Tonight was the fifth (and final) time over the past half-dozen years that I was rejected as a volunteer for the St. Albans City Planning Commission.  

I’ve gotten used to the drill by now.  All of the candidates are called into the City Council meeting to be interviewed before a vote is taken to fill however many seats are vacant.  This time there were two seats and four candidates.

I always know that the other candidates will get soft-balled with easy questions, but when my turn comes up I will be pummeled with questions around whether or not I have an “agenda” in volunteering.

As if the real estate agent with developers in the family is unlikely to have an agenda; or the Main St. restaurant owner who is transforming his physical premises couldn’t have an agenda.

But no, those questions are reserved for me because no one has an agenda more dangerous to the public good than someone who consistently advocates for sustainable planning policies.

It’s always been irritating; but this time took the cake.

Why was I the only candidate who was asked for my position on eminent domain?

I answered that I thought it was never a good idea and should only be resorted to in the most extreme circumstances of essential public need, because there is nearly always a way to negotiate your way around an impasse.

In other words, I was honest.  It’s unlikely the other candidates would think differently, but we’ll never know because THEY WERE NEVER ASKED.

One council member even asked me if I would make decisions based on my opinions!  That’s right; this guy actually thinks there is no place for opinions in the decision making process.  Maybe he favors a ouija board or the I Ching?

No one seemed to  even be interested in whether or not the other candidates had “opinions.”

After the interviews were concluded, when it was time to take a vote, one of the Council members actually said that I probably had more knowledge than everyone in the room, BUT…

Then there was a lot of rationalizing about how Sue would always be there; always show up for meetings, no matter what; always lend her perspective from the sidelines, etc…  

They lavished high praise on me for my school spirit, scholastic achievement and perfect attendance…or the municipal equivalent there of.  Then they said again that I would ALWAYS BE THERE!

In short, they didn’t need to give me a place at the table because I would always be lurking on the perimeter, willing to accept the crumb of opportunity extended for “public comment.”

So, they voted to seat the two least objectionable candidates, rejecting another; and never even put my name to a vote.  Neither new planner has any experience whatsoever with planning issues or even a familiarity with the system.

The City planner told me before the vote that, if I wasn’t chosen, there would always be another time, another way to serve.

‘Heard that one before, too.  Four times.

But that’s it for me.  I understand now how little value the Council members place on my participation.

For years I’ve read editorials imploring people to volunteer to serve on City boards and commissions.  Often it seemed they were beating the bushes to find people to volunteer.  

Some of the “volunteers” I’ve sat with for interviews didn’t even seem to know what the job entails.  Even tonight, one of the candidates wasn’t absolutely certain he had the time to serve.

But he’s in and I’m out…once again.

I can’t say I’m heartbroken.  Indignant, for sure; but heartbroken?  Certainly not!

If the City Council doesn’t realize that my time is valuable, I certainly do.  I told them that they could strike me permanently off of their lists because I am through with interviews for voluntary positions for which I will never be deemed suitable.

That will make many people happy, I am sure; and it will leave me with a whole lot more liberty to say and write exactly what I think.

Win-win.

It’s hard to know what to say about the massive explosion and oil fire that occurred this weekend on the Quebec/Maine Border when a Canada Rail train hauling crude oil jumped the track triggering massive explosions and fire.  

The little town of Lac-Megantic in the Eastern Townships lost dozens of buildings in the fire, and a toll in human casualties has yet to be determined.  

What caused  the derailment remains shrouded in mystery.  It is interesting though, that the train had been parked some distance from the town prior to the accident, and there was no one on board.

Nevertheless, it can be predicted that, rather than acknowledge that exploiting our relentless appetite for oil is the ultimate cause of this and all the other refinery and oil spill disasters, the fossil fuel industry will undoubtedly try to capitalize upon this tragedy in order to make its case for pipeline transport.

But that’s a load of fertilizer.  Enabling the pipeline would just mean further enabling the destructive potential of fossil fuels.

As in the case of nuclear energy, the justification for continued use of these dirty fuels is that they are “cheap;” but as this accident  dramatically demonstrates, collateral costs are enormous.  

Those collateral costs do not normally include accidents, of course; but they are substantial, including healthcare costs related to asthma, cardio-pulmonary stress and other diseases aggravated by air pollution.

