There is an alarming trend in Muncie politics, and I suppose the city in general, to “aim for the cheap.”

Mayor Sharon McShurley has her hands full to be sure, managing a city with no money. While some budget cutting is necessary, the mantra of “cut more and cut deep” is a short-sighted approach to our problems.

Economic development is also a function of government. City and local officials, working with groups like the Chamber of Commerce, are tasked with attracting new business to the community. Doing that costs money, though, and the taxpayers in this community seem to be only interested in “starving the beast.”

Well, when you do that, you lose the good as well as the bad.

Why would any company want to develop a facility here? The roads are bad, the schools are weak, the city corridors look and smell like ass, and there are signs all over town either griping about how property taxes are killing the county, or insinuating that the fire department is in trouble.

Would you want to relocate yours or your employees’ families here, if that was the only impression you had of the city?

The sad irony is that we have tremendous potential here, if we could just get out of our own way.

Real estate is cheap; we have a nationally top-rated school to model the others after; we have a good university, hospital and public protection services - we really don’t have nearly as far to go as places like Flint, MI does; and we’re further down the road than Youngstown, OH was when they began their turnaround.

The only thing stopping us is, well, us.

You have to spend money to make money. We need to invest in our community if we want to make it economically viable - and not just money. That means infrastructure improvements; trying to have the best city services, instead of just the cheapest; taking responsibility for the condition of your neighborhoods; and embracing and supporting local government, rather than just holding them in contempt because you actually have to pay for what you get.