Rules and Wilderness

This weekend I saturated myself listening to eulogies and tributes to Senator Ted Kennedy. As I was driving to take the dogs on a short hike, I heard over and over again about his graciousness, kindness, and ability to treat each human he encountered with dignity. My bubble full of hope in mankind was burst the minute I stopped my car.

I got to the trail head, opened my car door, and within seconds, a man said to me: you can't take dogs into the wilderness. First, the generic statement isn't true. But second, there were several recreational opportunities available from where I parked. Somehow, for some reason, this man decided to pounce before he even knew what I was going to do. And last, as a believer that wilderness is a state of mind, an artificial boundary, an anthropomorphic designation of a geographic area, I have a hard time with equally artificial rules. Somehow, a lot of white guys decided these areas are "wild" and "need protecting." That these areas were "untrammeled" by man. Never mind we are essentially colonizing these areas, but that is a whole other discussion. What unnerved me was this presumption to tell me "the rules."

I guess I tend to think of wilderness as a resource, just as water, trees, wildlife. It's boundaries are irrelevant. There is no special "ecology" within the wilderness boundary. It is not any more fragile than other areas.

The rules about dogs or cell phones or helicopters or horses (ironically, horses are allowed on these trails but not dogs or even more ironic are the complex electronics many of these guys now take in lieu of topo maps) are justified as protecting fragile systems, when really they are about protecting some white guy's idea of what a back pack trip should be about.

We have gone a long long way from when wilderness was about wandering, with or without dogs, friends, or GPS systems. Now we are all about rules.

What many of these guys don't understand is that a lot of people are more scared of them then they are the wildlife and adventures they will encounter in the wilderness. Hence, a perfect reason to take a dog along!

A Home Run

Anyone who has been to a sports stadium knows several things: the tickets cost way too much, the seats are way too skinny, it's a sure deal that the guy next to you or behind you will spill beer on you, and the food is expensive.

I remember attending the US Open for tennis in New York and having a mild heart attack at the price of a chicken burger (oh, sorry, they called it something quite fancy). This was almost 15 years ago, I can only imagine the cost now! Here at Mariner's baseball stadium, a hot dog is over $5! Yikes!

So it is with great pleasure that I saw fruit is being sold at Yankee Stadium. Now, I am rabidly anti-Yankees. During any World Series I will root for anyone other than the Yankees if they are playing (ABBY). But fruit? Bananas, apples, peaches at the ballpark?

It's a home run!

Across Boundaries

Last week, Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, announced a "new way" of managing our nation's forests. Rather than viewing lands by ownership patterns: private, state, federal, the United States Forest Service will be charged with managing all our forests. In other words, viewing lands as a landscape.

While this has been a much advocated position through academia, it's a welcome relief to see the federal government recognize that one of this nation's most valuable natural resources, our forest ecosystems, must transcend boundaries. The wealth of knowledge, research dollars, and plain common sense that the federal government has and can share with private land owners and state natural resource departments, much less the common boundaries between each of these stakeholders, mandates this type of management scheme.

From protecting water supplies to addressing pests, boundaries are false barriers to good management.

I have been, frankly, a little worried about the Obama Administration's goals for rural areas. This announcement, at least, mitigates some concern.

The End of An Era

I grew up in a Republican family. Some of my earliest memories are my parents watching the Kennedy/Nixon debates in 1960. I remember each and every Kennedy drama and tragedy: The President's assassination, Bobby Kennedy's campaign (the iconic picture of him walking an Oregon beach with his English Springer spaniel), his murder, Ted Kennedy's horrific accident at Chappaquiddick, Ted's failed presidential bid in 1980, the various divorces, drug issues, crimes, and mishaps that followed the clan. For all their tabloid foibles, the Kennedys have been a part of America's destiny and purpose. They have managed to rise above their troubles and serve this country in ways other people only talk about. They have walked their talk.