They include the impacts on plant and animal life, which not only represent environmental losses but also have real economic significance.

And when a spill or a fire does occur, the scale of its impact is enormous.  

Imagine if that train had been carrying solar panels or wind tower components instead of crude oil.

So bear that in mind when this incident becomes the argument du jour for allowing pipelines carrying vast new reserves of the filthiest oil products to snake through every corner of America.

I missed Bruce Lisman’s Campaign for Vermont public forum in St. Albans, when it was hosted last week at the State Police Barracks (!)

After viewing the Channel 16 recording of the event, I had some doubts that there was any there there.  It appeared pitifully under-attended, and generally pretty rudderless; so I was inclined to give it a complete pass on GMD; but a conversation or two persuaded me to take a second look at the recording and share a few observations.

Observation #1:  Bruce Lisman is as underwhelming in person as he is in print.

Observation #2:  I think this pretension that he has no bias is less the product of a calculating mind than it is of his not getting out much.  

He gives the impression of someone who genuinely doesn’t know a lot about things like farming and the environment; both being pretty significant to any policy conversation in Vermont.

Observation #3:  Except for one, his selected “panelists” had trouble staying on message.

That included dairy farmer Bill Rowell, who predictably thought that things would be just fine if people would quit yapping about the streams, smaller herds and going organic and just send a whole lot more money down the pipeline so that his cohort could farm as big as possible and as profitably as possible.  I believe at one point he even said that if he did “$5 million dollars” (worth of business) in a given year, he should be able to keep as much of the profit as possible (ie. pay less taxes.)  Okay…

This probably was fine with Mr. Lisman, but then Mr. Rowell strayed a little into populist messaging, complaining about the problems in getting the Farm Bill passed with all those “nutrition programs” falling under the political axe.  He said that was unfairly targeting children, the elderly and the poor…not to mention the farmers.

So?  Taxes…bad!  Nutrition programs fuelled by tax dollars…good.   Anybody see the messaging problem here?

And Mr. Rowell went unchallenged when he suggested that reducing the number of cows being pastured in Vermont would actually be bad for the environment because there wouldn’t be enough manure to spread around!  That’s right, he sees organic dairying as a threat to the valuable resource of manure production!

I later learned informally that Mr. Lisman has been under the impression that manure pits are good for the environment.  I think he’s been hanging out with the wrong crowd, and it may very well be that a change in the company he keeps would do wonders to rehabilitate his credibility.

Then there was the CEO of the Northwestern Medical Center, Jill Berry Bowen, who briskly rolled-out everything the NWMC was doing to ensure superior care for their patients.  Though Lisman nudged her to voice concern about  “uncertainties” with the new healthcare law, like the possible exodus of doctors due to compensation issues or even hospital closings; she sunnily replied that efficiencies were under consideration and that she was confident that  NWMC  would be around to give superior care for a very long time, even with the Green Mountain Care Board calling the shots.

The only one who was on-message was Annette Hannah of Swanton, who owns a small insurance company with a niche in Workers Comp.  She was all about business and delivered just the right amount of angst and talking points to make the Chicken Little argument against the “uncertainties” posed by the healthcare bill.  Yeah, that healthcare reform stuff will sure shake-up the Workers Comp business model!  

In fact, she was so much on message in contrast to the others that she came across more as a shill.

As the 90 minute forum ambled to its close with only a couple of audience questions, which were more like personal statements,  Mr. Lisman made a brief attempt to tie everything to “the need for greater transparency” (whatever that means to him), suggesting that this would fix everything because then we would know what was working and what was not.  Duh-uh!

Piece of advice to Mr. Lisman?  Get out more; that echo chamber you entered directly from Wall Street is doing you no good.  If you want to appear non-partisan, you need to go a little outside the Chamber of Commerce for your panelists.  

And for godssake, stop referring to Democratic lawmakers as “Democrat politicians.”

Did I detect just a hint of sarcasm in today’s Freeps story about the Genuine Progress Indicator?

One thing most probably could agree on is that there is no perfect way to measure a population’s well-being, however defined. But the measures keep coming, and a new one for Vermont is in the pipeline, thanks in part to the environmental movement.

Oh, those wacky environmentalists.

