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Weekend Reading 3/3/17

Serena

Former Grist staff writer Brentin Mock (now with CityLab) wrote an excellent article for Outside Magazine on the imperative for traditional green organizations to adopt racial justice as a central priority to their work. Doing so, he argues, is the only way to right these groups’ racist legacy and to remain relevant and powerful into the future.

My new morning mindfulness practice? Taking a minute each morning to ponder Dictonary.com’s Word of the Day. I find a weird calm and focus in contemplating a single word, as well as outsized joy in learning each one’s etymology (pro tip: there’s an app!). Some recent favorites: ataraxia, kanone, feinschmecker, bonzer, craquelure, fress, and scapegrace. I follow this up with reading aloud The Poetry Foundation’s Poem of the Day, and my word-nerd heart is momentarily content.

Alan

Last week, I read Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow. This week, I read the late Harvard Law Professor William J. Stuntz’s book The Collapse of American Criminal Justice, an incisive, provocative, and impossible-to-politically-pigeonhole survey of mass incarceration in the United States. The latter sometimes contradicts but often complements the former. It’s a scholarly survey of the ways that mass incarceration took over in the United States. It lays out a series of changes that sometimes intentionally and sometimes unintentionally malformed American criminal law and enforcement into its current punitive, racially disparate, not-very-just, and not-very-good-at-crime-prevention form: Supreme Court rulings over the decades that enshrined procedural protections for defendants but left substantive questions of criminal law untouched; suburbanization of the electorate for county prosecutors (and jury pools) that diluted the political weight of high-crime urban neighborhoods; the codification and endless proliferation of criminal statutes by legislatures that give discretion and power to prosecutors but remove most compensating discretion from judges and juries; the soaring rate of plea bargains occasioned by those changes, to where 96 percent of US felony convictions are from plea bargains, not trials; the use of drug and weapons charges as easier-to-prove proxies for violent crime charges; and more. A friendly critic reviewed Stuntz’s book here (providing a great synopsis).

I also read Race, Incarceration, and American Values (2008 MIT Press), which captures an extended academic lecture on mass incarceration by economist Glenn Loury, along with responses from three other scholars of the subject. Short, beautiful, learned arguments about an immense injustice.

This preliminary survey of state prison directors tentatively suggests, meanwhile, that—although US prisons house ten times more people with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and other severe mental illnesses (SMIs) than do psychiatric care facilities—at least the use of solitary confinement for those with SMI may be less widespread than previously believed. Or it may have diminished. Perhaps 30 or 40 percent of the general prison population suffers SMI, according to previous studies. This survey found a lower number of just 8 percent and, fortunately, the number of prisoners with SMIs in solitary confinement was a tenth as high.

Clark

The New Yorker’s Elizabeth Kolbert has taken a though-provoking but sobering review of recent literature on the many flaws in human reason: our overconfidence in our own opinions; our resistance to changing our minds, even when confronted with overwhelming evidence that we’re wrong; our joy both in reading evidence that supports our preconceived notions and in rejecting ideas that conflict with them.  Much of the blame, according to some researchers, can be traced to our evolutionary past: our powers of “reasoning,” these researchers posit, were designed to enforce social conformity and win power struggles rather than discern truths about the world.  As Kolbert puts it, “Habits of mind that seem weird or goofy or just plain dumb from an ‘intellectualist’ point of view prove shrewd when seen from a social ‘interactionist’ perspective.”

Eric

I also highly recommend Elizabeth Kolbert’s latest at the New Yorker, “Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds.” She examines some of the copious evidence that we, all of us, form strong beliefs in completely irrational ways, but she also suggests a potential remedy: people who are asked to provide detailed explanations for their beliefs tend to reduce their intensity.

Related, at Foreign Policy, David Rothkopt takes aim not at the so-called “deep state” but at the emerging “shallow state.” Speaking of its supporters he writes:

…are threatened by what they don’t understand, and what they don’t understand is almost everything. Indeed, from evolution to data about our economy to the science of vaccines to the threats we face in the world, they reject vast subjects rooted in fact in order to have reality conform to their worldviews. They don’t dig for truth; they skim the media for anything that makes them feel better about themselves. To many of them, knowledge is not a useful tool but a cunning barrier elites have created to keep power from the average man and woman. The same is true for experience, skills, and know-how. These things require time and work and study and often challenge our systems of belief. Truth is hard; shallowness is easy.

His argument is most forceful when he zeros in on the meaning of slashing federal funding for the arts and humanities:

Art is not an adornment to society. It is not a luxury. It is the purpose of society. It becomes our legacy. It is also, however, our teacher; it helps us consider that which is around us and what we want to be. It makes demands on us that in turn lead us to place demands on ourselves and those with whom we live and work.

As an antidote, perhaps, this video of Mr. Rogers defending his program before the US Senate in 1969 is very much worth watching. There’s more decency and kindness on display in 5 minutes there than it feels like I’ve seen in several months.

Anna

Mars and Venus, you say? Here’s a refreshing—and apparently exhaustive and incisive—study of the cultural constructions of gender difference, by Aussie academic Cordelia Fine, who dissects why they’re wrong and how we got them in the first place. She apparently pulls no punches and is funny to wit. This book is going on my to-read list for sure. Meanwhile, the review by Annie Murphy Paul is a treat, too:

If you hear a metallic rasp as you open the cover of Cordelia Fine’s new book, don’t be alarmed. It’s just the sound of the author sharpening her knives, the better to carve up the carcass of what she calls ‘Testosterone Rex’: the big, scaly body of assumptions, preconceptions, conjectures and distortions regarding ‘what men are like’ and ‘what women are like.’ Fine takes on this king of all biases with admirable vigor, and it’s a pleasure—albeit a strenuous one—to follow the action as she dismembers the beast.