It was the electrifying brothers, John, Bobby, and Ted who defined American politics for my generation. Their idealism, sense of hope, and noblesse oblige defined the parameters of how I think about public service. They, more than any other politician or national leader, defined the passion our generation has for this amazing land we call America.

No one in politics today, even Barack Obama, is able to fill those shoes, to provide Americans a sense of the possible, to advocate for people who have no one speaking for them. The Kennedys, all of them, saw things as they could be, not as they were.

Ted Kennedy, more than another member of that clan, has risen above his stuggles and found a path, a road, through the hearts and minds of Americans, a way to help each and every one of us: Medicare, Americans with Disabilities Act, Leave No Child Behind, and, in my world, more wilderness designations than I can count.

And so with Ted Kennedy's death, it is an end of an era. We have lost a man who had a compass, a sense of direction, of what is best about America. It is a loss.

Grumpy and Insecure Voters

Prior to his concession speech last Friday, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels stated the reason he thought he was losing was because Seattle voters were grumpy and insecure. Since his concession, there have been numerous articles analyzing what went wrong during Nickels eight years. Most commentators have been looking for Big Themes, such as Nickels intimidated and bullied too many people, he didn't know how to manage an increasingly complex city, or this blue collar boy didn't know how to manage a Microsoft suburb. I tend to think the reasons are far more complicated that a Grand Theory, but rather are a conglomeration of all those little annoying things that build up in you.

An accurate assessment of Mayor Nickels governing style goes something like this: he cobbled together an odd assortment of allies: environmentalists, developers, unions. Each feeding off each other. Developers deftly learned the language of environmentalists, talking about increasing densities in the neighborhoods and downtown as a way of mitigating suburban sprawl, an anathema to urbanista enviros. And the unions saw jobs in any sort of development. So, Mayor Nickels rode this coalition through the bling years, giving developers anything they asked for: tearing down ugly freeways, cute, European looking trolly cars slowly going from downtown to new development only two miles away, and permission to build cookie-cutter townhouses without adequate parking making Seattle's once unique neighborhoods homogenous collections of ugly and cheap condos.

Through all of this the Mayor rammed through revenue generators: photos at intersections intended to catch red light running cars, parking meters in neighborhood shopping areas (replacing free parking), fees on plastic and paper bags at grocery stores. And he arbitrarily closed neighborhood streets for "walking days," blithely towing cars that remained parked and telling people anxious on how to get to work to "chill." He reduced traffic lanes with street diets, forgot to plow the streets during snowstorms but then gave himself a "B," for his management. Figuring out garbage became stressful and he empowered garbagemen to riffle through your cans to decide whether you got a ticket for forgetting to compost the banana peel. But big business and landlords became exempt from all the rules. Travel to and from downtown became laborious. Seattle employees became arrogant. And the daily lives of everyone got slightly more difficult every day.

While governing can be sexy if you get to ponder all the big questions, it's really the little things that build up in people's minds. They remember the day they got a parking ticket in an area that was once free, or a city employee hung up on them, or when the Mayor tells everyone to ride bikes but says he can't because he has a security detail or when his park department decided to ban beach fires because of bogus environmental reasons. It's the slights that add up. And finally tumbled out in a grumpy vote.

Of course, now the pundits are wondering, like the morning after a drinking binge, what did we do? We now have two political newbees running for office. Hopefully they spend a little bit of time thinking just how they will manage the little things. Will they rein in the city's Department of Transportation that seems to think a "listening" session is merely a show and tell then cram a decision down citizen's throats? Will they figure out how to stop powerful stakeholders from controlling decisions at City Hall? Will they stop trying to figure out how to ding people for revenue at every moment? Will they find balance between government intervention and government intrusion?

It's a tough job. Probably the toughest in electoral politics. It's a balance between policy making and managing, unique in management structure. In the end, Mayor Nickels showed some of his true colors, gracious and magnanimous to his opponents, apologetic for the snowplows (again). But did he really understand that part of the tsunami that swept him out of office had to do with so many little things?

