Cascadia Scorecard Weblog

Tax Shifting in the Blogosphere

Not so long ago, it seemed like gas at $2.33 per gallon cost an arm and a leg; now it seems like a bargain.  And not surprisingly, high prices at the pump have spawned a backlash against fuel taxes across the US -- and have added fuel, so to speak, to the campaign to repeal Washington's most recent gas tax hike.

As a general matter, I think that responding to high gas prices by rolling back taxes is misguided.  The specifics get murky, of course, since a lot of the money raised by gas taxes is slated for dubious highway projects--so a vote for higher gas taxes isn't always a vote to reduce gas consumption.  But in general, gas taxes are too low, not too high:  right now, they don't even pay for roads, let alone incorporate all of the other external costs (pollution, greenhouse gases, noise, collisions, congestion, etc.) caused by driving and burning fossil fuels.  A stiff & sustained gas tax would do a lot more to reduce gas consumption than all the preaching in the world.

Still, even though I tend to favor higher gas taxes, one thing is clear enough:  gas taxes are regressive.  Like high gas prices, they hurt the poor the most.  Which, if you care about fairness and equity in the tax system, is a bad thing.

The question is -- as a matter of policy, what do you do about that?

For years we've advocated tax shifting--that is, raising taxes on gas, but lowering other regressive taxes, such as the sales tax.  Depending on how you structure it, you could actually wind up reducing the total tax burden on the poor, while still creating across-the-board disincentives for gasoline consumption. 

It seemed like a completely reasonable idea when I first heard about it -- but I hadn't heard many other folks making the same argument.  So I was pleasantly surprised to see similar thinking starting to echo around the blogosphere:  see, for example, here and here, along with a reference to this pdf.   

Here's hoping that this is an idea that keeps echoing.

The Rich Get Richer

Sure, the US national poverty rate has risen for 4 consecutive years and median income is stagnant. But the good news is that, according to the recently released Forbes 400, the nation's 400 wealthiest individuals collectively added $125 billion to their assets last year. (A quick back-of-the-envelope calculation tells me that's the equivalent of roughly $3,400 per fellow American in poverty.)

No surprise, two Cascadians continue to figure prominently in the rankings. Bill Gates ($51 billion) and Paul Allen ($22.5 billion) rank number 1 and 3, respectively.

Elastic Fantastic?

Based on figures through August, per-capita gasoline consumption in British Columbia in 2005 has dropped to its lowest level since 1978, which is the earliest year for which records are available.  BC's gas consumption is on track to fall to 19.2 liters per person per week -- just a hair lower than in 1990 and 1991, but a significant landmark nonetheless.

Just as important, per capita gas consumption in the province seems to have fallen by about a tenth since its recent mini-peak, in 1998.  And it's down by about a third from its all-time peak in 1980.

In contrast, Washington residents use about 60 percent more gas, person for person, than do residents of BC.  Washington's current consumption is only down 17 percent from its all-time peak, and the fall from the most recent mini-peak, when gas prices were at a low point in 1999, has only been 6 percent.

What this suggests to me is that gasoline consumption may be a bit more elastic in BC than it is in Washington.  As this Slate article points out, gasoline consumption in the US is fairly inelastic:  people are fairly locked into their homes, cars, and jobs, and there's only so much driving that people can eliminate from their daily routines.  Only long-term shifts in where people live and work, and what they drive, can yield substantial reductions in gas consumption -- which probably means that gas prices will have to stay pretty high for a while until consumption falls appreciably.

But in BC -- especially in greater Vancouver, which comprises about half the province's population -- a growing share of the residents actually do have viable alternatives to the car.  Some folks who live downtown don't need a car at all; relatively compact urban design has placed stores and services in closer proximity to many people's homes; some people can walk or take public transport for some trips.  This all adds up to greater flexibility for at least some BC residents to adapt to higher gas prices -- and, as a happy coincidence, lower overall spending at the pump.

The Price We Pay

This is just a back-of-the-envelope calculation, but it looks as though the state of Washington is on track to spend about $9 billion this year on crude oil and natural gas.  That's about $25 million per day; or, over the course of the year, about $1,400 for every man, woman, and child in the state.

For the energy geeks out there -- this is based on spot prices for Alaskan crude through June; an estimate of  price increases through yesterday based on price trends for Texas light crude (see crude oil spot prices here); and natural gas sales and prices at the city gate, in 2004 and 2005 through May.  The latest figures I could find for total petroleum consumption were from 2001; I assumed we'll use about the same amount this year as 4 years ago.

And note that this is only tip of the iceberg for energy spending.  We spend still more on refining crude oil into gasoline and diesel; on fuel taxes; on delivering energy to our homes and workplaces; on converting natural gas into electricity; and so on.  But Washington -- like Oregon and Idaho -- produces not even a drop of petroleum, nor a whiff of natural gas, so every dollar that we spend on crude and natural gas gets shipped immediately out of the state.  Which means that oil and gas spending siphons off, oh, about 3.5 percent of the state's total economic output.

Just saying...

Logging Loses in Litigation

As long-time readers of this blog may know, Washington's Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is planning to aggressively boost logging in the state's forests.

But yesterday a King County judge blocked the DNR's logging plan on the grounds that it failed to adequately account for endangered species like spotted owls and steelhead. Apart from being a victory for conservationists--whose position was supported by the judge--the ruling is yet more evidence that the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) labeling isn't worth the paper it's printed on. (Despite weakening the definition of "old growth," reducing streamside buffers, and ratcheting up logging by 30 percent, the state still won SFI certification.)

For the time being, DNR must revert to its previous logging plan, which gives the state yet another opportunity to pursue meaningful certification--Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) labeling--for at least some of the public's forests. For more on that, here's an op-ed I wrote that appeared in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer last summer.

Light as a Feather; Stiff as a Board; Safe as an SUV?

Is a heavy SUV always safer than a light passenger car? Maybe not.

Recent research is challenging the long-standing belief that cars must be heavy to be safe. It turns out that the quality of the car may be just as important as the quantity of its bulk. Several studies show that design, safety features, and vehicle size (for crumple zones) can offset safety losses from reducing weight. And in addition to better fuel efficiency, lighter cars are also safer for other vehicles involved in an collision.

Carmakers have long argued that fuel economy standards compromise passenger safety because efficiency usually means lighter weights. And until recently government studies seemed to support the weight-safety tradeoff. But now it appears that other factors are as important as weight. There goes one more argument against improving vehicle fuel efficiency.