Based on findings from a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, the red and blue divide among American voters looks to be nothing compared to the split in attitudes between young and old. “The divided opinions on Donald Trump’s young presidency are well known, but the gulf between those in the millennial and baby boomer age groups are stark and may hold the biggest long-term political impact.”

These stark differences in attitudes are all the more reason to listen to my strategic communication hero, Anat Shenker-Osorio, who reminds us to stop watering down messages to try to please everybody. You wind up pleasing no one and sounding like you don’t really have a strong position at all. Anat writes: “The problem with a message that attempts to turn no one off is that it cannot fire up the most enthusiastic believers. Messaging based on mitigating backlash must pull punches. The base may nod along. But they won’t be parroting your words to others.” Here’s my quick-reference cheat sheet on Anat’s strategy.

Seattleites, put on your walking shoes: there’s a #BlackLivesMatter March For Freedom, Saturday (March 4th) at 6 pm, starting at Seattle Central Community College.

Kristin

A recent Vox headline declares “voters really are less likely to vote for minority candidates.” But the voters described are not general election voters; they are Illinois Republican primary voters. Primary voters in the US tend to be whiter, older, and wealthier than general election voters. Indeed, digging into the study reveals that Illinois Republican primary voters are 97 percent white, have a mean age of 60, and live in higher-income neighborhoods. So an alternative headline could have been: Primary voters are mostly white and are more likely to vote for white candidates, giving general election voters fewer choices.

It turns out, health insurance is really complicated. But we keep debating the simple question of “who should pay?” when we should be asking:

  • Whom do we pay?
  • How do we pay them?
  • For what, exactly, are we paying?

Health insurance and health care should be so much better than what we have in the United States. Maybe our leaders will get tired of running into a wall and start asking better questions.

You may have heard me say we should all have a basic income. Now, thanks to GiveDirectly, thousands of people in Kenya are going to get one for two or twelve years, and the rest of us are going to get to see how well it works.

Is constitutional democracy in danger?

It was once thought that when a reasonably wealthy country achieved democracy, it would almost certainly maintain it. No more.

Democratic backsliding is far less rare than political scientists used to believe. In a recent academic paper, we identified 37 instances in 25 different countries in the postwar period in which democratic quality declined significantly (though a fully authoritarian regime didn’t emerge). That is, roughly one out of eight countries experienced measurable decay in the quality of their democratic institutions.

Scholars used to argue that democracy, once attained in a fairly wealthy state, would become a permanent fixture. As the late Juan Linz put it, democracy would become “the only game in town.” That belief turned out to be merely hopeful, not a reality.

John

Concerning the “deregulatory fever” in our nation’s capital, I have my own suggestion on a way to reduce the number of regulations and improve protections for public health simultaneously: one could consider each food-use of a pesticide as a separate regulation because each allowed use has its own “tolerance,” an allowed concentration of a given pesticide on a food item. In fact, the most recent set of federal regulations lists over 80 tolerances for just Chlorpyrifos and/or its toxic metabolites on food items. In other words, entirely revoking food uses for Chlorpyrifos would clearly boost protections for workers and the general public, plus it would effectively eliminate 80 regulations at a stroke, thereby allowing EPA to issue 40 more protections for health or the environment.

Are readers aware that a small discrepancy in the measurement of an astronomical “constant” may require fine-tuning the “standard model” of the universe? Details, including some cool Hubble telescope photos, here.

John Abbotts is a former Sightline research consultant who occasionally submits material for Weekend Reading and other posts.

What Would Multi-Member Districts Look Like in Oregon?

If you’re a conservative in Portland or a progressive in Crowley, you may be used to feeling like your state senator or representative doesn’t share your values and views, and you therefore have less of a voice in Salem.

But what if we could change that? “Multi-member districts” could help do just that, providing more candidate options for voters and a legislature that better represents the diverse political views of Oregonians—and that cooperates across shared values and ideas, rather than party lines, to get things done.

Senior researcher Kristin Eberhard recently testified before Oregon’s Redistricting Task Force to discuss what that would look like for Oregon. View her presentation and the rich Q&A that followed below.

Find the full meeting video from the Oregon State Legislature online here.

 

Returning Seattle to Its Roots in Diverse Housing Types

Multi-unit housing in single-family zones map by OpenStreetMap Contributors and Carto (license)

Editor’s note, 5/10/19: An earlier version of this article featured maps of single-family zones in Seattle from 1923-2014 that had inaccurate information. The maps have been removed. We will publish corrected maps in the near future and link to them here.

This is the story of a single city block in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood. It’s a picturesque, tree-lined rectangle, located just north of Gasworks Park. It’s bordered by North 36th and 37th Streets and Burke and Meridian Avenues.

The city has zoned the block single-family, allowing only one detached home per lot (plus accessory dwelling units, should residents choose to build them). Under this zoning, this little block should only be able to host 24 households–one per parcel. Yet in reality, the block provides shelter for 37 households, more than one-and-a-half times its zoned capacity.

