The present Collier County Commission set-up is taxation without representation. All 5 Commissioners are suppose to represent us; they spend some 35% of our tax dollars and we only get to vote for one commissioner. Where is the logic in this?
This topic is obviously a much debated issue, it was right around 1987 or 1988 when the change was made from countywide election to single member districts. In the former system, the people in the districts felt that they did not have their own representative. The current system is bad, but the old one was worse. Current commission meetings are nothing more than negotiations and deadlock between commissioners trying to get what they want for their districts because there limited accountability to the electorate. The system I would like to see, and it is permitted under state law, is a seven member commission with two members elected at large and the other five by district. This gives a broader view to the decision making process. It also gives us, the voters, a chance to have more than one commissioner represent a given district. What do you think?







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