The irony of the Town of Berlin’s budget and taxation predicament is if it had focused on maintaining a financially self-sufficient water and wastewater operation 10 or 15 years ago, kept tax rates closer to that of other area towns, and not devoted so many resources to infrastructure improvements and revitalizing the town’s economy and… Read more »
Editorial
OPA candidates like playing waiting game
With no candidates having filed to run for the Ocean Pines Board of Directors and just three weeks left until the May 10 filing deadline, and no board-appointed candidate search committee out scouring the neighborhoods for possible participants, this year’s Ocean Pines election is … not shaping up. This doesn’t mean there won’t be a… Read more »
Gazette Editorial: Credit due for Ocean Pines’ fiscal recovery
Rare would be the business that could say its operations suffered a million-dollar loss against budget the year before, but would reduce that by half in the current year and post a profit in the next. Rarer still would be the organization that foundered in a $1.3 million sea of red ink and 12 months… Read more »
Editorial Cartoon: Slobodan Trendic
Gazette Editorial: Ethics generally deal with actions, not words
The Berlin Ethics Commission’s decision that At-Large Councilman Thom Gulyas committed no breach when he allegedly criticized a citizen in harsh terms during a telephone call is almost a head-shaker. This isn’t because the commission failed to do its job, or that Gulyas was right or wrong or that public officials just shouldn’t criticize non-officeholders…. Read more »
Editorial Cartoon: 2020 election
Gazette Editorial: Tax increases arrived with town’s success
One of Berlin’s problems — and it doesn’t have that many — is its own success. While most other small towns on the Eastern Shore continue to suffer from an economic malaise that began decades ago, Berlin’s economy has surged in the past 20 years. An empty space in the business district isn’t empty for… Read more »
Editorial Cartoon: 2nd Friday
Editorial cartoon: Berlin Falls
Gazette Editorial: Public participation is the public’s job
Public distrust of government has been around since the beginning of organized rule, and it is no worse now than it was 100 or even hundreds of years ago. In the 14th Century Florentine Republic, in what would become Italy some 500 years later, skepticism of government was so great that voters elected new rulers… Read more »