Thread: Growing West may need fed support

No federal dollars to support "mega-growth" unless you're enforcing immigration laws

Sprawl, anyone?
Growing West may need fed support
"Megapolitan" areas like Arizona's "Sun Corridor" may need megadollars to keep growing
The Associated Press

DENVER - Western cities are developing into "megapolitan" areas that deserve more support from the federal government if they're going to continue to grow, according to a blueprint prepared by the Brookings Institution.

Areas where Western communities are seeking partnerships with the federal government include water, transportation, immigration and energy to provide the labor and supplies needed to continue growing.

According to the Brookings report, the so-called "Mountain Megas" include Las Vegas and surrounding communities, the Wasatch Front in Utah, the Front Range around Denver, the Sun Corridor in Arizona and northern New Mexico.

The report concluded that the Intermountain West, dominated by megapolitan areas, has emerged as America's fastest changing, most surprising urban region that will require the federal government and those communities to develop unique solutions.

"The region is neither the Old West, nor the New West. It is the New New West, continuously unfolding," the report noted.

Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman said one of the biggest challenges will be developing a water policy that works for the entire region, not just one state. He said Nevada is already knocking on Utah's door threatening to take more water.

He said Western states need more electric transmission lines, highways and a workable immigration policy that doesn't harm them.

"We can't do it without federal help," he said.

The report suggests federal incentives would reward communities that work toward regional solutions instead of their own self-interests.

Brandon Scarborough, a researcher for the Political Economy Research Center in Bozeman, Mont., a think tank that promotes free market solutions to problems in the West, said federal programs always come with strings attached that give Washington substantial control.

http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/ss/border/91689.php

Federal government way to highway from Mexico to Canada?

This is the next sale out and government venture with Mexico and Canada.

I wonder

There is still plenty of poverty and unemployment among citizens in the United States. If there is opportunity and needed worker in the "new New West" it should be going to our own citizens then the legal law abiding immigrants not to the people who violated them.

Do they not longer know how to sell a state back bond for say,to built a Electric co-op ? Do these new officials only know how to beg from the feds ? We don't need any bigger government . We need a government , state and local that knows how to work and bid and serve the people . Not the other way around imo .