Local officials hosting President Obama’s bus tour this week are hoping to cash in on the brief spotlight the large-scale event has cast on their small communities.
The mammoth event has stretched resources thin for the tiny towns hosting the presidential motorcade and thousands of spectators.
Law enforcement officials are clocking overtime hours, and every local governmental department has been called upon to pitch in by cleaning the streets, raising hundreds of American flags, rerouting traffic and making security accommodations.
Still, officials told The Hill, the benefits of Obama’s visit are likely to outweigh the considerable costs.
“[It was] a mild inconvenience – and nobody’s done the numbers – but the overtime our people have put in will probably be balanced off hopefully by things like sales tax and hotel and motel taxes that come in from all of the visitors and the attention both immediate and in the long term,” said Gerald Freund, the city administrator for Decorah, Iowa, where Obama spoke on Monday...
Now all he has to do is drop by every suffering small town in the land and America should regain its triple A rating in no time flat.
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