Jacob Smith Family Update

So all of you know, I am currently unemployed. I was laid off in June due to a "budget deficit" of about 3.5 million dollars at the City of Saratoga Springs. The real reason I was laid off was because they did not like the Assistant City Manager and in an attempt to get rid of him, they asked the City Manager to choose either his position or my position as well as one other. The City Manager chose the Assistant out of loyalty and my position became unfunded. Saratoga Springs' city council were the most radical I've ever seen in their approach to balancing the budget. In most cases, this job is done by city staff and the council approves it, in this case we had a BYU MBA student on the council who decided to tackle the problem and his solution was slashing staff (similar to the private sector model - very unethical). I lost my job as well as 16 others (out of 60 employees including police and fire).

Enough about that, fortunately and unfortunately we were building a house and had saved up enough money for the downpayment and closing costs, so we are living off of that as well as unemployment for the next little while. We are living in Malad with Melissa's parents until we can find a rental here in town. At first, the small town was an annoyance to me, but after being here for a couple of weeks, it is kind of refreshing and stress-free. I enjoy it.

In the meantime while I look for a job, Melissa is doing odd-jobs and I have accelerated by writing career. If any of you ever have any ideas for a novel, let me know. I am always open to ideas. Right now I am working on a piece dealing with Constantine (has never been done).

We look forward to seeing all of you, especially the ones we have not seen in a long time. See all of you at the end of July!