A local matter

Chardon Township, in Geauga County, rejected a $10,000 offer in disaster aid from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for an early March snowstorm. Though he would find disagreement on the board on which he serves, Trustee Chuck Strazinsky told The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer it was a typical snowstorm unworthy of federal aid.
Talk about a needed example. A local government recognized something was its responsibility, not that of taxpayers across the state or across the nation. If only every local government treated those outside their political jurisdictions with as much respect.
You can argue that, since the federal government was making the money available, it was foolish to pass it up. Some other local government surely would jump at the chance to have taxpayers in Allen County - or in DeKalb County, Ill., or in Boise County, Idaho - help pay its tab. So why pass up "free money"?
Because it isn't free. That money comes from somewhere, and the more anonymous the source - millions of U.S. citizens versus the 5,000 or so residents in Chardon Township - the easier it is to forget whose money it really is.
The money won't disappear from the massive federal budget. Federal officials are sure to see that some more appreciative local government somewhere receives the generosity those federal officials display with your money. Still, a group of township trustees on the eastern side of the state did what those in the federal government refuse to do: say this local matter isn't the responsibility of the federal government at the expense of federal taxpayers.