More Bang for Your Blog

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545 Leaps!

Hidden in the flurry of transit-related news hitting Seattle these days--everything from the closure of the bus tunnel to the bizarre death-gasps of the monorail--a minor success for sane transit was scored this week.

Word has quietly leaked out that Sound Transit's 545 bus began its new route through Capitol Hill over the weekend, the result of a long and intensive effort by Anirudh Sahni and other transit activists. "90% of the difficulty involved overcoming pre-conceived notions, the prejudices and biases of Sound Transit," Anirudh observed, "and getting them to undertake an objective examination of the trade-offs of changing the route. We'll see how it does."

It's reasonable to expect that this small step for the 545 represents a giant leap for Microsoft employees and others who live on the Hill but work on the Eastside. By making the bus far more convenient than a single-occupancy vehicle, a lot more commuters are likely to be on the bus and not adding to the already-clogged Evergreen Point Bridge.

The Endangered Act

As if the Endangered Species Act doesn't have enough problems right now. Federal records recently uncovered by reporters at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer show that the government may triple the amount of land where endangered plants and animals are protected not by the strictures of the Act, but instead by controversial Habitat Conservation Plans (HCPs).

In the abstract, HCPs sound like a good thing--they allow landowners to work out the details of a conservation program in exchange for a hands-off approach from federal regulators. But in practice, HCPs have proven to be a disastrously ineffective way to protect endangered species. In fact, recent investigative reporting at the P-I found that HCPs are often only loosely based on good science, the success of the plans are neither monitored nor tracked, the HCP program is badly under-funded, and the plans are virtually never enforced. In reality, HCPs can amount to carte blanche for landowners to harm species that are at serious risk of extinction.

So even while the Endangered Species Act is in danger of being emasculated by Congress, its current implementation is becoming ever-less effective. Depressing. Read all about it here.

Bus-ted!

A while back, the Seattle P-I ran a story about how Seattle's new diesel-electric hybrid buses weren't as fuel-efficient as advertised.  Our response was basically a shrug.  The chief benefit of hybrid buses, we argued -- particularly through the downtown bus tunnel, where many of Seattle's hybrids are routed -- is that they reducing pollution, not that they burn less petroleum.

Except now, a study from the University of Connecticut (via this post at Green Car Congress) found that GM's hybrid buses really may not actually reduce pollution coming from the buses' tailpipes.  In fact, driving identical routes, the standard diesel buses seemed to emit a bit less particulate matter (a particularly nasty problem for diesel engines) than the hybrid buses.

This, of course, comes as a surprise -- the air in Seattle's bus tunnel's has seemed surprisingly pleasant to me, even after the city switched from all-electric to hybrid buses through the tunnel.  So I'm not sure what to make of it.  But still, there's probably a lesson to be learned here:  you have to be really careful not to be sucked into the hype surrounding new technologies. Sometimes the benefits don't pan out until the technology is refined; and other times, the benefits may never materialize at all.

Loco-motive

UPDATE 9/26/05: Pretty good blow-by-blow coverage of the monorail's unraveling in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on Saturday.

We're not dead yet, proclaims the monorail board.

Just minutes ago, the board unanimously agreed to send the monorail back to the voters this November. This is apparently a last ditch effort to resuscitate the project in the face of stern opposition from the mayor and city council. The new plan may actually be financially viable because it will truncate the full Green Line route: the line would now run from the West Seattle Junction to downtown to Dravus Street in Interbay (between Magnolia and Queen Anne), a rather obvious solution that I've suggested before. (This slightly shortens the West Seattle route and lops off Ballard with the expensive bridge across the ship canal.)

What the heck is going on?

To my list of criticisms of the monorail board, let me now add: politically clueless and frenetic. It didn't exactly take a rocket scientist (or even a monorail planner) to see that city officials were serious about holding the project accountable to a financing plan that could pass a straight-face test. Why the monorail waited until the 13th hour to offer voters a new plan is utterly beyond me.

There is one possible silver lining, however. A shortened monorail line could conceivably be affordable. And the shortened line would still bridge the critical link between West Seattle and downtown. That could help replace lost capacity in the Alaska Way Viaduct, which is looking ever more likely to come down and be replaced by, well, nothing.

Perhaps instead of funneling billions into substitute road capacity, the city-county-state-feds should consider funding the monorail. If government chips in some money, they could--and should--attach some meaningful strings: namely, better leadership and public oversight. But I suppose I'm just being Pollyanna.

Monorail Stopped In Its Tracks

Well, so much for that transit project.

I just finished listening to the Seattle City Council unanimously approve a resolution to deny the monorail permits for building and right-of-way. They also agreed to do everything possible to get the state legislature to dissolve the monorail project. Basically, the council is concurring with Mayor Nickels, who demanded that the monorail return to voters with an improved plan. The monorail board refused and the city pulled the plug. Absent city permitting approval, the monorail's already troubled bonds will become anathema to investors, thereby essentially killing the project.

So barring something completely unforeseen, the monorail is effectively dead. But while the corpse is still warm, Seattle needs to conduct a thorough post-mortem.

Around the office here, I am was known as something of a rabid monorail proponent. Obviously, I was aghast at the ridiculously flawed financing scheme this summer that put the monorail on a collision course with the mayor and council. Still, I remained hopeful that the monorail board would revise their plan and come up with something credible, even if it was for a less extensive line.

One thing I'd like to see investigated--apart from the chicanery or incompetence of the monorail board--was the unreasonable hostility to the monorail that emanated from city hall and other city leaders. Despite consistently strong support from voters, the monorail made little headway with many decisionmakers, some of whom seemed predisposed to hate the thing at every step along the way. I wonder if that hostility didn't help create a culture of defensiveness and secrecy in the monorail project that ultimately led to its undoing.

City officials probably did the right thing today in the face of a recalcitrant monorail board. But I'd argue that the blame for the project's failure lies partly with city hall, as well as other institutions like the Downtown Business Association. I'd like to see some soul-searching from our leaders about the fractious and close-minded civic culture that stifled the monorail.

We should, of course, continue to debate the merits of transit alternatives. What is cost effective? What is efficient? What is politically possible? And what do ordinary residents--as opposed to engineers and billionaires--actually want to see in our fair city?

More importantly, we need to acknowledge a basic truth: there will never be a perfect transit system (or road project, for that matter). If we agree that we need better transit in the Emerald City, we should stop hunting for perfection and start looking for something practical. And we should do it with a quickness.

