Nevada’s E. Coli Conservatism

Posted by admin on August 5, 2007 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

So it seems that Nevada is lucky that it doesn’t have that many old bridges thanks to its topography (desert) and its comparatively small and uncivilized population:

Of nearly 1,800 public bridges in Nevada, 70 have sufficient problems or design flaws to make them “structurally deficient” or “functionally obsolete,” Nevada Department of Transportation officials said.

Of course four of those 70 “structurally deficient” bridges cross the Truckee River at Keystone, Arlington, Virginia, and Center Streets in downtown Reno. But I’d like to talk about this idea of decaying infrastructure in a wider lens if you will. Nevada is suffering from what Rick Perlstein has labled “E-coli Conservatism.” What is E. Coli Conservatism? It happens when government clearly fails thanks to a lack of funding–be it the FDA, the TSA, or FEMA.

A recent example of Nevada’s E. Coli Conservatism in action is Sharron Angle’s privately (and so far secretly) funded California Proposition 13-like initiative to lower property taxes to a retroactive rate. Its passage would be disastrous to our state infrastructure and services as Steve Sebelius notes:

The effects of this initiative are obvious: While homeowners and commercial property owners would see a reduction in their home values, services underwritten by those taxes would also take a hit.

For example, Metro Police officers and local firefighters would see a reduction in revenue to pay for crime-fighting and fire-dousing activities. University Medical Center, the county’s only Level 1 trauma center that cares for car-accident and gunshot victims, among other patients, would see similar reductions. The already-beleaguered Clark County School District would see a cut in the rate of its income growth, which certainly will not help with attracting quality teachers to the district. Public libraries, parks and the Clark County Health District would be affected, as well, as would voter-approved property tax overrides to pay for local needs.

Sure, Nevada doesn’t have many sinkholes or failing bridges but it does have the nation’s worst high school drop-out rate, crumbling roads, and a long record of poor health care and health coverage. The residents of the Whispering Springs condos know all about how E. Coli Conservatism can affect individuals. A lack of active and appropriate government oversight often ends in poor quality on the part of private contractors and corporations. Situations like this happen all the time, all over the country because city and state government agencies are underfunded and can’t assume the responsibility we expect from them, particularly when its our house or our children’s schools that are affected.

Perhaps Nevadans can feel better about their own short-sightedness knowing that we aren’t the only state that frequently puts lowering taxes and blaming government ahead of maintaining the necessary resources to support its population. Rick Perlstein has created an entire blog in order to document the failures of local, state, and federal government across the country thanks to what he has now famously called E. Coli Conservatism. Nevada is full of E. Coli Conservatism’s perpetrators who don’t seem to connect their hatred of taxes and government to the failure of state to take care of its own. It doesn’t make any sense to underfund schools and then blame the teachers’ union and administrators for their failure. As Perlstein would say: This is your government on conservatism. There is a connection between structurally deficient bridges, crumbling roads and sewer systems, failing schools, and a lack of health care and the fixation of some to continually reduce taxes in one of the fastest growing states in the nation. Of course government isn’t perfect, and I hate to break it to some of you, but most of us are aware of that. But are we ready for a state or nation that relies upon the private sector to put necessity ahead of profit? We can’t even rely on our legislative representatives to do that.