Under today’s zoning code, these thirteen additional households, likely including over 27 Seattleites, would have had to compete for housing elsewhere in the city or leave Seattle altogether, perhaps taking on longer commutes to hold down their jobs. Instead, members of these households can walk to Gasworks Park and the Burke-Gilman Trail, two of Seattle’s best-loved public spaces. They live within one block of an Italian restaurant, a salon, a church, and a local chocolatier, within two blocks of a bus stop, and within three blocks of a grocery store. Not only can they patronize these local businesses, supporting their neighborhood’s unique flavor and charm, they can do so on foot, allowing them to shrink their carbon footprint.

To what do these 13 households owe their housing in this coveted neighborhood?

To Seattle’s zoning history. The block includes 5 duplexes, a quadplex, and a 6-unit apartment building, which together host these 13 additional households.

Here’s the catch, though: none of these structures could be built today. They are remnants of the neighborhood’s more flexible zoning history, which permitted a greater diversity of housing types, making room for more people to enjoy and bring life to this corner of Seattle.

Detail from Sightline map; in this image, green polygons represent duplexes, and yellow polygons represent structures with four or more units.

In December, Sightline published a map (also linked at the head of this article) displaying all of the multi-unit homes in Seattle’s single-family neighborhoods. These almost 10,000 homes include ‘plexes—duplexes, triplexes, and quadplexes—townhomes, and accessory dwelling units (ADUs), and they provide housing for about an additional 12,000 people who call the Emerald City home. Had these multi-family units not existed, these 12,000-odd people would be looking for housing elsewhere in the area, bidding up prices in an already expensive city.

Yet all but the ADUs are now illegal to build in single-family zones. As I pointed out in our accompanying article, most of the units on the map are relics of Seattle’s zoning past. In this article, I’ll trace the zoning history that made these homes possible. Multi-family homes already deeply ingrained in Seattle’s neighborhoods. But the irony of Seattle’s zoning history is that its zoning code has clamped down on the city’s housing capacity even while housing demand has skyrocketed.

Related: Seattle's single-family neighborhoods already include thousands of duplexes.

Why does this all matter? Because Seattle now has the chance to once again open its single-family zones to a broader mix of housing, including duplexes and triplexes. Returning the city to its more flexible zoning past could provide housing for thousands of additional families.

Memoir of a city block

The Wallingford block highlighted above—which is typical of its neighborhood, not an exception—hosted all but one of its multi-family structures prior to 1920. This reflects a larger pattern: Seattleites built over half of the three-thousand-odd ‘plexes currently standing in the city’s single-family zones prior to 1923. That was the year Seattle published its first zoning ordinance, placing the first of a long succession of restrictions on homebuilding across the city.

Here are early images of some of the street’s multi-family units from the King County Assessor’s archives:



This first zoning code was relatively simple, containing just six zoning types, only two of which were residential. It designated between a quarter and a third of the city as “first residence districts.” First residence districts were the predecessor to today’s single-family zone; within these districts, builders could only construct single-family, detached homes, and a few non-residential buildings (like schools, churches, and art galleries). City planners grandfathered existing ‘plexes into these newly designated areas, but prohibited new buildings of these types. The majority of first residence districts fell closer to the city’s north and south edges. (At the time, Seattle’s northern boundary was North 85th Street; it’s since moved north to 145th Street.)

Our Wallingford block fell into the other residential zone category defined in this first zoning ordinance—the “second residence district.” This zone type covered less than a quarter of the city, but was much more flexible than the first residence district. Property owners could develop any type of residential dwelling in these areas, from single-family homes to duplexes to apartment buildings. Planners located almost all of this zoning type closer to the city’s downtown core. As a result, neighborhoods closer to the city center today have a much broader diversity of housing choices than neighborhoods located farther from downtown.

Here’s an image of our block from the city’s first zoning maps. The maps indicated second residence districts with diagonal hash marks.


In 1956, the block saw the construction of its last multi-family housing structure, the six-unit apartment building at the corner of 36th and Meridian. This building snuck in just under the wire, as the following year the city downzoned this block as part of its first major zoning code overhaul.

The 1957 zoning ordinance included a new set of zoning classifications, downzoned many second residence districts, and designated an even greater percentage of the city as exclusively available to single-family, detached homes.

Our Wallingford block was a part of this city-wide downzoning process and was rezoned into a new zoning type called “residential duplex.” Duplex zones were a half-step between first and second residence zones, as they permitted duplexes and some triplexes, but not other multi-family housing, like small apartment buildings.

Later zoning ordinances further downzoned most of these duplex zones, until the code completely did away with the evolved version of this zoning type, the lowrise duplex/triplex zone, in 2011. Here is an image of our Wallingford block wearing its new residential duplex zone (RD) label in the city’s 1960 zoning maps.

The story ends in 1980 when our block received its final downzone, this time to its current zoning classification: single-family. This corresponded with the city council’s second major facelift to the city’s zoning. That year, the council updated the requirements for many of the zoning types and continued to expand the share of the city limited to single-family houses.

Since 1980, the block’s housing capacity has remained fixed, despite a nearly 40 percent increase in the city’s population. Though the city permits the construction of ADUs in the neighborhood, none of the block’s residents has chosen to build one yet. They’ve likely been discouraged by the complex regulations that govern ADU construction in Seattle. The housing story of this single block mirrors Seattle’s broader housing story, in which ever more complicated zoning regulations have progressively strangled housing choices and capacity for the increasing number of families and individuals who need them more than ever.

The 90-year creep of single-family zoning across Seattle

The Emerald City has witnessed a slow but steady creep of single-family zoning across its landscape. In 1923, single-family zoning covered roughly one-third of the (geographically smaller) city. Today, this zoning type consumes more than half of Seattle. As the city council downzoned larger and larger tracts of Seattle to single-family status, it grandfathered existing multi-family buildings into these areas but prohibited the construction of any more of them.