The traditional way to quantify how well a state or nation is doing, is by means of its “GDP” (Gross Domestic Product) which is

That a smaller and smaller class of Americans enjoys the lion’s share of this productivity seems to have escaped the attention of Wall Street and the rest of the Sunshine Boys who point to the GDP as an unimpeachable sign that things are looking up.

The Free Press article acknowledges that the resulting figure does not take into account negative impacts generated by that economic activity, including things like pollution, erosion and loss of significant habitat; stuff that is apparently of only limited interests to people other than environmentalists, until a price tag for necessary remediation is attached.

But environmental impacts are only a part of the story of why a Genuine Progress Indicator is needed in order to truly understand how well one state or one nation is doing.

GDP looks only at the amount of economic activity that is generated  over a given period of time, without judgment as to whether that activity contributes to or detracts from a sustainable future.  It then divides that “product” on a per capita basis, concluding that each unit of population (or person) enjoys an equal share of that “productivity.”

As income inequity has grown exponentially in the U.S., continuing to apply the same old GDP yardstick seems akin to economic malpractice.  

It speaks well for Vermont’s legislature that they recognize this fact and are moving toward adoption of a GPI which will take into consideration both the positive and negative effects of commerce and development, as well as quality of life factors that have previously been ignored in quantifying our well-being.

Establishing GPI standards would be a positive step toward shaping a sustainable future; and Vermont’s legislature deserves our respect for having recognized that value.

It’s not that I am any less overjoyed that DOMA got the toss from SCOTUS this week.  It’s a victory for fairness and equality; and for plain common sense.

That it happened this week means  we must celebrate the news while bitterly recognizing that social justice battles are NEVER over; because this was also the week in which that same black robed posse rolled back the clock on civil rights to the shameful days of 1964.

In remarks explaining why it overturned a key provision of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, the nation’s highest court completely discounted blatant attempts at voter suppression that occurred in the general election as recently as last November.

As far as the Supremes are concerned, racial equality is a done deal.

Finishing the job begun with Citizens United, this decision sets the stage for future U.S. Congresses to be even less representative of “we the people” than they are now.

As if to illustrate the complete disconnect that exists between the supposedly post-racial U.S. that SCOTUS imagines we’ve got going on here, and the simmering stew that actually exists, American media has virtually ignored the knee-capping of  votier rights to focus instead on the etiquette of racially charged semantics.  

They devoted hours of debate to discussing whether or not celebrity chef Paula Deen ought to be run out of town on a rail for her use of the ultimate racial perjorative, not for the bizarre antebellum reference in which the word was used; then they capped off the week by “examining” whether use of the word “cracker” in the Trayvon Martin murder case was somehow an equivalent outrage!

Whether the target is black Americans’ or women’s rights, we are witnessing new assaults on those values that threaten to undo much of the good that was accomplished over decades of struggle.

So, even once marriage equality finally (inevitably) becomes the law of the land, LGBT Americans would be well advised to stay organized and activist.  Someone will (also inevitably) be waiting in the wings to try and take it all away again.  

I’ve had occasion, in the past, to disagree with George Plumb of Vermonters for Sustainable Population; but we are pretty much in agreement that the population of Vermont has no need for growth.

Focussing on the news that Vermont’s population has actually declined by 581 individuals between 2011 and 2012, VSP is reminding us that that may, in fact, be a good thing.

“Sustainability” is what defines a healthy population, and VSP recognizes that the metrics of sustainability involve many contributing factors.

Says Plumb:

“We’re writing a study on 11 different indicators, and each indicator will determine the optimal, or sustainable, population size of Vermont.” The indicators… range from a population’s ecological impact, to that population’s degree of democratic representation, to the numbers needed to support a “steady-state economy.”

It’s a pleasure to read that someone else is less concerned about the much ballyhooed “exodus” from Vermont and more about how we can ensure that the human population can be fully supported here without further compromising the state’s fragile natural resources and quality of life.

For years now, like clockwork, UVM Economics instructor Art Woolf has routinely hung crepe in the pages of the Freeps, lamenting that the population of Vermont is “aging.”  

Disregarding the fact that the population of the entire country is also aging, state Republicans have taken up the cry, demanding tax “incentives” to stem the imagined flight of “job creators.”  Even Governor Shumlin seems to have bought into that myth, although recent indications are that those old folks coming in and cluttering up the register have more disposable income than in most other states.

