How Mangano Can Save Money Without Attacking The Kids

For those of you who haven't yet seen it, County Executive Ed Mangano has decided once again that the services that could save your children's lives are a perfectly acceptable bargaining chip when trying to force Democrat legislators to vote in favor of a proposed bond, as he indicated in his blog entry which I have linked to at the end of this article.

By threatening to eliminate them, even though this happens across the state each year, at various levels of government, he attempts to portray these youth services contracts, which fund everything from Long Island's only 24/7 youth suicide prevention hotline to diversion programs for at-risk youth, as a bargaining chip that is acceptable to use for the sake of continuing to avoid negotiation and compromise between the two parties.

Furthermore, by doing this, Ed Mangano is telling HIS children and YOUR children that if they die because nobody was there to help them, that's just the cost of politics and they should blame the Democrats for not letting him do whatever he wants.  This sort of indifference towards the welfare of children is unacceptable for any elected official, especially as part of the duties of the county and state, as specifically written in the New York State Constitution, is to ensure the welfare of all children within its borders.

Keep in mind, Nassau County still has money. They're hiring plenty of lawyers, and making plenty of contracts with law firms, well in excess of the $41,000,000 they're asking to borrow to pay those court-ordered tax refunds from the tax certiorari cases.  Even if they didn't have the money, they would be allowed to defer the payments if they needed to. There is no reason to threaten the safety and well-being of YOUR kids, unless Mangano wants to harass the Democrats in the County Legislature.

Nassau County may still have money, but its County Executive has gone morally bankrupt!  It is beyond the realm of human possibility to justify the elimination of these contracts for any reason, even if the Legislature votes against the bond!  If these contracts are cancelled, KIDS WILL DIE.  That is an inescapable fact.

When these contracts are gone, and the Long Island Crisis Center has to limit their suicide hotline to 9-5 on weekdays only, what happens when your 13-year-old son calls them up at 4 AM on a Saturday because he's right on that fence between desperate for help and ready to die?  I can't pretend to know the exact details, but I do know that there's knives in the kitchen (and probably the dining room), razor blades in the bathroom (or their bedroom if they're at that point), various household chemicals in the garage, kitchen, bathroom, closets, and possibly a shed, all sorts of pills in the bathrooms and/or kitchen, and maybe even a gun somewhere in the house.  With all those possibilities, your imagination should be able to come up with a few possible scenarios.

None of this has to happen, regardless of that bond vote on June 18th!  If Ed Mangano truly cares about Nassau County's children, and more importantly, the children in HIS family, then I'm sure he'll understand this alternative I'm about to propose.  It's an easy one, with no ulterior motives and no political agendas.  I don't get paid by any entity that might benefit from it, nor do I stand to be hired by or otherwise benefit from the survival of any such organization, except for the knowledge that other youth will be helped like I was back when I needed it most.

The proposal is for either a County Ordinance or Nassau County Constitutional Amendment which would read as follows or similarly:

No downward adjustments (cuts) may be made to any contracts for youth services, and no contracts for youth services may be eliminated, unless Nassau County first reduces its spending on contracts with law firms and/or attorneys by 50-70%, or eliminates contracts with law firms and/or attorneys to yield an equivalent savings.

The children and youth of Nassau County should ALWAYS come before lawyers!

For more information on the County Executive's ultimatum, please read his office's blog entry:

http://nassaucountynewsnetwork.wordpress.com/2012/06/05/call-on-democratic-legislators-to-save-youth-and-mental-health-programs/