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UNCOMMON GROUND MIKE JOPEK
GUEST COLUMN DAVID HERBST CORPORATE WELFARE MUST GO
RENTERS AND WHOMEOWNERS
HITEFISH CITY LEADERS are once more advocating for the creation of an affordable
housing task force, hoping to produce results. Over time I’ve learned to trust leaders like Richard Hildner and Frank Sweeney.
If Hildner and Sweeney are re-elected next month, many remain optimistic that something good will happen to help assure that those working in town can actually afford to rent or buy ownership in this great Whitefish community.
Currently the fine people who make the decisions on the Whitefish City Coun- cil are homeowners. That’s not their fault, many of us bought into the market ear- lier, back when it actually was affordable.
All homeowners or renters may not be voters; even freeholders own property locally yet claim residency in other juris- dictions, counties or states. Some live and vote elsewhere for tax reasons, some just live elsewhere and have investment prop- erty locally.
Katie Williams the youngest Whitefish candidate said at a forum, “I am a hard- working Montanan who leads and helps develop a growing business. I am boots on the ground and I want to live in Whitefish and I am bringing that perspective of a lot of people who are going to be footing the bill 30 years down the road.”
Williams currently rents a home with housemates. That’s a common story in Whitefish where more people rent homes than own homes. Williams wrote, “I am fortunate and I live in my family’s house that was purchased in the ‘90s with two other roommates. This unique situation allows us rent affordably.”
A lot has changed in our nation since renters were not allowed a vote. Yet years back, Flathead County chose not to poll renters on planning issues surrounding Whitefish.
Having served on past planning boards, housing authorities, and hous- ing land trusts I’ve some insight into the politics of housing. And yes, housing is a political decision. When teachers, fire- fighters, or baristas cannot afford to live in the community they work, that’s one
huge and local planning decision.
Last decade the planning board, wit- nessing the building boom years cou- pled with a lack of affordable housing, recommended that Whitefish mandate some affordability into major subdivi- sions regulations. An ideological council rejected that proposed regulation saying that increasing density alone would work.
It has not.
Housing land trusts allows communi-
ties to hold ground leases under homes, keeping land and improvements afford- able into perpetuity. Plenty of resort communities across the nation use simi- lar concepts but Whitefish has yet to find much political will to act.
There were some federal voucher rentals in Whitefish, limited federal tax breaks to investors building affordable apartments, a couple nonprofits build- ing homes or offering small subsidies to fill affordability gaps, and good rent-con- trolled units for select seniors at the Whitefish Housing Authority.
A new housing task force will ferret out these facts once again. That’s a great step. Yet real decisions come from the coun- cil and their willingness to act on whether to use coveted urban renewal funds to help fix the housing crunch or expand partnerships with the Housing Author- ity, or require developers to participate
through subdivision regulations. Politics is about trust and relation- ships. With homeowners like Hildner and Sweeney, and renters like Williams at future decision-making tables, maybe Whitefish can ease the cost of living for those working here, living here, and rais- ing a family. Renters, homeowners and freeholders are all a part of the fabric of
Whitefish.
Mail-in ballots are in the hands of
some 4,000 Whitefish voters; hopefully most choose to mail-back a ballot and be counted.
It’s time younger voters acknowledge the power of the vote and how a young and articulate renter like Katie Wil- liams can help lead the next generation of Whitefish. Just vote like it’s your town.
I
and doling it out to corporations. American Rural’s Diane Smith recently took to the opinion pages argu- ing that some companies deserve cor- porate welfare because “we often need subsidies to support under-compensa-
tory industries.”
With all due respect to Mrs. Smith –
that may be one of the most absurd state- ments we’ve seen in a while.
Americans for Prosperity came to the hearing at the Montana Public Service Commission’s meeting because we saw the hearing as an opportunity to start a discussion. Are Montanans comfortable with paying into and receiving corporate welfare benefits from a program that is nearing completion and yet has no end in sight? Are Montanan’s comfortable with millions of their tax dollars being handed out willy-nilly to corporations to guarantee profitability?
In Montana, we’re at close to 90 percent wired and 96 percent wire- less broadband service. With so many households now being served, you’d think we’d have the end of this program in sight. But as it stands, the Universal Service Fund – a system of telecommu- nications subsidies and fees managed by the United States Federal Communica- tions Commission (FCC) – looks poised to stand forever, handing out corporate subsidies to telecoms in perpetuity.
As the program accomplishes its core goal – connecting rural areas to tele- phone and the Internet – the program should slowly be phased out to be sure Montana taxpayers aren’t on the hook forever.
The reality is that the Universal Ser- vice Fund was intended to promote access to telecommunications services. In Montana, that goal has largely been met and we should start thinking of ways for it to be phased out.
In the meantime, the program’s design is in desperate need for reform. The program favors larger telecoms and corners many smaller telecoms
out of the rural market. Americans for Prosperity Montana is in favor of tele- coms reaching the homes of Montanans with the best possible service, which is only possible under a system of free competition.
As it currently is, the program guar- antees incumbent telecom companies an 11.25 percent return, which means that the more costs the company incurs, the bigger the checks these companies get from us the taxpayer. What other indus- try – maybe aside from Wall Street – gets such fat, government-insured paydays?
The program has been riddled with case after case of outright fraud and evi- dence suggests that hundreds of carri- ers actually inflate or misreport costs in order to beef up their taxpayer-funded subsidies.
It has been well published that since 2011, nearly 59 cents on the dollar went to an increase in personnel, adminis- trative, and general expenses – not the infrastructure for which these funds were intended.
Lastly, we don’t really understand how systematic the problem is because the program is terribly under-policed. From 2002 to 2008, the Universal Ser- vice Administrative Company (USAC), the administrator of the USF program, completed only 17 audits of more than 1,400 eligible carriers. Even then the Government Accountability Office states “it has been difficult to deter- mine whether (the audited) carriers are actually in compliance with FCC rules largely due to a lack of documentation available to substantiate the carriers’ information.”
Support for the program is typical of today’s politics. It represents a politi- cal culture that blindly supports pro- grams that give concentrated benefits to a highly motivated minority of peo- ple, with little to no accountability. This toxic, culture of exploiting one another for monetary gain using the power of government needs to stop and we need to stop judging government programs based on their intention rather then their actual affects.
Even if the USF once served a good purpose for Montana, we ought to see these sorts of programs as temporary functions, and always maintain a skep- tical eye for abuse. Otherwise Montan- an’s face a grim future of perpetual cor- porate welfare.
Americans for Prosperity Montana opposes corporate welfare. And we are proud of that stance.
“WHEN TEACHERS, FIREFIGHTERS, OR BARISTAS CANNOT AFFORD TO LIVE IN THE COMMUNITY THEY WORK, THAT’S ONE HUGE AND LOCAL PLANNING DECISION.”
Mike (Uncommon Ground) Jopek and Dave (Closing Range) Skinner often fall on opposite sides of the fence when it comes to political and outdoor issues. Their columns alternate each week in the Flathead Beacon.
David Herbst is the state director of Americans for Prosperity Montana.
F SOMEONE BREAKS INTO YOUR house and runs off with your televi-
sion set – is the person a crook?
No one questions what he did with the TV, whether he sold it to help sup- port some noble cause, or used it invest in his community’s Internet bandwidth. Yet when it comes to corporate welfare, some would have you believe that as long some in society benefit, then you shouldn’t care that the government has been running off with your money – much less running off with your money
OCTOBER 14, 2015 // FLATHEADBEACON.COM
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