Last week I got the chance to sit in on the Sammamish Council’s annual “retreat.”

It’s misleading name for what is essentially a long and intensive boardroom meeting of critical importance – I was picturing a hot spring, drinks with little umbrellas and relaxing bird noises.

But it is nose to the grindstone time for the council.

Sammamish is a growing city, with a relative abundance of space outside a busy metropolis, and so making sure the right plans and blueprints are in place for expansion here is a matter of longevity.

And though there are many issues, big and small, currently in front of the city, none looms larger than what to do about an expected crossover of revenue and expenditure in the next five or six years.

The white elephant in the room is “taxes.”

I was fortunate enough to have ringside seats in 2008 for one of the most intensely fought political seasons in American history – with the Democratic primaries, the presidential election and all the state jostling, the politicians at one minute in their Sunday best and the next in their fighting gear.

One thing that I noticed particularly was people’s reaction to the word “taxes.”

Some described it as being “un-American,” and at best an abuse of government.

In many countries around the world, notably those with high standards of living, high tax rates are the necessary sacrifice for social services, universal health care, and affordable tertiary education.

It is a system that requires a certain faith in the workings of government, and a philosophy accepting of a common good.

But the spirit of the free entrepreneur is very much at the heart of the American culture, a person creative and energetic enough to build what needs to be built with their own money and vigor.

This society rewards that entrepreneurial spirit.

In this way, innovative business has almost become the new government, with private enterprises like The Gates Foundation, built by the massive wealth of a computer-whiz, taking over the provision of services and finding solutions to grave social problems that many think should be the responsibility of public agencies.

This week I read about a group called “Americans for Limited Government,” proponents of that concept that government should keep their hands off the revenue and profit of its citizens, and reduce their regulation of economy and society.

Though this has its merits, it places much at risk.

As we saw recently on Wall Street, as all those bad mortgages came tumbling down, to assume that private enterprise will act responsibly and in a manner respectful of the good of society is really asking for a suspension of logic.

What is at stake is social services – bus routes, care for the elderly, inexpensive education, clean air and water, garbage collection, maternity leave.

Which brings us back to the Sammamish council.

No matter how you look at it, what they are staring in the face is either an increase in taxes or a reduction in services.

Some of the councillors are rightly fearful that tax rates will enrage the population, and so be politically insensible.

Others have looked more closely at their responsibility as elected officials, elected by the citizens to make wise and informed decisions on their behalf, regardless of what it might cost them politically.

These councillors can see that without some increase in taxes, services will suffer.

The choice is at the heart of how Americans see their relationship with government.

It will be interesting to see which philosophy the people of Sammamish embrace.

Ringside seats again.