Charles M. Hess
I have spent most of my career in water resources, but what I have to say is applied to everything, from high -speed rail to the modernization of the airport. You say that all these investments have a requirement for long -term care and management and all investments in federal infrastructure are similar in maintenance and maintenance. Like buying that new car, but never change the oil, perform routine maintenance or put a layer of wax, it will not be new for a long time or work when you need it.
Using the purchase of a house as an analogy, it is one of the most serious financial decisions that an individual can make. Not only do you sign the point line, take the keys and declare the victory. You have inherited mortgage, insurance, maintenance bills and the inevitable roof repairs. A house is not only a purchase, it is a commitment to the decades of responsibility.
The same principle should be applied to major federal infrastructure projects. Too often, Washington aims to write initial control is the end of the story. The legislators cut ribbons, broadcast press releases, and declare the victory, as if the sole appropriation resolved the problem. He never does.
What the nation has “bought” is not only a flood wall or a bomb station, but also the long-term obligation to operate, maintain and replace them.
All owners know the importance of an inspection report; Federal projects need the same scrutiny. Feasibility studies, benefit relationships and environmental reviews are the equivalent of home inspections. They expose defects before they become disasters. When we cut the corners of these processes, often under the political pressure to “obtain shovels on the ground”, we not only buy a lemon. We are buying a public responsibility and, when a federal project fails, it is not just a wet basement. It is a neighborhood under water. Continuing the analogy, few people buy a house with a single check. Last decades mortgages, forcing planning and budget.
The problem of federal infrastructure is that the Congress estimates the innovative and hates the payment of the mortgage. Financing flows for the press release, but dries when the cameras leave. This is how communities end up with half -built levers, incomplete bombs and deviation projects that only exist on paper. Imagine your bank allows you to move to a house after paying only the initial payment. Worse, imagine just getting enough money to build a piece of the house for 20-30 years and not being able to move until then. You would never consider investing in a house if so. This behaves Washington and the result is predictable: unfinished work, unprotected communities and dollars wasted from taxpayers.
Property has obligations
Ask any owner of what the budget really drains, and US Willvtell: repairs, updates, the endless maintenance cycle. Federal projects are not different.
Operations and maintenance (inspection, dredging, bombs, collection shielding) are the real costs of property. It seeks that they do not exist and the bill is due to the catastrophe.
No more than New Orleans, where hurricane failed Katrina were not caused by a lack of innovative ceremonies, but for years of investment in maintenance, coordination and risk analysis. We learned the lesson in the way more: helplessness is always more expensive than prevention. However, the employer is repeated throughout the country, where the congress treats projects as unique purchases instead of lifelong obligations.
Here is the brutal truth: politicians are rewarded by photography, not to finance inspections 20 years later. The voters see the shining tape cut; They rarely see the inspection crews, maintenance records or the applications for O&M budget buried in the marking of the congress.
But in the infrastructure, as in the property of homes, what matters most is not the celebration of the acquisition, but the discipline of management.
If your neighbor stopped paying his mortgage after the first year, you would not offer congratulations on buying a house; Name irresponsible that the owner of the house. However, at the federal level, we accept exactly this behavior and the whole communities pay the price.
Until Congress begins to deal with these projects in the way a owner deals with a mortgage, with respect for the risk, with open eyes on the costs and with a plan for the long duration, we will continue to celebrate the cuts of tape and the mourning disasters.
