Bacon's Rebellion

I’ve been using the Bacon’s Rebellion forum for some time now to make the connection between Virginia’s energy-intensive pattern of land use and Virginians’ vulnerability to oil price shocks. Every $.20 increase in the price of gasoline translates into $1 billion hit to Virginia consumers. It’s been a lonely job — no one else in the media picked up the theme. No other lobbying or activists groups picked it up either. Until now.

Three leading conservationist/environmental groups have issued a press release making much the same point that I have. Indeed, they’ve done me one better: calling for the state to set benchmarks for per capita Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) as a tangible measure of the effectiveness of state transportation policy.

“Certainly, neither VDOT’s long-term plans nor the proposals before the General Assembly account for the predicted continuation of rising gas prices,” says Lisa Guthrie, executive director of the Virginia League of Conservation Voters. “We are concerned about the absence of fundamental reform in land use and transportation planning in this era of high energy costs.”

“Our first priority in transportation should be to set and meet a goal to reduce the amount that current and future Virginians have to drive,” says Stewart Schwartz, executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth. Progress would be measured in terms of Vehicle Miles Driven per capita. Reducing the amount of driving not only would reduce traffic congestion but cut energy consumption, energy dependence, pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.

“To achieve this goal we must reduce the growth that is extending farther and farther away from our job centers. By revitalizing our cities and towns, and creating more mixed-use walkable communities we make walking, bicycling, carpooling, transit and shorter car trips possible,” says Chris Miller, President of the Piedmont Environmental Council.

“In America,” he adds, “one of the largest contributors of global climate change is the air pollution which results from the increasing vehicle miles traveled. Reductions in per capita VMT do more to reduce greenhouse gases that are the cause of global warming than new technologies and improved energy efficiency.”

(The press release does not appear to be online at this moment, but the Coalition will get around to posting it eventually. Click here to check its website.)

Full disclosure to readers: The Piedmont Environmental Council underwrites Bacon’s Rebellion’s Road to Ruin project. Chris Miller and I chat from time to time but we have never discussed the connection between land use and energy dependence. This is an issue the PEC has arrived at independently from Bacon’s Rebellion — unless, of course, they’ve actually been reading our stuff! In any case, we’re delighted to have someone else sharing our perspective on this issue.

An enduring theme of Bacon’s Rebellion is the escalating cost of higher education. Higher ed is both a vital institution in our society — and out of control. I recall reading that tuitions are rising at the rate of eight percent this year (sorry, no source) — not just in Virginia’s public universities, which are compensating for the supposed miserliness of the General Assembly, but throughout the nation.

The cost of attending Harvard has reached about $42,000 a year. Remarkably, this most prestigious of institutions maintains this exorbitant fee even as its endowment surges in size, reaching $25.9 billion in 2005 — or roughly $1.3 million for each of its 19,500 undergraduate and graduate students. Invest that $1.3 million per student in U.S. Treasuries, and you’d generate income of about $65,000 a year. (Clearly, no matter how much money you give this particular university, it will never be enough.)

Of course, Harvard is known for the acumen of those who manage its endowment. The university has invested a significant percentage of its portfolio in hedge funds, an investment category that has been generating higher returns than normal stock market indices — and much more than the five percent example used here.

Now, it seems, other universities are eyeing the outsized investment returns of Harvard and Yale, and they’re pumping their endowment money into hedge funds, too, according to a May 3 article in Business Week (and forwarded by alert reader David Kaplan). The risk is that hedge funds are now the “hot” investment category, they’re attracting billions of dollars in capital, and that too much money is now chasing too few opportunities. As in any other financial bubble, the late-comers will end up with sub-par returns — if they don’t lose their shirts outright.

I would be very interested in knowing the extent to which Virginia educational institutions are investing their endowments in hedge funds. I recall reading that the University of Virginia has done quite well by emulating Ivy League investment strategies — not that a booming endowment has been reflected by a moderation in tuition price hikes.

What concerns me is what happens if the hedge funds go bust as a category and endowments take a hit. Will Virginia university boards use that as an excuse to jack up tuitions even more aggressively? Heads we win, tails you lose?

Fredericksburg stands athwart the sluiceway of growth running from Northern Virginia south through Interstate 95, and the local Economic Development Authority is preparing itself for the inevitable. Instead of trying to halt growth, the the EDA has formed a JumpStart! committee to fogure out how to shape it.

Inspired perhaps by its beautiful historic downtown, JumpStart! is touting mixed-use development. That’s quite a departure from, and improvement upon, the gargantuan and ghastly Central Park retail complex across the Interstate. Thomas Crimmons, a member of the EDA, lays out his thinking in a column in the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star:

Mixed-use development creates neighborhoods that include open public space, recreation areas, housing, offices, and retail space, all in one development that has an architectural theme and beautiful landscaping.

