Whitcomb: Memorable Wind; How to Get More Building; Artists’ Housing; Big Batteries
Robert Whitcomb, Columnist
Whitcomb: Memorable Wind; How to Get More Building; Artists’ Housing; Big Batteries
“In most cases men willingly believe what they wish.’’
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST-- Julius Caesar (100 to 44 B.C.), Roman general and dictator
“The three little sentences that will get you through life. Number 1: Cover for me. Number 2: Oh, good idea, Boss! Number 3: It was like that when I got here.’’
-- Nell Scovell (born 1960), American television and magazine writer, and producer
“Holding past summer's hold,
Open and strong,
One of the leaves in the crown is gold,
Set in the cold
Where the old seasons belong.’’
-- From “A Mabon Crown, for Mabon (fall equinox, Sept. 21),’’ by Annie Finch (born 1956), American poet, critic and performer
Today is the anniversary of the hurricane that swept across Long Island and then New England on Sept. 21, 1938. When I was growing up, it was referred to as our region’s greatest natural disaster, in the same tone, I suspect, as Californians’ when talking about the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. When I was a kid in the 1950s, there were still many visible reminders of the storm, such as the slowly rotting big trees in the woods blown down by the tempest.
Given the massive development, especially near the coast, in the Northeast, America’s richest region, since the Great Depression year of 1938, God knows how much property damage a storm of similar violence will do when it inevitably comes through. I’d guess several hundred billion dollars. It could wipe out some big insurance companies.
But we can be thankful that the warning systems produced by science and technology will presumably prevent anything like the hundreds of deaths caused by the 1938 storm, even though DOGE has taken an axe to NOAA.
Years ago, there were experiments involving seeding clouds in hurricanes with silver iodine to try to weaken them. But Mother Nature was too big to cooperate with Project Storm Fury, which ran from 1962 to 1983. That’s just as well. Tropical storms act to transfer heat from tropical oceans to higher latitudes. Disrupting them could create problems scarier than hurricanes.
Of course, Providence has very serious housing-affordability problems, as discussed in a new report from the City Council. Some of its recommendations make sense, such as speeding up permitting for “affordable housing,” reducing permitting fees for developers, and creating “pre-approved architectural templates to streamline construction approvals.’’ The core problem, after all, is a dearth of supply. The more housing, the more moderate the costs for renters and homeowners are likely to be.
But we live in a capitalist economy, and so some of the report’s other ideas are apt to make things worse over the not-very-long run, such as banning algorithmic software to set rental prices. The report complains of landlords’ strategies “to maximize profits rather than considering what tenants can afford.’’ Well, yeah, businesspeople generally want to maximize profits! And I’d be leery of “rent-stabilization” programs, which would tend to reduce landlords’ desire to operate in Providence, thus reducing the housing supply.
On the other hand, boosting taxes on unoccupied properties may have merit.
We have to do everything possible to encourage building.
Meanwhile, I wonder if the apparently decreasing interest among many young people in attending colleges, of which there are five in Providence, will serve to slow the rise in rents in the city.
Housing for Artists
Should cities show favoritism in housing to chosen occupational groups, with the idea that such favoritism can help the socio-economics of an entire city? Depends on the city, I suppose.
Consider the old factory town of Fitchburg, Mass., where the nonprofit community development organization NewVue has, with the help of state and federal low-income housing credits and other public help, turned three old buildings into the Fitchburg Arts Community, a 68-unit “affordable housing” project with amenities for artists. Mayor Sam Squalia said: “These homes help create space for musicians, painters, performers, designers and makers of all kinds to live, work and connect right here in the heart of our city.’’
Not incidentally, the $45 million project is right across the street from the Fitchburg Art Museum, founded in 1927 and which, especially given the size of the city, is impressive.
Providence, which of course is nationally known for its large arts community, should take a close look at the Fitchburg project, though I’m skeptical that such targeted projects can have city-wide effects.
Even at Night!
The U.S. Energy Department, now operating to an increasing extent as part of the fossil-fuel sector, recently came out with a brazen lie -- or just another example of the Trump regime’s vast ignorance:
“Wind and solar energy infrastructure is essentially worthless when it is dark outside, and when the wind is not blowing.”
In fact, energy from solar and wind can be stored in batteries, and those batteries are getting better. There’s been rapid growth in lithium-ion battery installations as well as such newer technologies as solid-state and zinc-based batteries. There are also other storage systems, such as using excess electricity from wind farms to pump water from a lower reservoir to a higher one. During low wind or high demand, the water is released back down through a turbine, which generates electricity to power the grid.
See the latest on fusion power, our greatest (mostly clean) energy hope.
Of course, we’re stuck with fossil fuel for a long time to come.
Rhode Island Secretary of State Gregg Amore has quite properly rejected the increasingly Trump administration’s creepy request for a voter-registration list with such information as Social Security numbers and birth dates. The states, not the Feds, are supposed to be in charge of elections.
Mr. Amore noted: “The current presidential administration has a long track record of seeking to, and in some cases, succeeding in, interfering in the operation of elections and sowing seeds of distrust between the general voting public and the very election processes that maintain and further our democracy.’’
I hope that many other states push back in this way.
Work-at-Home Issues
Several thousand Rhode Island state employees work completely or totally remotely. Commuting is usually no fun, so it’s easy to see the allure of not having to schlep off to a workplace with other hominids.
But remote labor can make it easier for some to work less, since managers can’t watch them directly, and work from home decreases the flow of ideas and suggestions that take place when a bunch of people are physically together. This may be particularly important in jobs that serve the public.
Further, there are apt to be family and other distractions, some pleasant, some not, at home that make for a less productive work day.
COVID was an intense accelerant for remote work, which I think has gone too far.
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Ah, privilege and power! This story might resonate with Newport neighbors of Wall Street mogul Stephen Schwarzman’s huge estate there.
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The post-mortem coverage of Charlie Kirk can be attributed to sensationalism, voyeurism and the intensity of his cult and its political enablers. But it’s also because of the continuing evisceration of responsible, fact-based, and seeking journalism. This has been brought about by the destruction of much of its business model by social media taking away its advertising revenue – the same social media wherein the likes of Charlie Kirk and Tyler Robinson dwelled.
So in this time of dwindling resources, the tendency has increasingly been to not look for a wide range of topics and instead cover just one big one, preferably involving great sensation, including violence, usually in remarkably repetitive ways. Journalists are more and more just copying each other. All Charlie all the time.
Nothing about Messrs. Kirk and (the very boring) Trump in the next column, if there is one. Our immune systems are reeling.
Ever Deeper in Debt
Some economists seem mystified by Americans’ continued heavy retail spending in the face of so much economic and political uncertainty. That includes rising inflation. Consider that household debt reached a record $18.39 trillion in this year’s second quarter. And yet retail spending rose 0.6 percent in August, unchanged from July’s upwardly revised 0.6 percent. A FactSet poll of economists had projected only a 0.2 percent increase.
But then consumers are borrowing more on their credit cards (which have sky-high interest rates), pushing total card debt to a record $1.21 trillion. Some of this is people simply trying to keep up with the Joneses, a dangerous practice, and some about folks trying to get a jump on tariff costs, as well as fear of future shortages. The bubble will eventually burst, perhaps accompanied by an epic stock market crash.