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March 16, 2005
Precious liberties and following the money
These words should be taught to every generation of our children so they might understand just how precious our liberties are. The founding fathers believed these liberties were bestowed upon us not by any government, but by the natural order of things in the universe. Although they are rarely heard in the mainstream media, a great many renowned physicists have stated a natural order and plan exists that simply cannot be accepted as coincidence or accident. It is their contention that anyone who would study the workings of our universe for years, as they have, would come to the same conclusion. Yet governments will do what they have always done. They see themselves as the end all and be all of good for mankind and its posterity. The fact they have never been able to accomplish anything they set out to do is beside the point. They have our best interest at heart, don't they? In fact, government planning can be ranked right up there with Microsoft Works as one of the great oxymorons of all time. No matter what the issue or function you may wish to bring up, both are so filled with design errors and imbedded junk programming as to make any normal person wonder how they can be so full of themselves and not laugh. Anyone who has driven over the hump along what was once Highway 160 knows what I am talking about. The first thing they need to do is give the road from Avery St. to I-15 a new name. I am not sure what to call it, but when you are continuously slowed to 0.1 miles every two minutes, highway seems a bit of a stretch. My question is how in the world could this be happening in an area where master plans, zoning, developer agreements and infrastructure build-outs have been the name of the game for more than 20 years. Shouldn't someone have realized that if you take an area where most people live on one or more acres and change the land use to six homes per acre you will need more than a two-lane road to go anywhere? Yet in areas all over Clark County, the planners who are paid very substantial wages failed to anticipate anything in this regard. In the northwest, Highway 95 is still under construction from Martin Luther King to Anns Road after almost six years. After almost five years the planners finally figured out an overpass similar to the one put in at Sahara would finish the 215 connector from Boulder City. A couple of more years might do it. Development along Rainbow Boulevard began seven years ago and the planners still haven't decided it might be time to widen it to allow traffic to flow. Mother Nature might have helped with the overflow of water during the February storms, but then, planners have been known to ignore these types of events in the past. Nothing seemed to help them get the idea development along both sides of Highway 160 might cause some congestion. The way the road expands and contracts in width it appears heavy breathing had more to do with the design than any engineer. And please don't forget about the Sen. Harry Reid Memorial Highway, more popularly known as the I-15 corridor from the Pahrump/Blue Diamond exit to the spaghetti bowl. This project was obviously a government-planned affair from the beginning. It has taken nearly 15 years and no cost figures have been made public for more than five of them. Anyone hazard to guess what the completion date might be, or if there is one? Just so you know where this is going, I thought you should all know the Nye County Board of Commissioners (we really need an acronym for that) has voted to hire its own building and safety planning engineer, or something along those lines. Since there is currently a company who performs this function very well, completing tasks the county simply has no qualification to consider, I have to wonder why creating a new position at $65,000 or more annually was such a priority. The planning part I can totally understand, as we haven't had anyone capable of planning more than the creation of a new department position in years. The most notable non-plan recently was the $3-plus million purchase of the Calvada Eye without having performed due diligence or having even a basic model of a business plan of what to do with it once they had it. From all indications, they didn't even have a plan for how to pay for it other than using the PETT fund they have promised year in and year out not to touch for such extravagances. But then, if you're government, what's a plan if you can't mess it up, blame someone else, and promise to fix it with a new plan and more of someone else's money? When all else fails, follow the money. Little writes from Pahrump. His column, "The Other Side," appears here on Wednesdays. |