Mixed-use projects create pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods that allow people to live near where they work and shop….

The EDA is positioned to encourage, prod, advocate, lobby for “smart development,” and, when appropriate, finance mini projects throughout the city.

The Metropolitan Washington area can accommodate another 200,000 households and reduce traffic congestion just by putting the new houses in mixed-use, transit-oriented development. That’s the startling conclusion of an exercise conducted by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments.

In his latest article for the Road to Ruin project, “Incentives out of Joint,” writer Bob Burke says there’s just one problem: There’s little financial incentive for local governments to cooperate. Given a revenue stream based largely upon property taxes and a state funding formula that reimburses affluent Northern Virginia localities as little as 20 percent for their education costs, local governments conclude that new households cost them more than they contribute in local tax dollars.

Until the tax structure and funding formulas change, it is unrealistic to expect local governments to support transit-friendly development that may relieve traffic congestion but brings in new families who pose a fiscal liability.

The bill for overtime sessions in the General Assembly have surpassed the $90,000 mark, according to the Warren Fiske at the Virginian-Pilot.

Gasp! Individual legislators are racking up a breath-taking $130 a day while twiddling their thumbs. Who do those guys think they are? The president of Exxon-Mobil?

K-Mart clerks, more likely. Most of these guys are professionals who get paid for their time. They’re losing money the longer the budget impasse continues and they cool their heels in Richmond.

Ninety-thousand dollars may be a lot to the Bacon household, but it’s a pimple on a mosquito’s butt in this year’s $53.9 million legislative budget: about 0.17 percent. As for the overtime’s impact on next year’s $17.9 billion General Fund budget, it doesn’t even register. G.A. overtime as a percentage of the total buget is so small my calculator won’t even calculate it. It doesn’t even amount to the the interest on the interest of state funds in the bank.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch also has made a big deal about the mounting cost of the extended session, dramatizing the numbers with informational graphics. My advice: Get over it. I’d much rather see our legislators take their time and get it right. Brother, what a non-issue.

This comes from the University of Virginia website, Top News Daily:

Don’t Stereotype:
What You See is NOT What You Get

Students in a Sustained Dialogue group handed out 1,000 T-shirts to their peers, and everyone who wore them on April 26 wrote their own statements on the back to shatter stereotypes. Students from left to right and part of their sayings: Casandra Bruce, “I’m graduating from the Comm School and I’m going to work in a kitchen;” Muslim student Alaa “Lulu” Buhisi, “I have Jewish friends;” Reem Ghoneim, “I am Egyptian and I don’t read hieroglyphics;” Nneoma Amadi-Obi, “I am Nigerian and I speak proper English.”

I’m all in favor of busting unfairly negative stereotypes. Here’s one more t-shirt I’d love to see: “I’m a Southern White Male — and I’m Not Prejudiced against Minorities!”

The Virginia Department of Transportation is way ahead of the public and the politicos in dealing with traffic congestion. For all the grief it gets, VDOT is one of the more technologically progressive transportation departments in the Country. In the latest example, the department has hired Open Roads Consulting Inc., of Richmond, to help the Virginia State Police respond more quickly to traffic accidents. (See press release.)

Open Roads’ computer-aided dispatch system (CAD) distributes information to all the regional Smart Traffic Centers, the 511 Virginia Clearinghouse, the Transportation Emergency Operations Center and local 911 dispatch centers. Explains David Sutton, a VDOT project manager: “One of the critical needs of traffic operations is to discover incidents quickly. The operators receiving real-time CAD data have significantly improved their ability to detect and respond to incidents. This enables the incident to be cleared sooner, traveler information is provided quicker, and traffic gets moving again faster.

Makes a lot more sense than punishing speeders and reckless drivers with excessive fines that they’ll fight to the death in court.

The National Park Service has ranked Virginia second among the 50 states in the use of federal tax incentives to rehabilitate historic buildings. The Service’s annual report lists Virginia with 140 approved approved proposals and 74 completed projects, second only to Missouri in both categories. The City of Richmond is second only to St. Louis, Missouri, of all cities in the nation for the number of rehabilitation tax projects using federal tax credits during the past five years.

The total private investment in Virginia leveraged through rehabilitation projects completed and certified by the Park Service during fiscal year 2005 was $128,603,161, making Virginia seventh in the nation for money spent. “The Commonwealth’s ranking highlights the power of historic preservation as an economic and community revitalization tool,” commented Gov. Timothy M. Kaine in a press release. “Historic rehabilitation through public-private partnerships, combined with state and federal tax credits, has the added benefit of supporting smart growth and helping to stem sprawl in our urban and suburban areas throughout Virginia.”

