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A Government-Funded Eclipse?

IN SOUTH CAROLINA, YES … The city of Columbia, S.C. is spending $110,000 on a promotional campaign for this summer’s “Great American Eclipse” – which is projected to pass over the Midlands region of the state on August 21 and plunge the region into midday darkness for several minutes. The…

IN SOUTH CAROLINA, YES …

The city of Columbia, S.C. is spending $110,000 on a promotional campaign for this summer’s “Great American Eclipse” – which is projected to pass over the Midlands region of the state on August 21 and plunge the region into midday darkness for several minutes.

The money – first reported by Chris Trainor of The (Columbia, S.C.) Free Times – will be taken from the proceeds of a two percent “hospitality tax” assessed on food and beverages within the city limits.

Is this a big deal?  Monetarily, not really … city of Columbia taxpayers have been screwed over much bigger than this in the past.  When it comes to government fleecing its citizens in South Carolina, this is indeed small scale waste.

Still, it’s the principle that counts.

This is $110,000 that won’t make its way toward core government functions, including law enforcement for the estimated 400,000 people who will flock to Columbia to watch the eclipse.  Small or not, it’s still a misappropriation – one taken from a fund whose very existence makes it harder for the city’s small businesses to survive.

City leaders should absolutely prepare for this event, but blowing money on promotional nonsense like an “eclipse website” seems to us to be a total waste of taxpayer funds.


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