Introduction
Pinellas Park City is located on the west-central coast of Florida with a population of about 49,079 based on the 2010 census report. However, its current population is estimated to be above 50,000. The city has a council-manager form of government. Therefore, the city is managed by councils that make decision touching on the lives of its residents. The main concern for the council and Pinellas has been the increasing number of people suffering from obesity and overweight problems. Pinellas Planning Council has been trying to find ways in which the two problems can be solved. The paper, therefore, focuses on Pinellas Leadership Group Meeting that occurred on 5th February 2016 with the aim of reducing overweight and obesity in the city.
Regulations Required to Reduce Overweight and Obesity
In order to reduce obesity, Pinellas must address the behavioral risk factors that are associated with an increase of people suffering from overweight and obesity. One of the main findings of the Pinellas Leadership Group Meeting was that children, youth, and adults in Pinellas city are getting less physical activity and they do not access nutritious foods. Hence, to tackle the problem, there is need to promote healthy behaviors, which is the most important factor for community health.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Therefore, the first regulation is to ensure that the majority of Pinellas city residents are able to access areas where they can engage in physical activities. First, there is need to expand Fred Marquis Pinellas that is currently 50 miles long to encourage walking, biking, walking, and jogging. Secondly, the city should put outdoor exercise equipment in all parks and people should not be charged for using them. In addition, the city should install free bike fix centers to encourage cycling around the city. As a result, the regulation should discourage the used automobile as means of transport but encourage physical means of transport such as biking and walking.
There is also the need to formulate regulations that ensure that people eat healthy and nutritious foods. The city should regulate the amount of sugar, fat, salt, and calorie that are used to make foods, particular snacks, and fast foods. There should also be nutritional standards that must be met by stores that manufacture foods. At the same time, schools should not be allowed to sell or offer snacks to learners. Besides, children staying close to schools should not be allowed to use school bus when going and leaving school.
However, some of the regulations should be viewed critically before they are implemented. For instance, offering free outdoor equipment is costly and the local government needs some money to maintain them. Therefore, the government should consider charging some fees under a given circumstance to make the program sustainable. Regulation requiring students to walk to school also raises safety and security concerns. Some students go to school early and leave late in the evening and they may be subjected to threats such as child kidnap and abduction.
Allocation of Resources towards Obesity and Overweight
Pinellas Park City has no specific budget allocation for weight loss and obesity programs. It majorly depends on grants to implement weight loss and obesity program. It mainly uses Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) to provide the suitable living environment, improvement of public facilities and services. It also depends on grants from state and federal government to finance some of its special programs. For instance, in 2010, it received $4.85 million federal grant to help it fight obesity (Maher, 2010).
Pinellas Park City Funding and Expenditure
The main sources of funding for Pinellas City Park are ad valorem taxes and millage rate. It uses the ad valorem rate of 5.5862 mils and a millage rate of 5.5862 per a thousand dollars of net taxable values it generates its revenue (City of Pinellas Park, 2014). For instance, the ad valorem taxes that were collected in 2015 amounted to $2.9 billion. Therefore, it mainly depends on property tax to finance its development and recurrent expenditures. It also generates its revenue from fines and fees.
Pinellas City Park’s main expenditure is personnel cost that includes salary, wages, and benefits. For instance, in 2015-2016 financial year, it spent about $33 million on personnel cost alone (City of Pinellas Park, 2014). Operation expenditure is the second largest expenditure, especially on traffic system signal, street lighting, and public buildings. The city also spends a lot of money in maintaining infrastructure and public equipment.
How Pinellas City Park Deals with Budget Shortfalls
In order to deal with the budget shortfalls, the city always reduced the number of unnecessary expenditures such as expenditure on recreation and other leisure activities. Sometimes it uses layoffs of excess staff, especially those doing clerical works in various departments. In some cases, it increases ad valorem and millage tax rates to increase its revenue and to reduce the budget deficit (Hoene, 2009).
Therefore, the value of those in government is to offer basic services to the people because they do not set aside money for other special services such as reduction of obesity. They largely depend on grants from other entities to finance special programs such as obesity reduction. Leaders in the city are also cautious, especially when it comes to inventing new taxes, as they depend on traditional taxes to generate revenue even in the case of budget shortfalls.
Conclusion and Reflection
By watching Pinellas Leadership Group Meeting, I learnt leaders were determining to solve obesity and other health-related problems affecting the public. All the participants were eager to improve the health conditions of all people. All the proposals were unanimously supported. However, the source of the fund to finance the problem was not clear from the meeting, which can hinder the implementation of the initiatives. Therefore, it is important for Pinellas Park City to budget for weight loss and obesity programs to have a sustainable solution to the problems.
References
City of Pinellas Park. (2014). City of Pinellas Park: FY 2015-2016 Operating and Capital Investment Budget. Retrieved from http://www.pinellas- park.com/Budget_FY15_16_Final.pdf
Hoene, C. W. (2009). City budget shortfalls and responses: projections for 2010-2012. Washington, DC: National League of Cities.
Maher, I., (2010). Pinellas gets $4.85 million federal grant to combat obesity . Retrieved from http://www.tampabay.com/news/health/pinellas-gets-485-million-federal-grant-to- combat-obesity/112337
