Environmentalism & the Public Good

Though caring for the environment in a balanced way is a great public good and a heritage many American leaders share, the environmental lobby often appear to act as if the public good does not matter, as this article from New Geography notes.

An excerpt.

“The awful oil spill in the Gulf--as well as the recent coal mine disaster in West Virginia--has added spring to the step of America's hugely influential environmental lobby. After years of hand-wringing over global warming (aka climate change), the greens now have an issue that will play to legitimate public concerns for weeks and months ahead.

“This is as it should be. Strong support for environmental regulation--starting particularly under our original "green president," Richard Nixon--has been based on the protection of public health and safety, as well as the preservation of America's wild spaces. In this respect, environmentalists enjoy widespread support from the public and even more so from the emerging millennial generation.

“Conservatives who fail to address this concern will pay a price, even more so in the future. The Bush administration's apparent clubbiness with conventional energy interests has undermined the GOP's once-proud legacy on environmental causes. The oil spill could prove a great campaign issue for Democrats assigning blame for the disaster on lax Republican regulators and their oil company chums.

“But there's also a danger for Democrats who tilt uncritically toward "green" policies. Instead of following the environmentalists' party line, they should adopt a balanced approach adding both economic and social needs to their concept of "sustainability."

“Sadly, many in the administration seem anxious to extend environmental regulation into virtually every aspect of life. Legitimate concerns over pollution and open space preservation, for example, have now been conflated with a renewed drive to strangle suburbia in favor of forced densification.

“The administration's "livability" agenda, as suggested by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, for example, proposes policies that favor dense urban development over the dispersed living preferred by most Americans. This, notes analyst Ken Orski, represents an unprecedented federal intrusion over traditional local zoning and local decisions.

“This centralizing tendency supports a wide array of interests, notably big city mayors and urban land speculators, and also is eagerly promoted by many architects, the media and planning professors. Not surprisingly, less intrusive ways to reduce energy use, such as telecommuting or the dispersion of worksites closer to people's homes, have elicited very little administration support.

“Herein lies the Achilles heel of environmentalism--its profound disconnect from public preferences and aspirations. By embracing such a radical social engineering agenda, the greens may end up undermining their own long-term effectiveness.

“The first sign of this pushback, notes analyst Walter Russell Mead, can be seen in growing skepticism about climate change policies both here and in Europe. At a time of severe economic challenges, greens and their political allies need to consider how specific environmental costs threaten an already beleaguered middle and working class.”

County Parks Holiday Fee Increase

A bad idea is reported by the Sacramento Business Journal.

An excerpt.

“A day in the park will cost a few dollars more during holiday weekends this summer, but ease the financial burden and provide much-needed staff at the regional parks in Sacramento County.

“Regional parks director Janet Baker said the county will increase vehicle parking fees during the three summer holiday weekends — Memorial Day, which starts Saturday; Fourth of July; and Labor Day. Vehicle fees will increase from $5 to $8, while vehicles with trailers will also pay more — from $10 to $13. However, fees will decline after the holidays.

“The summer holiday weekends are by far and away the busiest time for regional parks’ staff,” Baker said. “To help off-set the ranger and added maintenance costs that keep our regional parks in the best shape possible for visitors, we are implementing this new fee increase.”

“Thousands of visitors will enjoy the region’s 15 parks, including the American River Parkway, Mather Regional Park and Gibson Ranch, during the three-day weekend. And the additional visitors will require everything from more rangers and maintenance staff to emergency-service crews.

“The additional — and temporary — park fees will generate an estimated $7,000 for the county, which continues to battle financial shortfalls.”

Regional Parks Tax Increase Proposal

The recent proposal to the County Board of Supervisors, to fund county regional parks, Sacramento County Regional Parks Strategic Workshop, was commented on by ARPPS in a press release yesterday, posted here and, also posted to our website.

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release May 24, 2010 Sacramento, California

AMERICAN RIVER PARKWAY PRESERVATION SOCIETY (ARPPS)
REGIONAL PARKS TAX INCREASE PROPOSAL

A proposal was presented to the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors this month by the regional parks department, with support from some Parkway advocacy groups, to consider adopting one of three strategies to provide money for regional parks.

Each strategy calls for an increase in taxes requiring a two-thirds vote for approval.

Each strategy uses the American River Parkway as the lead park for the marketing of the tax increase for all regional parks.

While appreciating the concern the supporters of this proposal have for the Parkway, this is a direction that could actually cause more harm than good. Potentially, this could divert resources and attention from strategies which have a chance of becoming reality and promise more long term funding sustainability. There is a better way.

Raising taxes to pay for parks is not an equitable approach, as those who do not use parks, or realize an adjacent property benefit, would be required to pay an additional tax for something they do not use or benefit from.

Those who live adjacent to the North Sacramento area of the Parkway are already burdened by neighborhood crime and habitat degradation caused by the illegal camping of the homeless. These citizens will see no value in having their taxes increased to continue failed policies.

There is a better way, and it can be found in the funding success of other signature parks, such as the Central Park Conservancy and the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy.

Seek support for the American River Parkway through the non-coercive method of philanthropy tied to nonprofit daily management and Joint Powers Authority governance. (see published article posted to blog)

Based on the deep love the regional community has for the Parkway, a philanthropic strategy offers more promise than a tax increase.

Organizational Leadership
American River Parkway Preservation Society
Sacramento, California
May 24, 2010

Happier After 50

In what those of us lucky enough to make it to 50—and probably live in the suburbs—already know, life gets better, and this Gallup survey validates that, as reported by Science Magazine.

An excerpt.

“It doesn't matter whether you're employed, whether your children still live at home, or even whether you're married. Life gets better after age 50. A new phone survey of hundreds of thousands of Americans confirms that people tend to be happier, less anxious, and less worried once they pass the half-century mark.

“The main measure of well-being is called global well-being, which involves asking people how good they feel about their life in general. "That's been the standard in survey research," says psychologist Arthur Stone of Stony Brook University in New York state. But, he says, "this kind of question requires people to make a lot of judgments." For example, who should you be using for comparison: Your peers? Bill Gates? Victims of famine? The life you thought you'd have? It's also difficult to measure logistically: Scientists often ask people to wear pagers, and researchers beep them several times a day to remind the volunteers to record their feelings.

“Stone took a different, easier approach. Thanks to his work as a senior scientist with the Gallup Organization, which conducts a huge, ongoing telephone survey in the United States with questions on topics such as how well the president is doing his job and how confident consumers are in the economy, he was able to help write questions about specific emotions people felt the day before they took the survey. The survey reached more than 350,000 people in 2008 from all regions of the United States.

“Stone's team found that global well-being declines from the 20s to age 50, then increases steadily. Happiness and enjoyment also increase after age 50. Although sadness is fairly flat throughout the age groups, most negative feelings decline with age. Worry stays level until about 50, then drops. Anger falls steadily from the 20s; stress peaks in the 20s, starts a decline, then plummets after age 50. The patterns are almost identical for men and women, although women have more stress, worry more, and are sadder at all ages, despite reporting better global well-being than men at most ages.”

Suburbs & Cities

The war against the suburbs by the environmentalists, via the troubling narrative that the best way to live is in a high-density city (maybe for singles but not families) where you don’t have good schools, a yard, or need a car, is being amplified in this plan being promoted by the government, as New Geography reports.

An excerpt.

“Fostering livable communities...is a transformative policy shift for U.S. DOT,” announced grandiloquently in the Draft U.S. DOT Strategic Plan released for public comment on April 15, 2010. But what exactly does the Administration mean by “livability” and how does it intend to translate this vague rhetorical abstraction into a practical reality?

“To get an understanding of the Administration’s intentions one must delve into the stilted language and bureaucratic jargon of its policy pronouncements, notably the “HUD-DOT-EPA Interagency Partnership for Sustainable Communities” and the above-mentioned Draft Strategic Plan. “Livable Communities,” says the latter, are “places where transportation, housing and commercial development investments have been coordinated so that people have access to adequate, affordable and environmentally sustainable travel options.” The Interagency Partnership Agreement speaks in similar vague generalities. It defines livability principles as including “more transportation choices,” “equitable, affordable housing” and “reliable access to employment centers, educational opportunities and services.” Give credit to Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to reduce these abstract concepts to plain language. “Livability,” he said, “ means being able to take your kids to school, go to work, see a doctor, drop by the grocery or post office, go out to dinner and a movie, and play with your kids in a park, all without having to get in your car." In other words, “livability” in the Secretary’s mind means living in a dense urban environment where walking, biking and transit are realistic alternatives to using the car.

“But this definition is too narrow for most Americans whose notion of “livability” may include living in suburban communities and enjoy such obvious amenities as a safe neighborhood, access to good schools, the privacy of one’s own backyard and the freedom, comfort, convenience and flexibility of personal transportation. If “livability” becomes a euphemism for a federal policy of favoring high density, transit-dependent living, then we are moving closely to “newspeak” when words mean whatever Big Brother intends them to mean.