The graph below sorts the multi-family dwellings currently standing in Seattle’s single-family zones, excluding ADUs, by the year in which they were built. With the exception of a spike during World War II, the number of multi-family dwellings standing today in single-family zones that date from each decade drops over time, as zoning became ever more restrictive across the city. These numbers understate how many were built, especially in earlier decades, because they ignore ‘plexes that were subsequently torn down. Every one torn down had to be replaced with the only thing legal: a single-family house.

Original Sightline Institute graphic, available under our free use policy.

ADUs: More homes… if less red tape

Accessory dwelling units (ADUs) are the only additional dwelling unit the city currently permits on lots in single-family zones. The city permits the construction of ADUs inside or alongside detached, single-family homes. The city legalized attached ADUs in 1994 and brought detached ones (DADUs) into the fold in 2009. Since 1995, homeowners have added nearly 1,500 of them to the city’s housing supply. Over this two-decade period, building of ADUs has trended upward.

Original Sightline Institute graphic, available under our free use policy.

Still, regulatory barriers thwart much ADU construction, and growth in this type of multi-family dwelling has been glacial. Though the 1,500 additional homes property owners have added to the city through ADU construction have brought a range of benefits to those lucky enough to call them home, barely one percent of the city’s single-family lots have a secondary unit, lagging far behind Vancouver, BC, where more than a third of single-family homes make space for another tenant.

The real promise of reopening single-family zones

Seattle’s Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (HALA) recommends reopening Seattle’s single-family zones to a broader mix of housing, including duplexes, triplexes, and rowhouses. Some Seattle residents have viewed this recommendation as a threat to the character of Seattle’s single-family neighborhoods. Yet, as we’ve seen in the history of a typical block in the Wallingford neighborhood, duplexes, triplexes, and other multi-family homes have been a part of many of Seattle’s single-family neighborhoods for much longer than some of their single-family homes—and far longer than most residents. Indeed, the city grew up with these housing choices.

The HALA report also recommends increasing the supply of ADUs and DADUs by removing code barriers that hinder construction of these units. Though ADU construction has been gradually on the rise over the last two decades, Seattle lags far behind other Cascadian cities in incorporating this housing type into its landscape. As we covered in a previous article, ADUs allowed many neighborhoods in Vancouver, BC, to achieve a density at which neighborhood stores could thrive, more transit options became viable, and car ownership became less necessary—all while preserving the architectural feel of the neighborhood. Take a look at the street view images of some of the ADUs on the map and you’ll see the same: the ADUs are hard to see from the street, yet each one has given another person or family access to a neighborhood blooming with potential.

Reopening some of Seattle’s single-family zoned land to these housing choices would offer people more options when looking for housing, making this Wallingford block a model for the future of the Emerald City. As in this corner of the city, duplexes, triplexes, and ADUs could offer residents the ability to choose a smaller space and still enjoy the benefits of a walkable neighborhood. They could offer more families access to the city’s top schools and parks, most of which are in exclusive, single-family neighborhoods. These housing options could also grow the vibrancy of many neighborhoods, permitting them to house enough residents to support local businesses, restaurants, and frequent transit. Housing choices benefit not just those they shelter by meeting a range of housing needs, but also the neighborhoods they become a part of, bringing diversity and vibrancy to their communities.

 

Thanks to map maker Jeffrey Linn of Spatialities for his tireless work to make this map as accurate as possible.

Also thank you to CartoDB for providing Sightline with a grant to use its map hosting services.

Note 3/9/17: The four maps showing the growth of single-family zoning in Seattle since 1923 show the overarching story of this zoning type in the Emerald City, but may not be precise down to the city-block level. We are currently working on a block-by-block review of the city’s zoning history. Stay tuned for publication of this piece later this year.”

 

Weekend Reading 2/24/17

Migee

My son is two-and-a-half years old and very inquisitive. Lately, he’s been talking about and asking about death. It started with the knowledge that his dad’s cat had died and me having to explain to him what “died” meant. He said it so matter-of-factly one time right in front of his dad, it was jarring for him to hear. We, as a culture, do not teach children about or prepare them for death. Like sex, it’s a taboo subject that people prefer to avoid or use unhelpful euphemisms for. I don’t use pet names for private parts—like many do—and as such, I was happy that my colleague Meaghan shared this article with me. Both sex ed and death ed should be part of what we teach our kids, IMHO.

Like many post-election, I have been calling and writing my representatives, spending too much time on Facebook, and continuing to turn over in my mind the fact that we transitioned from Barack Obama to Donald Trump. I’ve moved on from the shell-shocked phase to the action-oriented phase, but my brain is still struggling to reconcile all of the things that needed to be true about our country and political system and values to get us here. I’m heartened by all of the “real” conversations about race that have been born out of the election results, but as bell hooks writes, “The sexism is so deeply, deeply embedded. If you think about public discourses on race in this past year, where are the big public discourses on feminism? They don’t exist.” There has been hardly a peep about sexism, feminism, or patriarchy. I think there needs to be. 2020 or bust.

YAY LEGO! One more reason to love this time-honored, amazing toy. They are finally going to move away from plastic and design a more sustainable version of itself. I have loved these toys since I was little and have enjoyed introducing my own kid to the hand-me-down duplos (younger kiddo version of Legos) but I was pleased to read that they are in for a redesign.

