Don Scott’s letter to woke dogma disguised as civic virtue (“Live a life of vision and courage”) deserves a reality check. The Fountain Hills Town Council was absolutely right to reject the $240,000 federal grant masquerading as a “street safety” initiative.
Why? Because like everything touched by Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), it came with ideological strings attached — climate change mandates, “gender equity” provisions, and “racial justice” nonsense baked into a plan that should have been solely about traffic, not activism. If this grant were truly about safety, we’d see results, but communities that implemented it haven’t seen accidents drop. It’s just a DEI trojan horse wrapped in bureaucratic jargon.
Scott tries to shoehorn Nelson Mandela into this debate, as though the struggle against apartheid has anything to do with forcing more bike lanes (“road diets”) into Fountain Hills. If he wants to talk about South Africa, let’s do it: Post-Mandela policies of racial “equity” have led to land seizures, economic collapse and the rampant killing of white farmers. That’s the inevitable result of DEI — government-sanctioned discrimination under the noble banner of “justice.” Would Mr. Scott be willing to move to South Africa to prove his point?
Fortunately, President Trump is dismantling this institutional rot, banning DEI in federal hiring, contracts and grants. That means towns like ours no longer have to bow to race-based bureaucracies in Washington. When the federal government finally purges this woke mind virus from legislation, we can reconsider infrastructure grants. Until then, Fountain Hills made the only rational choice: reject DEI, reject federal coercion and reject any attempt to turn our town into an ideological testing ground.
Fairness means merit, not racial bean-counting. DEI isn’t inclusion, it’s exclusion wrapped in moral posturing. Fountain Hills was right to say no.
Please send your comments to AzOpinions@iniusa.org. We are committed to publishing a wide variety of reader opinions, as long as they meet our Civility Guidelines.
Share with others
