Pork And Reason
— by Jeffrey Wisniewski — 23 December 2008 — 2 comments below »
Thanks to one snide comment in a Wall Street Journal editorial (courtesy of an unreasonable Reason editor), local papers across the country have begun to pile-on the news that the City of Hercules has requested $2.5 million in infrastructure stimulus spending for its “ready-to-go” Waterfront Duck Pond Park.
First, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: “Among other things on the U.S. Conference of Mayors list, the city of Hercules, Calif., requested $2.5 million for a ‘Waterfront Duck Pond Park’ and $200,000 for a dog park. Several cities requested multimilliondollar sports facilities.”
And second, MetroNews (the Voice of West Virginia): “The U.S Conference of Mayors has turned in a wish list for the stimulus that includes 11,391 projects. The Reason Foundation reports the list includes $2.5 million for a ‘Waterfront Duck Pond Park’ in Hercules, Calif., and $4 million to expand a tennis center in Arlington, Texas. The duck pond and the tennis center may be ‘shovel-ready,’ but just because a project is ready to go does not necessarily mean taxpayers should pay for it.”
Say what you will about waterfront development, ponds or ducks, all construction projects are pork. Re-paving I-80 from Vallejo to Fairfield was pork. The restoration of Hamilton Wetland was pork. Bridges, tunnels, parks and recreation centers; if they receive funds, it is pork.
Pork is how all projects are funded. Our representatives — local, state-wide, and in Congress — work our projects into spending bills. And any infrastructure stimulus bill will include pork. How much pork? As much as the stimulus bill is worth.
If no projects in northwest Arkansas or West Virginia get picked, either because their representatives didn’t flex their muscle, or the cities, towns and counties didn’t have all their ducks in a row (pun intended) to receive funds, so be it. That is how it works. But any project that does receive funds as part of an infrastructure stimulus bill will be just that: stimulus. It will create jobs; it will help the economy. And that is reasonable to understand.
Unfortunate name for the project. If one is considering which infrastructure projects to build – the words “duck pond park” don’t immediately come to mind as infrastructure. See definition below from Merriam-Webster:
infrastructure /ˈɪnfrəˌstrʌktʃər/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [in-fruh-struhk-cher] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun 1. the basic, underlying framework or features of a system or organization.
2. the fundamental facilities and systems serving a country, city, or area, as transportation and communication systems, power plants, and schools.
3. the military installations of a country.
I consider parks fundamental facilities (same with watershed restoration, creek improvements, etc.), but I understand your point.