[bequanna]

So, instead of an appropriate local bonding ballot initiative (or whatever) to fund this like every other city does, they just throw up their hands and ask for state handouts?

Maybe they are worried about the political implications of rising property taxes or water bills?

Seems like a HUGE failure by an inept local government.

[vineyardmike]

Considering Mississippi is one of the states most reliant on federal aid, I think maybe we should just say the whole state is a failure then? Maybe all of Mississippi should deal with the implications of raising their taxes even more. They’re a red state so I assume a state government official that campaigned to raise taxes wouldn’t win as easily as someone who campaigned to get federal money.

The article i link says they’re getting ~10B from the feds so they’d need add a 15% tax rate on their 3M people earning avg of 25K to pay for that. On top of the 5% they have. Thank god for them 25K income is so low that they only pay federal tax rate of ~12%.

Maybe a poor state that voted against handouts and critiques others from getting outside funding should pay their own way?

Or maybe they’re too poor and need help from the rest of society and we should help them because it’s a kind human thing to do, and not judge them for their poor financial decisions.

https://mspolicy.org/mississippi-no-longer-the-state-most-re...

[bequanna]

> The article i link says they’re getting ~10B from the feds so they’d need a ~15% tax rate on their 3M people earning avg of 25K to pay for that. Thank god for them 25K income is so low that they only pay federal tax rate of ~12%.

Huh? That isn't how that works at all. Cities issue bonds to raise the cash to pay for large projects. Those bonds are paid down over time or not at all if they just pay interest w/ no principle. A 10B project for a metro this size is a pretty manageable expense.

In this case, it seems like the local politicians simply didn't know how to do that or want to as raising taxes might make it difficult to get reelected.

The solution they seem to have arrived at is: Wait until things get so bad that there is a humanitarian crisis and the Feds have to bail us out. Which they will, because we don't want people to suffer without clean water.

So now the rest of us are made suckers as federal taxpayers are on the hook for this mismanagement/scam.

[vineyardmike]

Every year, Mississippi the state takes money from the federal government. Money that they don’t earn through taxes levied. Every state of course does this, but Mississippi is pretty bad on a per person level and on a percent of total budget level. To cover existing budget shortfall they’d need to tax an extra 15% of income for the average resident (6k per person). For comparison California would need an extra $12 per person which is like 0.03% to cover their differences. That should set the scene for how cash strapped the state is.

Considering how dependent the state is on funding, it’s not crazy to imagine that the local municipalities would also be similarly dependent.

Jackson surely knows how to raise bonds. In Dec2021 their water and sewer bond rating was put in the “B” range (Baa) for their existing 200M in debt for the water system.

Mississippi likely just has no more money from their existing population available. And has likely started to run out of availability debt accessible.

Ps: The “rest of us” surely are suckers paying for it, but it looks like we always were. I’m in California and I’d raise my own taxes by $12 just be able to brag to red states that California takes less in “government handouts” than them. But it doesn’t matter. We’re all in one big national union working together to help each other. It doesn’t matter who is paying and who is getting re-elected - those residents need water. And fwiw, it’s not like the fed balances the budget. That’s just “free money” anyways.

[greenie_beans]

do you know anything about jackson's local government, local tax base, the dynamics of power, the surrounding wealthy suburbs, or the extent of how much a repair like this would cost?

here's a primer: - https://mississippitoday.org/2021/11/08/jackson-water-crisis... - https://mississippitoday.org/2021/03/24/why-jacksons-water-s... - https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/a-mississippi-citys-...

[bequanna]

I do know that funding and managing local services like water, sewer, schools, police, fire dept., etc. is the responsibility of the local municipalities.

If you want to argue something else then please explain why local gov't even exists in the first place.

This is a primarily a failure of local government likely due to weak/inept leadership. Just because something like fixing your water supply is politically difficult or expensive doesn't mean you can ignore it.

[greenie_beans]

nobody is ignoring it. please take the time to learn about this situation before making generalizations.

[bequanna]

The situation seems to be: inept local govt refused to pay for services they are responsible for providing because they didn’t want to raise taxes.

So, they begged for outside money (again, for something that is their responsibility) and when that didn’t work stuck by their “do nothing and blame the state” strategy which ultimately created a humanitarian crisis that leaves federal taxpayers on the hook.

Did I miss anything?

[greenie_beans]

here's one example where they've been trying for at least a decade: https://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2013/dec/11/whats-boil...

[greenie_beans]

yeah, you missed pretty much everything.