Are We In Recovery?

Last week John Bernanke, head of the Federal Reserve, spoke to bankers at a conference in Jackson Hole (wow, I bet my friends who are fly fishing guides on the Snake River got a little economic stimulus last week! Way to go guys!). At the conference Bernake stated, unequivocally, that our economy is now in recovery.

At the risk of hammering at this point a little too much, I keep wondering whether the recovery is for Wall Street or Main Street? And indeed, the business and economy reporter for the Seattle Times wrote a nice, short piece about jobs and recovery. Until the United States figures out how to create jobs, sufficient to employ the unemployed and sustain the job creation at a rate of 127,000 a month (to keep up with population growth) this so-called recovery isn't going to help those who are gazing at computer screens trying desperately to find jobs.

The promise of green jobs is going to take many many years. Throwing money at industries like the failed banking system hasn't helped, since they have not been on a hiring binge as they figure out how to increase interest rates on credit cards, over-draft fees, and pay huge bonuses and lobbying salaries.

Looking at what remains of our manufacturing sector is also sad. Boeing continues to threaten both local governments and its unions that it will pull jobs away from areas like Western Washington and send them overseas or to the south where they can bust the union, unless Boeing receives even more tax credits and a no strike clause in its union contracts. At least in Washington, small businesses that actually have to pay taxes and consumers who are hammered with one of the highest sales taxes in the nation, are already subsidizing the highly paid executives at Boeing and Microsoft. But they want to squeeze out even more, while the state has to cut and ax people off of Medicaid and other social safety net programs.

Something is very structurally wrong with our economy and unless we correct the course rather than band-aid it, we'll be talking about these unemployment numbers over and over during the next 12 months.

So, just whose recovery is this?

Krugman Must Read This Blog

All I can say is Paul Krugman must read this blog!

Did Whole Foods Betray It's Base?

I am a finicky shopper. Or actually I am a penny pincher shopper. But I also want quality for my dollars. I don't shop exclusively at any one grocery store: meat from Whole Foods, vegetables from a locally owned small grocery store, non-perishables from a big box. I generally find Whole Foods prices to be competitive, frequently less than any of the other places I shop. Great customer service. Employees seem to genuinely enjoy working there.

Several days ago, the quirky CEO of Whole Foods published an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal. Not exactly a publication read by his market segment clientele, which are stereotyped as Volvo driving, latte drinking liberals (by the way, my brother has driven a Volvo almost his whole driving life, he drinks lattes, and he is a conservative). So, John Mackey, the CEO, opines that the health care reforms currently being bandied about are all wrong. Worst of all is the idea of a public option. Instead, Mackey, a self-described libertarian, suggests less governmental intrusion, more self reliance (eat your vegetables!), and of course the preverbal tax credit or deduction.

Instantly the Internet was filled with calls to boycott Whole Foods because Mackey violated, apparently, one of the progressive-ideology fundamental beliefs: health care must be reformed and we must have either single payor or a public option.

I don't agree with Mackey. But I do believe, especially as an employer and a successful businessman, we should listen to his opinions. And he may have something worth while to add to the debate. But the knee-jerk reaction of "if you don't agree with me I am going to walk away," is childish. It only increases the already Balkanized territory of American policy discussions.

I simply do not understand people whose beliefs are on either side of the middle and who demonize opinions other than those that are lock-step in agreement with them. I think about reading the Federalist Papers and the spirited debates among really smart men, who appreciated and valued their differences as much as their similarities. I think of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. We have devolved to become Jim Jones, indoctrinated into mini-cults of nodding heads in agreement, fearful of different opinions and values. Indulging in ugly stereotypes.

Great meat, fantastic employees, well stocked shelves, highly engaged local philanthropy, nutritious food (and fantastic pastries). Nope. You'll find me at Whole Foods, encouraging John Mackey to speak his mind any day.