The Manhattan Project?

This article -- which, in large measure, holds up Vancouver as a model for the redevelopment of lower Manhattan -- makes this arresting claim:

[D]owntown Vancouver has recently eclipsed Manhattan as North America’s highest density residential area.

This claim came as quite a bit of a surprise to me -- I thought I was a Vancouver statistics geek, but I'd never heard that before.  And after fiddling on the internet for a bit, I now realize why:  as far as I can tell, it's simply wrong. 

According to the 2001 Canadian Census, Vancouver's downtown peninsula -- the densest part of the city -- had just over 70,000 residents in a little over 2 square miles, for an average population density of just under 50 people per acre.  It's probably a bit higher now, but not all that much. 

Meanwhile, Manhattan squeezes more than 1.5 million people into just 23 square miles, which means that the average acre in Manhattan has 100 residents.  (That, of course, includes Central Park, which occupies well over a square mile in the center of the city.  Excluding that, as is done for Stanley Park in Vancouver, pushes Manhattan densities a bit higher.)

That makes Manhattan, on average, about twice as dense as the most heavily populated neighborhood in Vancouver.

I'm not trying to take anything away from Vancouver.  Its record in creating livable urban neighborhoods is truly remarkable.  Lower Manhattan can learn a lot from what Vancouver's accomplished over the past few decades.  Still, there's no purpose to be served in propagating bad information:  that can only lead to distorted expectations and, ultimately, bad decisions.

Update:  Apparently, Vancouver's downtown peninsula isn't even as dense as Brooklyn, let alone Manhattan.  Jeez.

Graph Theory

If anyone tries to tell you that there's no real evidence that humans are having much effect on the atmosphere, just show them this:

The graph represents carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, and the red line at the end -- part of which is enlarged in the upper left of the graph -- respresents the increase since the industrial revolution began.  So right now, CO2 levels are the highest they've been in, oh, nearly half a million years.

Hat tip to WorldChanging.

Is Gas Elastic?

In 1999 you could buy a gallon of gas in Washington state for less than a buck.  As recently as 3 years ago, gas prices averaged about  $1.20 a gallon.  Right now, though, expect to shell out about $2.85.

So what has a 136% price hike done to gasoline consumption?  As it turns out, not a lot.  In 2002, the average Washington resident went through about 8.4 gallons of gas per week.  Based on data through July 2005, that's now down to about 8.1 gallons per week -- a 4 percent reduction.

Elastic?  Not so much. 

Of course, the trends are a bit confusing. The state economy was in the doldrums in 2002, but has picked up a bit of steam since; if economic conditions had remained constant, the decline in gas consumption might have been a little steeper.

Over the longer term, the trends are a little more promising.  Person for person, gas consumption peaked in 1978, at 9.7 gallons per person per week.  We're down 17% from then.  (Which convinces me that federal CAFE standards--while far from perfect--really did accomplish something useful.)

Remember, though, these are per capita trends.  Population growth has worked at cross purposes to improved fuel efficiency:  all told, Washington state is on track to use the same total amount of gasoline this year as it did in 2002, and possibly a bit more.

The $100 Million Beetle

The mountain pine beetle, that scourge of British Columbia's inland forests, has officially reached new heights of infamy. Yesterday, provincial Premier Gordon Campbell called it, "the most significant natural disaster to ever hit British Columbia's forests." The province is planning to spend Can$100 million to stop the estimated 1.13 trillion tree-killing bugs. (Incidentally, that means that pine beetles outnumber people by about a quarter-million to one in BC.)

One ray of hope perhaps, is Blue Pine Products, a Prince George-based manufacturer selling small wood items that showcase the intricate blue streaking of beetle-killed wood. Their products seem mostly too small to have a serious impact on forestry in BC, but it's a start toward finding commercial uses for the beetle trees.

Prince of Whales

It's been a gloomy few weeks, but here's a bright spot: As noted by NEW's Eric de Place and People for Puget Sound's Kathy Fletcher in a Seattle P-I op-ed today, Puget Sound's resident orca population has been slowly rebounding over the past couple of decades, with 90 southern resident orcas visiting the Sound this summer. This trend is good news for orcas, of course, but offers a larger message:

"As the top predators of a diverse food web, the orcas embody the fate of the entire Sound. Their growing numbers are a promising sign that we can successfully improve ecological conditions, not only for the orcas but for us too. Cleansing the Sound of toxics and bringing back its abundance of salmon will take work--but there is plenty of evidence that we can do it."

Gas Mileage: (More) Truth in Advertising

We previously discussed problems with the way the EPA lets auto manufacturers measure the fuel efficiency of their vehicles.  What with all the hullabaloo, the EPA proposed to revise its testing methods by the end of the year so they more resemble the real world. According to the Boston Globe, the three core changes would be to:

• Alter testing to reflect today's more aggressive and high-speed driving habits, as well as address traffic-stifling congestion in cities and expanding suburbs.
• Account for vehicles driven in cold climates, where fuel economy suffers.
• Calculate the impact of accessories, such as air conditioners, that cut fuel economy.

While individual drivers still might find that their vehicles' gas mileage doesn't match up with official figures, because of differences in driving conditions and habits, the new EPA estimates would give them a better idea about actual annual fuel costs. Even better, since CAFE standards are based on these tests, more accurate tests would mean more accurate CAFE estimates, likely causing auto manufacturers to improve fuel efficiency all around.

The Scrap Heap Is History?

Check it out: by 2015, all cars sold in Europe must be 95% recyclable.  Apparently, Mercedes-Benz already has a 2007-model year car that meets the requirement.

Part of me wonders if automotive engineers aren't actually excited by this sort of challenge.  It seems that whenever a new idea like this comes along, the auto executives complain about how impossible and costly it will be -- but as soon as the industry's hands are forced, the engineers figure out how to pull it off faster and cheaper than the executives had claimed was possible.  It happened with catalytic converters, with seat belts, with air bags.  And now, if early signs are any guide, it's happening with recycling.

Sic Transit

As big-time blogger Duncan Black noted over the weekend, high gasoline prices seem to have boosted ridership on some of the the nation's transit systems -- which led big-time blogger Matthew Yglesias to speculate that gas consumption may be more sensitive to price than economists have predicted.