“How does the Administration intend to promote its vision of “livable communities?” Again, we must turn to the dense prose of its official policy statements. “To achieve our Livable Communities agenda,” states the Draft DOT Strategic Plan, “DOT will (1) Establish an office...to promote coordination and sustainability in Federal infrastructure policy; (2) Give communities the tools and technical assistance they need so that they can develop the capacity to assess their transportation systems...; (3) Work through the Partnership for Sustainable Communities to develop broad, universal performance measures that can be used to track livability across the Nation...; and (4) Advocate for more robust state and local planning efforts and create incentives for investments that demonstrate the greatest enhancement of community livability...”

California Policies & Business

Silicon Valley is surely the American model for business entrepreneurship, but much of what it has done lately—which has led to many jobs fleeing the state—has been in response to an overly burdensome regulatory atmosphere in the state whose innovation and creativity gave the Valley its birth.

An article from City Journal examines this.

An excerpt.

“Eric Demers can’t remember how many pseudo–Silicon Valleys he has seen around the world while traveling for Advanced Micro Devices. The globe’s second-largest microchip designer and producer (after Intel), AMD was created 40 years ago in the authentic Silicon Valley in California. Demers, the firm’s chief technology officer, has no intention of moving. Across the world, he points out, private and public attempts to create new Silicon Valleys have achieved only “pale copies” of the original.

“That original has remained the undisputed cradle of high-tech and communications innovation. Historic leaders like Hewlett-Packard and Intel have stayed here; more recent giants Google, Facebook, and Twitter cluster around the pioneers. The Valley’s economy, concentrated in a 60-mile corridor running from San Francisco to San Jose, attracts one-third of all venture capital invested in new businesses in the United States—39 percent in 2009, though the $7 billion made it a slow year. A new start-up launches every working day. From among these high-tech ventures will emerge the next Google or Intel.

“Silicon Valley faces a serious threat, however: the fiscal and regulatory earthquakes rocking California, which verges on becoming a failed state. Measured by per-household state and local government spending, California ranks third-highest in the nation, behind Alaska and New York. The state government is trying desperately to squeeze money out of any profitable activity to meet the crippling costs. Further, California continues to impose onerous regulations on the private sector. High taxes and stifling regulations give companies a strong incentive to move elsewhere. In this increasingly business-hostile environment, will Silicon Valley’s unique entrepreneurial spirit survive?

“Forty years ago, when Silicon Valley began to expand and soon came to dominate the high-tech universe, most of its companies were manufacturing enterprises, producing microchips and computers right on the spot. No longer. Starting in the 1980s, Valley firms began moving away from production to concentrate on inventing new products and services. AMD, for example, outsourced most of its manufacturing years ago to factories in countries like China, India, and Taiwan—places with lower wages and high production quality. The approximately 3,000 employees at the company’s Sunnyvale offices are designers, marketers, accountants, and mechanical engineers; what tiny production lines remain are for building prototypes.

“Was so much outsourcing necessary? Jason Clemens, research director for the Pacific Research Institute in San Francisco, one of California’s few free-market think tanks, acknowledges that countries like Taiwan offer a powerful “pull” factor for shifting manufacturing to East Asia. But there has been a major “push” factor, too, Clemens argues: the Golden State’s excessive income and property taxes and its web of regulations, which, he believes, have driven up outsourcing. As Berkeley-based journalist Francis Pisani puts it: “Outsourcing is the only answer to taxes and regulations.”

“California has piled every imaginable burden on businesses. Minimum-wage laws are among the highest in the country, and health and safety regulations are among the strictest; cities like San Francisco and San Jose require businesses to offer employees health insurance; labor laws are extremely union-friendly; environmental policies drive up energy costs—and on and on. Small firms have the toughest time in this business-toxic climate. A recent study by Sanjay Varshney, dean of the College of Business Administration at California State University in Sacramento, estimates that the cost of state regulations in 2007 reached an average of $134,122 per small business—the equivalent of one job lost per company. And it’s not just the small guys: Google, which uses colossal amounts of electricity, is building its data centers in other states or abroad, where energy is much cheaper.”

The Golden State?

I deeply love my native state, but what is currently going on with the state government is not a process to which one can place much affection, per this article from the Wall Street Journal.

An excerpt.

“Last week California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said revised budget numbers show the state is now $19 billion in debt. Say what? This is like a Hollywood horror story that has a new sequel every six months. The income and sales tax increases enacted last year were supposed to stanch the red ink, but the debt keeps rising.

“Mr. Schwarzenegger said that the "budget process is broken" -- no kidding -- and that the state now faces a "Sophie's Choice" of bad and worse options. His new budget calls for the elimination of whole programs and large reductions in health and welfare services.

“Democrat Darrell Steinberg, the senate president, called the proposals a "non-starter" and said he was "disappointed that the governor has chosen to surrender." Democrats hope to wait out the crisis until lame duck Arnold is gone from office in seven months, but by then California might be Greece. The state already has the worst bond rating in the country.

“Everyone knows that a main source of these fiscal woes is pension obligations, yet Democrats continue to resist substantive reform. "The cost of employee retirement benefits this year is $6.1 billion," said Mr. Schwarzenegger. "That is more than what it would cost to keep [the welfare-to-work program] CalWorks, child care, mental health services and in-home supportive services."

Park & Ride Announcement

Regional Parks Sponsors Park ‘n’ Ride FREE Event on May 20

In celebration of Bike to Work Day, parking fees will be waived at four Parkway locations

Sacramento, CA, ‐‐ In support of the regional “Bike to Work Day”, Regional Parks will host Park ‘n’ Ride: a special day of free parking at four locations along the American River Parkway. The American River Parkway Jedediah Smith Bike Trail is popular among local bike commuters, and Park ‘n’ Ride this is the perfect chance for novice commuters to give commuting by bicycle a try. Parking fees will be waived at the following locations:

• Lower Sunrise Recreation Area
• William B. Pond Recreation Area
• Sacramento Bar
• Howe Avenue River Access

From 6‐10 a.m., energizer stations with coffee, juice and bagels will be available for event participants, donated by the American River Parkway Foundation. At the four energizer stations, parks Annual Passes and Parks Supporter Passes will be available for sale.

Anyone who purchases a pass at one of these locations will be entered to win a Trek 7.2 FX with survival kit, valued at $650 courtesy of Bicycles Plus. The bike will be presented to the winner during Capitol Bike Fest, starting at 11 a.m. at the State Capitol on May 20.

Energizer Stations are located at:

• Lower Sunrise Recreation Area
• William B. Pond Recreation Area
• Mile Marker 8, near Guy West Bridge
• Howe Avenue River Access

For more questions about Park ‘n’ Ride, please call Regional Parks at 916‐875‐6961 or visit www.sacparks.net.

Suburban/Urban Diversions

While some attempt a spin supporting the "dying suburbs" narrative from recent census data, the spin stops at the New Geography story revealing that the data clearly show no change in the historic migration to the suburbs rather than to the cities.

An overwhelming majority of people--since ancient times--prefer to live in the suburbs rather than the downtowns of cities.

An excerpt.

“The week opened with an important report on metropolitan demographics by the Brookings Institution, only to be followed by the Census Bureau's annual report on migration, which contained a different message than the Brookings report. We offer yet a third analysis, since both the Brookings and the Census Bureau reports classify up to one-sixth of suburban population as not being in the suburbs.

“Brookings: The new Brookings State of Metropolitan America report examined trends in the 100 largest metropolitan areas using Census Bureau data between 2000 and 2008 (the census and the American Community Survey). Brookings highlighted findings that some "primary cities" were experiencing an increase in white population, while the rest of the metropolitan area (which it called suburbs) was becoming more diverse. Not uncharacteristically, the core city oriented press took the bait and embellished a bit on the findings. MSNBC characterized the report as indicating that "many younger, educated whites move to cities for jobs and shorter commutes." Brookings, which largely shares and encourages the urbanist media spin, calls this movement of young, educated whites from suburbs to the cities "bright flight."

“Brookings also expanded is previous finding that the majority of people in poverty live in suburbs to note that a majority of Hispanic and African-Americans now live in the suburbs. This is really not all that surprising, since suburban areas continue to grow faster and comprise the overwhelming share of metropolitan population.

“Census Bureau: Just a day or two later, the Census Bureau published its annual analysis of migration in the nation. The basis of this report is the Current Population Survey, which like the American Community Survey is conducted by the Census Bureau. The Census Bureau report received considerably less press attention than the Brookings report, perhaps it would be hard to characterize any of its findings as being consistent with the favored "death of the suburbs" line. The previous annual editions back to the beginning of the decade indicate little difference from the 2008-2009 migration trends in the current report.