Do We Need Elected Experience?

We had a primary for mayor in Seattle yesterday (well, it really lasted for weeks since it was done by mail in ballot). The race is still too close to call, but it appears the incumbent mayor is either out of the race, or will have an uphill battle for re-election. The two possible candidates for mayor may be election newbees. They have never held an elected office before (although both of them have been active in a variety of community issues). We also have one candidate for county executive who is an election newbee. And that is the rub against them. Or at least, that is what the political "elite" are saying.

I also have been having a little discussion with friends throughout the country about term limits in the context of how much money is thrown around in politics and for political issues.

I have a ton of thoughts about this criticism, this idea that to run for higher office, you know, something other than dog catcher, you have to have elected office experience.

It seems that in slightly more than 200 years we have gone from citizen "legislators" to professional politicians. You know, the folks who have spent their whole careers in one elected office or another. I can name dozens: Bill Clinton, Andrew Cuomo, Jerry Brown, Warren Magnuson, Maria Cantwell, Chris Gregoire...and Seattle's current mayor who didn't go to college so he could begin working in politics and has done nothing else for 40 years. 40 years.

There are many professions where having experience, lots of experience, is a good thing. Plumbers for instance. A policeman who has street instincts. A general who has seen battle. But in politics, really, there is a huge body of knowledge already in existence for the elected officials to learn from and draw upon. When you're mayor you're not out fixing the water main, but you are having to make it happen. Is someone who has held an elected office their whole life any better at making that happen than a former banker or car dealer or lawyer?

Plus, entrenched elected officials begin to care about one thing, it seems, and that is getting elected. Over and over again. So decisions about fixing the pothole become political calculus because so much more rides on making a decision. Pleasing a donor, for instance. Which isn't to say newbees don't make decisions upon the same math once they are elected. But when you have been there forever, doesn't it become habit?

Then there is the invincibility factor. I think it is just human nature to believe once you're elected over and over that you're infallible in the eyes of the voters. You may become a little cocky. Seattle's mayor ungraciously called the voters grumpy and insecure (hmm, could he be "projecting?). One of the reasons President Bush's incredibly high favorable ratings went into the cellar so quickly is because he could not admit he made mistakes about Iraq or Hurricane Katrina. The same can be said about Seattle's mayor. When you come to believe your invincible you don't have to admit mistakes. Heck, you don't make them!

What is ironic here in Seattle is the same folks who think the two remaining candidates (or who may be the remaining candidates) are not "seasoned" enough are the same folks who voted, enthusiastically, for an unseasoned, Freshman US Senator as President of the United States. Seems like he is doing ok so far, eh?

I tend to think novices to elected office, while a risk, have a lot to offer. Fresh ideas, little corruption, humility, fire in the gut to prove yourself. And these days, there is nothing wrong with those qualities.

How Gullible Are We?

Today Washington State is having a primary election. Aside from the horrible date (I am convinced politicians love having primaries when only their core constituents will be around to vote, but more on that later), this is also the first all mail in ballot vote for this state. Early indications are that this is a popular idea. A local ballot drop off box was stuffed to the brim by 8 AM this morning!

Here in the City of Seattle we have a hotly contested mayoral race. Which is unusual, given we have an incumbent. But, after two weeks last winter where snow clogged traffic (worse yet, holiday packages were not delivered because it was during the last two weeks of December and no garbage was picked up for three or four weeks) and a contentiously bitter dispute over how to replace a major earthquake damaged thoroughfare, our current mayor suffers from low favorable ratings.

Seattle is a very blue town. During the last presidential campaign it was almost a city ordinance to have an Obama sticker on your car. So what's an incumbent mayor to do? Especially one who came late to the game of being "green," but once he embraced the idea, seems bent on making sure he gets every photo-op and press release out about his so-called green agenda. His marketing research, then, has told him that he needs to use the words: "progressive values," every chance he gets. In one television ad he says he wants to be the mayor of Seattle and champion it's progressive values as he gazes up at signs showing where to bicycle.

