We learned during President Biden’s 2021 push for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that infrastructure could be whatever Democrats wanted it to be. In September, the Cincinnati city government turned infrastructure into a way to support Kamala Harris.
The Cincinnati Enquirer has the story. Earlier this year, a federal lobbyist for the city communicated to inartful Bengals fan Mayor Aftab Pureval and members of his staff that the Biden administration would like if local projects that benefited from the infrastructure law, passed in late 2021, gave it credit. The city would receive “a ton of goodwill and brownie points” from the administration if it complied, the lobbyist said.
Those with long enough memories may remember that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — the “stimulus package” — got similar treatment, even in the Cincinnati area. Though I cannot recall whether the signage for the “project” I spent the most time driving on at the time, a highway interchange near my high school that seemed to get an extra lane painted onto it (a marginal improvement at best), specifically credited it to Barack Obama.
Pureval himself made the decision to create signs that credited the Biden administration for several projects in the Cincinnati area. When Biden dropped out in favor of Harris, the signs were altered before being put up to include her name. A delegate to the Democratic National Convention who spoke there in praise of the infrastructure law, Purveal has campaigned for Harris. But he told the Enquirer that the decision was not political.
Yet the mayor’s decision has understandably raised eyebrows locally. Its originating with him may have violated the city’s political distribution of power. The $11,500 for the signs was initially taken out of the city’s street-repair fund before it was instead allotted from the city manager’s office. And the optics of the sign design and placement belie Pureval’s claim that his decision was not politically motivated: One email the Enquirer obtained suggested that the signs could come down as soon as November 6 — the day after Election Day.
In totally unrelated news, local governments claim that they don’t have enough money for infrastructure.