Eric

At The Guardian, Pankaj Mishra takes a long look at the “age of anger” indicated by Brexit and Trump. He argues that our dominant intellectual model—rationalist, economically liberal, democracy-focused—is failing to grasp what’s happening around the world politically because it incorrectly insists on viewing people as motivated primarily by material self-interest.

At Science, Warren Cornwall explains why the demise of the federal stream protection rule won’t revitalize the coal industry.

Alan

Seven years after I started the first chapter, I finally went back and read the entirety of Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, which argues that mass incarceration functions as a system of racial control comparable in salient respects to the old Jim Crow. I found it about 75 percent convincing. My few skepticisms lined up well with this friendly critique by James Forman, Jr.

So far, ten candidates have signed up for Seattle’s Democracy Voucher program; two have already qualified to participate by gathering hundreds of signatures and $10 contributions from Seattle residents; and more than 4,000 vouchers have been turned in so far by more than 1,000 Seattle residents. An encouraging start toward the program’s goals—to allow candidates to run campaigns with little or no dialing for dollars from the donor class and to allow a wider diversity of candidates to run competitive campaigns. (Unfortunately, I got all this information from a briefing, so I can’t provide a link for further reading.)

Asymmetries in the composition of Congressional districts and the US Senate mean that the obstructionist strategy that conservatives used against the previous administration will not work for progressives against the current one, this article argues.

This long blog post describes a phenomenon that fascinates me: many things—health care, education, housing, transit infrastructure, for example—cost many times more than they used to, and it’s hard to figure out why. Sometimes the sustainability agenda, as opposed to the left or right agenda, is about how to dramatically reduce costs.

And this essay on Americans’ attitude toward housing is well worth reading: “The point of this thought experiment is… to open our eyes to the negatives of the national obsession of owning a home, expecting its value to rise, and using the levers of local government to keep neighborhoods as they are.”

Event: Contemplating “The Future of Ice”

What does climate change look like in Cascadia? And what can we do about it? Six experts will discuss these questions and more at next weekend’s “Future of Ice Series: Conversations about a Positive Future.” This free and open-to-the-public panel discussion will provide a grounding in the local impacts and opportunities present in the global challenge of climate change.

Sightline policy director Eric de Place will detail the story of the Thin Green Line as part of Saturday’s conversation. Event moderators will be Eric Steig, Professor of Atmospheric Science at the University of Washington, and Gwyn Howat, Executive Vice President of the Mt. Baker Ski Area.

The Future of Ice Series: Conversations about a Positive Future

  • When: Saturday, March 4 – Sunday, March 5, at 2:00 PM both days
  • Where: Mt. Baker Ski Area, Deming, WA (map), Raven Hut (area map)
  • Who: Saturday
    • Cecilia Bitz, Ph.D., Professor of Atmospheric Science, University of Washington
    • Eric de Place, Policy Director, Sightline Institute
    • Claudia Frere-Anderson, Director of Sustainability, University of Washington
  • Who: Sunday
    • Sharon Shewmake, Assistance Professor, College of Business & Economics, Western Washington University
    • Derek Long, Director, Sustainable Connections
    • Rachel Vasak, Executive Director, Nooksack Salmon Enhancement Association
  • Tickets: This event is free and open to the public.

More information about the event and panelists can be found here.

Why To Say “Protections,” Not “Regulations”

Original Sightline Institute graphic, available under our free use policy.

Quite a while back I wrote about how the Environmental Protection Agency should be renamed the Environmental Protection Army, with the idea that the name might prompt people to take its role in protecting American people more seriously—on a par with the way they see (and fund, staff, and empower) the military.

Call it what we will, it’s time now again to revisit the reasons majorities of Americans of all political stripes believe in a strong EPA. In a recent Reuters poll, just 19 percent of US voters said they would like to see the agency “weakened or eliminated,” while a robust 60 percent favor keeping it as is or strengthening it under incoming President Donald Trump.

I’m not holding my breath for “Agency” to be replaced with “Army.” But the words we use to talk about the EPA and what it does matter. As George Lakoff reminds us, for example, we should always say protections not regulations. As the cognitive linguist and political strategy guru explains:

The term “regulation” is framed from the viewpoint of corporations and other businesses. From their viewpoint, “regulations” are limitations on their freedom to do whatever they want no matter who it harms. But from the public’s viewpoint, a regulation is a protection against harm done by unscrupulous corporations seeking to maximize profit at the cost of harm to the public.

Imagine our minority President saying out loud that he intends to get rid of 75% of public protections. Imagine the press reporting that. Imagine the New York Times, or even USA Today headline: Trump to Eliminate 75% of Public Protections. Imagine the media listing, day after day, the protections to be eliminated and the harms to be faced by the public.

The Environmental Protection Agency is about just that—protections that keep people safe from harm. It’s not just about wildlife and habitats—though protecting the people we love and our way of life involves safeguarding the places we live, all the natural places we share, and our water and air, the atmosphere, and planet.

Top takeaways:

  • Always say “protections” instead of “regulations.”
  • Remember: Protections emphasizes the viewpoint of people—the public—instead of the corporate viewpoint.
  • Remember: Regulations is abstracted policy-speak. Protections is plain language, accurate, and simple.
  • Give real, concrete examples that people can relate to—and that we rely on: keeping lead out of our drinking water; making sure our rivers and streams are safe to fish and swim in; preventing oil spills; keeping our food free of harmful pesticides.

Who said it best? “The EPA is here because the American people demanded it. We stand between pollution and our people.” Find out here.