Yglesias' take seems mistaken to me.  Nationwide, less than 5 percent of all commuting trips are taken on transit; and commutes represent a minority of all trips that people make, but a fairly large share of all transit trips taken.  So even if transit ridership were boosted by, say, 20% -- which is a huge spike indeed -- that might represent a decrease in vehicle trips of, oh, a half a percent or so at most.

In fact, it seems to me that any recent increases in transit ridership are pretty much in line with what economists would predict from recent gas price increases.  (See here, especially table 8, for a summary of economic predictions for the relationship between fuel prices and demand.) Of course, that doesn't necessarily undermine Yglesias' main point, which is that higher gas taxes would decrease fuel consumption. 

I've also got to second this part of Duncan Black's response to Yglesias:

[L]and use patterns in much of the country have made it quite difficult for any proposed transit systems to really improve the lot of most existing homeowners/commuters. Expanding rail systems into existing suburban areas really only makes...sense if its accompanied by some land use changes in those areas (there at least needs to be higher density development around the stations themselves).

As far as I can tell, this is just about right: transit is rarely cost-competitive in low-density, sprawling neighborhoods, since both riders and destinations are simply too spread out.  (Color me extremely skeptical about about supply-side theories of transit ridership.)  Which means that, since the shape of our cities changes much slower than gas prices, a lot of us may be stuck in our cars no matter what gas prices do in the short term.

Dead End For Viaduct?

Headline from the Seattle Times:  Remove the viaduct even if state can't rebuild it?

Apparently, Seattle city officials are increasingly willing to say that, if the state's gas tax hike is repealed this November (as looks increasingly likely), the Alaskan Way Viaduct along Seattle's downtown waterfront should simply be torn down.  The existing structure poses a safety hazard, and without the $2 billion provided by the state gas tax, there's simply no money to replace the Viaduct with a tunnel, which is the city's preference.  (Of course, even with the gas tax there may be no money for the tunnel; but that's an issue for another day.)

Of course, the word from the mayor's office probably isn't final; proponents of the Viaduct will no doubt try to resurrect the rebuilding project even if the state's funding dries up.  But if this this certainly raises the stakes for November's statewide vote on the gas tax -- more and more, it looks like the gas tax vote will wind up being, in effect, an up-or-down referendum on rebuilding the viaduct.

Complex Carbohydrates

Has it come to this? Do careful shoppers really need to bring a book to the grocery store to help pick their way through the flood of labels claiming "100 percent organic," "made with organic ingredients," "natural," and many others? Yes, says a new book titled A Field Guide to Buying Organic, which offers an aisle-by-aisle guide to a wide range of labels and tips on when they're worth the extra cash you usually pay.

When I read through the book, though, I found it doesn't quite deliver on its promise. It's certainly a thorough and even-handed examination of labeling and standards, and offers lots of comparisons of, say, pesticide residues found in various conventional vs. organic produce. But it's a bit lacking in new and useful practical advice. (This is partly because of the cumbersome way they separate tips for health-oriented shoppers from tips for environmental shoppers or socially conscious shoppers.)

The exception for me was an eye-opening chapter on dairy products: how they're regulated; the kinds of contaminants that regularly show up in conventional and organic milk; why organic butter might be especially worth the price; and many other troublesome issues, such as somatic cell count (yikes).

The authors conclude that buying milk from smaller farms--organic or not--is probably worth the extra money, because they do a much better job of caring for cows, preventing infections, and restricting drug and hormone use. (This is especially in true in western states such as Washington, which tend to be dominated by large, industrial-size dairy operations.)

And a recent article in Grist on organic food prices is worth a read. It looks at the history of the organic movement, what share of the marketplace organics need to capture before prices come down (one-third, according to one study), and the contradictions inherent in the price issue, like: Is organic food too expensive or is conventional produce too cheap?

King of Sprawl

Does sprawl kill?  Looks like it.  This study found that people who live in sprawling counties -- places with low population densities and poorly connected street grids, and with rigid segregation between stores, businesses and residences -- are more likely to die in a car crash. 

Apparently, living in the sort of place where you can't get anywhere without a car makes you drive more.  And people who drive more tend to crash more.  (When you put it that way, social science seems pretty simple, no?)

But, of course, the question remains:  how much?  How much more accident risk do residents of sprawling places really face? The answer is surprisingly straightforward: according to the model developed by the study's authors, residents of Washington's King County (relatively compact and urban) should face a 20 percent lower risk of getting in a car crash than the people who live in neighboring Snohomish County (relatively sprawling).

That's the theory at least.  And in this case, the theory matches up pretty closely with reality.  Over the last few decades, the age-adjusted traffic fatality rate in King County has averaged about 20 percent lower than the rate in Snohomish.  (See table E-8, here.)

Or, said another way: if King County sprawled like Snohomish, about 800 additional King County residents would have died in car crashes since 1980.  And since the National Safety Council estimates that each traffic fatality is associated with 54 non-fatal injuries, King County residents also avoided more than 40,000 injuries, just because of how its urban and suburban areas are laid out.

Now, just imagine how many fatalities could have been avoided if King County looked like greater Vancouver, BC.

SUV Watershed

There's more to this article than the headline, but the headline alone says quite a bit:  "Poll: 8 in 10 want drivers to drop SUVs."  That's another tentative -- though possibly shallow -- sign that high gas prices are turning Americans against their gas guzzlers.  Of course, since SUVs, trucks and minivans have commanded roughly half of the new vehicle market in recent years, one wonders if this means that 3 in 10 people want other drivers to drop their low-mileage vehicles.

Other poll responses are equally telling. Seven out of 10 respondents want to the government to fight rising gasoline bills by establishing price controls. Of course, holding down prices makes us consume more gas than we otherwise would, which in a world of limited petroleum supplies could lead to all sorts of other problems -- shortages, rationing, etc.  (As The Washington Post's Robert Samuelson reminds us, Cheap Gas Is a Bad Habit.)

Seven out of 10 also support new government spending on transit.  But almost six in 10 now think it's more important to explore for new sources of energy than to protect the environment; and five in 10 favor opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development, up from just 42 percent earlier in the year.

The obvious result of a poll like this is that consumers are just screaming for something -- anything -- that might bring gas prices down.  And mostly they're looking for solutions that involve government subsidies -- for energy companies, transit, and gas consumers themselves -- or for sacrifice by someone else. That's not surprising. 