That’s the Tim Kaine I knew — back before he went over to the dark side, favoring tax hikes to support sprawl-inducing transportation projects. I remember chatting with him during the early days of his campaign — back when he was still spending time in Richmond — and discussing his ideas about economic and community development. Kaine, a former Richmond mayor, cited the historic tax credits and Richmond’s tax abatement program for restored properties as an engine in the city’s resurgence.

It’s good to see that the Governor is still thinking in these terms, even if he hasn’t taken any tangible action yet. Maybe we’ll see an urban renewal initiative next year. It would be cool if we could bump Missouri off its perch.

I am posting this passage for Jim Bowden who encountered technical difficulties and could not add it himself. — Jim Bacon

My state senator, Marty Williams (R), has another op ed in the Daily Press ( “Ball is in House’s court now,” May 2, 2006). Apparently, according to Marty, the ball is a ‘regional plan’ for Hampton Roads passed by the Senate last week.

Marty concludes with his conditions for a Transportation Plan:

“Provide meaningful support for transportation needs for the foreseeable future.

Do not raid the general fund ensuring that roads do not compete with schools, public safety or health care.

Do not pay for road construction by saddling other parts of the budget with additional debt that will have to be paid back later with interest.

We’ve heard enough criticism from House Republicans. What Virginians deserve from them now are constructive contributions. That means taking action on the Hampton Roads regional plan now.”

I agree. The House should reject the regional plan if includes another unelected government with taxing authority. Marty pushed this before and the voters in his own district have decisively beaten it – twice – at the polls.

Marty never gives us a number on how much money is needed each year for meaningful support. We need a number, not an adjective.

Marty was happy to raid the Transportation Trust Fund to move money to the General Fund. Either he has a principled reason to raid funds one way only – from Transportation – or he is just being a politician.

Marty was thrilled to support saddling Virginians with huge debts a few years ago. Again, has he has discovered, recently, a principle that forever more he will fight bond issues, or he is just being a politician?

Marty never tells us how much the professional staff will cost for this unelected regional government. How many persons will be hired for what jobs? How much will they be paid?

Marty never explains why VDOT can’t manage the tolls across the James River – and maybe on I-64.

Marty has failed to offer a plan to fund the first priority for Hampton Roads since he was elected in 1995. Eleven years without any leadership, except to demand a new, unelected government with taxing authority and no oversight, means the ball really is in the House. Clearly, the Virginia Senate, especially the ruling majority of Republican senators, isn’t up to setting priorities, making decisions and providing leadership.

What is the url for this Senate plan for unelected regional government for Hampton Roads?

One of the persistent themes of Bacon’s Rebellion is that human settlement patterns influence the demand for new roads. Some of us have argued that scattered, disconnected, low-density development patterns force motorists to make more car trips and drive greater distances — thus putting more stress on the transportation system — than their counterparts living in more compact, more balanced and better designed communities.

While most people commenting in this blog accept the idea that the pattern and density of development has some impact on travel, some disagree that it’s a significant factor. In the end, everybody’s arguments go around in circles because no one can produce “conclusive” evidence one way or the other.

Maybe it’s time to start gathering “conclusive” evidence. Building upon an idea suggested by Chris Miller, president of the Piedmont Environmental Council, I would propose a two-part initiative.

(1) Categorize every census block in Virginia by its dominant development pattern, accounting for variables such as population density, building type, street pattern (grid street, cul de sac, whatever), presence of mass transit and other salient characteristics. (I’m open to ideas on which key variables should be considered.)

(2) Then append to the list of census blocks these two data sets: (a) Census commuting data, and (b) Division of Motor Vehicle data on vehicle miles driven by every licensed driver residing in the census tract.

That relatively simple exercise should provide the data to answer once and for all the question whether certain settlement patterns generate more automobile traffic than others — and by how much.

Given the General Assembly’s new-found interest in measuring the impact of new development upon traffic, the findings of such a study would prove extremely useful to everyone from academic researchers to local planning offices, from metropolitan planning organizations to VDOT.

Virginia industry released 3.2 percent fewer toxic chemicals into the environment in 2004 than the previous year, according to the latest Toxics Release Inventory produced by the Department of Environmental Quality.

Even more significant was the progress made in a group of chemicals known as “persistent bioaccumulative toxics,” which remain in the environment for long periods of time and can build up in living tissue. Releases of these persistent chemicals in 2004 declined 20.6 percent from the year before.

Virginia is moving in the right direction. If industry can maintain these gains year after year — through on-plant recycling, incineration, chemical substitution and other strategies — we can look forward to 30 percent improvement in toxic chemicals and truly dramatic reductions in the persistent, bioaccumulative toxins over the next decade.

I would have expected more press coverage of this good news, but the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star is the only newspaper that I’ve noticed has picked it up.

The most recent issue of the Bacon’s Rebellion e-magazine included a new feature column called Blogology. Blogology is an attempt to chronicle the developments in Virginia’s vibrant political blogosphere by getting to know the bloggers and blogs one-at-a-time. With the continue emergence of the medium as a political force and alternative to the traditional media, it seems like the right time to do this.