“The Census Bureau analysis indicates that, almost regardless of the category, many more people are moving from "principal cities" to what it refers to as "suburbs."
• Every ethnic group is moving to the suburbs in greater numbers than to principal cities. Three times as many Hispanics are moving from principal cities to the suburbs as from the suburbs to principal cities. The same is true for twice as many African-Americans and Asians. Whites are moving to the suburbs at 1.5 times the rate of their moving to principal cities (Figure 1).
• Every age group but one is moving to the suburbs at substantially above the rate of movement to the principal cities. There is strong movement among people aged from 20 to 25 to the suburbs rather than the principal cities (Figure 2). The one exception was that among people over 85 years of age, not exactly the epitome of the “bright flight” cited by Brookings and the media.
• The overwhelming migration from principal cities to the suburbs, rather than from suburbs to principal cities was characteristic across all income categories.
• There is, in reality, little "bright flight" to report. Among people with college and graduate degrees, nearly twice as many moved from principal cities to suburbs as moved from suburbs to principal cities (Figure 2). While the Census report does not provide mobility information on educational attainment by age, there was strong movement of young adults to the suburbs (noted above).”

Medical Hub

It seems Sacramento is growing a medical technology sector that promises to grow bigger—as reported by the Sacramento Bee—creating more well-paying jobs and attracting more people, all very good news.

An excerpt.

“Here's a nugget of hope, pulled out of a grim economy: Sacramento is carving out a niche in the promising field of medical technology.

“Local entrepreneurs are using brainpower to create tools to treat disease, which in turn could create high-paying jobs.

“There are at least 54 medical device firms headquartered in a nine-county area centered on the capital. An additional 19 companies have a substantial presence, according to MedStart, a nascent effort by the Sacramento Area Regional Technology Alliance to turn the region into a medical technology hub.

"We were amazed at how big of an existing industry we already had here," said Cary Adams, who helped launch MedStart two years ago.

“From new stem cell therapies to tiny, umbrella-like devices that scoop stroke-causing clots out of blood vessels, local firms are part of a lucrative $123 billion national industry.

“In 2006, the U.S. medical technology industry employed nearly 360,000 workers, generating $21.5 billion in salaries and producing $123 billion worth of products, according to the most recent data available from the Advanced Medical Technology Association.

“The wave of aging baby boomers is driving growth in the overall health care segment, of which medical technology is a part. Health care is expected to account for nearly one in every five dollars spent in this country by 2020.”

Downtown & Suburbs

As we have been blogging on for years, here and here for example—inspired by the premium suburban narrative and data blog, New Geography—people prefer suburbs to downtowns for a whole bunch of reasons, and fighting that obvious trend is city suicide…with the endless K Street drama as case one.

Dan Walters, as usual, nails it.

An excerpt.

“California's population exploded in the post-World War II era, thanks to a wave of migration from other states and the postwar baby boom. It nearly tripled from 6.9 million in 1940 to 19.9 million, the largest in the nation, by 1970.

“As the state's metropolitan areas expanded, agricultural fields evolved into vast housing tracts. A new phenomenon, the sprawling suburban shopping center, sprang up to serve the appetite of young families for consumer goods.

“The trend petrified traditional downtown retailers and property owners, who saw suburban rivals as not merely serving growth but luring away existing customer bases. They desperately sought ways to dam the outgoing tide of trade.

“Fresno offered one of the earliest responses in the mid-1960s, erasing auto traffic and parking along Fulton Street, its chief retail boulevard, and converting it into a pedestrian mall with ample off-street parking. The Fulton project's backers theorized that if the suburban mall's chief attractions were free parking and the ability to stroll from store to store without dodging cars, they could be matched in a downtown setting.

“Fresno was not alone. While larger cities shunned the downtown mall concept, some smaller ones embraced it – most notably Sacramento, which soon followed Fresno's Fulton Mall with its own K Street Mall, decorated with a series of concrete fountains.”

Early Parkway History

The Sacramento Bee has published a nice story about the visionary people who played an early role in the American River Parkway ( a subject we posted on previously), with a focus on Elmer Aldrich, who recently died.

I was fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to talk with Mr. Aldrich a few years ago and he sent me a copy of his 1952 article, A Long-Needed Park System For The Sacramento Region—which should be republished—which is truly visionary.

In it he wrote:

“We have in the Sacramento region a perfect stage setting for a conservation project of note. Sacramento, at the Apex of two great river courses, is perhaps the only city of its size in the country that has not developed them into parks or at least made them available for public use.

“Approximately six months ago a civic-minded handful of citizens met in the County Court House and decided to do something about making plans for developing natural type parks along the rivers. This group now known as The River Recreation and Parks Association is soliciting support from all local clubs and civic groups. Briefly their three-point program is this:

“(1) Promote development of areas along the rivers in city ownership.

“(2) Promote the acquisition and development of river recreation areas by the State, and

“(3) Promote the establishment of a Regional Park District.”

(From “The Observer”, the newsletter of the Sacramento Audubon Society, in the March-April, 1952 issue, pages 2-3.)

An excerpt from the Sacramento Bee story.

“Sacramento has had its share of farsighted people who have fought for public parks and natural areas. What has been difficult, however, is translating vision into reality. It has taken the persistence of people who devote their lives to an idea and a place.

“Elmer Aldrich, who died May 7 at age 95, was one of them. His life's work was envisioning and shepherding a park system for the Sacramento region. The American River Parkway, which Aldrich championed for more than 60 years, is one result.

“A naturalist and state parks conservation supervisor, Aldrich came to Sacramento after World War II and lived in River Park. From the beginning, he saw the potential value of the Sacramento and American rivers and the potential threat of sprawl in the postwar boom.

“In 1952, Aldrich wrote a piece for the Audubon Observer titled "A Long-Needed Park System for the Sacramento Region." It could be a blueprint still today.

"We have in the Sacramento region," he noted, "a perfect stage setting for a conservation project of note. Sacramento at the apex of two great river courses is perhaps the only city of its size in the country that has not developed them into parks or at least made them available for public use."

“He announced that a "civic-minded handful of citizens" had created a group to "do something about making plans for developing natural type parks along the rivers." This group sought an "integrated park system" connected by a parkway – on the Sacramento River from Verona, 15 miles north of the city, to Rio Vista, 50 miles south of the city, and on the American River from Folsom Dam to the confluence.

“Aldrich was not the first to come up with this idea. Wanting to plan a city worthy of the capital of California, Sacramento in 1914 hired John Nolen, a renowned city planner and landscape architect, to design a park system to rival Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. The city never fully implemented it. But Aldrich had seen Nolen's maps outlining a river parkway.”

Super Tankers can Suck up Oil

That is true, according to this story from Fast Company and if so, one wonders why it hasn’t been done in the Gulf.

An excerpt.

“Underwater robots, containment domes, top hats, hot taps, junk shots ... the potential fixes to the Gulf Oil Spill sound like they come straight from a cringeworthy disaster flick (or a PR think tank). But what if the solution is right under our noses? What if it's already sitting in the Gulf? John Hofmeister, the former president of Shell Oil, and Nick Pozzi, a former pipeline engineering and operations project manager for Saudi Aramco, think it might be.

“According to Hofmeister, oil supertankers could be used to suck up massive amounts of oil--possibly millions of barrels at a time.

“In an interview with FastCompany.com, Hofmeister explained that a little-known Saudi oil spill from an offshore platform in the early 1990s dumped more crude into the sea than any spill in U.S. history (think hundreds of millions of gallons). But the government and local press kept it quiet. And that's why one of the big fixes in the Saudi oil spill--the oil-skimming supertanker--hasn't been publicized.

"[They] figured out how to deploy supertankers that had the ability to both intake and discharge liquids in vast quantities with huge pumps," Hofmeister explained. "The supertankers could simply suck in seawater and oil simultaneously--they can hold millions of barrels--and when full, they could discharge oil at a port into tanks where they could separate oil from water. The idea is novel in that you can get massive of oil amounts quickly." Once the supertankers make it to the port, water can be treated and discharged, and oil can either be used or destroyed.”

ARPPS Letter Published in the Sacramento Bee Today

Let nonprofit run parkway

Re "Give a little love to our local parks" (Editorial, May 11): While the idea of adequately funding the American River Parkway and other regional parks resonates with many in the region, the idea of increasing taxes, as called for in a Bee editorial, on an already overtaxed population does not.

There is a better way to raise money for the American River Parkway. What many jurisdictions have done to help their signature parks is convert to nonprofit daily management and philanthropic fundraising, under contract to local government park ownership. This model has worked very well in New York City and Pittsburgh.

The advantages are many, besides the obvious one of not raising taxes. The funds raised by the park nonprofit are safe from the type of government fund-shifting common during periods of economic stress. Philanthropic fundraising allows for parkway enhancements we have not seen in years as the county has been running a substantial shortfall for basic maintenance funding for the parkway.

The strategy we favor is to have the parkway-adjacent cities and the county form a joint powers authority for governance and core funding. The JPA would then create a nonprofit organization, which contracts with the JPA for daily management and supplemental fundraising for the parkway.