But what's all-too-clear from polls like this is that solutions that could really ramp up fuel efficiency and curtail consumption over the long term -- think feebates, or fighting sprawl, or paying for car insurance by the mile -- really aren't on the political landscape.  And that's probably because politicians (and pollsters) simply don't talk about them.  Which seems odd.  After all, they're no more infeasible than, say, expecting the powers-that-be to cut into oil industry profits by capping the price of gasoline.

Mobility Without a Motor: Notes From Buckley, WA

Editor's Note: This is the second post in a series by Dan Staley on land use and quality of life in Buckley, Washington, a small town near Mount Rainier. (See the first here.)

Recently I commented on Clark’s post about Vancouver, BC’s decision to create dedicated bike lanes on a bridge, where I stated I wished I could get that kind of varied participation here in my little town of Buckley, Washington.

Well, what the heck am I doing to encourage different ways of traveling out here?

First, folks have to want it--you can’t force something (anything) on anyone and expect it to be accepted unless people understand why they are doing it--be it recycling, wetland preservation, stringent searches at airports, living in compact neighborhoods. One must ensure the public understands, accepts and trusts what you’re trying to do--if you don’t have this, forget it. We’ve found that the best strategy to get acceptance is still word of mouth. In Buckley, we primarily work with homeowners, businesspeople, and decision-makers to make this happen.

It turns out that folks here want to walk, want to ride their bikes, want to have children skateboard safely to school, want to get out of their cars. It’s just that nobody gave them the chance to have this kind of infrastructure before. 

We have a robust portion of the Foothills trail (when completed, some 30 miles long), a formal Park and Ride planned, some compact neighborhoods. For transit, we really need more people here before it is a viable option, but we are working on that for the future too; density and population drive transit, and we’re not there yet (our human population is about 4500). We work directly with developers to ensure their development connects to trails, bike paths, and sidewalks--which means few culs de sac and no gates. Developers appreciate knowing, early, what they need to do to get their project done--surprises cost money and establishing a relationship has positives for both sides.

In our struggles to update our Comprehensive Plan—which we take to City Council in a few weeks--we are also trying to create more walkable neighborhoods by narrowing the streets, bringing houses closer to the street, and ensuring that design guidelines don’t result in boring cookie-cutter neighborhoods that aren’t conducive to walking. We want to create something to walk TO--the neighbors’ house, parks, small businesses owned by someone we know, the river.

Is it enough? Who knows? You can only do your best, and hope. But something’s started. The five people running for mayor are discussing the plan changes, which shows people are engaged.

People seem to understand how the non-motorized ideas we’ve put forth benefit them, and also how they benefit their neighbors. And that seals the deal, because we know our neighbors out here.

$10 billion? That's nothing!

Cleaning up Puget Sound--removing toxics and restoring its ecosystems--could cost as much as $10 billion, according to a gathering of conservationists and lawmakers as reported in the Seattle Times. Leaders are hoping to wrangle $5 billion of that total from Congress, but so far the Army Corps of Engineers, which has a sweeping vision for restoring the Sound, has garnered only a tiny fraction of the necessary dough.

Okay, $10 billion is a lot of money--even when it's spread out over a number of years--but one way to make the amount seem smaller is to compare it to other expenses. So, just for the heck of it, how about a comparison to American household spending? Here's how that multi-year $10 billion compares to just a single year (2003) of spending. It's...

• 30% of household spending on tobacco
• 22% of household spending on alcohol
• 7% of household spending on gasoline
• 4% of household spending on health care

Or another, more locally relevant way to think about it: it's substantially less money than taxpayers in just three counties--King, Pierce, and Snohomish--were, in 2004, nearly asked to shell out for a Regional Transportation Improvement District that was predominantly for road-building.

Charming 3-bedroom, 2 bath with only 5 pounds of weight gain a year

Obesity has many causes, but current research indicates that sprawl may play a part. So far, researchers have concluded that people who live in sprawling, car-dependent neighborhoods are more likely to be obese, while people who live in walkable neighborhoods are apt to do more walking. But researchers still trying to tease out cause and effect: do walkable neighborhoods encourage people to walk? Or do people who like to walk move to walkable neighborhoods? I suspect it is both.

However, one recently study claims that sprawl doesn't, in fact, cause obesity. The authors, who base their findings on a complex theoretical model, don't dispute that sprawl and obesity are linked. But they claim that people who move to sprawling neighborhoods are simply making a more-or-less conscious choice to put on more weight:

"[R]esidents are willing to accept locations that result in weight gain because they face lower housing prices and can purchase more housing."

In other words, people buying a house don't mind putting on a few extra pounds in order to get the house they want.

But here's the catch: the link between sprawl and obesity just isn't that widely known. Researchers have just been started exploring these connections over the last few years; the literature is growing, but it's still in its infancy. So it's hard to imagine that most home-buyers, over the last several decades, were weighing the concrete effects of neighborhood design on their health. How could they, when the information just didn't exist?

While I haven't worked through the entire model line-by-line, I also have some quibbles with the methods. As with any theoretical model, it's based on a host of assumptions.  And one of them -- that calorie consumption increases as income increases -- clearly poses problems. As Clark blogged about a while ago, food is really cheap, and cheapest foods are the most calorie dense (think greasy fast food). So there's ample reason to believe that calorie consumption could actually increase as income goes down. 

Theory can be very useful; and there may well be some truth to the notion that people who don't like exercise don't mind living in places that discourage walking. But in this case, only studies that track actual people over time as they move among actual neighborhoods will yield reliable answers.

Read This Outdoors

Is it possible that today's children suffer from Nature-Deficit Disorder?

At least in our imaginations children and nature are as inseparable at Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. Kids seem born to run through the woods, fish, build forts, and explore their natural surroundings. But according to a new and, I think, rather intriguing theory, children are increasingly constrained by sanitized and regimented activities that alienate them from nature. The result may be worsening psychological problems for kids and may help explain the pervasiveness of that bogeyman of contemporary child development, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

I have no idea whether there's any empirical merit to the case, but a new book, Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv, argues that children are more estranged from nature today than ever before. And because contact with the natural world can be a powerful remedy for ADHD, children's alienation from nature may be contributing to the prevalence of ADHD.

I won't blather on further now (I haven't read the book), but it is worth pointing out a good book review in Orion Online that explains Louv's reasoning and offers a glimpse of his research context. Seriously, it's fascinating. If that's not enough, read an interview with the author at Salon.com (free access if you watch a short ad).

