Lehi Free Press New Utah! - Wednesday, December 2, 1998 Page 2 Opinion With 1 you get eggroll i sitg: lit Pay raise comes at poor time Members of the Utah County Commission are in the process of giving themselves a pretty hefty pay raise. That move comes along with salary adjustments for all the county employees those who are appointed as well as those who are elected. But while commissioners have taken themselves out of the salary loop by creating a Career Service Council, they still find themselves in the awkward position of raising their own salary on the heels of an election. It's not their fault, necessarily. Utah County manages its budget on the calendar year and next year's budget must be finalized by Dec. 15. That means the system almost forces them to consider county payroll changes following an election. But it's not right, either. As a matter of honor, elected officials who vote on budgets should avoid granting themselves pay raises of any kind during their current term of office. Instead, all pay raises for the people who make the budget should be voted on before, but take effect after the next election. Postponing the salary increase until after the next election puts the power of deciding who will get the pay raise in the hands of the voters, where it not in the hands of the peobelongs ple who have just been elected. Candidates for these important positions know what the salary is before they file for the election. If they take the opportunity to raise their salary immediately after an election win, they are open to accusations of helping themselves to the public's decision-makin- g money. There are other reasons for making the Commission salary decision before their choice. but I do know' I'd like to start with an eggroll," h told him. He appeared to rush off, and I. assumed he was headed for the, kitchen and specifically for the; eggroll department. A few minutes later, he returned to take my order, and not long after, that, he returned with the meal I had ordered, along with the eggrollr which I had hoped would come in. advance of the meal, almost as if it had been an appetizer. Regardless of its positioning ori under the the menu, however it wasn't an title "Appetizers" appetizer, for it had not performed" that vital function for which it was designed. Instead, it was merely an addition-tmy regular meal and clearly a vio lation worthy of Emily Post's atten-ition. At the very least, it should have discounted been significantly because it was not what it went around purporting itself to be. I didn't grouse, though, and merely added it to the colorful array o food on my appointed table. Not long into my meal, my eager, young server returned to see if I would like a box in which to place-m"I haven't decided yet, other night, I found myself needing to stop in for dinner at a restaurant. Going out to eat by oneself is an awkward experience, and this particular excursion was no exception to that generality. Entering one of my favorite Chinese restaurants, I observed a young man (emphasis mine on 'young5) trying to coordinate the register as well orders that were litas the take-ou- t erally coming in and going out. By his side was an even younger female employee, who could easily have seated me and the people who started to line up behind me. But no, she was too engrossed in what the kid was doing; unfortunately, she not only didn't offer to seat customers or even tell them that a hostess would be along shortly, but she wasn't helping him at all, either. Several times I watched him run back to the kitchen to pick up the take-oorders. When the hostess, and I use the term extremely loosely, did wander in, she looked past me to the trio behind me; I wasn't sure if she assumed that I was with them, or if she was trying to ignore me because, being alone that night, I was an anomaly among regular customers. Politely, they signaled her that I was ahead of them in the queue, and young woman (emphasis completely hers on 'woman') turned to show me to a seat. Stopping at a table near the wall, she placed the menu on the table and said, rather indifferently, "Is this OK?" You know how you don't think of the really great comeback until well after the offender has volleyed? Well, her attitude took me so completely by surprise that it wasn't Away from home the an election is held. This year the two County Commissioners who were runBut ning for office were under the current process, if these men had lost they would now find themselves in the uncomfortable position of approving pay raises for the candidates who had defeated them possibly in a disagreeable election campaign. It is poor timing any way you look at it. Commissioners claim that by putting the salary decisions in the hands of the Career Service Council, they have attempted to the salary process. What the council does is look at salaries for public employees in similar positions, and determine Utah County salaries based on that market data. The goal is to keep Utah County salaries competitive, so that good candidates can be attracted to these positions, without making the salaries exorbitant. But for elected officials, those salaries need to be in place before the election if we are going to attract the best candidates not after when the decision has already been made. In their defense, Utah County Commissioners have avoided any tax increases in Utah's fastest growing county, and they say they are trying to keep salary increases within reasonable levels. But by voting themselves a pay raise immediately after an election, the commissioners put themselves in an unenviable position. This particular part of the budget process should be moved to well before general election time, and scheduled to take effect after the voters have made with 6 you get appetizers until I was seated at the table and waiting for my server that I considered what I could have said in response. What would she have done if I had refused that table, I mused. Then, diabolically, I pondered what her reaction would have been if I had refused several different tables in the establishment, finally settling on what I considered the "perfect table," that is, the first one she showed me. I watched with interest as Miss Too Young (not anyone of Chinese descent, but