– David H. Lukenbill, Sacramento, senior policy director, American River Parkway Preservation Society

Tax Increase for Parks?

With a lead photo reminding us of the illegal camping problem in the Parkway, this article from the Sacramento Bee reports on the effort to form a special regional park district—requiring the raising of taxes—to fund the parks.

We feel there is a better way to support the American River Parkway—without raising taxes on already over-burdened taxpayers—which is detailed on our website news and strategy pages.

An excerpt from the Bee article.

“To address the threat to regional parks – including the renowned American River Parkway – Sacramento County officials are considering asking voters for a new tax to fund the system.

“In addition, county officials are considering a wholesale reorganization of the parks department – possibly forming a separate district to run the parks.

“The county is grappling with a projected general fund deficit of $166.5 million for the coming fiscal year and may cut the parks department's budget by 40 percent.

“The proposed fixes wouldn't help with budget cuts the Board of Supervisors is set to make in several weeks. Officials are, however, hoping reorganization could provide a long-term solution for the region's parks, which often lose out on funding to mandated social service programs or politically popular agencies such as the Sheriff's Department.

"The current model is not a sustainable model," Paul Hahn, administrator of the county's Municipal Services Agency, told the board at a parks workshop Wednesday. "We need to think differently."

“Nearly 100 parks supporters, many wearing green shirts, filled the chambers Wednesday afternoon to support officials' efforts to find a stable revenue source for the parks and to urge supervisors to keep funding parks until such a source is in place….

“Baker presented three options the parks department is considering. They include forming a new regional parks and open space district; partnering with neighboring cities and districts; or creating a community facilities district.

“The bureaucratic hurdles are slightly different under each scenario, but all would require approval by a two-thirds vote of the public to approve a new tax.”

Regional Parks District?

While the idea of adequately funding the American River Parkway—and other regional parks—resonates with many in the region, the idea of increasing taxes, as called for in a Sacramento Bee editorial from yesterday, on an already over-taxed population does not.

There is a better way to raise money for the American River Parkway and we have outlined it in several news releases and on our website strategy page.

We favor forming a Joint Powers Authority (JPA) for governance and core funding, by the Parkway adjacent cities and the County. The JPA would then create a nonprofit organization which would contract with the JPA for daily management and supplemental fund raising for the Parkway.

An example of the potential is the 85% of needed funding the Central Parks Conservancy provides for Central Park in New York, and the $45 million raised by the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy.

An excerpt from the Bee editorial.

“As Sacramento County faces a deep budget crisis, the American River Parkway and other county parks are in deep trouble. Drastic cutbacks and closures are on the table again.

“To avoid slow, steady decline in the county's parks, those who care about them will have to get creative.

“It is time to take the next steps in creating an independent regional park agency – like the East Bay Regional Park District, which was established and funded at the height of the Depression.

“While the county has been able to assemble lands for the parkway and parks, what's been missing in the postwar development of Sacramento's regional park system is a permanent, stable source of funding. And in troubled financial times, what must be avoided is the temptation to jettison those hard-won public lands. County officials should reject a piecemeal surrender of county parks to cities.

“Longtime residents will recall the attempt to create a regional parks district for our region in 1994. Measure B would have assessed homeowners $10 per year for park acquisition, maintenance and capital improvements (raising $5 million a year for 30 years). It went down, 47 percent to 52 percent. Advocates had raised less than $10,000 for that campaign.

“Yet such an option is looking better all the time. Continuing to beg for less than 1 percent of the county's budget each year simply is not working to sustain a quality regional parks system.”

Increasing Dam’s Storage

This article from the San Diego Union-Tribune is about the doubling of storage capacity of a local dam by raising it 117 feet from its current 220 feet.

An earlier post, Dams are the Solution, noted the possibility of tripling the storage capacity of Shasta Dam—reported by the Los Angeles Times—if it was raised to its originally engineered height.

An excerpt from the San Diego article.

“EAST COUNTY— Construction crews will soon begin the painstaking work of raising East County’s San Vicente Dam, a project the San Diego County Water Authority calls the largest of its kind in the world.

“The $568 million effort involves boosting the 220-foot-high dam by an additional 117 feet. Work is expected to begin this spring and finish in early 2013. When the dam raise is completed, the capacity of the adjoining San Vicente Reservoir will more than double.

“The project is part of a larger, $1.5 billion effort by the San Diego County Water Authority to provide up to six months of storage in the event of an emergency.”

An excerpt from the Los Angeles article.

“REDDING - From Highway 151, Shasta Dam emerges through the fog and rain like an awesome apparition, a giant wall of concrete whose power generators humming eerily far below add to its supernatural dimension.

“As California looks for new ways to increase water supplies in the face of mounting shortages, this monstrous 602-foot facade holding back the Sacramento River seems destined to grow even taller.

“It's a perfect spot for expansion, although it's not the only site under intense scrutiny in this scramble for new water storage.

“Shasta Dam was designed to be 800 feet tall, so adding concrete to its top presents no significant engineering obstacles.

"This is like adding a room on a house, rather than building a new house," said Michael J. Ryan, the Bureau of Reclamation's Northern California area manager, whose small office overlooks the dam, the lake and, on a clear day, Mount Shasta looming large in the distance.

“But most importantly, the clean, cold water it would add to the state's supply is exactly what water managers are looking for. A taller dam means additional downstream protection against floods, more downstream supply for farms and cities and, because Shasta Lake would be deeper, more cold water to send downriver when the salmon are looking for a place to spawn....

"According to a 1999 Bureau of Reclamation study, a dam 200 feet taller would be able to triple storage to 13.89 million acre-feet of water.

"Still, tripling the size of Shasta Lake, on paper at least, would store nine times the projected 2020 water deficit for the Sacramento, San Joaquin and Tulare Lake basins during normal water years.”

A Homeless Perspective

The interesting perspective of one homeless writer on the nine day closing of the major homeless service provider in Sacramento—which is a ten part series in the Sacramento Press, concluding today—and here is the first post.

An excerpt.

“This is part one of a ten-part daily series.

“It's May Day, when people weave ribbons around a May Pole and there used to be parades with tanks past Red Square.

“This year, it's the first day of a sudden, nine-straight-day, barely-announced cessation of some essential services at the nonprofit Loaves & Fishes, which advertises itself as offering "survival services" for the homeless.

“Homeless people are used to surprise closes: In my two years of homelessness, there have been Friendship Park closures when empty hard-liquor bottles were found in the men's room trash or when people dash too fast into Friendship Park when it opens or when the L&F staff suddenly goes on retreat.

“There have been closures for holidays, of course. And there have been closures when tree branches or whole trees have fallen in the park. And there have been closures for the park to be winterized and for the heaters in and the plastic around the gazebos to be removed.

“This closure is of the latter kind, to remove the installations of winter. And to do other rather-ordinary work to perk up the grounds and facilities which suffer from unattended-to wear and disrepair.

“The question that I and other homeless people have is Why doesn't Loaves & Fishes act like other organizations and do upkeep on an ongoing basis?

“No profit-seeking business could survive if it operated with the laxity that L&F allows for itself. But Loaves & Fishes doesn't have to answer to anybody. Its donors give generously based on heart-rending pleas for cash and because the Bee, other Sacramento media and the mayor are smitten by the general concept of helping the poor, and don't take an interest in the hardscrabble reality of people trying to make do in a world where "warehousing the rabble" is the operant philosophy.”

Earth Day Revisited

Though it is now a couple weeks since it was celebrated, this Earth Day story from the Philadelphia Inquirer reminds us of the doom and gloom predicted on the first Earth Day 40 years ago, none of which turned out to be true—nice to know given the current proclamations of doom and gloom—which will also probably turn out not to be true, as our created earth has an amazing capability of fertility.

An excerpt.

“On this 40th anniversary of Earth Day, prepare to be bombarded with apocalyptic tales of disaster. But don't let the gloom-and-doom-fest get you down. Odds are the doomsters will be wrong.

“To help "celebrate" the first Earth Day in 1970, biologist Barry Commoner wrote, "We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation."

“In a speech at Swarthmore College that year, ecologist Kenneth Watt said, "If present trends continue, the world will be about 4 degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but 11 degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age." And a New York Times editorial proclaimed: "Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction."

“Time has not been gentle with these prophecies. Four decades later, the world hasn't come to an end. Most measures of human welfare show the Earth's population is better off today than at any other time in human history. Life expectancy is increasing, per-capita income is rising, and the air we breathe and the water we drink are cleaner. And, of course, concerns about climate change have shifted from cooling to warming.

“Yet fiction can be more interesting than fact. Paul Ehrlich, a Stanford professor and prominent prophet of population doom, predicted in his 1968 best-seller, The Population Bomb, that the world would have more than seven billion people by 2000, and that "massive famines" would occur soon, "possibly in the 1970s, certainly by the 1980s."

