GOT SURPLUS? FIX ROADS!

GOT SURPLUS?

FIX ROADS!

According to the latest economic forecast, our state’s projected surplus for the end of the current biennium -- June 30, 2015 -- will be $1.23 billion. That’s right, BILLION. So we’re not taking about over a million dollars, we’re talking about more than a BILLION dollars!

Suddenly, Minnesota’s going to be “in the black.” Suddenly, this state’s going to be “in the money.”

Uh-oh. Here it comes: the inevitable big showdown in the state legislature.

More money -- even just the possibility of more money later on -- always means more feuding among our legislators over what to do with our perceived windfall. That’s probably because too many lawmakers are too concerned about getting re-elected and making sure their respective political party either remains in power or seizes power come next election time. How silly!

Oh, you wacky public servants! Here you are, all worried like a swarm of juicy Junebugs at a World Bird Convention. And here we are, your lowly constituents with only the power to elect and re-elect you -- not the power to make you do any roadwork.

But you’re all worried and scared now because you know that’s what you should be doing: ROADWORK.

If you’re having any second thoughts about being too busy, or getting your hands too dirty, or getting you muscles too sore, then think again. Somebody’s got to fill in those potholes, and it might as well be you guys. After all, you’re working for us, the voters. Might as well do something constructive -- like actually repairing our gravelly, dangerous roads full o’ holes. And I do mean BIG holes.

As Minnesotans, we should have the right to drive to work, to school, or to the store without falling into one of Paul Bunyon’s gigantic footprints on 66th Street. We should be able to ride comfortably and safely on our streets without navigating  endless stretches of moon craters. We should be able to use freeway entrances (and exits) without getting our tires chewed up and swallowed by the Hannibal Lector Highway. We should be able to do all these things, but we can’t because our infrastructure is disintegrating before our eyes.

There’s wear and tear, there’s potholes, then there’s that lunar landscape we used to call Crosstown 62. The potholes are getting so big that the urban coyotes are starting to think they’re watering holes. So are the other city critters. Only crafty raccoons have decided that these wading pools on the roadways are too dangerous for their young to swim in.

Attention, Minnesota State Legislators: Don’t you get it? Waterholes for varmints. Rodent wading pools. Moon Craters. These ridiculously dangerous conditions await motorists and passengers alike now.

So why won’t you do something about this mess?

I know, I know, $1.23 billion is just a projected amount that Minnesota won’t have until next year. But couldn’t our state braintrust find some way of innovative financing or introduce some kind of creative option that would pay for our badly needed road repairs now? Come on. Think! Think! Don’t act like you’re talking to me, a lowly taxpayer/voter/citizen. Act like you’re talking to the owner of  the Vikings. Or the Twins. Or the Mall of America. You know, those millionaires who become billionaires because they can get other people like you and me to pay for their stuff.

I don’t know about everyone else, but this Minnesotan is getting sick and tired of a governing body that always comes up with funding for the financially blessed but hesitates, often refuses, to provide any kind of financial assistance for little guys like us. We can’t have a welfare state in Minnesota, oh, no. But we sure can have corporate welfare, can’t we?

Minnesota is fast becoming a haven for you and your fatcat friends with big money.

And please, no more C.Y.A. dog-ate-my homework BS excuses, either. Don’t try to spin or rationalize what you’ve been doing. I know what you’ve been up to. So do you. You know what I mean, yes you do, yes you know. You haven’t been thinking of the commonweal. You haven’t been thinking of your constituency. You’ve only been thinking of yourselves and your richbitch friends.

There’s always enough money in the State till to give yourselves raises and make the wealthy one per cent even wealthier.

No matter how bad things look financially, you guys can always reach in and magically pull out millions of dollars for your own salaries... and then give your poor billionaire buddies even more handouts and financial breaks.

Consider the owners of our multi-million -- nay, billion -- dollar sports teams. They always seem to have more money than God...until it comes time to build a new football -- or baseball -- stadium. Then the poor things can’t afford it. Then you raise taxes on us to make the one per-cent happy. Otherwise, they’d move their teams out of Minnesota. Then we wouldn’t have any sports teams in our state at all.

So, we’re paying higher taxes to fund new stadiums so we can watch millionaires give other millionaires head injuries, as humorist Bill Mahr likes to say. Only most of us -- about 95-99% of us -- still can’t afford tickets to see the Vikings or the Twins play.

Of course, we’re already paying taxes. But these taxes aren’t giving us, the majority of Minnesotans, what we’ve been promised. We thought we were already paying taxes to cover road building, maintance, and repair. We thought we were paying taxes for schools and libraries. Now that there’s supposed to be a big budget surplus next year, it can’t be used towards repairing Minnesota’s deteriorating infrastructure? Why?

Usually when some lowly voter poses such a question, you guys call out your know-it-all civil servants from MnDot. Or some brillant engineer with Asberger’s Syndrome to put all us voters in our place.

That is, we’re just stupid Minnesotans angry at the potholes. And the road repair hasn’t been done because there’s no way to repair them in this frigid cold. Then we’ll get a lot of mathematical formulas about expansion and contraction. Just confusing enough to make us feel real stupid and go away quietly.

Well, today’s a new day in the 21st Century. There ARE things the legislature can do to get these god-awful roads fixed. There are options available now for road repairs -- badly needed road repairs. So let’s do it. Let’s fix them.

And if you don’t know how to do it, then find a way. Invent new products. Use different materials. Try innovative methods.

BUT. FIX. THESE. ROADS...NOW.