Energy News That's Fit to Print

The New York Times has a bonanza of energy related stories today.  First, there's this feature story on "peak oil" -- the notion that the world's oil producers are very close to the point at which they no longer can increase production, after which worldwide crude oil output will inexorably sink.  This idea has gained currency and adherents over the past several years as oil prices have risen -- though there are plenty of detractors who say that we're nowhere close to a global production peak.  There's nothing new in the article, but it's a good summary of the debate for those who haven't been following it.

Next stop, this news that the recent gasoline price spikes have suppressed gasoline sales for the second consecutive week:

All told, Americans used an estimated 8.63 million barrels of gasoline a day in the week that ended Sept. 9, down 4.3 percent from the week before and 6.5 percent less than the comparable week in 2004, according to the Energy Information Administration.

It's not clear if this decline is because consumers are buying less gas, or if it's because retailers are drawing down their existing stocks, waiting for prices to fall a bit before replenishing them. But at least one oil economics firm has reported steep drops in retail gasoline sales over the past week -- a sign that higher prices may actually be changing consumer behavior, at least somewhat.

(As a side note -- the general consensus seems to be that over the short term, a 10 percent increase in gas prices leads to a 1-2 percent decrease in per-capita consumption.  So if average gas prices rise from $3 to $3.30 over the next year, we'd still see a negligible decline in total consumption --  perhaps not even enough to offset population growth.  If high prices are maintained over the long term, though, people will reduce their consumption quite a bit more. But I digress.)

Third, there's this story about declines in overall retail sales -- led by a drop-off in new car sales in August, after a torrid July.  But the interesting thing to me is that higher spending on gas helped bump up spending a bit -- which means that, for those who think of high levels of consumer spending as a harbinger of a strong economy, high energy prices may actually be giving the nation a boost.  Yet another example of how standard economic indicators should be taken with an appropriately-sized grain of salt.

And finally, there's this story:  "Toyota Says It Plans Eventually to Offer an All-Hybrid Fleet."  Apparently, the automaker thinks that by ramping up production it can cut the cost premium for hybrids -- making them that much more competitive with conventional cars and trucks.

Interesting times, indeed.

San Francisco, Here We Come?

As Joel Connelly points out in today's P-I, there's no guarantee that I-912 -- the Washington State initiative that would roll back the most recent hike in state gas taxes -- will pass.  That said, repeal of the gas tax looks pretty likely, in no small part because of the surprisingly tepid response from the state's business community, which had previously been outspoken in its support for higher gas taxes and transportation spending.

Come November, if the new gas taxes are repealed, the $2 billion in state money currently slated for Seattle's Alaskan Way Viaduct will simply evaporate.  And as Mayor Nickels has pointed out, without that money there's essentially no chance that the Viaduct will be rebuilt:

If Seattle doesn't get the $2 billion approved by the Washington Legislature to help replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct, the city will tear down the deteriorating elevated highway anyway because it is unsafe, said Mayor Greg Nickels.

So it's perhaps a good time to point out what just happened in San Francisco:  the city just opened a new 6-lane boulevard that -- get this -- replaced an elevated urban highway.  This is the second time the city has replaced an elevated freeway with a boulevard.  The first was the waterfront Embarcadero Freeway, which was torn down after it was damaged by the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989.  The city put up a waterfront boulevard in place of the highway -- a move that, according to most observers, revitalized a waterfront formerly depressed by the blight of a freeway.  And city residents liked the results enough that they decided to do the same thing to a stretch of the Central Freeway smack in the middle of downtown.

Obviously, the Alaskan Way Viaduct plays a different role in Seattle's transportation system than the Embarcadero and Central freeways did in San Francisco's.  But that city's highway removals do serve as important reminders that, no, a big-city's transportation system doesn't necessarily grind to a halt when you put the budget for downtown highways on a strict diet. 

Gas Mileage: Consumer Retorts

As Jessica mentioned last week, Consumer Reports recently claimed that EPA's vehicle ratings routinely overstate how fuel-efficient cars and trucks are in real-world driving.  For standard cars and trucks, the magazine says, EPA's ratings overstate real-world fuel economy by 30 percent.  But for small hybrids, such as the Toyota Prius, they claim that EPA overstates actual miles-per-gallon by a hefty 42 percent.  (Ouch.)

Now, I believe that there's reason to question Consumer Reports' figures.  Of course, I have read a number of reports that the Toyota Prius doesn't actually get the EPA-rated 55 mpg in combined city/highway driving (though some people -- particularly those who've optimized their hybrid-driving habits -- get pretty close, and these folks actually squeezed out 110 mpg from their Prius, albeit in highly non-standard driving conditions).  But I'd never heard any claim that the typical Prius averages just 32 mpg -- which is what the magazine's figures suggest.  See this comment by WorldChanging's Jamais Cascio for a similar take.

But, just for the sake of argument, let's take the CR figures at face value, and assume that small hybrids' mileage really is overstated by 42 percent, vs. just 30 percent for regular cars.  Doesn't the higher mpg reduction for hybrids suggest that their fuel-savings advantages vs. regular cars are overstated -- and that they don't save as much money as advertised?

Actually, no.  As counterintuitive as it may sound, the Consumer Reports figures, on their face, actually bolster the economic case for buying hybrids.

As we've said before, mpg math is tricky.  And though it may be hard to believe at first, Consumer Report's figures suggest that the Prius is an even better choice in the real world than EPA's fuel economy ratings would suggest.

Consider, for example, a regular, non-hybrid car with an EPA fuel economy rating of 30 mpg.  "Officially" it burns 2 gallons of gas every 60 miles.  But Consumer Reports estimates that the vehicle actually would get 21 mpg in real world driving -- 30 percent less than advertised.  Which means that over the course of 60 miles, the car actually burns 2.9 gallons of gas.

Now consider the Prius, with an overall EPA fuel economy rating of 55 mpg.  At its advertised mileage, it burns about 1.1 gallons of gas every 60 miles.  But if its mileage is reduced to 32 mpg -- a 42 percent reduction, per Consumer Reports' estimate for small hybrids -- then it uses about 1.9 gallons of gas every 60 miles.

So that gives us...

	Gallons consumed in 60 miles
	"Ideal"	"Real World"
Prius (rated 55 mpg)	1.1	1.9
Regular car (rated 30 mpg)	2	2.9

Look at the "ideal" column -- which represents how much gas EPA says the two cars should burn over 60 miles.  The Prius has a .9 gallon advantage -- a nice bonus.  But look at the "real world" column:  as estimated using Consumer Reports' figures, the "real world" Prius has a full one-gallon advantage over the "real world" regular car. 