“The world's population in 2000 turned out to be six billion, and fertility rates dropped from about five children per woman in the 1960s to about 2.5 today. While too many people remain hungry, agricultural advances have helped head off massive famines. Even as the world population doubled, per-capita food consumption in poor countries increased from 1,932 to 2,650 calories a day, and malnutrition in those countries fell from 45 percent of the population in 1949 to 18 percent today. Yet Ehrlich continues to make his catastrophic projections, and people continue to buy into them.

“This sort of faulty reasoning started some 200 years ago with the writings of Thomas Malthus, who argued that human population growth would run into constraints imposed by fixed natural resources, especially land for food production. But are resources really finite?

“Stanford economist Paul Romer said: "Every generation has perceived the limits to growth that finite resources and undesirable side effects would pose if no new recipes or ideas were discovered. And every generation has underestimated the potential for finding new recipes and ideas.”

K Street Update #5,999

A proposal, reported by the Sacramento Press, to increase the already over-burdened and struggling businesses in the corridor by adding to the homeless population congregating there by building 75 units for homeless people; adding to the underlying problem many observers feel is responsible for the long-term degradation of K Street and one major reason why people will not go there unless they have to.

An excerpt.

“A proposal is in the works to create one of the largest permanent supportive housing projects in the city.

“The $41 million building at Seventh and H streets also is poised to become the city's newest single-resident occupancy, or SRO, structure. The infill project would feature sustainable design and materials, so the developers and architects will ask the U.S. Green Building Council to certify it as a sustainable building.

“But perhaps most unique about the public-private project being developed by Mercy Housing and the Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency is that it would offer support services to formerly homeless people in innovative and mixed-population permanent housing. Its architects are Mogavero Notestine Associates of Sacramento and SERA Architects of Portland.

“Half of the mid-rise's 150 units will be set aside as for homeless people. The other half will become home to the working poor: low-income workers who earn 40 percent to 50 percent of the median income, or $20,000 to $25,000 a year.

“The 7th and H Mixed-Use Affordable Housing project differs from transitional housing, such as Mercy Housing's Quinn Cottages, which provide up to two years of transitional housing close to downtown.”

Public Compensation & Public Budgets

As one is connected to the other, it is crucial to understand what has been going on in the public employee sector versus the private over the past few years, and this article from RealClearMarkets helps.

An excerpt.

“Three months ago, I wrote that it was time for a public employee wage freeze, to offset three years of much stronger compensation growth in the public sector than the private sector. One quarter on, what has happened?

“First, the good news: in the first quarter of 2010, private employee compensation growth outpaced state and local government employee compensation growth. This happened both because private sector compensation grew faster (0.6%) than any quarter in 2009, and because public sector compensation growth moderated to 0.4%. (These figures, and all employment cost figures cited here, are seasonally adjusted.)

“But we have seen blips before (as in the third quarter of 2009) with public employee compensation growth taking a brief break and then coming back the following quarter. Indeed, over the last four quarters, public employee compensation growth outpaced private growth, as it has for every period of four consecutive quarters since 2005. More quarters of private sector outperformance will be needed before we can call this a shift in the trend.

“And there is still much more to be done to bring compensation back into balance. Even including this quarter, employee compensation has grown 38% faster in the public sector than the private sector since the end of 2006. At last quarter's pace, it would take several years for the private sector to catch up with the public sector's compensation growth during the recession.

“So, what should state lawmakers do? First, they should take steps to ensure this quarter's modest growth in employee compensation costs continues for an extended period. Wage freezes were a good idea three months ago and are still a good idea now.

“They should also particularly take steps to ensure that the cost of employee benefits is contained. Public employees receive a relatively large share of their income as benefits (34%, compared to 29% in the private sector) in part because of their unusually generous health care and pension benefits. As for total compensation, the new figures on benefit cost growth are an improvement over last year - the employment cost index for public employee benefits rose just 0.3% last quarter, versus an average of 0.8% per quarter last year.

“But the gap between public and private sector benefits remains massive. In the first quarter, the average public employee earned $4.45 worth of health benefits per hour, compared to $2.01 in the private sector. In general, public employees have more generous health plans and pay a smaller portion of their insurance premiums.

“The difference is partly explained by differences in job mix - public employees tend to be more highly skilled and educated. But even comparing employees in similar job types, the differential remains. For managerial, professional and related workers, health benefits average $4.90 per hour in the public sector, versus $2.94 in the private sector. Sales and office workers: $4.11 public, $1.80 private. Service workers: $3.62 public, $0.90 private.

“This gap is not new: since the start of 2004, health benefit costs rose 31% for private sector workers and 32% for public sector workers. But as health care costs continue to soar and health insurance makes up a larger share of most employees' compensation, public employees' richer benefit packages push up their total compensation relative to the private sector.”

Need a Dam!

Following up on yesterday’s post, where’s the Auburn Dam when good rain years reveal the very deep need for additional storage for dry years.

Excerpt from an article in the Auburn Journal.

“Striking azaleas frame this scene from Bowman resident Bonnie Lightner's property. In the foreground is Lake Clementine's North Fork Dry Dam and in the background are the snow-heavy Sierra Nevada mountains.

“For 22 years, Bowman's Bonnie Lightner has been enjoying a front-row seat from her home overlooking the North Fork American River to the ebbs and flows of the Sierra snowmelt.

“This past week things turned sensational.

“With the spring snow melt and rains continuing, Lightner watched as the water that continually spills over the Lake Clementine-North Fork dam began to flow more heavily. She judges by how many "dividers" at the top of the dam are obscured by the water and by Wednesday morning, the water was all the way across.

“That's a rare occasion, Lightner said, and indicative of the amount of water now pouring downstream from the mountains.

“This past week's rain caused rivers to rise but nothing like past events like January 1997's storm that rose nearly to Highway 49 at the American River confluence. Another major storm occurred in 1995, when heavy rains and clogged creeks in the Roseville area led to flooding, declaration of Placer County as a disaster area and a visit by then-President Bill Clinton.

“Up in the Sierra, water forecasters have been attempting to determine the impact of the colder weather, sudden increase in spring storms and heavier-than-normal snowpack will have.

“Late-season snow and rain has meant a huge jump in Placer County's Sierra snowpack to 154 percent of the average for this time of year, Placer County Water Agency reported last week.”

Good Water Year

It is a time when one wishes that the Auburn Dam (which future leadership may revive) had been built to store the extra water that is flowing out to the sea instead of watering the crops in the great food producing valleys of California.

The Western Farm Press reports on the snow pack storage.

An excerpt.

“The latest round of spring storms have increased the water content in California’s statewide mountain snowpack to 143 percent of normal, according to the California Department of Water Resources (DWR). “This is good news after three years of drought, but we still face water shortages in many parts of the state,” said DWR Director Mark Cowin. “State Water Project storage is well below average and Delta pumping restrictions to protect native fish species will continue to hamper our ability to deliver water to millions of California homes, businesses and farms. If we are to ensure an adequate water supply for the future, it is critical that we conserve water and develop smarter, more sustainable ways to manage our water resources.”

“Lake Oroville in Butte County, the State Water Project’s principal storage reservoir, is still only 59 percent full or 71 percent of normal for the date. And fishery agency mandates to protect Delta smelt, longfin smelt, salmon and other species affect the amount of water that can be pumped from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. DWR currently estimates it will be able to deliver only 30 percent of requested State Water Project water to cities and farms in the San Francisco Bay Area, San Joaquin Valley, Central Coast and Southern California.”

Trees on the Levees

Though both arguments—tree roots help maintain the integrity of the levee, and tree roots help degrade the integrity—have merit, having nothing but grass on the levees does ensure that future levee improvements will be stronger, as the natural dying-off of trees can cause the decaying roots to weaken the levee regardless of the possible levee strengthening healthy trees provide.

And in this case, we would have to agree with the engineers regarding flood safety, better safe than sorry.

An excerpt from the Sacramento Bee article.

“The federal government is pressing forward with a policy that could require trees to be stripped from California levees, eliminating what shade and wildlife habitat remain along the state's rivers.

“An interim agreement appears likely to shield the state's levee habitat until 2012. But after that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers could impose the new rules, which would allow nothing but short grass on most Central Valley levees.

“Levee maintenance agencies can seek an exemption – called a variance – but even then, many trees would not be spared.”

Public Leadership is Hard

In between the lines of this editorial from the Sacramento Bee supporting one candidate for the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors, the extremely difficult work of that body, and the various city councils in our regions, is revealed.

Leadership in any venue is difficult, and in the public sector—given the requirements of relative transparency and regular elections—the stress levels can become very high; and in that context we can often forget the personal price people sometimes pay to lead and shape public policy, and remember their sacrifice and hard work as we struggle with our own difficult economic times.

An excerpt from the Sacramento Bee Editorial.

