If elected, Barton said he wants to push more aggressively to recruit employers by making sure roads and utilities are available to companies seeking to move to the area.
Cobb said he's against tax rebates for companies and developers. If someone wants to do business in the county, he said, the court can assist by providing infrastructure and a work force.
Note: Early voting in the November 2 election begins Monday Oct. 18. Go to this link at the Hays County Elections Office website for all early voting locations and times. Voters can vote at any of the locations during the early voting period.
Send your comments to roundup.editor@gmail.com, to the Statesman article (below) or click on the "comments" button at the bottom of the story
Click on this link to the Statesman to read the complete story.
By Patrick George
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Published: 12:35 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 14,
Barton, who has served on the Hays County Commissioners Court since 2007 and from 1992 to 1998, bested incumbent Judge Liz Sumter in a tough Democratic primary earlier this year. The scion of a prominent Democratic Hays County family — his father is former state Rep. Bob Barton and his family owns the Hays Free Press newspaper — counts improvements to roads and bringing good jobs to the region among his accomplishments.
But he's encountered serious competition from Cobb, a physician who resides between Wimberley and San Marcos. Cobb, a Republican, has been critical of a proposed 2010-11 tax rate increase that the Democratic-dominated court ended up voting down in September.
Cobb is running at a time when Republicans could be poised to make a resurgence in local and national elections. In this tough economy, his calls for fiscal discipline are catching on with many voters.
8 comments:
Barton says the county judge position is too important to leave to an inexperienced candidate. If it's so important, why have Barton and his cohort on the court, Will Conley, badgered and belittled the position and current County Judge Liz Sumter for the past four years? When Barton says it's important, he means it's important for him so he can continue feeding his special interest crony consultants millions in contracts. The reason we voters and taxpayers need Bert Cobb in there is to stop all that nonsense once and for all.
Barton's form of corporate welfare of using tax rebates and infrastructure improvements (i.e. exterior decorating) to attract already financially-solvent corporate businesses to Hays County is nonsense.
We already have two economies in the US - 1) the Wall Street economy and 2) the main street economy. The Wall Street economy is already doing well and we don't need to give them anymore handouts.
Hays County is already a very attractive area to do business in and any business that wants to domicile here should do so at their own expense.
It is time the corporate sector pays their fair share of taxes - to finally benefit main street - after years of pilfering our tax dollars with various corporate welfare schemes implemented by using their lobby and campaign money to bribe (and corrupt) our politicians.
America is not a socialist state, it is a corporate welfare state. And citizens need to understand the difference. Most people cannot reconcile their free markets beliefs with the reality of why the Wall Street economy always comes out richer - and main street comes out poorer - during recessions.
Until Americans can reconcile that economic cognitive dissonance, we will see continue to see the rich get richer and the middle class get poorer.
It's that "veteran of commissioners court" part that disturbs me about Barton. He certainly is a veteran of taxing and spending and misapplying the taxpayers money. I want to see a fresh set of eyes and clean hands on the court. If nothing else, Cobb does qualify in those two areas.
The candidate I will vote for must show me that they will only use my tax money for locally owned small business development.
And no more out of state corporate infrastructure subsidies from which they take their profits and build CEO mansions in Delaware or the Cayman Islands.
And no more using my tax dollars for good old boy deals cooked up during Texas crony circle jerks.
If I want to waste my tax dollars, I can do so much easier by simply supporting a no exit date strategy in Afghanistan.
Let’s see, Barton ran against Liz Sumter and beat her handily, now I hope Cobb does the same to Barton. That will be 2 Democrats sent packing, and we didn’t even have to work for the first one. Let’s hope it is a clean sweep for Republicans for the State and the Nation.
Hey you, last Anonymous, speaking of stupid Republicans, at least we don't have local candidates similar to the cretin-imitator ignoramuses running in Nevada like Sharon Angle and the Delaware Republican bimbo who had ot reassure people she wasn't a witch.
And at least Cobb and Isaac are smart Republicans runnning against the Dem incumbents.
Most important, I sure am glad you. last Anonymous, are not running for any office. I'm afraid you would be saying you're not a warlock.
The US Republican Party is more and more like the Chavez regime in Venezuela. They need to "brain-up" instead of "man-up". "Man-up" is for homophobes and all those closet right wing US Senate philanderers.
Barton is correct. Corporations have gotten used to getting tax breaks and other perks for doing business in Texas and around the nation.
Look at what the Bartons did for Kyle and Buda areas. Look at what Perry has done at the state level. He brought businesses here who agreed to hire many more Texans than they really did once they opened. A case in point is Toyota in San Antonio. They got the breaks but didn't ever hire the numbers promised.
While Barton is correct in how to draw businesses to Hays County, it is NOT the method we need to do at our local level.
Voting for Bert Cobb is the best thing we voters can do to promote reasonable and controlled growth throughout the county. We don't need more of the same from Perry, Rose, Wentworth and now Barton. We need someone with both feet on the ground.
To see who has contributed to Jeff
Barton and Bert Cobb for the period
February 21-June 30, 2010, go to
www.smmercury.com. Only contributors of $200 or more are
listed.
You will see that many of Jeff Barton's contributions came from
land developers, surveyors, hazmat
transportation, engineers, etc. in
Houston, Austin, Dallas, and Fort
Worth. Almost all of Bert Cobb's
small contributions came from San
Marcos, where he lives.
Among Barton's contributors are:
1. Charles Ray, Midland, $1,000
(Wimberley Springs subdivision)
2. Winton & Kim Porterfield, San
Marcos $1,000 (He works for
Chas. Ray, and she is running
for re-election to San Marcos
City Council.)
3. Jason & Beth Donaldson,
Wimberley $1,000 (Both work for
Wimberley Springs, Charles Ray.)
4. Zachary Stearns, Bastrop $500
(hazmat transportation)
5. Matt Torbit, Dallas $500 (land
acquisition & development)
6. Thomas Arndt, Pflugerville
$1,000 (Dannenbaum Engineering)
7. Halff Associates, Austin $700
(land development, construction
management)
8. Freese and Nichols, Fort Worth
$200 (highway engineering)
9. Cobb Fendly, Houston & Austin
$500 (surveying, engineering)
If you think this list smacks
of a puppet on strings held by
land developers, I'd agree with you.
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