indicating her chronological age compared with her attire and her demeanor) seated the trio which had been behind me in line. Delivering her standard monotone "Is this OK?" she ignored line the daughter's request that they be seated at a table instead of a booth, owing to her mother's infirmities. Not wanting to be a bother, just as she had earlier not wanted to be seated ahead of me since I had arrived first, the mother brushed aside her concerns and took her seat in the proffered booth. Later, after their server distributed menus, they decided that a ut table would indeed be more comfortable and they moved to a nearby table, which they obviously would have preferred right from the begin- ning. When my own server came to my appointed table, he asked me if I was ready to order. Actually, I wasn't ready to order, although I knew that I wanted to start off with the traditional eggroll. o . uneaten food. Did I look satiated? Or did Miss Too Young have her eyes on my table, hoping to be able to assign it to the next diner? I shooed him away with the assur-- , ance that I was nowhere near finished with my meal. He returned two or three more! times, possibly hoping for an indica-- ; tion from me that I was filled and that he could finally bring the check, with or without some doggie bags. Needless to say, I didn't pay too; much attention to the motto printed on my fortune cookie: ; But what of all that? We are now home The holiday traditions of Thanksthink some stories have been told a giving and Christmas draw us home hundred times, but everyone laughs more powerfully than any other time as if it were being told for the first of year. And just about everyone has a time because the memory is so real. detailed concept of this idea they call By the same token, I notice that we "home." It is generally family; it is talk-fa- r less of sad memories; This is usually a specific place and iUis seven true when we gather horn for a funeral probably the time when the i,r- . always made of memories. Since our parents are only a few longing for home and family, is at Jits , ' "miles away, my wife and I feel this crescendo. And of what do we speak? emotional pull to go home almost The memories; usually the very best of every weekend. In her lifetime, her them. Think for a moment how we feel parents have moved only twice (all within the same "home" town). about someone who is homeless or Although the house was expanded, my who has no home to which they may especially during the holiparents have lived in the same place return I life. often human being seems to be tease wife entire Each my days. my that when we lived in New York City, born with this desire to go home. In a broader sense, think of the she cried every weekend. And then I remind her by saying, "We were only time and resources we spend in trying to find our origins the origin of life; there for two months!" I notice that when we get together the origin of planet earth; the first with brothers and sisters, we often man; the first civilization and so on. talk of childhood memories this is Are we trying to find home? For that matter, think of the time especially true of my wife's family. I - and resources we spend trying to gather the family home when they may be scattered across the country or even across the earth. Perhaps it is in this regard, like no other, that LDS theology stands apart from other religious doctrine and phi- " losophy. " s - Before by Brent L. Topp) And oh what memories! Brigham Young also said that we probably wouldn't worry too much about the; tribulations or sad memo-rie- s as quoted in The Life We believe we left a heavenly home with actual, literal parents, father, mother, brothers, sisters... and probably a few gerbils. And speaking of all those who faithfully return, Brigham Young once said, "And when they get there, they would see that they had formerly lived there for ages, that they had previously been acquainted with every nook and corner, with the palaces, walks, and gardens; and they would embrace their Father, and He would embrace them and say, "My son, my daughter, I have you again;" and the child would say, "0 my Father, my Father, I am here again." Journal of Discourses, 4:268 , of mortality: "We talk about our trials and troubles here in this life; but suppose that you could see yourselves thousands and millions of years after you have proved faithful to your religion during the few short years in this time, and have obtained eternal salvation and a crown of glory in the presence of God; then look back upon your lives here, and see the losses, crosses, and disappointments... you would be constrained to exclaim, 'But what of all that?' Those things were but for a moment, and we are now here. We have been faithful during a few moments in our mortality, and now we enjoy eternal life and glory, with power to progress in all the boundless Last Tuesday, the presses came to a stop need to make an apology to a group of Cub Scouts in Alpine who waited for me to show up last Tuesday. I failed to take down the name or phone number of the gentleman who so I couldasked me to come speak n't call to excuse myself. Here is what happened. You don't often hear the words "Stop the presses!" any more. For one thing, we don't even have a press. Our newspaper is produced here in our American Fork office, where we end our production process by shooting e negative images of our pages. We are supposed to complete this process for the entire newspaper around 5 p.m. on Tuesday. Then we drive these negatives to a press in Bountiful where the newspaper is printed, stuffed and tied into bundles just the right size for our many young newspaper carriers. Then the bundles are loaded in the back of a truck and brought back to north Utah County, where they are distributed to bundle droppers who take them around to each carrier's home. However, last week, we had two "stop the press" moments, although they are not the same as you might have seen in an old newspaper move. In the first case, it was the "presses" that almost stopped us. Not the presses in Bountiful, but the office equivathe laser printers that produce lent I full-siz- Wm press ning late, because our front page featured a lead story about how the city was refusing to