“The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors badly needs a reboot.

“Failing at one of their core duties, supervisors allowed the budget crisis to fester, and now they face no-win choices of what services to cut. But their challenges go much deeper, and require them to be open to new strategies and to more assertively chart the county's path.

“On June 8, three of the five board seats are on the ballot. Because the election will likely produce only one new supervisor, that choice becomes even more crucial.”

Externality

It is a term loved by those of us with a professional or academic background in public administration, but the way it has been often used to determine legislation and regulation can cause problems of its own—its own externality if you will—and this article from PERC Reports, examines that.

An excerpt.

“For several years, I have been on a campaign to expunge the term “externality” from the vocabulary of economists, policy makers, and environmentalists. My campaign is not motivated by a belief that markets perfectly account for all costs and benefits. Rather it is driven by the lessons learned from entrepreneurs—people with a passion for solving problems by finding win-win solutions. Indeed, entrepreneurs thrive in the space where there are impacts not accounted for in market transactions. It is in that space that they create gains from trade.

“Consider the example of irrigation water withdrawals reducing stream flows for fish habitat. Viewed through the externality lens, trout fishers might argue that farmers are imposing costs on them and that the government should regulate water use. An environmental entrepreneur, however, sees an opportunity to convince trout lovers to contribute to the cause and to contract with farmers to increase instream flows.

“Or consider the desire for open space. Through the externality lens, demanders of open space might say developers are imposing costs on them by building houses and that land use regulations are necessary. Land trust enviropreneurs, on the other hand, accept the landowner’s right to develop and obtain conservation easements to determine future land use.

“There is a big difference between the externality approach and the entrepreneurial approach to improving environmental quality. Asserting the existence of an externality pits one user of a resource against another in a zero-sum game where property rights are not clear. California’s Mono Lake is a quintessential example. In the early 1980s, environmentalists filed suit to stop Los Angeles from diverting water out of the Owens Valley even though the city had purchased the water by buying farmland and its accompanying water rights. The environmentalists “won” the suit, but it was not until the late 1990s when the legal wrangling ended and some water started flowing back into Mono Lake.

“In contrast, entrepreneurship encourages conflict resolution and results in positive outcomes for all parties involved. Chris Corbin, a PERC enviropreneur fellow, epitomizes entrepreneurship. His firm, Lotic, increases cash flows by encouraging efficient water use, by protecting and maximizing the value of water rights, and by developing water projects with ecological benefits (see www.perc.org/articles/article1120.php). Rather than promoting conflict like that in the Mono Lake case, Corbin utilizes cooperation to keep more water in streams.”

California’s Population

According to this story from the San Francisco Chronicle, it grew by almost 400,000 people in 2009.

An excerpt.

“A report out Thursday from the state Department of Finance says California added 393,000 residents in 2009, pushing the total population on Jan. 1 to an estimated 38,648,000.

“Los Angeles, already the most populous city in the state, added 44,000 residents, expanding its population to 4,094,764.

“The second most populous city, San Diego, added more than 17,000 people, growing to 1,376,173.”

New Earthquake Fault Map

The new map, as reported by the Los Angeles Times, includes data on new faults.

An excerpt.

“More than 50 new surface earthquake faults have been discovered in California over the last two decades, according to a new state map that officials hope will help guide future development decisions and emergency planning.

“The state's fault activity map, produced by the California Geological Survey, is the first in 16 years and offers a sober reminder of California's quake risks.

“The new faults range from small ones that don't pose much threat for major temblors to very large ones, like that responsible for the 7.1 Hector Mine earthquake that shook Southern California in 1999.

“Most of the faults have been known to researchers, and information on them is contained in scientific files. But state officials and quake experts hope that putting all the faults on one map will educate the state about quake risk zones and help residents grasp the geography of the fault lines.

"I think every classroom in California should have these maps on the wall," said Caltech seismologist Lucy Jones. "I don't think we do enough to educate the general public about these features. We turn it into something for the specialists, as if science is only for scientists. But if you're going to buy a house, would you like to know what fault is under your house?"

“About 50 new faults might not seem like a lot in a state with thousands of them. But experts say the new maps point to a basic fact of seismology: The more scientists study quakes in California, the more faults - and dangers - they find.

"These maps are used to make a lot of other maps, to map landslides, areas where you have liquefaction because of earthquakes, for tsunami coastal mapping," state geologist John Parrish said. "They can be used to make decisions on where to build schools and hospitals, where you need a higher standard of construction. They can tell you what kind of a surface you're building on, and how close you are to a fault."

“The release of the map comes amid an increased interest in quakes in California and beyond. Last month's 7.2 quake south of Mexicali produced thousands of aftershocks, including dozens registering above magnitude 4.0. As a result, officials said 2010 is shaping up to have significantly more quakes greater than 4.0 than any year in the last decade.

“Parrish said the map represent the state's best efforts at compiling information on the faults across California and will hopefully be used to enhance earthquake preparedness.”

Green Myths II

Many perambulations from Climategate and other revelatory stories about environmentalism continue to unravel the narrative, and another book, Power Hungry: The Myths of "Green" Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future—by the author of the article we posted on in Green Myths I on Tuesday—examines the myths around green energy.

The book is reviewed in the Wall Street Journal.

An excerpt.

“Al Gore has a dream, a dream increasingly shared, according to opinion surveys, by people all over the world. It is that the 19th century, the age of steam and iron and coal, will finally end and that, as Mr. Gore wrote in an article for the New York Times in 2008, the time will soon come for "21st-century technologies that use fuel that is free forever: the sun, the wind and the natural heat of the earth."

“It might be better, and much more realistic, says Robert Bryce in "Power Hungry," to imagine our journey toward a "green" energy Arcadia in units of Saudi Arabia. "Over the past few years," he writes, "we have repeatedly been told that we should quit using hydrocarbons. Fine. Global daily hydrocarbon use is about 200 million barrels of oil equivalent, or about 23.5 Saudi Arabias per day. Thus, if the world's policy makers really want to quit using carbon-based fuels, then we will need to find the energy equivalent of 23.5 Saudi Arabias every day, and all of that energy must be carbon free."

"Power Hungry" unfolds as a brutal, brilliant exploration of this profoundly deluded quest, from fingers-in-the-ears "la-la-la-ing" at the mention of nuclear power to the illusion that we are rapidly running out of oil or that we can turn to biomass for salvation: Since it takes 10,000 tons of wood to produce one megawatt of electricity, for instance, the U.S. will be chopping down forests faster than it can grow them.

“Mr. Bryce also points to the link between cheap power and economic productivity and asks why we should expect much of the world to forgo the benefits of light bulbs and regular energy when we enjoy these privileges. But if "Power Hungry" sounds like a supercharged polemic, its shocks are delivered with forensic skill and narrative aplomb.

“So you want to build a wind farm? OK, Mr. Bryce says, to start you'll need 45 times the land mass of a nuclear power station to produce a comparable amount of power; and because you are in the middle of nowhere you'll also need hundreds of miles of high-voltage lines to get the energy to your customers. This "energy sprawl" of giant turbines and pylons will require far greater amounts of concrete and steel than conventional power plants—figure on anywhere from 870 to 956 cubic feet of concrete per megawatt of electricity and 460 tons of steel (32 times more concrete and 139 times as much steel as a gas-fired plant).

Homeless Transformation

A huge new homeless transformation center—Haven for Hope—has opened in San Antonio that doubles down on the service-based approach to helping change the homeless; though individual actions driven by individual choice—which marks the majority of the homeless—usually takes individual interior transformation before individual exterior change occurs.

That being said, we wish them the best of luck on their $100 million investment.

Here are their Guiding Principles, from their website.

"Seven Guiding Principles:
As the Council to End Homelessness traveled around the country searching for best practices in the world of homeless services, they developed seven criteria that are critical to the success of a Transformational Campus.

1) Change the Culture of Warehousing to a Culture of Transformation
2) Co-locate and integrate as many services as possible
3) Master Case Management
4) Reward Good Decision-making
5) Consequences for Bad Decision-making
6) Align as many external services with the Campus as possible
7) Separate the Panhandlers from the Truly Homeless"

And here is an excerpt from an article about Haven for Hope from the San Antonio Express News.

“Envisioned and built with a goal to...improve the lives of San Antonio’s homeless population, Haven for Hope is opening in phases through June.

“After years of planning, fundraising and construction, the $100 million campus for the first time will provide housing, meals, job training, counseling, medical care and a host of other homeless services in one place.

“Modeled around best practices from successful homeless centers in other large cities, Haven for Hope already is drawing praise from those who do similar work.

“I would expect it to be the best in nation for two reasons,” said Father Joe Carrol of Father Joe’s Villages in San Diego, Calif., one of the homeless centers Haven people visited. “One, it was well thought-out. When we built our center, we did it in a hodge-podge fashion, with one building here, one building there. There was no long-range plan. Two, San Antonio had tremendous cooperation between the government, the private sector and social services, which is rare in America.”

