First of all, I wish you a safe, prosperous, happy and joy filled New Year.
There is the famous saying that says insanity is defined by doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Yet here we go into a New Year with the same efforts.
So I tweeted this morning that I would post more public policy ideas, yet no one listens, we still have the same problems in this country ie affordable healthcare, immigration, now inflation has come back, which affects affordable housing, public education is still lagging, social security needs help, taxation is tilted the wrong way, to name a few issues.
Today though is not going to be about the above. My original plan was to dive right into social security, yet I am sidetracking. And in this side track I will make references as if I have already posted my social security ideas.
So let me start there, I am a big believer we need more public/private partnerships to solve some of our ongoing concerns. We need to allow municipalities to partner with corporations and businesses in their communities to help build out infrastructure projects. Business needs infrastructure as much as people. And since businesses gain when infrastructure is improved maybe they need to have more skin in the game when cities and states are improving infrastructure.
Currently municipalities will give tax breaks for a company to move to their region because it can be a boost economically and increase jobs. Yet with the increase in economic activity and people who are now moving in there is a larger strain on the electric, water, road systems that are needed by everyone including the businesses. These need to be upgraded and it cost money. Too much of the burden of improving local infrastructure is put on individuals. Sure more people means more people paying taxes, but the burden is on their shoulders while the businesses benefit with more business and not contributing the cost to achieve this business.
To alleviate or balance the burden of costs public/private partnerships can be used. So knowing there is more to come on public/private partnerships in another post let me dive into the actual topic. And yes public/private partnerships will play one role in improving the health of social security which will be another post to come.
The issue for now is water. We all need it, we all use it and clean water is vital to our health. Many moons ago I made major pushes for desalination and I am still a big fan. Another proposal I put forth was for a national canal system. I am still in favor of building one that piggy banks on to our interstate highway system.
An article I read got me to thinking about our water issues again. The article mentions a project called FloodMARs in which the state of California would develop a system to catch their rain run off and try to put it back into the ground water. The article did discuss some of the pros of doing this, but also some of the difficulties in achieving this project.
I am not going to go into the weeds of their specific project. I do want to discuss this on a broader level. One of the issues was trapping flood water from city runoff. It would be too polluted to use for human consumption so it limits what this water can be used. The other parts of the project talked about trapping the flood water and pumping to land where it would eventually go back to replenishing the ground water. One issue for California is that the rain they are receiving right now is in Northern California and Southern California is in more dire need of ground water replenishment.
Yet I am a fan of catching this water along with the runoff from rivers, rural areas, their mountainous regions to collect to put to use. And I think we can be productive with all the water. It may need to be collected separately and stored separately at first due to the amount of pollutants in some of the runoff. And shoot just some basic trash is going to get caught up in all of this. Cleaning or filtering this water is going to take some new or improved infrastructure.
In anything I blog about in trying to solve our water problems, and by water problems I mean balancing the draughts and floods since both are increasing in severity year over year it seems and includes having enough potable water for humans, I believe whole heartedly we need everyone involved. One reason I say Democrats are clueless is they put to much of the burden of solving the country’s problems on the federal government which means they keep spending tax payers money and yet most programs are run inefficiently. The Federal Government does need to get involved in solving national problems and water is one of our biggest, but it shouldn’t be the Feds doing everything. It would be better if they help develop the plans and create the framework but allow other avenues to do the hard work including coming up with the funds to solve the problem. Basically allowing the local community to work on the project that falls into larger plan.
So for the water example, the Federal government develops the canal system and the local communities develop the collection and preservation of water to use for people, agriculture and business. This project includes the water treatment facilities, storage whether in ground water or in large pools similar to the dams we have built to hold our reservoirs, to irrigation for our agriculture and more.
An example is a public/private partnership develops a new treatment facility for example. The private investment is derived from all the surrounding businesses. They all benefit from having water, some more than others, but they all benefit. And you can arrange where national corporations pay a small amount into many local projects so that they are not unduly burdened with over contributions throughout the country. Municipalities issue bonds for their portion. In cases like water some of the bonds can be revenue bonds that help to control costs at this level.
So the large collection of city runoff to river overflow is redirected into certain canals and manmade holding ponds. It takes a bit of an extra cost, but you could keep the city runoff separate to start until you are able to filter it more thoroughly. Then the water is fully treated and ready for local use and any remainder can be sent to where it is needed via the interstate canal system. Or the city runoff could be used for non potable purposes locally and nationally.
So when hurricanes come barreling into the Gulf Coast or atmospheric rivers come through the northwest large portions of this water is put into productive use instead of flowing back into the ocean after causing large scale flood damage.
Again a more detailed description and planning diagram was in the article discussing FloodMARS or flood water managed aquifer recharge which as I am discussing can go much further.
Going back to the treatment plant, businesses make an investment in it not looking for direct profits, but to obtain the use of the water they need. And yes they need to pay for the finished product water just like everyone else since the taxpayers are paying for the municipality to issue bonds and pay the non revenue bonds back and we all pay our water bills.
And a well planned water treatment plan can also derive other benefits. One tool for water treatment plants are activated charcoal. And activated charcoal can use recycled resources. Yes there is a cost to building these plants, but with well planned projects using recycled materials instead of virgin raw materials and the cost not being overbearing for the difference it can be a double win. And of course entrepreneurial individuals can create businesses in the collection of recycled resources from their community to sell to people who manufacture activated carbon so you have industries where the product is all USA made.
So what has this to do with the price of tea in China? Generally we all need water so making the best use of nature giving us water helps everyone. It is up to us to develop the projects that take advantage of what is there and not let it slip away.
This is not my first post on solving water issues including that I discussed ideas such as insurance companies investing in flood management to lower their claims cost or the national canal system to transport flood run off to areas where needed. And since California is working on the program mentioned I am no where near alone in this thinking.
Where my insanity comes into play is wondering why we cannot come up with the political gumption to start addressing these problems throughout the country. And yes I understand businesses do not want to raise their costs by “investing” in these types of projects, but we all know they benefit from increased business so it is no harm to them to spend some money to help their customer base no matter how much they say differently.
And insanely I ramble on saying we need new parties, we need to change lobbyists clout in Congress, and we need the will to do what is right even if it costs a bit up front.
Cheers
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