste and did nothing to stop it. The feds are not an example that we can afford to follow.
It is one thing to root out the bad apples in government; but, we have people in Congress demanding that efforts to end wasteful spending be stopped and look the other way. The worst part of all of this is that Americans voted these people into office. Either we are blind to the people we vote for or we are just plain stupid. If you still believe what the legacy media is telling you, then you really don’t know what is going on in the world. Anyone who encourages government employees to waste money are idiots.
Sometimes, in order to be a good steward, we need to stop listening to the people around us who are trying to direct our paths. It is easy to take up the cause to help homeless animals if we put on blinders that prevent us from seeing homeless people. I have always advocated for helping animals. But do animals hold a higher priority than that of people?
Animal rights groups are made up of one dimensional people. They only see the animals that exist in our world. That’s great, animals need our help. We can make catchy phrases to “speak for those who have no voice.” Animal rights groups are free to live in that world.
But those of us in animal welfare have to live in the real world. When we are fighting for our budgets, we realize that we are competing against other needs. We are not like the federal government that has been given such large budgets that they are free to spend it on nonsensical things. We have to fight for money just to feed our animals.
You are right, I am still steamed about the animal rights group going to the media to complain that one of our local cities turned down a TNR grant because they could not commit to keeping the grant going after the “free” money ran out. The city had the foresight to recognize that they didn’t have the money to care for feral cats now, so they didn’t want to default on the grant later. We call that integrity.
You see, if you show integrity in your stewardship of your budget, your city/county commission is more likely to fund you. I worked in one county in which our County Administer desperately tried to cut our budget. For a while, I worked full time in creating budget scenarios in which I outlined various levels of budget cuts. But, I had an excellent relationship with our County Commission. We were always funded at the same level. Why? Because we showed that we were serious about being a good steward.
I draw this comparison because there will be people trying to tear down your budgetary decisions for being frugal with your government funds. These people only see things from their own perspective. Given how tight money is, I would gladly forgo funding for a TNR program, if that money could be used to help homeless children. Being a grownup is knowing that you don’t always get what you want; you usually get what you need. Sometimes keeping a feral cat population going only encourages coyote populations to move into our cities. Fortunately, the statistics for coyotes eating cats are not part of the no-kill equation. In case you missed that: the more coyotes that eat cats, the faster that we can become a no-kill community.