It appears to have occurred to no one in the administration that this aging demographic represents a new market to be addressed with goods, services and quality of life experiences; all of which Vermont might position itself uniquely to deliver.  When that “aging” population is creatively recognized for the nascent market it represents, there will be plenty of jobs attracting young workers who will have families, reinvigorating both the economy and the gene pool at the same time.  Then, the cycle will begin again.

But all that is beside the fact that a sustainable population should be the goal, not a growing one.  

Why is it that we recognize the unsustainable nature of unlimited growth with regard to the body (ie. cancer), but can’t quite grasp the fact that economies and even nations “die” when population growth exceeds the loading capacity of both natural resources and human services?

The sustainable population message is not without its problems, however.  In order for a sustainable population model to allow for the essential revitalizing effect of immigration, some things have got to give.

Opportunities lie in voluntary changes to our consumption patterns in order to spare resources; and in establishing easy access to birth control and full-choice family planning services for everyone.  

Neither option will appeal to everyone, but sooner or later those will be the choices we all have to make.  Mindlessly ramping-up population growth, were it even possible in Vermont, would just force us to make those choices that much sooner.

It’s time to look at our state as “almost full” rather than “almost empty,” and to start making some smart decisions to optimize the situation.

Just as South Burlington is poised to vote again on whether or not to oppose siting of F-35’s at Burlington Airport, I see that the Air Force has acknowledged more “mistakes” made in the F-35 impact study.

Beyond configuring their impact assessments with population data more than ten-years out-of date (from the 2000 census), it now appears that they misrepresented public support for the siting

as 8-2 in favor.  Apparently, the true numbers are more like the exact reverse.

‘Kind of makes you wonder what else has been fudged.

…And, speaking of the “confidence quotient” for Congress…

I have just returned from DC, where I joined representatives of the League of Conservation Voters from all over the country to bring an appeal to the doorsteps of our President, our Senators and our Representatives:

Act to address Climate Change Now!

We want to send a message to President Obama, that all the distractions of the past few months are no excuse to neglect the commitment he made in his second inaugural speech, to get the U.S. onboard with responsible climate action.

I seriously doubt that more than a handful of key Republicans continue to deny climate change in their most private conversations; yet, they have succeeded in paralyzing the U.S. response to this global threat.  That paralysis leaves us, as a nation, not just guilty of colossal neglect, but also vulnerable to incredible economic impacts for which we remain officially unprepared.  

There are good people proposing some kind of meaningful action ( like Bernie Sanders‘ bill proposing a carbon tax); but there are not enough of them and the problem has grown too big for a single bandaid fix.  

Even if, by some miracle, the carbon tax was adopted, there would still be contamination by methane from the newly introduced practice of “fracking” which represents a windfall for fossil fuel speculators but ignores the fact that the methane released in the process has roughly five times the potential for climate impact of carbon. We haven’t even succeeded in weaning the fossil fuel industry from it’s grip on the  government teat, so we are essentially suckling the demon child that will devour us all!

And, while the President spoke eloquently on Climate Change in January, it is now June and the agenda still appears to be to claim fuel “independence” by ramping up extraction and production of domestic dirty fuels. It’s as if Dick Cheney still haunts the Oval Office. Of course he does; and so do all the fossil fuel industry poltergeists.

I remember reading a couple of years ago about climate change deniers in the legislature of a southern state actually prohibiting state planners from factoring the impact of climate change into projections of shoreline decline over the coming years.  I’d like to think that even those folks are finally getting the picture now.

As if on cue,  as soon as Bill McKibben announced to the world that we had already exceeded the dreaded 400-ppm, the heavens opened to release some of the most violent storm and climate events of recent memory.

The City of New York, no longer the blase capital of the world, got ahead of the news (and they hope the next big wave) when Mayor Bloomberg announced a $20-billion plan to prepare the city for shoreline loss and the catastrophic weather events predicted for the future.  While Mayor Bloomberg may represent the leading edge of official U.S. response to Climate Change, he is well-behind much of the world, where many feel “the end is here,” and nothing is left but to adapt as the inevitable blight descends, leaving island nations homeless and others in economic and societal peril.

