In this new year San Benito County must start to move ahead in a timely manner on all fronts, especially economic, before it is too late. Why economic? Because the county’s lack of economic resources is the key problem adversely effecting just about everything we must do or want to do such as improving water quality; providing better library services, court security and public safety; promoting tourism; or upgrading the county’s entire education system. All of them and more are stifled by the lackluster local economy.
We cannot stop the world and get off even if we wanted to. The federal and state governments continue to impose expensive mandates, government employees and service providers demand more money, and residents have to bear those heavy burdens while competing with other populations for economic opportunities daily.
Moving ahead means providing more and better jobs, increasing property values, offering consumers more and better choices, bringing in businesses, improving education and cultural opportunities and all the activities related to those goals and, critically, doing it expeditiously. We can never make up for lost or wasted time.
Every proposal has some downside and it is to up political leaders to weigh the pluses and minuses; however, too often they have been comfortable with things as they are, no matter how bad. This leads them to demand instant returns from every change as the price of approval. Meanwhile they ignore the long-term benefits we must have to progress. The net result is an arc moving in the wrong direction, while the county withers and gets poorer in relation to others while we wait for the next or ultimate silver bullet that is never coming.
We should have had our major transportation issues such as Highway 156 widening and improvements solved a decade ago, but along with real deficiencies such as inadequate flood control, we have been intent on sniping, obstruction and demanding that no one have any objection to anything before moving ahead. This is a formula for disaster and all one has to do is look at the economic difficulties at both the cities and county to see the results.
When it comes to the future nothing can be assured, but it is self-defeating to attribute certainty to every potential negative while forgetting the overall devastating effects of doing nothing for so many years because we continue to delay to death proposals that could bring progress.
If that is what our local political leaders want, that is fine, but then they should not continually complain that they could not pay the bills or improve public services. That path has proven only one thing – the county has to move forward or its residents will be left further behind in a competitive world. Leadership is about more than just maintaining the status quo and getting reelected. It’s about building a future.