 

Weekend Reading 2/17/17

Anna

Don’t stand between a baby and its mama. This mantra goes for wild animals, of course—polar bears come to mind; don’t mess with them—but humans too as it turns out. Here’s an excellent snapshot of the many powerful ways moms—and women in general—are motivated and activated around climate protections.

Speaking of mamas and their babies, David Hochschild, the environmental commissioner on the California Energy Commission and an architect of Proposition B, San Francisco’s successful $100 million solar initiative, makes the case for moving the needle on climate concern and solutions in the way that campaigns mainstreamed marriage equality. “I think there’s actually some lessons for the climate movement in what happened with marriage equality, because they framed the movement in terms of love: Government has no place to get between two people who love each other,” he said. “I actually think climate change is the same thing. It’s about loving the next generation, and I think that is a good way to think about it.” You can watch his talk here.

And Haley Littleton has a beautiful essay on love as a framework for environmental involvement.

(And PS, I wouldn’t have read that one if I weren’t a follower of @Sightline on Twitter. Just sayin’.)

And please take a moment to watch this short clip of the many people who came to a livestream event in Ithaca, NY, on Inauguration Day as part of ACLU Nationwide‘s initiative to encourage citizens to stand and be counted, declaring their personal commitment to the Constitution. It’s powerful. (Full disclosure: This film features one of my favorite relations, my dad’s cousin, and is made by his brilliant wife and her outfit PhotoSynthesis Productions.) #peoplesoath

Eric

It’s not too early to start making your summer vacation plans. I, for one, will be in the Central Oregon desert at 10 am on August 21 when the first total solar eclipse in the United States in 26 years will race across the Northwest. Before you go, however, you are required to read Annie Dillard’s magnificent essay, “Total Eclipse,” about the 1979 episode near Yakima, Washington. It feels sacrilegious to excerpt her, but I’ll do it anyway:

I had seen a partial eclipse in 1970. A partial eclipse is very interesting. It bears almost no relation to a total eclipse. Seeing a partial eclipse bears the same relation to seeing a total eclipse as kissing a man does to marrying him, or as flying in an airplane does to falling out of an airplane. Although the one experience precedes the other, it in no way prepares you for it…

“Look at Mount Adams,” I said, and that was the last sane moment I remember.

I turned back to the sun. It was going. The sun was going, and the world was wrong. The grasses were wrong; they were platinum. Their every detail of stem, head, and blade shone lightless and artificially distinct as an art photographer’s platinum print. This color has never been seen on earth…

From all the hills came screams. A piece of sky beside the crescent sun was detaching. It was a loosened circle of evening sky, suddenly lighted from the back. It was an abrupt black body out of nowhere; it was a flat disk; it was almost over the sun. That is when there were screams. At once this disk of sky slid over the sun like a lid. The sky snapped over the sun like a lens cover. The hatch in the brain slammed.

The full piece is contained in her book of essays Teaching a Stone to Talk.

It’s almost a year old now, but I highly recommend this piece at Breitbart—yes, that Breitbart—by Allum Bokhari and Milo Yiannopoulos about what the alt-right is and is not. Among my 2017 resolutions is to read more widely, especially un-redacted original pieces by people I strongly disagree with. Curiously, I found that I didn’t object to every point they make (just the vast majority of them).

I can’t stop laughing about this brilliant PSA-style ad campaign for YIMBYs: “it’s time to talk about zoning.”

Sightline alum Samir Junejo just published an intriguing equity analysis of toxic sites in Washington and how the state regulates (and taxes) them. It’s important research from climate justice group Front and Centered.

The fact that he is, to me, always “Omar from The Wire” goes to the heart of the question that the actor Michael K. Williams wrestles with in this brilliant short video at the Atlantic.

Kristin E.

The secret of Nordic democratic socialism: a deep commitment to equality and democracy. Because you can’t really have one without the other. Combining the best of capitalism and socialism, Scandinavian countries make capitalism cooperative and “redistribute equitably the wealth it helps to produce.” Sigh.

Mr. Money Mustache, one of my favorite bloggers, just read a book about urban planning. He retired at 30 through “badass” frugality, and he has some advice for American cities: spending almost half our tax dollars paving over our living spaces or dealing with the consequences of the isolated sedentary lifestyle resulting from paving over our living spaces is not a good use of money.

Aven

There’s so much in the news these days that’s depressing, so I’ve made a habit of seeking out some positive news to try and counterbalance the despair a little. This week I learned that Rhinoceroses, although they are still doing poorly in Africa and Indonesia, are actually making a comeback in Nepal. The country just announced its fourth consecutive zero-poaching year, and the program is being explored as a model for other extremely endangered species, like tigers and elephants. Besides preventing poaching, the program gives money to local communities to promote economic development as well as conservation. I hope governments and NGOs alike are taking notes.

In more local news, independent bookstores are joining the resistance.

Kristin G.

I’ve always been a bit curious about substitute teachers, even as a youngster. Who are they? Where do they come from? These questions were always followed by the hope that we would skip the math lesson and watch Voyage of the Mimi instead.

What I didn’t realize is that there are many complications that can occur when a teacher needs to find a sub. Is a lesson plan ready? Are there even any subs available? One startup may be in a unique position to help schools have broader access to a new type of substitute teacher. Parachute Teachers helps connect schools to community members interested in bringing their talents into the classrooms. Will it work? Perhaps one day we’ll find out.

