My favorite politicians are those who are good at solving problems. It really is not helpful to anyone to only read about the terrible opposition political party. We need good ideas to make Virginia an even better place to live!
A good example comes from last week’s paper. A columnist focused on the bad energy situation in Virginia, and how it is all due to the Democrats. Not helpful at all – and how could it even be true as our Governor has been a Republican? Truer is that the Democrats had a plan for lowering future energy costs by passing the Virginia Clean Economy Act, which went nowhere due to the Republican Governor’s opposition. I think it is fair to say that this showed a difference of opinion about the importance of reducing immediate costs (the Republicans) as opposed to reducing future costs (Democrats). With a divided government in Richmond over the past four years, nothing major happened to deal with energy costs even as Virginia kept attracting extremely high users of energy (data centers, etc.). The new legislature and governor are facing a tremendous problem, with demand for energy greatly increasing while new supplies have been developing very slowly. We even will have to pay for high expenses from the past, as we allowed the energy companies to securitize some of their past costs – meaning we allowed a slight rate reduction now (during this Republican administration) to pay energy company expenses over an extended time period. This means that our future electric bills will be higher to pay for energy used long ago.
Let’s respect good ideas from politicians from both parties! For example, one idea being developed would allow local governments to require up to half of new non-residential parking lots to use solar energy producing canopies. Think of a large new supermarket parking lot producing energy and providing shade. Of course, the market owner would have to pay for the canopies, and repayment would occur only over time through the revenue from the panels and (presumably) the increased numbers of shoppers appreciating having some shade during the summer. Another bill being developed would allow for use of small solar panels to be plugged directly into home electrical outlets – providing some energy without involving the local energy provider. One of these ideas is being promoted by a Democrat, and the other by a Republican. It will be good to see the debate on these ideas – representatives from both parties should be able to evaluate, support or oppose these proposals independently. Neither Republicans nor Democrats are only responsible for good ideas, or for bad ideas. Yet, last week’s column claims that new “bad ideas” are sure to come from the Democrats. Much better is to evaluate ideas based on their merits, not political party.
Let’s be hopeful that future columns in this local newspaper will reflect the advantages and disadvantages of proposals. Lately, we are seeing a lot of resistance to solar and wind energy coming from Washington – perhaps the only national government in the entire world not acknowledging the advantages of renewables. But – on the local level – let’s have politicians from both parties evaluate what proposals would mean to their communities. Our local politicians were not elected to repeat national political party positions. We should demand instead that they represent all of us (even those who didn’t vote for them) in coming up with good ideas, working in a bipartisan way, and truly helping our communities.