In other words, the Prius is actually an even better deal--roughly 10 percent better--in the real world than it is in the abstract.  And compared with lower-mileage cars and trucks, the "real world" Prius looks better still.

Now, this obviously isn't evidence for or against Consumer Reports' estimates for hybrids.  And it doesn't do much to change my assessment that buying a Prius can be a pretty pricey way to reduce your greenhouse gas emissions. 

Still, it's good to remember that, as Barbie famously said, math is hard -- and miles-per-gallon math turns out to be among the more counterintuitive gauges that Americans are expected to understand.  So it's important to actually run the numbers.  Apparently, at least when it comes to gas mileage, it's just not enough to trust your instincts.

Docs Take the Gloves Off

(Back from my three month sabbatical, I lament writing a first post that rehashes bad news. But this item simply must be marked again.)

The Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report has assembled published opinion from around the United States on the FDA's scandalous further delay on Plan B's application for over-the-counter status.

Highpoint: A medical doctor and his coauthors write in the staid New England Journal of Medicine:

"The recent actions of the FDA leadership have made a mockery of the process of evaluating scientific evidence, disillusioned many of the participating scientists both inside and outside the agency, squandered public trust and tarnished the agency's image."

They have also kept the abortion and birth rates higher than they need be.

Girth vs. Growth

In 2004, total health care spending reached roughly $30 billion in Washington state.  In Oregon, that total was $16 billion; In Idaho, about $5.5 billion.  That's not chump change:  health care now absorbs about one-eighth of the total output of the Northwest states' economies.

And, based on the results of these national studies, and these state-level estimates, at least a tenth of all medical spending in the Northwest is related the ailments (diabetes, hypertension, colon cancer and the like) caused by obesity, overweight, and physical inactivity.

These are, of course, round numbers.  Unless I'm mistaken, there just aren't good, up-to-the-minute estimates of health care spending in the Northwest.  And multiplying the confusion, it's hard to separate out the costs of obesity, overweight and physical inactivity. 

That said, it looks pretty likely that the total, direct medical costs of the obesity-overweight-inactivity nexus top $5 billion for the three Northwest states combined.  And that's just the direct medical costs; it doesn't account for lost worker productivity, worker's compensation, and all of the other indirect costs of poor health brought on by inactivity or overweight.  This report suggests that those indirect costs top $4.6 billion per year -- for physical inactivity alone, and just within Washington state.  That number seems mighty high.  But if it's anywhere close to being accurate, it could mean that promoting exercise and eliminating excessive body weight might boost the region's economy by, oh, about 3 percent.

Or, put differently:  reducing the size of our people might be a pretty good strategy for increasing the size of the economy.

For Fuel Economy, the Numbers DO Lie

With gas prices soaring, some people may trade in their gas-guzzlers for more fuel efficient vehicles. But don't trust the EPA ratings. A recent analysis by Consumer Reports shows that 90% of vehicles get worse gas mileage than advertised -- in some cases more than 50% worse for city driving. And nationally, Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) may be overstated by a whopping 30 percent.

How does this happen? Manufacturers inflate fuel efficiency in several ways. First, they don't test cars the way people actually drive. Vehicles are tested in a laboratory, not on actual roads. And while the EPA assumes that 55% of driving is done in city traffic, which uses more fuel than highway driving, many cars actually spend 62% of time there, according to Consumer Reports. Second, the car they test is not the car you buy. Manufacturers are allowed to use prototypes built especially for the fuel economy test, so they often modify them (within limits) to get the best rating possible.

In 1984 the EPA responded to an outcry by consumers who were angry that they could not get the fuel efficiency advertised. But rather than change the way it tests cars, the EPA just adjusted the test results it reports: 10% lower mpg for city driving, 22% lower for highway. And, as Consumer Reports shows, even these adjusted numbers still aren't accurate, especially in city driving.

And worse, CAFE standards, already low and full of loopholes, are also affected. Automakers successfully lobbied so that only the unadjusted mpg ratings are used when enforcing CAFE standards. While the government estimates that the fleet of 2003-model-year passenger cars that Consumer Reports tested averaged 29.7 mpg, Consumer Reports only got 22.7, well below the current standard of 27.5 mpg. For light truck the difference was 21.4 mpg versus 16, with a standard of 20.7 mpg.

When buying a new car, follow Consumer Reports's advice:

The EPA sticker can help you evaluate relative gas mileage among vehicles, but not absolute mpg.. .. [D]iscount the EPA sticker numbers for city travel as follows: conventional cars and trucks, 30 percent; larger hybrids, 35 percent; diesels, 36 percent; smaller hybrids, 42 percent.

For more information, go to the source.  Consumer Reports has the complete article online plus its rating for 303 vehicles (use links in their left column), available until November 2, 2005.

Gasoline Price Gouging?

I'm not sure what to make of this news from the Seattle P-I (and reported elsewhere as well):

Senators condemn oil price 'gouging'
Responding to high-octane suspicions of price gouging at the pump, senators from both parties Tuesday condemned price manipulation but differed over the best way to attack the problem...

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., is convinced that the oil companies have artificially increased prices and wants President Bush to have the power to cap gas prices if necessary. She likens the conditions to those that caused the Enron fraud of the electricity market in 2000 and 2001.

"Absolutely. I just don't have the document to prove it," Cantwell said when asked if oil companies are price gouging.

I don't mean to defend the behavior of oil companies here, and I also don't want to get mixed up in semantics.  But I'm far from convinced that the recent runup in gas prices is actually a case of unethical profiteering.  It seems to me to be simple market economics:  oil and gasoline supplies are tight, and demand is up.  And that dynamic alone -- quite independently of any malicious manipulation by oil companies -- seems to be what's forcing prices up.

This post at The Oil Drum blog goes into the details of recent oil pricing dynamics better than I could.  Start there for the real skinny.

But I'll just say that there seems to be a material difference between recent gasoline price runups and the California energy crisis.  The winter of 2000/2001 was one of the driest on record, which meant that hydroelectric production was unusually low up and down the West coast.  But that scarcity set the stage for market manipulation:  a handful of energy companies were able to game the California electricity market by (among other tactics) taking some power plants offline -- allegedly for "maintenance," but really to manufacture more scarcity.

But nothing similar seems to be happening here. US oil refineries really do seem to be running full-out, or close to it:  they've got very little unused capacity, and the only ones that have been shuttered for maintenance recently are the ones that got pummelled by Katrina.  So refiners, at least, don't seem to be gaming the system. 

