[GPSCC-chat] Latest OpEd in Morgan Hill Times.

[Wes Rolley]

After a change in the editorial responsibilities at the paper, I am back 
writing an occasional OpEd.  This is my latest.  It is dependent on the 
fact that Morgan Hill is going through an update to it's General Plan.  
While that is not true of most cities, he basic idea still holds.  It is 
idiotic for cities to become dependent on growth to fund government.  It 
will become increasingly likely that governments will face bankruptcy.

__

The City of Morgan Hill is now in the process of updating the 
community's General Plan. According to a recent headlined story in the 
Times, they are not satisfied with citizen participation. That sent me 
to the web site Morgan Hill 2035. And, after reading the section on the 
Economy, I decided to participate, returning to the task of writing a 
Green Talk column, an effort that I set aside after the 2012 election. I 
am not sure that the City will welcome my return.

My main concern was to make sure that the economic assumptions behind 
the new plan are right. While there are some easily corrected mistakes 
in the Economic Plan document, such as double counting work location in 
Table 1-5 so that we have 191.5% of workers accounted for. My real 
problem with these economic assumptions is the fact that they are 
premised on continued growth, both in population and in the tax base 
that supports City services.

If the experiences of the past seven or eight years will teach us 
anything, it should be that economic growth is a fickle thing, here 
today but always at risk. When government is depended on sales taxes to 
fund it's activities, it needs to be attentive to those things which 
affect consumer behavior. To the extent that we depend on real estate 
taxes, as the housing debacle of 2007/8 demonstrated, governments are 
forced to cut spending and their only segment of their budget where than 
can cut enough to make a difference is employee salaries. Would it not 
be much better to make sure that we don't require continuous economic 
growth to keep government working?

Lurking in the background is the notion that we live in a world without 
limits. It has always seemed that way, especially in America where the 
push to the West provided new land, new jobs and new consumers. The 
largess of the land seemed without limit. But increasingly a few 
economists are beginning to challenge this often unstated assumption. 
Most of us have the common sense to know that the world is changing and 
not necessarily for the better. We are running up against limits that we 
have never before had to face.

Let us examine the relationship between land, water and energy. 
California is blessed with abundant fertile land. It appeared that we 
had enough water to farm even the drier parts of the Central Valley. You 
either put a dam across a river to capture spring runoff or you pumped 
ground water for irrigation. But, ground water needs to be replenished 
or the land will begin to sink. That was the fate of Alviso until 
government stepped in an made sure that ground water was replenished, 
but not before Alviso dropped below sea level.

Now in the second decade of this century, we have also to face the fact 
that we have changed our climate. California will become increasingly 
dry. Additional dams won't provide more water if the existing reservoirs 
are not full. California agriculture will surely shrink. At the same 
time ,we are replenishing the soil with nitrogen from natural gas and 
phosphates from abroad, 80% of the world supply coming from Morocco. The 
cost of food is going to increase and then, since Morgan Hill is 
basically suburban, more people will turn to their own land as a source 
of food. My wife and I do that now, sourcing almost all of our fruit and 
much of our vegetables from our on garden.

Since agriculture and transportation are contending for the same 
supplies of natural gas, and that supply will be sold at the best price, 
the costs for both food and transportation will continue to rise faster 
than the industrial sector can raise wages.

Some economists, notably Herman Daly of the Univ. of Maryland are now 
calling for the recognition that a Steady State Economy is a good thing 
and that continued unlimited growth is bad. Dr. Brian Czech has written 
a recent book entitled Supply Shock that makes it even more clear how we 
got here and where we might be headed if we do not heed the warnings. 
The cliff is precipitous.

I am not confident that we will listen. There were those who warned us 
of the housing bubble and the financial fraud inherent in some of the 
derivative schemes being marketed by Wall Street and we did not listen 
then. The next crash appears to be worse than the last and will surely 
happen by 2035.

I would prefer to live in a community where we have shed our dependence 
on growth to fund government, where government has helped to build 
self-sufficiency into the fabric of our daily lives.  This General Plan 
update seems to be the place where we can make that happen.


-- 
"Anytime you have an opportunity to make things better and you don't, 
then you are wasting your time on this Earth" - /Roberto Clemente/
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