Lake County's little toe is in the pond of debt, and it makes me wonder how long it's going to be until the county starts going down for the third time.
The Lake County Council on Tuesday approved borrowing $15 million either from Porter County or through the private bond market.
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Yes, the county's fiscal situation is desperate, unless you want to skip all that nonsense like roads, waterways, the county jail and other services.
But the alternative is that word of death, the one most commissioners and councilman utter the way Clark Kent says kryptonite: Taxes.
Yeah, I think taxes stink, too. But the fact remains that of Indiana's 92 counties, only Lake remains without a local income tax.
Now, let's look at the picture, bad as it is. If we borrow a boatload of money from Porter County (as have some local municipalities already) we are going to have to pay back $51 million with interest.
I don't know what kind of deal they got, but Lake County's going to have a pretty penny to pay to the piper, even if it's down the road.
On the other hand, should the county once more grab its nose and vote in a local tax, all the money will go to local projects, not to bondholders or lenders.
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