Thank you Ken Klak for your letter (Gazette, Sept. 16) regarding voting for planning to spend more money out of the taxpayers' pockets.There is so much controversy over how to spend my tax dollars and it seems the only people being asked about expenditures are the affluent. I am one reader who does not see the need for another library. Edmonton opted to renovate its main library and have small satellite libraries and libraries on wheels to save on building a new library. The size of their taxpayer base is 10 times that of ours. But their council is trying at least to be frugal. Our economy is not out of the red yet. But the affluent do not seem to see that. What about those of us who are seniors trying to stay in our modest homes and on fixed incomes? Taxes are set to rise again and so are utilities and food. Many people cannot afford to get into even their first home here. As a senior I am barely managing to make ends meet. There are other seniors like me who can't afford to move to a condo, but can't afford the taxes to stay. My little bungalow isn’t worth what I paid for it, and my taxes are twice that of a similar home in Edmonton. And the so-called tax increase is just to keep things as they are now? What happens when all the future projects are added on? In other provinces seniors do not pay school taxes. I pay for Servus Place...Why? I paid for painted sidewalks that cannot be seen in winter. Why? All the useless redundant signage duplicated many times over. No one asked me. This city managed without the traffic circle in front of City Hall for many lifetimes ... but now we have a traffic circle to nowhere. Why not actually ask the people who pay for all these so-called needed items. Let us vote on some of these over-budget expenditures. Let those who demand new services, demand new buildings, demand new amenities pay for them. Sandra Norton, St. Albert
