We cannot forget. And we face a momentous choice.
Those are powerful points for Metro Atlantans to remember as we trudge on through an unseasonably cold winter, still-mindful of the Jan. 28 icecapade that lassoed our usual way of life to a rough and slippery halt. Mother Nature’s recent wrath delivered a chilly warning that this state and region must become better at both assessing and responding effectively to disruptive weather events.
We cannot forget, even though our political leadership is quietly hoping we will do just that. Our leaders who let us down are likely betting that we will chalk up Snow Jam 2014 as just another one of those Atlanta inconveniences that comes along every decade or so. We should grin and bear it, goes that thinking. And tag up the dismay, the searing cold, the worry, the injuries, the risking of life and health to an Act of God that could not have been prevented – or more effectively handled.
We cannot forget, even as Gov. Nathan Deal has quickly assembled yet another task force to study the storm response and ways to do better next time. State leaders love task forces. They sound and look good.
A task force is not a result, though. Nor is it a substantive change in standard operating procedures. Study groups can only offer up recommendations. Which are too easily shelved and ignored.
That cannot happen this time in our nationally influential region and state. It cannot if for no other reason than that Atlanta and Georgia might not be as lucky the next time weather disaster strikes. Past performance is no predictor of future results, as the financial-sector saying goes. There will be a next time. That we cannot forget.
So we face a choice here in this great metro. One that will impact one way or another this region’s future prospects and prosperity, if not the very lives of Georgians who might fall victim to a ludicrously lackluster response during a future storm.
This choice is whether we can somehow agree on a better way forward – before the next storm slams us. Can we put aside differences petty and substantial and come to realize the merit of building a better way of disaster response? One that actually works next time.
That will first require a new way of thinking about ourselves and our neighbors – and our responsibilities to each other as human beings, business partners, Atlantans and Georgians.
A good result to achieve would be a joint command-and-control apparatus that sweeps in this entire region and state in a way that strengthens how we anticipate and address future storms. Surely we can better coordinate how we assess weather forecasts, communicate when and how to close schools and workplaces, and even how and where we pour salt and sand on roadways. What we’ve just outlined is a force multiplier that’s sorely needed here, as late January’s event proves.
Yet, getting there will prove a tall order for this place where many people react viscerally and negatively to regionalism – which doesn’t even really exist here.
Perhaps thinking about all this as a matter of enlightened self-interest can make the concept more palatable. Consider the words of Adam Smith, the granddaddy of free-market economic theory. In his work, “The Theory of Moral Sentiments,” Smith wrote that, “It is thus that man, who can subsist only in society, was fitted by nature to that situation for which he was made. All the members of human society stand in need of each others assistance, and are likewise exposed to mutual injuries.”
If we can’t get that; if our competing factions simply won’t accept the certain truth that a storm-snarled I-285 cascades trouble from far above Alpharetta to well below Peachtree City, then it will fall to others to make the big decisions for us.
For one, it is a safe bet that competing cities’ chambers of commerce are already working up sales pitches on why job-creators should avoid the Atlanta metro because of weather unpreparedness.
And, as a political matter, Gov. Nathan Deal and other state officials have felt a snow-melting amount of heat over their strikingly sub-par storm response. That’s a good thing, if it can fuel real change.
In our view, if this region can’t get its act together in terms of figuring out a better way to handle future Snow Jams, then that power should land with the state. Meaning the governor and other state leaders would have the final call on when to close schools and roads, or ordering other measures deemed necessary to safeguard at-risk Georgians and aggressively fight storms. If that requires changes in state law, the General Assembly should be prepared to do just that if we insist on ongoing inaction here.
At minimum, this added responsibility will require state officials to greatly step up their game, from prediction to plowing. They should do that anyway.
It should not come to this drastic remedy, however. We should all learn to work better together.
