Editor, Manteca Bulletin,
I love it when Mr. Wyatt shares his tales of travel, and takes us back in time when life was simpler.  However, when he asks us overtaxed taxpayers to give more of our hard earned money to the city of Manteca, I vote a resounding “no” (Dennis Wyatt column: “Would you pay 8 cents a day to make Manteca better?”, June 10). 
The City of Manteca and it’s council members along with department heads, most of whom are not Mantecans, have squandered millions of taxpayer’s dollars in failed projects, overpaid consultants who know nothing of our city, and poor decisions that result in undoing and redoing multiple mistakes.  Then there is the council’s failure to fulfill promises, such as one of their biggest in not completing Atherton Drive, which was promised to the residents of Woodward Avenue years ago, and fully funded.
Moving those funds to various different projects should be considered a crime.  Dennis always says that Mantecans should step up in restoring our city, but when you have a questionable council that prefers to line the pockets of their friends under the guise of consulting, it makes it hard to give our suggestions, which fall on deaf ears.  Ask Debbie Moorhead how it feels, as she fights to save dollars that are put into the questionable partnership funding, and for the completion of projects promised years ago (Atherton and crumbling roads).  There is also the repair of our levees, which somehow got put on the back burner as well.  It has been twenty years since we were promised upgrades and repairs, but, as usual, during the flood season this year, our farmers had to use their own resources to protect their land and others’ property.  Thank you to them and thumbs down to the city council for their inaction on this continuing problem.  I could go on and on, but I’m sure I would be preaching to the choir. 

Michele Painter
Manteca