California pays $205,075 to move shrub that typically sells for $16

If you wonder why governments in this country are broke, consider their priorities. While taxpayers struggle with bare necessities, California spent close to a quarter of a million dollars to move a shrub.

The story starts in 2009 when an ecologist spotted a bush called Franciscan manzanita in the path of a highway project. The shrub is a common plant that can be bought from commercial nurseries for as little as $15.98. It was formerly fairly common in the San Francisco area, but as the city expanded, examples of it growing wild dwindled. There was still plenty of it in nurseries if you wanted it, but it wasn’t known to be growing wildly in nature as this one random plant was.

After the ecologist spotted the plant in the path of a billion-dollar highway project, three local environmental groups — Wild Equity Institute, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society — filed an emergency petition for protection under the Endangered Species Act.

As a result, an agreement was reached between the Presidio Trust, the California Department of Transportation, the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the California Department of Fish and Game to spend $200,000 to save the bush by transplanting it to another location. About half of the cost was for the actual transplanting, but another $75,000 is for taking care of the shrub for the next 10 years and an additional $25,000 is to pay for paperwork requirements for the plant over the next decade. (You can read the 42-page PDF of the agreement here.)

Keep in mind that it’s tax money — both state and federal — that paid for this project. (The federal money came from one of the rounds of “stimulus” spending.) Do you honestly believe that the people from whom the money was taken would have wanted their money used that way? And since there are some people who honestly see it as worthwhile, why weren’t they spending their money — instead of ours — to do something that’s useless as far as I’m concerned?

This is one of the many things wrong with the current system. People who care passionately about a small issue get their way — and get the rest of us to pay for it. The idea that it’s immoral to forcibly take money from people to pay for things they don’t want to pay for never occurs to these people.

I don’t have any objection to saving this shrub. If you’re fired up about the genetic diversity of plant life in an area, go right ahead and pursue your passion. But don’t pretend that the rest of us have the obligation to pay for what you want. If you want to raise $200,000 to move this plant and pay for it over the next decade, be my guest. It honestly won’t bother me.

Just don’t demand that I pay for what you want.