Takoma Park Invests $300 Billion on Time Machine to Undo $15 Million Library Renovation

TAKOMA PARK, MD – Just weeks before the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the newly completed $15.2 million Takoma Park Library, the City Council announced spending $300 billion to develop a time machine to go back and redesign the project at a lower cost.

“Sure, it’s beautiful and functional,” admitted Ward 1 Councilmember Jessica Landman, “But in hindsight, we could have shaved a couple million, which could have gone to more important things, like funding this time machine.”

The announcement comes amid heated budget talks, with residents demanding spending cuts and lower property taxes. After residents flooded Facebook to relitigate the finished library project, officials decided a $300 billion time machine would be more efficient than holding another public comment session.

“This is a common-sense investment,” said a visibly excited Ward 3 Councilmember Roger Schlegel, who first proposed the idea. “Sure, $300 billion sounds like a lot right now, but if we are successful in traveling back in time, not only will we save $15 million, but also, it technically makes spending $300 billion never happen. That’s a total savings of $300,015,000,000!”

Schlegel also announced his personal plans to use the time machine to travel back to 1985 to obtain an architecture degree to commission the design to himself. “I’ll invent a new type of architecture that won’t have any of those expensive and unnecessary structural walls,” he said while sketching over the approved library plans with a black Sharpie. “I’ll even bring back construction crews from the past who will gladly work for 1980’s wages.”

To mitigate the obvious dangers of tampering with the past, the Council unanimously approved the creation of a Butterfly Effect Task Force. This 17-person panel — made up of local “experts,” philosophy majors, and an amateur sci-fi novelist — will analyze how even tiny changes might cascade into catastrophic new futures.

Questions already under review by the task force include:

• If the Roscoe statue had been built facing south instead of north, would the co-op have become a Whole Foods?
• If a Councilmember in 1974 had chosen Pepsi over Tab, would Takoma Park have been declared a nuclear-free zone?
• If Takoma Park legalized dispensaries in the 90’s, would residents be complaining about a grass lawn in front of the library today?

“We’re not saying the time machine is a sure thing,” said Councilmember Landman, “But if it works, just imagine: no expensive library, fewer listserv arguments, and maybe, just maybe, we can prevent burritos from costing $19.”

An exasperated City Manager Robert DiSpirito reminded the City Council of their legal requirement to adopt a balanced budget, and that given that Takoma Park only nets about $30 million in annual revenue, it would take 10,000 years to pay down a $300 billion project. “Not to mention that we asked the contractor to give us a ‘Takoma Park’ price quote,” DiSpirito added, “which, as everyone knows, automatically triples when you say the word ‘progressive.’”

At press time, engineers working on the time machine had already requested another $50 billion because “we realized you can’t build a flux capacitor fueled entirely on homebrew kombucha that is constructed of 100% recycled compostable materials.”