Likewise, major oil producers -- not just domestically, but globally -- seem to be pumping just about as much as they can.  There's very little unused production capacity left right now -- and, as a consequence, very little cushion against supply shocks, such as those caused by Katrina.

So:  global oil supplies are tight; global demand for petroleum products is high and increasing; domestic refiners and oil producers are both running as fast as they can; spare production and refining capacity is low & unstable.  That's a perfect, free-market recipe for higher prices. There's no need to invoke corporate malfeasance to explain high prices: in a market for a finite & highly valued commodity, price runups are exactly what one should expect.

Now, I'm not saying that higher gas prices are desirable, fair, or good for the economy; and there are probably reasonable arguments that some oil companies shouldn't be reaping such an economic windfall from a supply shortage.  But just because oil companies are benefitting from high gasoline prices, it doesn't follow that they're causing prices to rise.  For that, blame the fact that we've shackled our economy to a scarce commodity and a fickle marketplace.

Abstinence Makes the Heart Just As Fond

An interesting piece of research from Case Western Reserve School of Medicine suggests that students who completed an abstinence-only sex education showed an increase in "their HIV/STD knowledge, their personal beliefs about the importance of abstinence and their intentions to remain abstinent in the near future."

That's a good thing, right? Not so fast. Abstinence-only education changed what students said about abstinence. But it didn't make them any more abstinent -- and worse, it may have encouraged a slight increase in risky sexual activity.

...the program did not affect students' avoidance of risky sexual situations. In fact, female students and students already sexually inexperienced reported a decrease in their intent to use condoms.

The study also found the program did not significantly reduce the likelihood the teenagers would engage in sexual intercourse or to use a condom consistently.

Just another example in which actual results trump good intentions.

Wolf Numbers Up Again

Wolf populations are continuing to grow in the northern US Rocky Mountains. New wolf census data shows a steadily rising population, especially in Idaho where remote habitat-rich wilderness is ideal for expanding wolf numbers. After being extirpated in the early 20th century, wolves were reintroduced into central Idaho and Yellowstone National Park in the mid-1990s. (A few wolves had also begun re-colonizing Montana.)

I'm always inspired simply by the raw data of wolf recovery, especially because the returning wolves have frequently acted as agents of ecological restoration. So when wolf populations are expanding rapidly, their ripple effect on ecosystems is even more positive. The return of the wolf--happening much faster than even the most Pollyanna wolf-lovers predicted--reminds me that, at least in some instances, we still have a chance to repair the harm that we've done to wild places.

Here's the state-by-state breakdown.

Read the full story in today's Idaho Statesman.

Measure 37 One Year Later

Editor's note: Guest contributor Rex Burkholder is Deputy Council President of Metro, greater Portland, Oregon's regional government. He also chairs the Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation (JPACT) and serves on the Bi-State Transportation Committee, as well as other regional transportation committees. See a full bio here.

This coming November marks the anniversary of the passage of the landmark Measure 37 in Oregon. The measure (described here and here) created statutory permission for property owners to claim compensation or waiver of any land use regulation adopted after they or their ancestors acquired the property that they feel reduced its value.

You can imagine the bizarre and harmful impacts. Setbacks from streams to prevent flooding downstream? Demand compensation or a waiver (and because most governments in Oregon are in tight fiscal straits, a waiver will always be the response) so you can log to the edge, downstreamers be damned? Walmarts and subdivisions in the middle of farmland? Why not?

The newest development is that Metro, the Portland area’s regional government recently released findings from a broad-based task force that cataloged the impact of Measure 37 in the North Willamette Valley and determined what responses may be possible.

Is this the opening of Pandora’s Box, releasing plagues and demons that can never be constrained? Is it a dangerous beast, that, released from its chains, trashes the countryside enough to alarm the good citizens who voted for “fairness” to recognize that protecting community livability and environmental health requires some restrictions on individual action? Here is what the task force found out:

• The number of claims region-wide has continued to increase dramatically; almost all of the claims are located outside the Metro Urban Growth Boundary and on exclusive farm use and exclusive forest conservation lands.

• The issues of transferability (the Oregon Attorney General ruled that the Measure does not allow the rights claimed by historical owners to transfer to new, non-family owners) and reluctant financing (banks and developers don’t trust the durability of these changes or don’t want to get involved in lengthy litigation) are expected to have significant impacts on the pace of development.
• The true impact of M37 cannot be assessed because getting a waiver of a regulation and getting permits to build are not the same.
• M37 development in rural areas will have impact on orderly urban expansion and on water quality and quantity (septic systems and wells would be expected to be needed in all development outside current urban service boundaries).
• In addition, there are doubts about who is responsible for paying for public services like roads, police, and fire to new development in rural areas.

The task force goes on to describe a number of difficult and expensive mitigation measures that could be taken, including setting up a Transfer of Development Rights system (difficult in Oregon where urban expansion in required and dictated by state law), conservation easement programs, extending services outside existing urban service areas (in order to lessen environmental impacts but certainly to exacerbate the greater environmental impact of low density, dispersed development); getting the State to wake up to its obligations to protect water quality and quantity (farmers need water to irrigate); and looking for new ways for the public to pick up the costs.

While all regulation, including Oregon’s successful land use system, imposes higher costs on some people, the general good that is achieved has long been held to be worth it by the majority of Oregonians. There have been three unsuccessful efforts in the past to openly eliminate the state’s land use planning system. Measure 37 is a backdoor attempt to undo 30 years of good planning that has resulted in healthy farms and cities.

Dealing fairly with those few property owners who get caught in the lurch by regulatory changes is a good thing; but there are very few of these. Certainly not the landowners near the small, rural town of St. Paul that want to build 200 houses, a casino and a strip mall on what has always been farmland. I doubt their grandfather envisioned Las Vegas in the Valley when he first walked those fertile acres.

P.S. -  See 1000 Friends of Oregon's website for an extensive summary on Measure 37 and its impacts.

Poor Reasoning

The US federal poverty line is not a good measure of real life poverty. Most researchers agree that the standard method of computing poverty is outdated, overly simplistic, and probably drastically undercounts the number of poor. (Here's a quick summary from Dan Staley; here's the longer version of the same story.) Still, despite its glaring flaws, the poverty rate remains the most widely reported gauge of how many poor people there are.

Enter a new report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). The report develops a more m