We voted for you in the belief we were hiring a fiscal conservative. It looks like we got one. 

You resisted the barrage demands from bureaucrats, public interest groups, and public employees soliciting more of our money. 

You seem to be aware that many of your constituents have suffered job losses, pay cuts, and increases in health insurance costs that are vastly greater than those proposed for Dallas County employees.

You have avoided insulting the intelligence of your constituents’ by suggesting county taxes will remain the same for the average homeowner in the wake of county tax increases due to falling home values. You didn’t expect us to quietly swallow tax hikes in an environment of huge home value losses and reduced income. 

You seem to be cognizant of the fact that the private-sector worker rides the business cycles without shock absorbers. In contrast, the government worker lives a cushioned existence in which terminations take years, salary cuts are often tiny or non-existent, health insurance contributions are generally paltry by comparison, pension amounts are often guaranteed, and recessions are only a thunder in the distance. Yet worse than this division in circumstance is that the private-sector worker is expected to pay for these public-sector cushions with ever-escalating taxes.