And where are all those great plans for reversing the trend?  Where are all those folks who claimed we would come up with a “solution” in plenty of time to prevent catastrophe?  Let’s hear something helpful from the roughly 1.5% of scientists who are always cited as experts by the knuckledraggers who restrain even the White House from meaningful action.

I only saw the really “good guys” on my Capitol Hill visits; but what they said was uniformly discouraging: “We’re trying but we can’t get much of anything done.”

Unfortunately, that isn’t good enough.  Climate crisis won’t wait for the political stars to realign with reality.  It’s here right now.

The good news is that four U.S. nuclear reactors have retired so far in 2013.  The latest is at San Onofre, California.

The bad news is that even after permanent shutdown, retired nukes leave a very long and dirty trail.  

It will be many decades after shutdown before they can be buried and uneasily forgotten; and long after then, it will be millennia before the byproducts of their brief curtsey on the energy stage no longer pose a threat to all living things.

But this is still 2013, and far more of these infernal engines continue to tick away, answering  the call of a bottom line so compelling that it will not hear the awful truth:  that nuclear isn’t clean, isn’t safe, isn’t cheap; and, if recent events are anything to go by, certainly isn’t reliable.

Japanese citizens have learned that the hard way.

Now some are finding that all those claims that health impacts from the Fukushima accident would be minimal were just as false as early press releases from TEPCO and their own government that  minimized the danger and advised many to “shelter in place,” when they should have been evacuated.

This past week, it was reported that there are twelve confirmed and fifteen suspected cases of thyroid cancers already in the aftermath of the 2011 accident.   This number was recorded from among 174,000 individuals aged 18 or younger.

The official take on this news was myopic denial:

Researchers at Fukushima Medical University, which has been taking the leading role in the study, have so far said they do not believe that the most recent cases are related to the nuclear crisis. They point out that thyroid cancer cases were not found among children hit by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident until four to five years later.

Yes, we all know how reliable those Soviet era records from Chernobyl were.

Some countries, like Germany, and even Canada, are beginning to get the message, though.  

As in the U.S., one of the advantages the nuclear energy industry enjoys in Canada is a liability limit that essentially indemnifies the industry against the crushing cost of major accidents.  Now Canada is rethinking that policy and preparing to increase the industry’s liability there.  This should prove very interesting because the relatively low cost of insuring nukes has been one of the traditional supports that has served to artificially decrease the cost of nuclear power.

If “cheap” is removed from the industry’s talking points, how well will “safe” hold-up with customers in the aftermath of Fukushima?

We can only hope that nuclear is poised to go out with a whimper rather than a bang.

From the Department of Things No One Disagrees With, perennial political question mark, Bruce Lisman, has once again emerged from his burrow to announce importantly that government in Vermont should strive for more transparency.

What made this nonplussing pronouncement that much more underwhelming was the fact that it appeared in the Free Press directly above the announcement of Secretary of State Jim Condos’ second “Transparency Tour” since his election in 2010.  Transparency has, in fact, been a central theme in his tenure as Sec. of State.

I had the opportunity to attend one of his public events on the first “Transparency Tour.”  St. Albans had been experiencing some controversies, and Sec. Condos came here to answer questions and teach a “refresher course” in basic rules of open meetings.  It was a great presentation and I learned much in that one evening.

Since he took office, Sec. Condos has been working tirelessly, and as quickly as budget constraints will allow, to update the interfaces for public access to things like campaign and election data.  I have found that he and his staff make themselves extremely available for questions and do a pretty impressive job of providing information despite the challenges inherent in trying to upgrade systems during a belt-tightening phase.

In his Free Press cameo appearance, Mr. Lisman states in the broadest terms what everyone agrees should be the goals for open government.

There are no specific new suggestions as to how this goal of greater transparency (which is undisputed) should be achieved, just restatement of the obvious and the suggestion that yet another layer of government be added, “a transparency authority,” which according to Mr. Lisman, should include representatives of the Ethan Allen Institute and the Public Assets Institute.

(I erroneously identified PAI as being right-leaning, and apologize for the mistake.)

These organizations already function in a watchdog role, independent of the process.   In my opinion, that’s a much better arrangement.

So long as Mr. Lisman has big bucks and coyly refuses to drop the last veil on his political bias, the media will no doubt give him ink and flatter his notions of self-importance, even when he really has nothing of substance to say.