The choice of the first subject of the profile – Waldo Jaquith – was timely. As one of the veterans of Virginia’s blogging community, Waldo is among its more innovative practitioners. His latest creation – the Virginia Political Blogs aggregator – is striking in both its simplicity and potential reach. As such, it seemed fitting that a new column focused on the life and times of blogs would start with him.

Blogology will cover Virginia’s entire political blogosphere from all ideological and partisan persuasions. Hopefully, the new column will showcase a different side of the profiled bloggers, not just inside blogdom, but more purposefully to the larger political, policy and media arenas beyond. At the very least, Blogology may reflect another stage in the maturation in the sometimes rambunctious land that is the blogosphere.

In his most recent column, “The One Object Rule,” Philip Rodokanakis broaches a fundamental issue in the General Assembly maneuvering over taxes and transportation. The “one object rule” in the Virginia Constitution, he argues, prohibits the General Assembly from passing a budget with yet-to-be-enacted taxes embedded in it. Patrick McSweeney raised a similar alarum in a column a month ago, and House Speaker William J. Howell has raised the issue as well.

Of course, the state Senate insists that passing a budget with taxes baked in, which gives it considerable leverage in negotiating with the House, is perfectly legal. I’m no lawyer. I don’t know. My question is this: Does the “one object rule” prohibit the Senate budget?

According to Phil, someone filed a lawsuit after the enactment of the 2004 budget and built-in tax increase on the same grounds. The case was dismissed on the grounds that it was not “ripe,” meaning that all other avenues for determining the case had not been exhausted. Here’s Phil’s interpretation:

The courts seem to be saying that no one should be held accountable for a possible violation of constitutional prohibitions until after the actual violation has occurred. This absurd legal thinking is akin to saying that the police cannot arrest a person who attempts to murder his victim — until after the murder has been committed.

Phil’s argument make sense to me. But, then, I’m not a legal scholar. Can anyone shed some light?

Henrico County thoughtfully puts curb cuts in its sidewalks for the convenience of handicapped people like Buddy Besette. Yet Buddy prefers to ride his wheel chair to the mall on county roads where traffic flies past at 40 miles per hour. Clearly, something is seriously awry. I explore the nonsensical placement of sidewalks in sububurban development in this week’s Bacon’s Rebellion column, “Suburbia Absurdia.”

An important larger point is buried near the end of the story.

Protestations to the contrary, there’s no shortage of paved surface in Virginia’s suburbs. The scandal is that these assets are so poorly arranged, that parkways destroy real estate value rather than enhance it, that so much investment is wasted on sidewalks leading nowhere, and that so much roadway is tucked away in cul de sacs where no one but a handful of families ever touch tire to asphalt.

I plan to explore these themes in future columns and blog posts.

The May 1, 2006, edition of Bacon’s Rebellion has been posted online. Columns include:

Suburbia Absurdia
Suburbs are full of sidewalks that go nowhere and nobody uses. What are people thinking? Why do we persist in building this schlock?
by James A. Bacon

Take a Piece of Transportation
Since being named to the Commonwealth Transportation Board, this e-zine columnist is trying to stay on time and on budget.
by Doug Koelemay

“I Don’t Give a Rip”
Editorial pundits are blaming Bill Howell for Virginia’s budget impasse. But John Chichester is the one who’s repeatedly used the threat of a government shut down to get his way.
by Patrick McSweeney

Discord in the Axis of Taxes
Tim Kaine has split with the state Senate over increasing the gas tax. That gives the House of Delegates a chance to seize the initiative in the taxes-and-transportation debate.
by Patrick McSweeney

Let’s Make a Budget Deal
The General Assembly can make big improvements to the transportation budget even without a special session and new taxes. Here are some ideas to get budget negotiators started.
by Michael Thompson

The One Object Rule
Determined to raise taxes, the State Senate is trampling the “one object rule” of the Virginia Constitution. Thankfully, House Speaker Bill Howell appears determined to hold the line.
by Philip Rodokanakis

Economic Law and Order
One law the politicians can’t repeal is the law of supply and demand. If legislators want lower gasoline prices, they must increase supply or moderate demand. Nothing else works.
by Jim Bowden

Teaching our Teachers
Virginia seems ill-prepared to deal with a looming teacher shortage. One solution might be to re-think the policies of its education schools.
by Conaway Haskins

Where’s Waldo?
Waldo Jaquith, a pioneer of Virginia political blogdom, has just launched an aggregator. Now you can get Virginia political commentary around the clock.
by Conaway Haskins

A Community in Formation
The UVa students who got arrested for their sit-in last month may not have won the battle over a living wage, but they did help build a movement.
by Barbara Ehrenreich