My British husband loves rest stops. He said when he first came to America, he thought it was the most civilized country he'd ever seen with all these areas 'to rest.' He was feeling quite tired with jet lag on his first trip over so decided to go to one of these places to rest. But he was so shocked because all it had in it were toilets.
Eventually he figured out that 'rest rooms' were euphemisms for toilets.
from the Wall Street Journal:
This holiday weekend, remember to use the bathroom before you hit the road: States are closing rest stops as a part of new budget cuts. Louisiana has shuttered most of its rest stops already; Virginia has announced it will save $9 million a year by closing 19 rest areas; and Maine, Vermont, and Colorado will soon follow. The Wall Street Journal reports that as this all-American staple becomes scarce, people aren't just learning to hold their bladders: The closings have generated a backlash in states, with the American Trucking Associations opposing the move and town hall meetings in Virginia focused on reversing the cuts.
8 comments:
This is just a ploy to get the people to ask for higher taxes. Louisiana still has 11 billion in unused money sitting around in stocks, bonds, credit default swaps, and mortgage backed securities (these latter two are risk free, high return investments for those of you who don't know- we are simply flush with cash projections!)
As long as cities and states are selling off infrastructure, they might as well sell these rest stops off. They are in excellent locations and should bring in some quick money. Surely Exxon/Mobil, Shell and BP could find some way to keep them open and make them pay.
Hehe... keep the earmarks in, cut high profile services.
Sorry about the double post, Elizabeth, would you remove one please?
ATT has failed to provide enough bandwidth to keep up with all the iphones sold over the last 18 months so their wireless service is now almost as slow as the old dialup was. But it's 3G Edge!
I guess they have to make cuts somewhere if state budgets are tight. The reasoning might be that it primarily benefits out of staters.
Where would you cut, Marty? Welfare payments? They're actually quite good for the state taxpayers as the money is immediately ploughed back into the local economy.
"In House Bill 1, the 2008-2009 operating budget for Louisiana’s state government, these groups are referred to as NGOs [nongovernmental organizations]. There are 66 listed in the bill, requesting $13,985,227." http://www.businessreport.com/news/2008/apr/21/earmarks-louisiana-style/
That 13 million is more than enough to keep the rest stops open. Truck drivers are required by federal law to stop after a set number of hours and sleep for a set number of hours. I think that is a lot more important than buying minority votes with untracked gifts of public money.
$14m is a lot of money to you and me, but it must be peanuts in the context of the state budget. What's the total spend? The article doesn't say. Getting steamed up about stuff like this makes good copy, but it takes attention away from the big wastes of your money.
Having said that though, looking at the list of earmarks, I don't really approve of much of it. Lots of money for churches - whatever happened to separation of church and state? If a church runs into difficulties, the last thing it should do is ask for a handout from the taxpayer.
I'd still argue, though, that spending like this benefits the local economy more than rest stops. If the truckers are required by law to stop, surely they will still stop? Maybe at a cheap motel or truck stop rather than a rest stop, benefiting the local economy even more.
Mel, Louisiana's budget for this year is 28.7 billion, with 28 million in earmarks in House Bill No. 1. The earmarks are always in Bill 1, first bill to be considered in regular budget session, with a few others that later get snuck into other bills during.
The budget is about what it was last year, but keep in mind that each year's budget is greater than the previous year's expenditures by about 12%- that's the money they skim off and put into various investments.
Separation of church and state doesn't apply to money (it should though). The state is just not supposed to make any law establishing religion or prohibiting the practice thereof. Most of those churches (and other ngos) are minority churches and ngos.
The money for the Winnsboro Catfish Festival might as well be for a church, a white one this time. I went up that thing a few years ago with some motorcycle friends to ride in a "poker run"- that is a ride where you pay to participate, with profits going to charity. On a poker run you go from place to place (bars, usually) where you get a playing card, at the end of the run the person with the best hand wins some kind of prize. In the Catfish Festival poker run, a Baptist event, we weren't allowed to collect cards, since they frown on gambling. We had to collect little rocks. At the end of the ride we exchanged our rocks for darts we threw for high score. The darts were of such poor quality they wouldn't fly straight and most of the ones that did hit the board fell apart- the fins would fall to the floor and the tip stay in the board.
Truckers do stay in truckstops, large gas stations with huge parking lots. Because of the number of trucks those lots fill up fast, so some truckers are forced to stop on the roadside. You don't see them on the interstate because they get off on secondary roads and park on the onramps that will continue their journey. It's not a very safe thing to do, but as long as they are 15 ft off the roadway it is allowed.
Most of the rest stops don't have staff. The regular hwy maintenance crews stop in once or twice a day and clean them. Only the big ones at the borders have staff, and that is for the assistance of tourists- they give out maps, etc, and sell items so they actually make money.
You are right, this makes good copy, and that's why I think it is a ploy for more taxes. Mississippi passed its budget, only leaving two issues unresolved- public safety and the public utility commission. This is how they work the system over here. Every year around budget time they first talk about having to cut education, then public safety. A "cut" is a reduction in increase, not a real cut.
An example of US politics: Ms. gov. Haley Barbour (R) always runs on a "no new taxes" platform. In two speeches, one last fall, and one in January, he was attempting to institute a $200 dollar per day per bed hospital tax. This is reported as a "tax on hospitals, they need to pay their fair share". Yet, in the two speeches, he explained that the hospitals asked for the tax to be imposed because they collect 6 dollars in medicare money for every 1 dollar in tax they collect (from the patients). During the budget battle the Mississippi Hospital Association vehemently fought the tax, giving in only at the last minute in "a hard-nosed fight". ("please don't throw me in the briar patch br'er fox!", begged br'er rabbit) What this tax does is increase expenses for patients with insurance, who must pay more as part of their co-pay, and increases cost for insurance companies (who will raise their rates), and transfers that money to medicare recipients the hospitals will get to treat more of. The insurance companies lose nothing, the hospitals make more money; the only downside is to sick people who are taxed $167 additional per day for the privilege. But, the greedy hospitals are paying their fair share, dammit!
As if healthcare isn't expensive enough anyway!
Stuff like this leads me to believe that maybe the whole system needs to be looked at again. Just think of all the time and money spent on collecting and processing the various payments.
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