Of Moths and Men - Moth-Like Agencies Pose as Butterflies

Let's see if you can make sense of the following confusing picture using examples drawn from Southern California but certainly replicated across the country.

A New Obsolescent Reservoir? Earlier this month California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein proposed a $9.3 billion bond to build yet another new reservoir in Northern California to inconsistently "offset the climate change impacts of reduced snow pack and higher flood flows" and to finally route water around the Sacramento Delta to Southern California. But in 2004, the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) of Southern California completed a huge dam and reservoir for $2 billion - Diamond Valley Reservoir - which was to provide the long-term solution for water supply for the south half of the state. By 2008, the dam and reservoir is now apparently being declared obsolete, as yet another new dam in Northern California is declared needed.

Contrary to the portrayal of a water crisis by elites, drought is normal, Lake Powell on the Colorado River is full, and the only reason northern California water flows have stopped to Southern California through the Sacramento Delta is the ruling of a judge to protect a vanishing small fish, likely caused by ridding the Delta of pollution and fish food (crustaceans).

Was the dam built on the wrong side of the state water system (the southerly Colorado River Aqueduct instead of the northerly California Aqueduct)? It certainly looks like it, as the main source of imported water for Southern California has since shifted from two-thirds from the Colorado River Aqueduct to two-thirds dependence on the California Aqueduct.

During a drought Southern California typically uses only 4 million acre feet of water to serve 15 million people and 5 million during wet periods. So conservation results in more water available in a year than the 800,000 acre feet Diamond Valley Reservoir holds. Water and environmental activist Dorothy Green writing in the August 15, 1994 issue of the L.A. Times was apparently right as the headline of her article said it all: "Diamond Valley: A dam site too expensive MWD: a huge reservoir would cost $2 billion, but water to fill it is problematic and there are cheaper alternatives."

Fixing Up "Closed" School Buildings In the City of Pasadena , the Unified School District has recently proposed to put on the ballot a $350 million bond, backed by a 1.26% increase in property taxes, to refurbish public schools, many of which are now closed due to declining enrollment. Pasadena not long ago completed $250 million in repairs to many of the same closed schools buildings in 1997 to 2001 under what was called Measure Y (dubbed Measure Why?). The new vague proposal would fix the school buildings up for rumored social service centers, or as magnet schools to take drop-outs from surrounding schools districts, or as over-improved public parks, or just to preserve as "white elephants."

This is reminiscent of the massive Belmont Learning Center in downtown Los Angeles which was built by the L.A. Unified School District in 2000. It cost one-fifth of a billion dollars and sits empty as a "contaminated" complex of buildings erected over a known oil and gas field. In 2004, approximately 60 percent of the buildings were demolished because of a discovered earthquake fault under the project.

Expanding Public Transit Now That Freeways are Uncongested Contemporaneously, the Board of the Southern California Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) voted to put on the November ballot a half cents sales tax measure for Los Angeles County that would finance several new light rail and subways.

The media perception is that these projects are necessary with the spike in gasoline prices and public transit riders. But the increase in public transit users is already being absorbed by the current transit system. And, ironically, freeway commuters report that due to high gas prices, for the first time in an eon the freeways are truly free-ways with almost no congestion at rush hour.

What's going on with all of the above projects is that public agencies are morphing into their "New Deal" jobs creation programs from their stated missions as water suppliers, public schools, and public transit carriers. This process is probably not too different in other parts of the country, as state and local agencies declare a symbolic economic recession as the necessity to launch new public works and jobs programs. Politicians declare that they won’t raise taxes to plug state and local budget deficits, but oddly want to raise taxes for new infrastructure projects.

Just as a caterpillar turns into a pupa and then into a butterfly, public agencies morph into their Keynesian economic stimulus mode, only they do it invisibly to the public as the media is blind to the process taking place. And just as butterflies are important economically as agents of pollination, so are public bureaucracies as economic stimulators. But unlike pretty butterflies, the public projects most often turn out as ugly moths.

A problem is that the media -- sympathetic with government and reflexively anti-business -- typically is blind to this cycle taking place. Instead, it dutifully reports such bureaucratic actions as if they are part of the primary mission of such agencies. In fact, if you review the mission statements of public agencies you won't find their shadow purpose - to act as a piggy bank during economic downturns. Sociologists call this the difference between the manifest and the latent function of an organization. Most people, including the media, never seem to catch on that the latent function (jobs programs) is, or originally was, the real primary function of many bureaucratic agencies since the Depression era New Deal. Do we need behemoth water agencies to combat droughts, public transit agencies, and public school systems? The consensus answer of political and media elites would be yes. And maybe we do, but what about full disclosure of what these projects are and what real public benefit will be gained by those paying for them?

During the last recession from 1990, Southern California saw three similar huge public works projects all of which promised reliable water, a solution to traffic congestion, and a magnet public school for downtown Los Angeles.

The Los Angeles Wilshire Subway and Pasadena Gold Line Light Rail did not solve congestion, but ironically high gas prices have, at least momentarily. Light rail and subways don’t make sense economically on a cost per passenger basis or as even an effective method of transportation compared to much cheaper bus ways which can deliver passengers closer to their destinations.

Public schools are nearly untouchable because they are deemed to accomplish the public good in society. But large school boards and districts could be reduced to mere financing mechanisms for charter schools rather than humongous jobs programs.

In retrospect the Diamond Valley Reservoir in Southern California was arguably a mistake.

The public will likely not get much benefit from the current round of large public works projects being touted either unless the media better informs the public that such projects are first and foremost economic stimulus programs rather than necessary public works projects. But the media has an occupational ideology that incapacitates it from doing so.

Just as the caterpillar goes into its cocoon, history repeats itself. Only what will emerge will likely be an ugly pickpocket moth that puts a hole in the change pocket of your pants. You will end up having to buy a new suit, which will stimulate the economy. Only the new suit you get will not fit and will just hang useless in your closet until you donate it to the local non-profit thrift shop, whereupon you may get a tax credit for a charitable donation.

"The best laid plans of mice (moths) and men, often go awry." - Robert Burns, 1785

You noticed that too, eh?

As of today, 62.23% full.

Although it is the fullest it's been in about six years.

Reply: Go to this website and judge for yourself whether Lake Powell is “full” or “near full”

http://lakepowell.water-data.com/

Excerpt from LakePowell.water.data.com/
Lake Powell is effectively “full”

Elevation & Content Water Inflow Data Glen Canyon Dam Release Data
Lake Powell is 67.31 feet below Full Pool (Elevation 3,700)
By content, Lake Powell is 62.32% of Full Pool (24,322,000 af)
Total inflows for water year 2008: 11,377,310 acre feet

This is 114.34% of the August 3rd average of 9,950,578 acre feet Total releases for water year 2008: 7,450,532 acre feet

This is 90.53% of the minimum required of 8,230,000 acre feet
During WY 2008, water storage has risen by 3,230,765 AF and total inflows have exceeded total outflows by 3,926,778 AF
Reservoirs above Lake Powell are currently at 84.57% of capacity.

I’d hardly call Lake Powell “effectively full” when it’s at 62%.

It’s also got some significant releases coming up to keep Lake Mead from dropping below its current level.

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