| Skateboard
Park Logic a Distortion |
|
To the editor:
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| Last week the Reston Community Center provided its justification
for funding the proposed skateboard park solely with District
5 tax money, even though more than 80 percent of users will
come from outside District 5. |
| The rationale: some of that 80 percent non-resident population
may work in Reston, and the RCC charter allows programs for
persons who reside or work here. There is no way to say this
politely: That logic is a distortion of the RCC's mandate. |
| From its inception the RCC was designed to provide programs
that principally benefits the ones paying the taxes--Reston
residents--but incidentally may benefit others. |
| This is fair, since the Reston business community also provides
RCC tax revenue. The skateboard park proposal stands this
principle on its head. It will principally benefit (by design)
a user population more than 80 percent outside Reston. This
is contrary to the letter and spirit of the RCC's charter. |
| Moreover, since the RCC purports to justify its actions
based on taxes the business community pays, recent events
undermine that rationale further. Two weeks ago the Greater
Reston Chamber of Commerce adopted a resolution opposing the
use of any RCC money--surplus or otherwise--on any new programs
such as a skateboard park. The resolution asks that all RCC
money be spent on existing programs and not on new ventures. |
| The RCC's alarming view of its mandate, which is generating
concern among disparate elements in the community, threatens
to swallow whole the idea of a skate park in Reston. The Fairfax
County Board of Supervisors appoints the RCC; approves the
RCC's budgets; and defines the RCC's charter. |
| Contact County Supervisor Cathy Hudgins at 703-478-0283
and let her know that you reject the RCC's expansive view
of its taxing and spending authority, and that Fairfax County
should reassert the RCC's core mission of providing programs
that primarily benefit the District 5 taxpayer with incidental
benefit to others. |
| Robert Goudie |
| Reston |
