The most important question on Toledo's 2013 budget

Yesterday I listed a series of questions - important questions - relating to the City of Toledo's 2013 budget.

But here's another question that is equally worthy and may be the most important of all: which member of council - or the media - bothered to ask any of these questions themselves?

I'm often told that I ask really good questions - and that may be true - but why aren't our elected representatives asking these types of questions? And absent the elected officials doing so, why aren't the media?

It's not hard to come up with the 'good questions' on the budget because they're just common sense and a little bit of basic math. When you look at the line items and you see one that doesn't have anything allocated to it for 2010, 2011, and 2012, but a large amount for 2013, don't you want to know why there is a brand new line item in the budget, especially when the city just asked for a 10-year levy in November because they didn't have enough money?

When you see the city estimate an income item that is nearly double what they've gotten or budgeted in the last couple of years, don't you wonder where that money is coming from and how they decided they were going to get twice as much?

It's not hard to be curious - and the budget really isn't that difficult to follow.

So why aren't our elected officials and the media all over these points, demanding answers and accountability?