Even developers have done a 180:
Developers who once fought with conservationists are now pushing the idea, after discovering that successful parks -- such as Manhattan's Bryant Park and Atlanta's Piedmont Park -- can dramatically increase property values.Green space conservation and its positive effects involve plain common sense. Why did it take them so long to come around?
Aren't the federal park spending cuts aimed at National Parks, not these local urban parks? I don't understand why the federal government should be funding local parks, anyway.
ReplyDeleteBecause the federal government has an interest in promoting the well-being of local communities. Money to support local park development is not that different from block grants (which were the creation of the Republicans) or any other monies designated to help police or emergency management or any other dimension of the local community. Given the environmental challenges of urban development, the federal government also has an interest in promoting conservation and green space development nationally.
ReplyDeleteWell, no, the federal government doesn't actually have an interest in promoting local well-being--that's why it's federal. We have local governments to promote local well-being. The ever-expanding interests of the federal government are worrying to me.
ReplyDeleteUsing your reasoning, there is no limit to federal programs--anything that has any local interests can be federally funded. That is a recipe for far too much federal government. Why not have all education also federally funded? Why not roads, and local government, and every other government program? Does the federal government really have a clue about what small local communities need? Can it know which ones are "deserving" and which ones are not?
You cite the Republican support of block grants as if that should somehow be important to me. I don't understand why. Even if I were a Republican, which I am not, that wouldn't mean I supported them. In any case, I will grant that block grants make a lot more sense. They are precisely unlike spending on specific programs such as parks, in that they allow local governments to decide how to spend the money. I'm not convinced that federal block grants are a good idea in general, but at least one could argue that they are part of a general program of income redistribution, and they do not rely on the federal government knowing what programs are best for local communities.
I also don't see why, say, Texans should pay for our local parks. If we want more local parks, perhaps we should pay for them, rather than asking other people to pay for them--and if we're not willing to do so, perhaps that means we don't want them badly enough.