And chances are voters will fall for those lines. They have been polled, numbers crunched, and sure as heck, "progressive values" will appeal to Seattle voters. Mayor Nickels has probably spent hundreds of thousands of dollars just to learn that using the line "progressive values" will get him re-elected.

Mayor Nickels isn't the only Seattle candidate who is using those terms. I heard at least several others mouth the exact same language. This week, at least, Seattle is about "progressive values."

Acutely aware of marketing language, I was struck with another ad I heard today. It was for a local appliance dealer. During the height of the real estate bling bling when they couldn't sell fancy Italian stoves, wine storage units, and expensive stainless hoods fast enough, I went into the store looking for a replacement for my broken refrigerator. The minute I told them I didn't want to spend more than some magical price they had in mind, I was toast. I couldn't have gotten a sales person to wait on me if I screamed. But now, now they are advertising that they are all about value. Value to the customer in terms of service, quality merchandise, delivery and installation. And the reason they are all about value is because their marketing research (or someone's marketing research) has told them that in a recession, consumers are looking for value. I finally counted and in a 60 second commercial, this ad used value 20 times! They got value out of their ad, that is for sure! I would hazard to guess, however, if I went back to the store I still wouldn't get service because I don't want to buy fancy Italian stoves!

Moral of story? Remember, we're being marketed to 24/7 now days. From President Obama to the appliance store, they all have their marketing research. They know what terms work on us and what doesn't. Think for yourself. Laugh when you hear terms used over and over. Sometimes the issues are really important, like health care, local politics, or the next national issue, immigration overhaul. Working your way through the hype is easy, ignoring the sophisticated marketing, targeting directly at your "profile," is hard. But it's important to do...

Being Close to Fire

This weekend I experienced what is a good result from September 11, 2001 and Hurricane Katrina. A well oiled machine of inter-agency coordination fighting a brush and dry grass fire near Cashmere, Washington.

The Chelan Country Sheriff's office was fabulous, keeping every single land owner and occupant informed of the situation, advising on evacuation, taking inventory on who is on the property, livestock, and other issues. Teams from the Cashmere (the closest town) volunteer fire department, the Washington Department of Natural Resources, and the US Forest Service did an amazing job at containing the fire within a few hours of it's start and as of today, are combing every inch of 40 acres to make sure there are no embers which can blow onto the dry grass and start another fire.

I was impressed. In this rural area, the government certainly watched from afar and understood the role of police and fire protection.

There are good things happening.

Our Fascination With Dick Cheney

Maybe it's the dog trainer in me, but sometimes I think we should ignore really strange behavior rather than reward it by constantly exposing our fascination.

Just a thought.

Stop the Madness

I swear if I hear the line "we need to give this compensation or bonus in order to keep good people," one more time I am going to keel over laughing. Are these the same Lords of Wall Street who drove us into what is now being called The Great Recession? Wow. I really think we need to keep these people in the same jobs, because, who knows, we may dig ourselves into even deeper holes!

And keep them from what? Apparently banks, you know, the places where you deposit money, they lend it, making you some interest and giving themselves a little profit, well banks also invest their own money. These bonuses and fat compensation packages are going to the traders, the folks who are making trades on Wall Street, investing dollars in all sorts of exotic financial instruments. Frankly, if they leave the banks and the Glass-Stengal Act which prohibited banks from trading, is re-instituted, we could solve many many problems.

But we all know that isn't going to happen. The huge compensations are also not going to be trimmed. This Administration and Congress lost their window of opportunity to change and reform America's financial institutions. Now we're getting lame credit card regulation, which gave the credit card companies a year running start to up interest rates, change late fees, and reduce credit limits. A consumer credit agency that will, what, monitor how these credit card companies are doing, and no further regulation on banks or Wall Street.

