Posted on 10/23/2009 9:18:35 AM PDT by WayneLusvardi
The rhetorical "water witch" of the Pasadena Star News, staff writer Rebecca Kimitch, has an op-ed disguised as a news story on water rates rising in San Gabriel Valley - read here http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/rds_search/ci_13612524
Since Kimitch likes to cast personal attacks and bad omens on Republicans and conservatives in many of her so-called "news" stories, perhaps the rhetorical term "water witch" is fitting (a "water witch" is a person who claims to be able to find underground water with a divining rod; aka a sorceress).
Kimitch's news story merely regurgitates what several local water agency public relations types, or rhetorical "witch doctors," tell her as to why wholesale water rates for imported water from Northern California are rising. Kimitch doesn't use her divining rod to probe why this is so.
One might ask why water rates in a socialized water system such as California's should rise, because in such a system there is not a "market" price for water like there is for the stock or real estate markets. In a socialized system less supply of water shouldn't necessarily mean higher prices unless the underlying rate base can't be met from water sales.
It is politically incorrect to even suggest that water conservation may be undercutting the rate base of water agencies, thus leading to higher water rates. Rather, conservation is justified as a reaction to drought. But a three year drought is normal in California. So the reasons that water agencies give for raising water rates often reflect circular reasoning. As they say in the water biz, the only thing that seems to make sense is that water runs uphill toward money.
Water is essentially free from nature. Water rates should reflect only the cost to capture, store, transport, and treat it plus actual overhead costs. Since wholesale water agencies in California are all governmental entities, hypothetically there should be no "profit" included in water rates.
The water agency public relations "witch doctors" interviewed by Kimitch state that water rates are rising because MWD, the regional water supplier, has raised rates due to a drought. But a drought shouldn't effect water rates because the cost of supplying water should be effectively the same, drought or no drought, assuming water sales are rising due to population increases.
If there are new water infrastructure and conservation projects proposed to develop new water resources because of a prolonged drought then perhaps water rates would rise. But there are no such specific projects or bond issues in the offing because the legislature, the governor and the courts have been in a political "logjam" over water shipments to Southern California for the last three years with no resolution in sight. And MWD hasn't been buying any new water from farmers. So why then are water rates really rising? Neither Ms. Kimitch, nor the water agency representatives she interviews, tell us. It never seems to dawn on Ms. Kimitch to probe deeper with her diving rod.
Many of the commenters to Ms. Kimitch's article blame "new development" and"immigrants." But water conservation has, for the most part, offset any increased demand for water due to more population. So, once again, why are water rates rising then?
Ms. Kimitch fails to mention other possible reasons that have been in the news lately, such as MWD's attempt to increase retirement benefits and prop up the ailing Cal-PERS retirement system with water rate increases. Could that be a reason? Again, Kimitch apparently does not ask.
Moreover, Kimitch doesn't address that recently Pasadena had to raise retail water rates, not because of increased population from new development, but because of all the unsold and unrented new housing units that aren't paying water bills due to the busting of the Real Estate Bubble. So are increased water rates, in part, the penalty we must now pay for the busting of the Real Estate Bubble? Again, we aren't told in Kimitch's article. If so, was all that "Smart Growth" in Pasadena so smart after all?
Knowing what is going on in government, especially with the subterranean politics of water, is a big mystery. The reasons given for water rate increases are often circular . You would think that someone dealing with the paranormal, such as a rhetorical water witch, might be able to tell you especially as we approach Halloween. But apparently neither water agency public relations witch doctors nor newspaper water witches or journalists can tell us. The mysterious reasons why water rates are rising are apparently still underground, still waiting to be found with a dowsing or divining rod.
As an after thought, perhaps the reason that water rates are rising is that water, like oil, is subject to the declining value of the dollar. Does it now take more dollars to buy the same amount of water? Is water rate inflation due to dollar deflation? If so, we could call this the Dollar Evaporation Theory, a version of Voodoo Economics. And, if so, there is a bigger story here than water rates because it means that all the money the Federal government is pumping into the economy is resulting in dollar deflation and commodity price inflation.
Moreover, this could signal something positive - a shift from a consumer economy to a production export economy. This may require more water for new industries which would pump up tax revenues and restore state and local government budgets and retirement funds. This, in turn, will require a shift to new political leaders other than "Moonbeam" Brown and Gavin "Greenie" Newsome for Governor, novelist Barbara Boxer for U.S. Senator (novels: "A Time to Run" and "Blind Trust") or state legislators Anthony "Open Space" Portantino, Carol Lu-Liu, and Pasadena preservationist Mayor Bill Bogaard on the local level. Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina where are you?
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