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Words of Christmas Joy and Hey, City Council, can you spare a dime! |
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Wednesday, 19 December 2007 |
To Save a Dime
Kudos to the Forest Lake City Council for cutting the proposed 2008
budget and keeping my taxes low. Eliminating one additional police
officer has saved the average homeowner 65 cents a month. Scrapping a
new squad car has saved the average homeowner 26 cents a month. Guess
that’s OK. Who needs them?
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To Save a Dime
Kudos to the Forest Lake City Council for cutting the proposed 2008 budget and keeping my taxes low. Eliminating one additional police officer has saved the average homeowner 65 cents a month. Scrapping a new squad car has saved the average homeowner 26 cents a month. Guess that’s OK. Who needs them?
Ask any police officer or the chief. Think about the real cost of saving a dime.
Scrapping the weed harvesting program has saved the average homeowner 55 cents a month. I’m sure we’ll find a new and better way to deal with the weeds.
Of course the lakeshore home owners are going to pay for it at a much higher cost.
Since the Forest Lake Lake Improvement Association will most likely be responsible for future weed control and costs, maybe they should charge all the others who use the lake. It’s only fair.
If the city budgeted for fireworks, it would have cost the average homeowner 17 cents per month and saved hundreds of hours of volunteer time trying to raise money; time much better spent working with teens at the Youth Service Bureau, or volunteering at the local food shelf or in our schools.
We don’t have to worry about that one though. It was killed by the council a month or so ago.
And whatever happened to the quarterly newsletter and improved communications? Cut from the budget, saving the average homeowner 34 cents a month.
Guess that’s OK.
We don’t want to know what’s going on anyway.
Terry Smith
Forest Lake
Christmas Joy
One of the joys of Christmas is to share. Recently a group from Faith Lutheran decided to share Prayer Shawls with residents of The Arbors who have been studying together for a year. St. Peter’s and Faith have Prayer Shawl Ministries.
A decision to serve lefse — left over from the lutefisk supper at Faith and other Christmas treats including Swedish pancakes and ligonberries — was made. Unfortunately, I could not find ligonberries. I tried so many, many places.
Several of my friends and children made stops at various places trying to find ligonberries.
I was reminded of the five decades in which our family traveled to my home in South Dakota and the gift of ligonberries which sometimes was not possible to provide.
If you do not know what ligonberries are, you are not alone; these berries grow in Sweden and are most delicious and unique.
On Monday night, a group from Faith was meeting, I posed my dilemma.
One of the new members said, “Try Perkins.” I knew Perkins served ligonberries and Swedish pancakes.
Early on the morning of the Christmas Gathering at the Arbors, I was preparing the Swedish pancakes. I knew I could stop and pick up preserved ligonberries.
As the nostalgic preparation of the pancakes continued, I hesitantly called Perkins. I asked if I could purchase some of their ligonberries. The response was positive.
I stopped at Perkins, walked to the counter with a $20 bill in my hand and said that I had called earlier about buying ligonberries. One of the waitresses said that she would get the manager.
The manager of Perkins handed the jar to be and said, “No Charge; Merry Christmas.”
The smile on my face quickly replaced the lines of concern.
The ligonberries and Swedish pancakes were served. The Prayer Shawls given to the residents and the smiles on their faces were filled with joy.
If you have a chance to say “thank you” to Perkins. Please do.
Next year maybe it will be German applesauce pancakes.
Gwen Hansen
Forest Lake
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