We had a chance to stop the madness. Now we're just getting business as usual. Except for this one case, where a judge is actually questioning the cozy relationship between Bank of America and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Count to ten and wait for someone to label him the new judge slime word: activist. I'd call him a hero.

Symbols

In Venezuela, Hugo Chavez is attempting to close the golf courses. He believes they are for only the wealthy elite and the land could be better used to house the poor.

Now that is presidential action against the divide between classes.

Are we ready to talk about executive compensation, yet?

Are We Really A Nation of Mindless Thugs?

Seemingly a lifetime ago, a Congressman who I worked for had "District Days." He had them almost every Saturday, scattered throughout his Congressional District in school cafeterias, church basements, and even outside in parks. The staff would be on hand to take constituent concerns. We'd write out the various problems on forms and make sure what ever aide was responsible (immigration, medicare, social security) for those issues would get the form. The Congressman also spent time answering questions on national issues (at that time it was all Watergate all the time). The Congressman was the only Member of Congress who was doing these District Days. But that's how he was.

Now, Members of Congress have town halls. They stand behind podiums and talk about all the great things they are doing for their state or district. Then a few questions and every one goes home. Except now.

According to news reports and pundits who are generally supportive of President Obama, right-wing mouthpieces have stirred up the populace, egging them to attend any public town hall meeting their Senators and Congressmen are having. And what were once quiet affairs where the local newspaper reporter took a nap in the corner, are now national prime time news events, as people shout down the elected officials and even cabinet members.

What concerns me about the media response, in particular the liberal pundit response, is this assumption that people who take the time to go to these meetings are mindless zombies expressing some "talking points" generated by Rush Limbaugh. And indeed, some of the folks who attend these meetings may have talking points from a conservative talk show host. On the other hand, people who attended Senator and Congressmen's town hall meetings after the vote authorizing the war in Iraq, shouted down the people who voted for that war. Were they mindless zombies?

The point here is that we have a Constitutional right to talk, to yell, to express frustration. And indeed, what seems to me is there is a huge miscalculation by the Obama Administration on the amount of frustration and anger people are feeling. They have watched, in less than 12 months, their 401(k) evaporate. Their credit cards are maxed out, their elected officials don't listen, foreclosures are all around them, and they worry every time they go to work that they will be laid off. It's scary out there. On top of it, no one knows what is in the several bills floating around Congress to change or reform health care (oops, now President Obama is calling it health insurance reform...hmmmm). I mean, do you trust someone who has the best health care insurance in the nation, no the world, to be making decisions about how to reform the health care insurance you get?

It boggles my mind that the current Members of Congress don't seem to know how to handle talking with angry people. And that they seem to want to engage in some sort of fight, barking back at the angry folks as if it is their own fault they are scared and tense. Or that the calls for "civil society," seem to forget that our nation is forged in dissent, vocal, somewhat abusive, dissent.

It's called community organizing.

Ah, Finally Summer in New York

Finally, summer in New York. It reached over 90° in Central Park this afternoon. This whole summer I was beginning to wonder whether those hot, humid, and hazy summers would ever show up in the Big Apple.

All is right with the world.

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly in Unemployment Numbers

There was good news today. While many economists predicted the unemployment number would rise to double digits today, they in fact went down a bit, from 9.5% to 9.4%. Statistically, the margin of error makes them the same, but that doesn't stop everyone from celebrating and headlines trumpeting the end to the recession (depression) is near!

The bad news is, of course, unemployment is still high and is probably going to remain high regardless whether the mucket-mucks say the depression (see, I said it) is over.

And the ugly news is in reality, this 9.4% is only measuring people who are actively looking for jobs, not people who have been unemployed for over the 15 week measuring mark. My suspicion is if we could figure out how to measure all the unemployed but want to find work people in this country, well, that figure would certainly be double digits and also scare the crap out of most politicians. So, like how we measure inflation (taking out food and fuel from the equation, which as we all know from last summer can be and are highly volatile) the government is essentially controlling information to "make us feel better."

