Abolish County Government

That happened to be the topic du jour on Sandy Beach's program this afternoon. Apparently, Amherst Councilman Bill Kindel sent Sandy a bunch of stuff about MA, NH and other states' experience with the abolition of county government. I don't know when Kindel first mentioned it, but as far as I know (and I know I'm tooting my horn here), I first posed the idea of abolishing the county's government on this very page. County government is redundant and wasteful. It exists solely to enact Albany's programs and pay for them, to boot. Imagine no county government = no county sales tax. That means that NYS sales tax would be 4%. And zilcho on clothes. Imagine no county government = no unfunded state mandates. That means Albany has to tighten its belt and figure out its own way to pay for Medicaid and other, similar social programs. Imagine no county government = no county legislators bickering with a non-existent county executive. Imagine no county government = towns and villages would have more control over how their money is spent. Imagine no county government = more jobs, since there'd be one less stratum of bureaucracy for businesses to deal with. I'm glad people are finally talking about it.