Over the last 20 years residents in many parts of Dallas have come to rely upon federal money to help maintain their communities. Federal money has been distributed to organizations such as the Ferguson Road Initiative in Dallas to help support groups like Crime Watch as well as to finance graffiti clean ups, and drug education programs. Money was also used to fight crime through paying for increased police staffing and patrols and to maintain city services that would otherwise suffer for lack of funds. The "Weed and Seed" grants, as they are known, are intended to help weed out drugs and crime and seed the communities with services and projects to foster the bloom of revitalization. The results have been mixed. Many communities have seen a drop in crime and a rise in property values (not always a blessing). Others have not.
The Weed and Seed program was enacted under President George H.W. Bush to revitalize communities through five year grants distributed to foster development and improve services. Some communities are already under their fourth five year grant. For 20 years communities like Far East Dallas have been weeding and seeding. They have pulled roots and tilled the soil. But they still rely on the government to provide the fertilizer and the seeds.
The Weed and Seed program is facing dissolution. Money is tight in Washington and a few corners are being cut. The Weed and Seed program is in one of those corners. In Dallas, of Ferguson Road Initiative's current annual budget of $400,000, $156,000 is from Washington. By many accounts, the Ferguson Road Initiative has done well, just not well enough to make itself irrelevant. Without continued federal funding it will have to cut programs and, even worse, lay people off.
Alice Zaccarello, the executive Director of the Ferguson Road Initiative claims the cuts will impact all of Dallas, not just her neighborhood. "I don't think the general population realizes that when Weed and Seed can reduce crime in high-crime areas, then every other area in the city of Dallas benefits." That might be true under the casuistry that what benefits one benefits all. But in reality of the hundreds of square miles that make up the City of Dallas a drop in crime or up tic in property values in Fergsun Road will be unnoticed.
When groups like the Ferguson Road Initiative in Far East Dallas need federal funds to stay afloat it is a sign that the nation has become overly dependent upon the federal government. This is in part a result of short sighted thinking on the part of the federal and local government. They tend to think in terms of simple dollars and conflate money with results. It is also a result of calculation on the part of many in Washington to bring more and more economic and political activity under the purview of Washington. Federal money is often a snare designed to entrap state and local governments and bring them further into reliance upon Washington.
The Ferguson Road Initiative needs federal money. A lot of people need federal money. The Founding Fathers would be astounded to find that in only a little under 250 years, states and cities have become so enfeebled that they cannot operate without federal support.