The No DAPL Movement: New Shapes, New Fronts

Editor’s note: The following is a guest article by Mark Trahant, originally published at TrahantReports.com. Mark is the Charles R. Johnson Endowed Professor of Journalism at the University of North Dakota, a Sightline board member, an independent journalist, and a member of The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes. He has been closely following events around the Dakota Access Pipeline for months. Find him on Twitter at @TrahantReports.

The Trump administration has been in office for less than a month, and already construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline is again proceeding. Company officials say oil will be flowing by June.

Yes, there is a flurry of activity around the Dakota Access Pipeline, a project that has cost more than $3.8 billion and that aims to transfer oil from North Dakota to markets in Illinois and beyond.

But every action to build the pipeline is met with many more reactions to stop it. The fight about this pipeline—and the broader issues it represents—is far from over.

The fight about this pipeline—and the broader issues it represents—is far from over.
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Of course, some days it does not seem that way. The US Army Corps of Engineers approved the final easement for the pipeline to cross under the Missouri River and complete the project. The Corps also withdrew its ongoing environmental review, citing President Trump’s executive memorandum. But that begs a huge question for the courts: Can a president do that? Is an order from the president (along with previous environmental findings from the Corps) enough to satisfy the law? That question will be sorted out by the courts.

And there are many other challenges to the pipeline. A press release from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe said if the construction is successful, “the tribe will seek to shut the pipeline operations down.” The tribe has also called for a march next month in the nation’s capital.

“Our fight is no longer at the North Dakota site itself,” said tribal chairman Dave Archambault II. “Our fight is with Congress and the Trump administration. Meet us in Washington on March 10.”

In addition, there remain water protectors near the construction site itself, as well as a massive cleanup of where people were camping in flood-prone areas.

What’s clear about the “what’s next?” question is that the battle against the Dakota Access Pipeline is taking a very different form. It’s also getting a new start because there will be many more actions as the administration and oil-related corporations move to restart the Keystone XL pipeline, or in Canada, the Kinder Morgan pipeline.

President Trump lives in a world where none of this is a big deal. “I don’t even think it was controversial,” he said. “I haven’t had one call.” Of course, the White House wasn’t actually taking calls on the issue. So the Center for Investigative Reporting and Reveal News created a new phone number to solicit voice mails from the public about what they would tell the president (it’s 510-545-2640).

Another challenge is financial. Many individuals, tribes, cities, and companies are pulling their money from the banks that finance the Dakota Access Pipeline. But that’s really just the beginning of the actions ahead. Rebecca Adamson, founder of First Peoples Worldwide, points out to investors how much capital is lost by companies that operate without consent from the community  involved, a cost she has pegged at somewhere between $20 million to $30 million per week when there are operational disruptions. “The time it takes to bring oil and gas projects on-line has doubled over the course of the past decade due to community opposition, creating significant financial loss,” Adamson writes. More investors are learning about that financial risk, and even more still need to understand what’s at stake.

“The movement to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) is wreaking financial havoc on the companies and banks involved,” Adamson writes. She continues:

In August 2016, Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) reported ‘it could lose $1.4 billion in a year if delays continue…. Even a temporary delay would mean losses of over $430 million.’ ETP is attempting to raise new debt. This could mean that the banks are ramping up pressure on the company to repay its loans out of concern DAPL will never be finished. In November 2016, Energy Transfer Partners announced a merger with sister company Sunoco Logistics in order to raise much needed cash to finish construction. ETP’s own shareholders are filing a lawsuit to block the merger, alleging conflicts of interest.

Like I said: The financial challenges are just beginning.

I also have a big idea I want to toss out, one that could have significant financial implications. So we know the project will take some 30 days to complete and fewer than four weeks to actually transfer oil from North Dakota to the end of the pipeline.

What if on that day, the day the oil reaches markets, there is a Day Without Oil. One day. It takes a massive organizational effort. But why not? What if every ally of Standing Rock, every community that has its own Standing Rock, every one who is concerned about water, takes a day off from oil? Either walk everywhere that day or just stay home. Do what it takes to remind the companies—and the government itself—who’s really in charge of the economy.

 

Listen In: How to Resist America’s Dirty Energy Agenda

Sightline’s policy director Eric de Place joined KBOO Community Radio‘s Barbara Bernstein this week to discuss how American communities are staying energized and fighting fossil fuels at the local level. Eric detailed how state and local power will play an increasingly important role in protecting regions like Cascadia from coal, oil, and gas projects. He also emphasized how this fossil-fuel resistance isn’t just occurring in the Pacific Northwest; local governments across the United States are overcoming challenges to protect themselves from volatile oil trains, widespread fracking, and offshore oil drilling.

“We have a tremendous opportunity if we can maintain the line of defense,” Eric stated. “We have all the power we need to chart a clean energy future in the Northwest and on the West Coast.”

Listen to the full interview from KBOO’s Locus Focus program below. And find out more information about the program here.

 

Weekend Reading 2/10/17

Eric

Sage advice for left-leaning policy folks: when it comes to benefits and entitlements, keep it simple and take credit. Jack Meserve argues that, “either Democrats complicate their initiatives enough to be inscrutable to anyone who doesn’t love reading hours of explainers on public policy, or else they don’t take credit for the few simple policies they do enact.” He unpacks a suite of recent policies to offer some striking comparisons—between Obama’s tax cut and Bush’s; and between Roosevelt’s WPA and the stimulus package—to demonstrate that some worthwhile ends of progressive policy have become hopelessly mired in the means of technocratic wonkery. For example:

This “benefit through tax cut” idea is far from unusual, unfortunately. Here’s a partial list of  programs based on federal tax credits, many started by Democrats:

Got those? Ok, now don’t forget tax-preferenced savings accounts—for retirement, there are IRAs, Roth IRAs, 401ks, and 4013bs. For your kid’s college, start a 529. And if you’re eligible, don’t forget to create a health savings account.