The reality is that we have to be creating over 125,000 jobs a month in this country just to employ the people coming into the market. Right now, we have close to 7.88 million people unemployed. There are guesses that the real unemployment rate is over 16% and rising.

If you believe that the American economy is a function of confidence, the numbers released today, the President's comments, and Wall Street's closing are all intended to bolster your sense that the economy is getting back into shape. But dig deeper. Don't let the bally-hooing out of New York and Washington fool you. Numbers can and do deceive. They are intended to do that. It's good, it's bad, and believe me, it's really ugly.

Madame Justice

I think we are witnessing the confirmation of a woman who will be an outstanding Supreme Court Justice. Plus, she got her law degree from Yale! Go Bulldogs!

Unsustainable Local Economies

It's all the buzz now, particularly among the food addicts, to buy local. Be local. Its all local all the time. So imagine how a locale feels when a government agency decides to leave and set up port, literally, elsewhere.

Since the 1970s, the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which is part of the Department of Commerce, has moored it's research ships in Seattle. Their docks are located in Lake Union, which is inland from Puget Sound and accessible only through an arduous and long wait through navigation canals and locks. Nevertheless, the NOAA ships became part of Seattle's identity, even though if you asked many new Seattle residents they probably were clueless about the ships being here.

The reason they were here in the first place has a lot to do with seniority of US Senators. At the time NOAA was created by Congress, the chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee was Senator Warren Magnuson, from Washington State. He was effective, very effective, at bringing home lots of pork. NOAA ships and research facilities are one of the rewards to his home state.

However, two years ago the moorage docks on Lake Union burned down, requiring NOAA to scatter it's ships around the area. And in 2010 the lease on the docks is up. So NOAA went shopping. And Newport, Oregon won the ships.

Now, of course, there is much hand wringing in Seattle over the loss, calls for Congressional investigations, and attempts at stopping the sailing to Newport. However, in the meantime, Seattle government and civic leaders are busy trying to lure a financial management firm based in Tacoma up to Seattle. Incentives and subsidies are being thrown around while complaining at the same time, that Newport, Oregon did the same thing.

All this says that local economies are not sustainable. There is not only a glut in office space but there is still a huge inventory of homes, whether condominiums, single family, or converted to rentals. More than likely the unemployment figures which will be released on Friday will show, nationally, a rate of 10%, meaning every job in every local area becomes important. Poaching on employers will become even more fierce.

Perhaps the lesson of the NOAA ships ought to be that those in power should be attentive to the businesses and entities already based in the cities and towns. And maybe those in power need to think about ways of creating long term, living wage jobs rather than trying to steal businesses from other places (on the theory that if they are willing to leave one place what is to prevent them from leaving another?). Plus, if we really are trying to make communities sustainable, why try to lure even more people with the need for more housing, more transportation, more infrastructure?

It will be sad to see the ships go. But there are lessons we need to learn from their wake.

The New Rural West

For almost two decades, there was much bally-hooing among students of the West, that there were signs of a New West. The New West's economies were more urban based, less natural resource dependent. Our focus on the natural world would be amenity rather than resource driven. Gateway communities would spring up near the magnificent sights, such as Yellowstone, Yosemite, Canyonlands and Zion. For the longest time, eco-tourism was the buzzword. The much extended version of eco-tourism were all encompassing resort developments. Golf courses, spas, hiking trails, wildlife viewing, fly fishing. Everything was environmentally sensitive and the sun always shined. Names like Suncadia, Sun River, Tamarack where lots were sold, dreams were made.

And now, there is the New New West. Or perhaps a reversion to parts of the West that are familiar to old Westerns, the ghost towns. Ghost towns are the remnants of boom and busts. Mining towns such as Sunshine, Wallace,Virginia City, Cripple Creek. Logging towns like Granite Falls, Forks, Klamath Falls, Libby. Or fishing communities with empty harbors in Blaine, Coos Bay, and Westport. Now the new ghost towns are Yellowstone Club, Tamarack, Semiahmoo, and even Bend.

