SAMPLE SIX-PART OPINION PIECE:
El Paso Must Die
We must prepare El Paso to die. The stark
truth is that in the coming decades the city we love must either be
put to sleep gently by our own hand, or else it will surely die a
tragic and perhaps violent death in spite of our best efforts.
Unfortunately, in this part of the
world water does not just fall from the sky. Even in a "rainy"
year like 2006, even with recycling and the strictest possible water
rationing, the city cannot possibly meet its essential water needs from
renewable sources. Meanwhile, we are rapidly depleting our fossil aquifers
that were formed during the Ice Ages. When every drop of this
water is finally all pumped
out there will be no more. This will inevitably occur within two to three
decades at present pumping rates, perhaps a bit later if we extend
pipelines deeper into New Mexico and western Texas. Even then, we share local
underground water reserves with Ciudad Juarez, where nearly two million thirsty
people depend on the same dying ecosystem as we do.
As El Pasoans we all love our desert border
region and our unique binational, bicultural community. However,
unlike those who choose to close their eyes to the facts,
responsible El Pasoans are already seeing the handwriting on the wall and know
that we
need to act now by beginning the evacuation of our community before
crisis forces our hand.
The inevitable coming water crisis will wreak
greater havoc on El Paso than earthquakes caused to Haiti.
When water runs out first across the border will a couple million Juarenses sit quietly and die of thirst? Will they peacefully wait
for their own dysfunctional administration to solve the
problem "somehow"? Will they migrate to the impoverished interior of their own
country? Or, will they look northward? And when our own
faucets finally start drying up in El Paso it will be too late! On that day we may envy
the people of Haiti.
True, some people say not to worry because surely
"they" will find "some solution" before our water runs out. These
dreamers suggest that a U.S. government that has been deliberately
weakened and downsized and is deeper in debt than any nation in
history will somehow manage to cough up enough money (or
manage to borrow enough from China!) to build giant
desalinization plants and grand transcontinental pipelines from the
Great Lakes or the West Coast to ship water to thirsty El Paso,
projects that would be bigger and costlier than the Apollo moon
landing or even the Great Wall of China! Others simply refuse
to face the facts. While they may sincerely love El Paso, these people
are tragically mistaken and to follow their leadership will bring
disaster.
Death may come for El Paso in twenty years,
or in thirty, or in fifty, but no matter how positively we think
about it, no matter how hard we try to ignore it, our fate is
already
sealed. It is time to begin the exodus. Construction of
new homes or businesses needs to be absolutely prohibited, starting
today.
Instead of wasting millions on costly projects like campus
construction or downtown renovation, local and state authorities
need to offer whatever money they have left to residents and
businesses to leave El Paso and never return. Youth and families,
business people, workers and professionals all need to start
building new lives elsewhere. Students need to start planning their
dreams in areas with a future, because ours has none. The great
desert liner that is the S.S. El Paso is on the rocks, the deck is
already tilting and the tide is going out--it is time to "abandon
ship" and take to the lifeboats before we all go down with the ship!
OW 1/07 rev 10/12