Instead of making retirement benefits more generous, or college cheaper, or health care universal, we’ve created accounts upon accounts, each of which you have to have enough money to contribute to, remember to pay into, and jump through all sorts of other hoops to maintain.

Implementing these kinds of policies are also no road to electoral success.

Exactly. File his argument under “reasons to support a national basic income.”

Kristin

This article about the top five reasons plurality voting fails has great, easy-to-understand illustrations of each point.

Project Syndicate had an interesting interview with Jeffrey Sachs, head of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, about current national and international trends. He talked about the rise in right-wing populism around the world, different countries reactions to refugees and immigration, and said this about the wall between the US and Mexico:

The left doesn’t have a language that acknowledges the need for borders and the need to police them. I’m not in favor of a wall, per se, but I am in favor of regulated borders, not an open door to unregulated migration. All high-income countries need borders. Borders do not mean closed doors or bans, least of all religiously based bans, which are deeply offensive and self-defeating. But borders do mean enforcement of limits to migration.

He also made also this interesting point:

Africa’s demographic trajectory is deeply worrisome because it is built on an extremely high fertility rate that will hinder its own sustainable development. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the average fertility rate remains more than five children per woman, and the resulting population trajectory is roughly a quadrupling of the continent’s population by the end of this century…. Africa’s own economic, social, and environmental health depend on achieving a rapid and voluntary reduction of fertility rates, mainly by enabling Africa’s girls and boys to remain in school.

OpenWork is a new nonprofit encouraging employees and employers to step outside the box of a 9-5 office. They link to great resources showing flexible workplaces boast greater productivity, happier employees, and employer cost savings. They have a lot of short case studies, including one for Buffer (whose product I use). Buffer has a 100% remote workforce, so they have a thorough hiring and on-boarding process to make sure new employees integrate into the culture, make liberal use of Google Hangouts, and use their precious in-person time to hang out and bond with each other, not just work near each other.

The threat to American democracy is not autocracy, but partyocracy.

John

My favorite “truth to power” news show, Democracy Now!, has continued to cover immigration matters and the situation with the Dakota Access Pipeline, and ran segments on both topics on its show this Wednesday.

On a more positive note, Yes! Magazine’s Winter 2017 issue covered 50 of its “favorite inspiring solutions” around the country. It is also introducing their new executive director, Christine Hanna, who years ago was managing director and director of strategic initiatives at Sightline. Congratulations, Christine!

The New Yorker also has a profile of Oregon’s feminist governor, recently elected in her own right. Among other topics, she gives her advice to progressives for this new era.

On a related topic, The Stranger maintains a running list of Resistance and Solidarity Events. Speaking for myself, I already marched this year to save healthcare and Medicare, then in support of women. So I can empathize with folks who might be worried about “outrage fatigue.” My own strategy is to pick and choose events as my schedule allows. After all, I am a senior citizen, and my doctors have recommended more exercise; marching for democracy seems to fit the bill. Besides, some of the events on The Stranger’s calendar are benefits and fundraisers, so folks can relax and have some fun at the same time.

Anna

Check out this On The Media podcast. First up: Wisdom from language and cognitive linguistics guru George Lakoff on keeping control of winning frames in the face of fake news and presidential tweet storms. He offers a “Tweet Taxonomy” with ideas for how to deal with each type. There’s:

  • the Preemptive Framing Tweet—a way of getting ahead of and controlling how things are interpreted;
  • the Tweet of Diversion—head fakes and outrageous statements that bend everybody’s focus from the real story at hand; and
  • the Trial Balloon Tweet—putting something radical or new out there to see how people will react.

Overall, Lakoff suggests we (and particularly media) talk about what kind of tweet we’re dealing with, call it what it is, and name the strategy. And, that we stick to substance and the truth. Don’t just repeat the tweet! Give context and focus on what’s really going on.

Next up, in the same show, an incisive take on fake news from Craig Silverman, media editor for Buzzfeed. He authored a study on fake media stories during election season, finding that people (that’s you, that’s me) overestimate our ability to detect a hoax. Silverman says, “We think ‘I’m not going to get fooled,’ but we are all susceptible.” The combination of social media algorithms and our human biases can be deadly. We are drawn to stories that feed our emotions and worldview, just like eating junk food. I’ve been trying to live by his words of advice in the past few weeks. He says, “when I read something that makes me feel good, I try to question why that is.” A reminder to retain a little emotional skepticism resulted in a new Facebook policy: I only “share” stories that I’ve read. It’s slowed me down a little—and I’m better for it.

Another important language tip from George Lakoff: we should consistently refer to regulations as protections. People respond differently to the two concepts. And the words—a.k.a. frames—define the viewpoint prioritized in the conversation, either the corporate one or the people/community/public one:

The term “regulation” is framed from the viewpoint of corporations and other businesses. From their viewpoint, “regulations” are limitations on their freedom to do whatever they want no matter who it harms. But from the public’s viewpoint, a regulation is a protection against harm done by unscrupulous corporations seeking to maximize profit at the cost of harm to the public.

 

John Abbotts is a former Sightline research consultant who occasionally submits material for Weekend Reading and other posts