“The cooperation is unprecedented. Almost 80 social service agencies are partners in the project, with many located on the campus to deliver direct aid to the homeless….

“The first thing you notice about Haven for Hope is the way it looks — more like a red-brick college campus, with green spaces and lots of windows. This was intentional: Designers sought to give the center a human scale.

“Haven for Hope will house 1,400 people a day — about 500 men, 500 women and children, and 400 in Prospects Courtyard, a vast expanse of concrete where the homeless will sleep on mats under the stars, be fed cold meals and have access to showers and bathrooms.

“Security to get into the courtyard is more rigorous than that found at the airport.

“Homeless people who are intoxicated can still come in, “as long as they aren’t a threat to themselves or others,” said George Block, Haven’s vice president and chief operating officer. No drugs, alcohol or weapons are allowed on the campus.

“An even more complete intake procedure is done when people move from the courtyard to the campus proper.”

Green Myths I

From the Washington Post.

An excerpt.

“Americans are being inundated with claims about renewable and alternative energy. Advocates for these technologies say that if we jettison fossil fuels, we'll breathe easier, stop global warming and revolutionize our economy. Yes, "green" energy has great emotional and political appeal. But before we wrap all our hopes -- and subsidies -- in it, let's take a hard look at some common misconceptions about what "green" means.

“1. Solar and wind power are the greenest of them all.

“Unfortunately, solar and wind technologies require huge amounts of land to deliver relatively small amounts of energy, disrupting natural habitats. Even an aging natural gas well producing 60,000 cubic feet per day generates more than 20 times the watts per square meter of a wind turbine. A nuclear power plant cranks out about 56 watts per square meter, eight times as much as is derived from solar photovoltaic installations. The real estate that wind and solar energy demand led the Nature Conservancy to issue a report last year critical of "energy sprawl," including tens of thousands of miles of high-voltage transmission lines needed to carry electricity from wind and solar installations to distant cities.

“Nor does wind energy substantially reduce CO2 emissions. Since the wind doesn't always blow, utilities must use gas- or coal-fired generators to offset wind's unreliability. The result is minimal -- or no -- carbon dioxide reduction.

“Denmark, the poster child for wind energy boosters, more than doubled its production of wind energy between 1999 and 2007. Yet data from Energinet.dk, the operator of Denmark's natural gas and electricity grids, show that carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation in 2007 were at about the same level as they were back in 1990, before the country began its frenzied construction of turbines. Denmark has done a good job of keeping its overall carbon dioxide emissions flat, but that is in large part because of near-zero population growth and exorbitant energy taxes, not wind energy. And through 2017, the Danes foresee no decrease in carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation.”

K Street Update 5,113

Cars coming back?

The Sacramento Bee reports that may be so.

An excerpt.

“Slowly, ever so slowly, Sacramento is edging toward allowing cars back on the K Street Mall downtown.

“The City Council on Tuesday will consider freeing up $2.7 million to reopen Eighth through 12th streets.

“The plan: One lane in each direction, probably a 15 mph speed limit and no parking, but some drop-off turnouts.

“The 700 and 1200 blocks are too crowded, however, to allow cars, officials said.

“The changeover isn't expected until next year. First thing, officials will check to see how cars interact with light rail.

“If the plan works, it marks the end of Sacramento's failed pedestrian mall era.”

Zoo on the River

The plan to move the Sacramento Zoo to a site along the American River consultants say is too expensive is the best plan and those involved in the issue need to rework their strategy and find a way to make it work.

What may seem too expensive right now may not seem so a few years down the road, and being able to have the Zoo along the American River would be a wonderful boon to that area of the city and the Parkway with an influx of legitimate family oriented activity to an area currently too prone to illegal homeless camping and the related crime.

An excerpt from the Sacramento Bee article.

“The fur is flying over an idea to expand the Sacramento Zoo.

“A consultant told city and zoo officials earlier this month that expanding the zoo in its existing Land Park location is one of a half-dozen concepts worth considering. The recommendation came after the consultant determined that a proposal to move the zoo to Sutter's Landing Park on the banks of the American River would be too costly.

“The mere mention of expansion put the influential Land Park Community Association on high alert. Members of the group and neighborhood residents voiced their anger at a community meeting last week, where one woman called the idea "atrocious."

“The zoo, in turn, has been forced to act like a cornered badger. Zoo officials said they feel intimidated by the community association and cautioned that the idea of expansion in Land Park is merely one of several they are exploring with the community.

“A second public meeting is scheduled from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Hart Senior Center, 915 27th St. The issue will also be the focus of a City Council workshop this summer.”

Nuclear Energy is the Answer

This article from City Journal reports on the conversion of one environmentalist who formerly did not, but now believes in using nuclear power.

An excerpt.

“Consider Stewart Brand’s meaty, well-informed, and mostly sensible new book, Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto. The man who used to be so California Hip that in 1968 he made a cameo appearance in Tom Wolfe’s The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test now presents himself as a “hacker (lazy engineer) at heart,” ready to promote realistic responses to the great eco-existential crisis of our time—climate change. How can Greens fulfill their new mission, which is to save not only birds and trees but all humanity? The man who founded and then edited the Whole Earth Catalog for 16 years—a magazine guided by “biological understanding” and enamored with the planet-saving power of organic farming, solar, wind, insulation, bicycles, and handmade houses—now concludes: “Cities are Green. Nuclear energy is Green. Genetic engineering is Green.”…

“The question I ask myself now,” Brand tells us when he gets to nuclear power, is: “What took me so long? I could have looked into the realities of nuclear power many years earlier, if I weren’t so lazy.” When he got over his nuclear sloth, here’s what Brand learned. (Most of the words quoted here are Brand’s own, but some are Brand quoting others approvingly.) “Fear of radiation is a far more important health threat than radiation itself.” “Reactor safety is a problem already solved,” and the new reactors are even safer than the old. Waste isn’t a problem; we need the $10 billion Yucca mountain disposal site “about as much as we need a facility for imprisoning dangerous extraterrestrials.” Nuclear power isn’t just the cheapest practical carbon-free option around, but the cheapest, period, when not snarled up in green tape. Scientists “invariably poll high in support of nuclear.” The people so pragmatic that they actually keep the lights lit, he might have added, have polled that way for 40 years, on the strength of reams of data and analyses, as well as the operating experience of our nuclear navy and a wide range of commercial reactors scattered across the planet.

“Other Greens, Brand reports, have experienced similar nuclear epiphanies as age moved them closer to a place hotter than tropical. Among them is Gwyneth Cravens, a novelist, former New Yorker editor, and activist who in her salad days “helped frighten the American nuclear industry to a standstill” by successfully crusading to kill a brand-new nuclear power plant in Shoreham, Long Island. And James Hansen, a NASA climatologist and the most outspoken American advocate of drastic reductions in carbon emissions. And founders and former high officials of Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, and “a surprising number of [other] prominent environmentalists.” Canada, Finland, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, Italy, England, and other countries that not long ago either froze new construction or resolved to shut down their nukes have flipped from red-hot aversion to tepid embrace.

“But tepid may not suffice. “One of the greatest dangers the world faces is the possibility that a vocal minority of antinuclear activists could prevent phase-out of coal emissions,” Brand writes, quoting Hansen. It’s an indubitable historical fact that the developed world was poised to break free from a carbon-centered energy economy 30 years ago. Greens locked us back into it. By demonizing nukes so effectively, they boosted U.S. coal consumption by about 400 million tons per year. We would instantly cut our coal consumption in half if we could simply conjure back into existence the 100-plus nuclear plants that were in the pipeline three decades ago. If global warming is a problem, Brand and his ex-friends own it.”

Earth Day: Two Remembrances

Earth Day was celebrated yesterday and this story from the Sacramento Bee reports what has happened since.

An excerpt.

“Forty years ago today, Earth Day exploded into our American lexicon with a new brand of do-it-yourself environmentalism. Billed as "the largest protest in American history," the first Earth Day centered on college campuses as part sit-in, part act up.

“This commemoration of conservation consciousness has grown into a worldwide effort, with "saving the planet" becoming an everyday part of life.

“How the movement has changed:

“Go-to Earth guy

“Then: Sen. Gaylord Nelson, the father of Earth Day. The former Wisconsin governor overhauled his home state's resources policy, then took on the whole country as senator. His inspiration for Earth Day came from two sources: a 1969 Santa Barbara channel oil spill and student anti-war protests.
“Quote: "Our goal is not just an environment of clean air and water and scenic beauty. The objective is an environment of decency, quality and mutual respect for all other human beings and all other living creatures.

"Now: Former Vice President Al Gore. His book and Oscar-winning documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," brought the global climate crisis into perspective for millions.
Quote: "The good news is, we have everything we need now to respond to the challenge of global warming. … But we should not wait, we cannot wait, we must not wait."

