Woods taxpayers can rest assured that this Woods PR committee will never let a few facts spoil a good story.

They "cut" employees from 105 to 87? Ask 'em how many were just laid off and how many others decided to retire with fat pensions and just weren't replaced because the city had too many employees in the first place.

They cut funds from road construction? That's nice. Fixing our chronic crumbling roads is supposed to be the main goal of the 4 mill, $1.2 million annual Headlee override tax blank check they've proposed that's going to cost Woods taxpayers between $400 and $500 a year - with no "sunset" provision to end it, ever. You don't suppose they cut roads' funding to make the roads look worse before the Nov. 6 Headlee Override vote, do you?

Settled union contracts? The biggest, most expensive union contract is the police and fire public safety contract. With luck, they'll get it shaped up just in time to start negotiations on the new contract.

The problem with giving Mayor Novitke and his hand-picked council the Headlee override blank check windfall is that they really don't want to save taxpayers' money by with sound spending practices. They just want more of it to spend wastefully.

As a journalist, Ms. Fraleigh, you might want to ask the Woods council and administration how they can justify using public funds and public time to pull together a so-called "fact sheet" to help them convince Grosse Pointe Woods' taxpayers to give them a blank check for millions of tax dollars - yes, millions - for years to come, to do with as they please. A  4-mill Headlee Override is a blank check and no matter what they tell you, it cannot be ear-marked strictly for road repairs or public safety or any other guaranteed project. Once we give them all that cash they can do anything they wish because, by law, it goes into the General Fund. Also, you might want to ask Mayor Bob Novitke how he can justify spending taxpayers' money to raise our taxes without forming a legal ballot question committee - like private citzens who support or oppose it  - must do under Michigan law. The Woods' PR committee is a sham. And not a very good one at that. They say they need the Headlee Override windfall to fix our crumbling streets, which have blighted all of our neighborhoods for years while he wasted the money elsewhere. Now in their FAQ sheet  they want to brag that they've trimmed their budget by "cutting road construction?" They can't even get their story straight. Another thing you might want to ask them about, Ms Fraleigh: The Woods taxpayers paid $210 plus salaries and travel expenses to send City manager Al Fincham, City Clerk Lisa Hathaway and Council member Art Bryant to Lansing on March 29 to a seminar called "Millage Matters," where a high-priced lobbyist, fund-raiser and PR flack gave them tips on how to hoodwink voters in order to pass the outrageous Nov. 6 "Headlee Override" bailout proposal. Some of his incredible tips: "You must create a problem before you can solve it," then research the opposition and "See if you can get a mole on the inside." "Mole" is another word for spy. Then he advised our public officials, they should call prospective voters on Election Day, but "Tell all the 'no' voters the election is in two weeks...yeah, that's right, two weeks!" Those are straight quotes. And there are others and I have copies.  I was there. I had to pay $125 to get in because I was just another taxpayer. Our tax dollars at work...against us.