Candidate blog series: Auditor candidate Jim Stith (R)

Our candidate blog series ends today with Jim Stith’s blog below. We want to thank all the candidates who participated. We assure you that your blogs have been widely read, as evidenced by the nearly 50% increase in our daily blog traffic since last Monday when the series started. That’s not to say every Norwood voter reads our blog, but considering the fact that our forum is free to candidates, it’s been an excellent campaign investment.

Our readers can learn more about this year’s candidates by going to the League of Women Voters website www.smartvoter.org. So far, 10 candidates have posted their bio’s, stated their top priorities, and answered 4 questions about issues.

As each candidate blog moves off the page, it will be available on our secondary blog here. For our readers’ convenience we have installed a temporary link to 2009 Candidate Blog Series on the right.

Jim Stith, Auditor.
Hard Work and Common Sense

In January 2008 I was appointed to the position of Auditor for the City of Norwood. I must now run for the remainder of the unexpired term. I have dedicated myself to this position and brought a strong work ethic and common sense to the office. I now ask for the chance to finish the job I started.

Since becoming Auditor I have brought responsibility, professionalism, transparency and a strong work ethic to the Auditor’s office. I continue to fight for a balanced budget, fiscal responsibility, and excellence in financial reporting.

As Auditor I have made myself available regularly during weekly office hours for department heads, elected officials and our citizens. I also attend every City Council meeting making the Auditor’s office accessible to City officials. I have modernized our City’s financial systems and technologies and updated and converted the City’s accounting system to be compliant with Federal and State accounting practices. We have worked with the law department to save the City over $13,000 a year in property taxes and uncovered almost $50,000 in available stagnant funds.

Since becoming Auditor I have appointed an excellent staff with financial, accounting, and technological experience. This staff includes the Deputy Auditor Marcus Patterson who holds a Masters Degree in Accounting. Together we have created true Transparency in Government identifying and correcting inefficiencies, finding and correcting problems. There are those who want to hold this against me. I insist that finding problems and correcting them is not a bad thing, hiding problems and sweeping them under the rug is!

Every month we generate reports for City Council and the Administration. We prepared and filed the 2006 & 2007 Annual Financial Reports, prepared a Five Year Financial Forecast for the City and we are completing the first Comprehensive Annual Financial Report since 2003. Every report is available for viewing by the public in the Auditor’s office or online www.NorwoodAuditor.com.

I am not a life long resident of Norwood, Jen and I moved here 9 years ago. This is where we choose to live, where our children go to school. We do not have generations of family in the City, we are the start of new generations for the City. We represent people who see how special this community is and come here to raise our families.

I am not City government as usual. I became involved in local politics because I care about our community and noticed problems which were not being addressed. There was a need and I knew I could help. I had to take a stand for what is right. This is not about pride, this is not about personal gain, this is about the community in which we choose to live and raise our children.

I am hopeful that the voters of Norwood will give me the chance to finish the job that I started.

• Keep Responsibility,
• Keep Professionalism,
• Keep Transparency,
• Keep Fiscal Responsibility,
• Keep Jim Stith working hard for You!

For a detailed bio and more information please see my web site www.VoteStith.com.

Jim Stith