This story from the American Spectator profiles a person who did a whole lot more to help the world than either of the two aforementioned.

An excerpt.

“We cannot let this day pass without commenting on the passing of a remarkable human being who directed his ingenuity, energy and commitment to the cause of feeding the world's growing population and thereby avoiding the human catastrophe predicted by so many experts of less than hopeful bent.

“Norman Borlaug, the famous plant scientist, died on September 12, 2009, at 95. The Economist called him the "feeder of the world."

“Having quit a fine job at DuPont, Borlaug began working in Mexico in 1944 to increase grain yields and bring food to the poor. By 1956 that country's wheat production had doubled to the point of making it self-sufficient.

“He won the Nobel peace prize in 1970 for basically precipitating the "Green Revolution," which resulted in global grain production outpacing population growth, saving millions of lives. He was a researcher and a man of action. He was always in the fields checking on his experimental crops in places such as India and Africa.

"The famines and huge mortality that had been predicted for the second half of the 20th century never came to pass," noted the Economist in its laudatory obituary on Borlaug.

“Moreover, as Gregg Easterbrook has observed, his techniques of high-yield agriculture avoided deforestation on a planetary scale since fewer acres are needed to feed more people. And his modern agricultural techniques have lead to lower population growth since they allow for a higher premium on education rather than "muscle power" as the key to family success.”

Fast Cities

Fast Company publishes a list of the fast cities every year and this year’s group fulfills their ongoing benchmark for innovation.

Though Sacramento didn’t make the list, two California cities did—San Francisco and Oakland—and San Francisco’s idea is Open Source Government.

An excerpt.

“It's a good thing Gavin Newsom checks his Twitter feed during meetings. Otherwise, San Francisco's mayor would've missed a life-changing missive about ... potholes? "It really made me wonder," he says. "What if we used social media to make our city services work better?" That stray tweet led to the city's first-of-its-kind Twitter account (@SF311), which encourages residents to send queries and messages about nonemergency issues. But it also underscores the city's open-source stance on government. Just as Google, Facebook, and Twitter released their programming interfaces to app makers, San Francisco opened its arsenal of public information -- train times, crime stats, health-code scores -- to software developers. "There's a tremendous amount of tech talent here," Newsom says. "We'd be fools not to leverage it." To date, more than 140 data sets have been liberated, spawning roughly 30 smartphone apps, such as Crimespotting (browse interactive city-crime maps), Routesy (see real-time train schedules), and EcoFinder (locate the nearest recycling spots).”

This is the type of idea, using technology to help governance, that we called for in our 2005 research report: The American River Parkway Lower Reach Area: A Corroded Crown Jewel; Restoring the Luster, where we noted:

“b) Public Safety Hotline and Website with Follow Up Responses: A place where the public can call and/or email the location of illegal camping sites and other illegal activities and there is a follow-up response to the report.

“The ongoing statistics from the ranger crime reports should be placed here as well as recent report of crime and descriptions of suspected criminals.

“Right now there are several members of the public from the Lower Reach who call in locations of campgrounds and crimes, but the follow up is sporadic and not publicly accessible. Something as simple and cheap as a Parkway Public Safety Website would be a start.

“The point is to allow the community to help, as they have shown a willingness to do so.” (p. 40)

K Street Update #4,150

As reported by the Sacramento Press, it is now bike friendly, so keep a watch out when walking down there.

An excerpt.

“From now on, Doug Koleada will be a law-abiding citizen when he rides his bicycle on the K Street Mall.

“The city of Sacramento has installed new signs on K Street that list rules for bike riding. Cycling can now commence legally on the Mall from Seventh to 13th Streets and in the tunnel between Second and Fourth Streets.

“Koleada was riding his bike near the Westfield Downtown Plaza Wednesday afternoon. He readily admitted to biking on K Street in the evenings; his nighttime rides will now be perfectly legal.

“The Pyramid Alehouse Brewery employee said he knew about the city’s former ban on bicycling on K Street Mall, so he didn’t bike there when police officers were in sight.

“Koleada also didn’t bike when children were walking on the Mall. “If some idiot’s speeding on their bike, it could lead to an ugly accident (with a child),” he said.”

Loving the Suburbs

It is a feeling deeply embedded in the American psyche—most of human history actually and particularly for those of us fortunate enough to live in the suburbs bordering the American River Parkway—to live in “their own home, with a front and back yard, however small, in a safe neighborhood with good schools,” and the generations now coming of age in America, feel the same urge, as this article from New Geography reveals.

An excerpt.

“Back in the 1950s and 60s when Baby Boomers were young, places like Los Angeles led the nation’s explosive growth in suburban living that has defined the American Dream ever since. As Kevin Roderick observed, the San Fernando Valley became, by extension, “America’s suburb” – a model which would be repeated in virtually every community across the country.

“These suburbs – perfectly suited to the sun-washed car culture of Southern California – have remained the ideal for most Americans. And they remain so for the children of Boomer and Generation X parents, Millennials,(born 1982-2003), who express the same strong interest in raising their families in suburban settings.

“According to the most recent generational survey research, done for Washington-based think tank, NDN, by Frank N. Magid Associates, 43 percent of Millennials describe suburbs as their “ideal place to live,” compared to just 31 percent of older generations. In the same survey, a majority of older generations (56%) expressed a preference for either small town or rural living. This may reflect the roots of many older Americans, who are more likely to have grown up outside of a major metropolis, or it may indicate a desire of older people for a presumably simpler lifestyle.

“By contrast, these locations were cited by only 34 percent of Millennials as their preferred place to live. A majority (54%) of Millennials live in suburban America and most of those who do express a preference for raising their own families in similar settings. Even though big cities are often thought of as the place where young people prefer to live and work, only 17 percent of Millennials say they want to live in one, less than a third of those expressing a preference for suburban living. Nor are they particularly anxious to spend their lives as renters in dense, urban locations. A full 64 percent of Millennials surveyed, said it was “very important” to have an opportunity to own their own home. Twenty percent of adult Millennials named owning a home as one of their most important priorities in life, right behind being a good parent and having a successful marriage.

“This suggests that some of the greatest opportunities in housing will be in those metropolitan areas that can provide the same amenities of suburban life that Los Angeles did sixty years ago. In this Millennials are just like their parents who moved to the suburbs in order to buy their own home, with a front and back yard, however small, in a safe neighborhood with good schools.”

Nuclear Power & Rancho Seco

Every time I read another article extolling the positive impact nuclear power would have on our environment, I am further saddened by the short-sightedness that led Sacramento to shut down Rancho Seco.

It was a rushed response to catastrophe and a lack of vision that infected a lot of people, but now it appears the tide has turned, as this story from the Wall Street Journal reveals.

An excerpt.

“By the end of the 1980s, the nuclear-power industry appeared to be heading for a meltdown.

“The Three Mile Island accident in 1979 confirmed many people's fears about the danger of nuclear power and led to expensive safety upgrades for planned and existing plants. A recession slashed demand for electricity, inflation made new nuclear plants more expensive and falling energy prices made nuclear power less competitive with other power sources.

“Then, in 1986, the Chernobyl accident in Ukraine killed at least 56 people directly and spread radiation throughout much of Europe. Responding to "no nukes" sentiment, many states blocked new plant construction, and some European countries called for shutting down existing plants.

“Twenty years later, though, nuclear power may have found its reason for being: global warming. Several leading environmentalists have come out in favor of nuclear power because it is a low-carbon, plentiful source of electricity that could replace dirty coal, especially in rapidly growing countries such as China and India.

"Coal is the major villain when it comes to greenhouse gases," says Stewart Brand, founder of the Whole Earth Catalog and a former nuclear-power opponent who is now an avid supporter. "Countries are discovering that wind and solar are good to do, and they make a dent. But when it comes to base-load, always-on power, we have nothing that really replaces coal except nuclear."

“Meanwhile, public support for nuclear power is growing. A March Gallup survey found 62% of those asked favor nuclear power, the highest level since Gallup began polling on the subject in 1994. In a handful of unscientific surveys on environmental Web sites, a small majority say they are willing to give nuclear power another look as a way to fight climate change. Others, including those who don't believe global warming is a real problem, favor nuclear power as a way to give the U.S. more energy security.”

"Governments, too, are being swayed to back nuclear power as a way to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions. In Sweden, officials recently introduced legislation to allow construction of new nuclear-power plants; the country, which gets more than 40% of its electricity from nuclear, banned new plant construction in the early 1980s and planned to phase out existing plants."

Rain Symposium Announcement

California Extreme Precipitation Symposium

Save the Date for the 2010 Symposium

When: Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Where: Freeborn Hall, University of California, Davis

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Proceedings

Since 2001, proceedings from each symposium have been posted to this website. Proceedings may be posted in one or more formats: abstracts, printable slides from the presenters, or videos of the sessions. For a list of prior year themes and links to the proceedings for those years, see our Proceedings page.