But unlike the old ghost towns where hoards of people stripped the land of trees, gold, silver, and the coastal waters of salmon and crab, these new "boomers" were developers who robbed the land of it's soul. They made the history of the area a moniker for their multimillion dollar developments, calling elaborate bars and restaurants names of things long buried by their greed. They co-opted Native American names and architecture, hanging Edward Curtis photos on the wall as if to authenticate the "western feel."

And now they are financially broke. More ghost towns. Torn up land with hulking, empty structures. And it seems the common theme among so many of these developments is the amount of leverage used by the developers. It wasn't their money. And the other common theme was the attempt by so many of them to appeal to the wealthy, or the wealthy-wanna-bes. Perhaps the lesson we may learn from these haunted developments is that there are not enough people willing to leverage their lives to live behind gated communities reeking of exclusivity. Certainly, that isn't part of the Western ethos of egalitarianism. It's as if these developers hadn't a clue what parts of the west remain in the air, the soil, the rivers despite their attempts to make it gated, exclusive, for the monied.

It's a good thing in the West, whether new or newer, that nature seemingly endures all our know-it-all follies and that the wind through the Ponderosa pines still reminds us that it will endure long after the Tamaracks and Horizons become dust.

You've Earned It, Now Enjoy It...

Recently, I went to a "resort community" near the border between Washington State and Canada. The focus of the resort is a hotel, Semiahmoo, and two golf courses. Clustered around the courses are housing developments, all behind gates. Along the spit of land jutting into the entrance of the Strait of Georgia, is the hotel and several condominiums. It is an area ripe for extensive real estate development.

And indeed, like ship wrecks washed up on the shore, there are two buildings next to the Semiahmoo hotel which are abandoned and in foreclosure. The Marin at Semiahmoo. With prices averaging in the high 600,000's, because, as the web site says, "you've earned it, now enjoy it." The developers, a couple from White Rock, British Columbia, were recently sued over the loan guarantees they made and the property itself is slated for a foreclosure sale in October. The development was intended to be elegant, a statement of good taste and enjoying the good life.

There is a second development, up near the golf courses, away from the marvelous spit and marina, called Horizon. It was supposed to be a planned unit development, placing over 400 hundred units on former pasture land of 140 acres. Oh, but it was going to be sustainable. On this beautiful piece of property are two more ghost buildings, a preview office and apparently a "show" home. There are hinges on rock pillars where apparently the gates were to be hung, wires sticking up from the ground, and pvc pipe everywhere. The self-described country boy developer apparently was put into receivership by his lender late in July.

Meanwhile, the land is torn up, concrete has been poured, and hulking, empty structures sit, attracting pigeons, sea gulls, and other wildlife.

Between these two projects, lenders are holding onto over 50 million dollars in loans. The two primary banks are relatively small and regional. 50 million must be a lot of money to them. The banks were egged on by amped up realtors and developers who, believed that rich Canadians like "hockey players who want to hide their money in the US," and others who desire the good life of the Pacific Northwest, would buy their projects. Bankers, developers, realtors foresaw millions in profits. They spun stories of quality materials, sustainable housing, elegant details, and rich life experiences if only we would buy their product.

There was nothing sustainable, elegant, rich, or of quality in what they produced. They were, like their brethren mortgages and re-finances, collateralized debt obligations, or derivatives, modern day economic Elmer Gantry's, promising something they could never deliver, believing they would be long gone before anyone caught up with them. Hidden behind limited liability corporations controlled by other limited liability corporations, these real people, probably don't even think they are or were part of the problem.

Meanwhile, the wind in Semiahmoo howls the motto of the past decade through the empty buildings: "you've earned it, now enjoy it."