hand over the report. Had that page already gone to press, there was nothing we could have done to stop it. As it was, we were already so far behind, another delay hardly mattered. While I finished other pages and sent them to be printed, our American Fork city editor, Barbara Christiansen, sat down to change that front page story to reflect the fact that we did indeed have the report in hand. We were able to get that story onto the front page of the newspaper, replacing the other story. I finally got out of the office just after 8 p.m., and went to shoot the final minutes of a basketball game I had been assigned to cover. So, to those Cub Scouts to whom I failed to appear, I offer my sincere apology. But the presses were stopped, twice. It was out of my control, and I deadline. didn't know who to call. But I didn't By the time 5 p.m. rolled around, we had completed some of our news- just forget, and if you wish to please give me a call. papers, but not all. That's when the There is some good news coming mayor of American Fork walked through the door to deliver us a copy of from the entire affair. We have since a report on a controversial police posted a copy of the police report, in its within his allot- entirety, on our web site, www.newu-tah.codepartment audit ted time, but, under most circumwhere it will remain for two stances, too late for that week's edition or three weeks. We think this is a prime example of of the American Fork newspaper. It was a good thing we were run how we can use the Internet to our original pages. Last weekend our main laser printer went down. We later learned that the problem was the result of faulty printer paper. For newspaper purposes, we print on paper with a special backing. But a batch of that paper had a problem with the backing which, over time, had ruined one of the printer's working parts. Anyway, one thing led to another, and by the time we had the printer up and running late Tuesday morning, we found our computers could no longer talk to the printer. So even though it was working, we had no way to physically reproduce the newspaper, even though by that time many pages were saved in our computer memory, just waiting to be printed. We worked around the problem by printing to another machine in our office, but it all took too much time especially when we were working on a Published weekly by NewUtah! (ISSN No. A 309-50- member of NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION NATIONAL & Circulation Jewtalijews fjroup 59 West Main American Fork, Utah 84003 Deadlines Classified Advertising 9 3 Brett Bezzant Publisher 1521-685- (U.S.P.S. No. Telephone Numbers Advertising News Marc Haddock Managing Editor City Editor Russ Daly Subscription price $24 per year Periodicals Postage Paid at American Fork, Utah POSTMASTER: 59 Wnt Main, tend addmi changt to American Fork, Utah 84003 Display Advertising News Missionaries Weddings Sports . . .Tuesday, noon Monday, 5 p.m. Monday, 2 p.m. Community Calendar . .Monday, 10 a.m. Letters to the Editor . . .Monday, 10 a.m. Obituaries .Tuesday, 11 a.m. the countless', stages of progression, enjoying the; smiles and approbation of ourj Father' and God and of Jesus Christ our elder! brother." (Journal of Discourses Vol.', 7:275) I guess that's why we search out our ancestors; how can we go home until' every willing member is there? I sup-- ; pose that's why the temples stay so; busy they symbolize the trek home" and, for the moment, satisfy a deep! longing for that place from whence we; came. Sooner or later, I suppose, like son, every one of us will real-- i ize that there really is "no place like; home." And if at all possible, we will; return to a Father who, filled with! compassion, will run to meet us and fall on our neck and kiss us, encircling us eternally in the arms of his love.' : l Reader's: Forum II enhance our newspaper and vice versa. We invite you to check it out. We are not entirely satisfied with our copy of the report, since it has been altered since the first official copy was delivered to the city around Nov. 9. We had requested a copy of that first complete document as soon as we learned it had reached the city offices. What we got was a version which had been altered by its author after Nov. 16. We are still fighting that particular battle. But that's a topic for another week. We also were forced to use our a specialized kind of imagesetter d newsprinter that produces paper pages. We are still working the bugs out on this one, but last week was kind of a event for us. The result was a crisper looking g phonewspaper with The tographs. imagesetter will also make it possible for us to produce color pages something we've never been able to do before. We are really looking forward to that. full-size- ground-breakin- g better-lookin- se Buyer beware Editor: My children joined the shopping frenzy on the "busiest" shopping day of the year, the day after Thanksgiving;. Along the route, they went to Mervyn's in the Orem mall to partake of the barr gains that could be had there. Later, at home, they realized that they were the ones who had "been had!" They had been overcharged on several items. They went back to Mervyn's and compared ad prices, sticker prices ana what they were charged. By the time everything was sorted out, my girlS were refunded almost $50 (out of a purr chase of about $200)! The sales clerk was very courteous and helpful, as well as surprised by the amount of the The reason for the error given to the girls was that they (Mervyn's) didn't have time to put all the sale prices into the computer! So, if you made a lot of purchases or) the "busiest" shopping day of the year, I suggest that you check your sales receipt to be sure you weren't Meanwhile, have a happy hol5 iday. over!-charg- overi-charge- Linda Ann Turner We welcome letters to the editor. All letters must include the author's name (printed AND signed) and a telephone number. We reserve the right to edit letters for clarity, punctuation, taste and length. Letters are welcome on any topic. .... .Monday, 2 p.m. Monday, 2 p.m. Monday, 10 a.m. knowledge and through HOW TO REACH By Mail P.O. Box 7, American Fork, UT 84003 In 59 W. Person Main, American Fork US . By Fax 756-527- 4 By editornewutah.com POOR - 1, ,, .,)