Projects like this are what I consider to be pork barrel spending. Sure, some people may benefit. However, it is not the job of the federal government to act like an unending pool of money to be siphoned off for special or experimental projects.
When building or expanding the town's water supply is the time to innovate and include the gray water reclamation lines. I remember that the proposed ethanol plant in Selma was planning on using gray water for its plant. However, there was no such line existing anywhere. One would have to be built from way out in Smithfield all the way in to Selma's fringes. That of course would have been funded by tax dollars in one form or another.
Government grants are TAX DOLLARS. Never forget that fact. Whenever some town applies for a grant to revitalize its downtown, for people to renovate their homes, or whatever, we are talking about tax dollars. Multiply those local expenditures times the tens of thousands of other communities in this nation and you can see why we have such a huge budget in our federal government.
Government loans are probably even worse than grants. Why do I say that? Because the federal government taxes us citizens to get the capital. Then they turn around and lend it to municipalities like Selma or Benson, as is the case in this instance. Then the town has to pay back borrowed tax dollars with funds it derives from...yup, you guessed it, tax dollars. In essence, we are being taxed twice for the same funding.
The federal government has no business being in the lending industry. It has no business redistributing the wealth of its citizens. People wonder why I am passionate about such waste, why I decry it so. It is because it truly impacts each and every tax payer in this nation. There are some who pay no taxes. Even people who pay very little taxes often get back more money than they paid the government by nature of the earned income tax credit and the recent tax rebate incentive package.
In the 1950's, women were primarily stay at home mothers and wives. The man of the house went to work in the morning and came home in the evening. They usually lived comfortably on one salary. Nowadays, that is virtually impossible for many Americans. It means that more and more families can not survive on a single income so now both parents have to work. It means that children are placed in day care so that a stranger can raise the children instead of their own parents. It means that there is a lot more economic pressure that stresses out couples and fractures their marriages. It means that women have lost the sense of femininity and compete with men in the work place instead of glorying in the role of a mother that they were created to perform. It means that the high taxation rates have short changed our youth instead of helping them. It means that welfare queens can have more babies and get more money instead of marrying a man and settling down. It undermines the family. Yes, building a gray water reclamation pipeline in Benson helps undermine its own citizenry.
Here is the news item from the WTSB news page.
Benson Receives Federal Loan To Fund $3M Reclaimed Wastewater Project
Benson is one step closer to start construction of a nearly eight-mile pipeline to take treated wastewater and deliver it to CPC Wholesale Nursery on Benson Hardee Road where it will be used for irrigation. The town has accepted a low-interest loan for $886,000 from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to help fund the $3 million project. Reclaimed wastewater can be used to irrigate decorative plants and other crops not intended for human consumption. Commercial-scale grass growing operations, including pasture land, golf courses and turf farms, are common beneficiaries of reclaimed wastewater. While no other area businesses or farmers have expressed an interest in tying their irrigation systems into the pipeline, officials maintain it’s an excellent incentive to prospective agribusiness owners. Benson Town Manager Keith Langdon said the nursery was chosen as the initial recipient of the water because of the amount of water they use for irrigation: between 300,000 to 350,000 gallons per day. The pipeline is part of a water reclamation project that would capture an estimated 300,000 to 500,000 gallons per day of water that would otherwise be dumped back into Hannah Creek. The town is currently restricted to treating and discharging no more than 1.97 million gallons per day. While the reclaimed water project will reduce the amount of treated wastewater being released, it will not increase the capacity of the water treatment plant, according to Martin Morris, the plant supervisor. Water reclamation is not entirely new to Benson. For the past two years, effluent from the wastewater treatment plant has been routed to South Johnston High School - about a mile from the plant - to be used for irrigation. Mr. Morris said the school uses about 24,000 gallons per day.
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