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Hot Off the Press –

Balancing the Budget, Jazz, Zoning, and Hawpe in Hot Water

By Theresa Fritz Camoriano

1.  Budget - When Kentucky voters elected Ernie Fletcher as Governor, they made it clear that they want the state to rein in spending and not increase taxes.  If the Republicans have gotten the message, they may have a long tenure in power.  If, instead, the Republicans listen to The Courier-Journal and raise taxes, the voters may well decide to clean house again in the next election. 

2.  Jazz -  Fans of jazz music are disappointed that Louisville’s public radio recently has reduced its jazz programming, and, as a result, they are whining loudly.  Apparently, these jazz fans believe the taxpayers have an obligation to subsidize their taste in music.  But why?  If jazz fans want to listen to jazz music, they can sponsor their own programming on private radio stations, pay for satellite radio, or buy some CD’s.  Did the city of Louisville really give public radio $300,000 of our taxes last year?  That would fill quite a few potholes!  Taxes should be used only to provide services that cannot be provided in the private sector -- radio certainly is not one of those services.  As soon as the tax funding of public radio ends, so will the whining.

3.  Zoning - Is the city of Paducah using zealous enforcement of zoning laws to drive low income people out of their homes in order to attract an upscale colony of artists?   If so, it would not be surprising, as zoning laws often are used to benefit people who are favored at the expense of those who do not have political clout.  In fact, the first zoning laws in the U.S. were used to oppress the Irish immigrants in New York.  If the upscale artists want to buy homes in a neighborhood to create an artists’ colony, they could offer their poorer neighbors a price for their homes that would enable them to move elsewhere on a voluntary basis – but why should the artists bother operating on a voluntary basis when they can rely on the zoning enforcers to kick the low income folks out on the street, keeping the cost of the housing low?  Then, after systematically using zoning to kick the low income people out of their homes, the zoning enforcers will decry the shortage of “affordable housing”, will blame developers for the shortage, and will then force developers to build “affordable housing” before they will grant approval for new subdivisions, again forcibly shifting the cost of their decisions onto others.  How compassionate!  

4.     Hawpe in Hot Water - The C-J’s David Hawpe, a self-proclaimed worshiper of government as the solution to all of life’s problems, has finally found a government regulation he doesn’t like!  Hawpe says he has taken the law into his own hands by physically removing the flow restrictor from his shower head.  Since there is no water shortage in Louisville, and since he likes to take water-guzzling showers, he thinks it is alright for him to ignore the government regulations designed to conserve water.  Of course, he is selfishly ignoring the fact that it takes energy to pump all that water he is using, and energy to heat it, and that the use of large quantities of water puts a strain on water mains and sewage treatment plants. 

When laws and regulations affect other people, Hawpe thinks they are great, believing that other people should be forced to sacrifice for the good of “society as a whole”, but in this case, when the regulations put a crimp in his own style, he refuses to make the personal sacrifice for the good of “society as a whole”.  Actually, I agree with him.  If hot water is what floats his boat, I think he should be able to guzzle as much as he wants, as long as he is willing to pay for it.

However, if Hawpe thinks he has the right to exercise his own judgment and ignore the regulations against water guzzling shower heads, then, if he is a man of integrity, he’ll have to accept the similar right of other people to make their own individual judgments about how they want to live their lives, as long as they are willing to pay their own way.  They may decide that it’s alright for them to drive gas guzzling cars, or to take control of funding their own retirement rather than supporting Social Security, or to take control of their children’s education rather than paying education taxes, or to spend the money they earn on their own pet projects rather than having it forcibly taxed away to finance Hawpe’s pet projects.  Just imagine the possibilities!   

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