The 100-mile Convergence
Signs of a parallel universe. If you live in BC, you already might be familiar with the “100-mile diet” movement launched by Vancouver, BC, journalists James Mackinnon and Alisa Smith.
Last year, Mackinnon and Smith wrote an entertaining series of articles in The Tyee about their attempt to live for one year on only food that was produced within 100 miles of their home. The website, which they hope will be a hub for a full-fledged movement of “100-milers,” includes an interactive map where you can chart your personal 100 miles.
Well, the distance of 100 miles must have a ring to it: As reported in Time Magazine today, a group called the Locavores in San Francisco has launched a similar 100-mile effort, though their "eat local" challenges have lasted a mere month. They have 1,000 people signed up from across the US.
Meanwhile, if you’ve been wondering whether you should focus more on buying local or on buying organic you might find some some peace from this Grist excerpt of a new book called Organic, Inc.: Natural Foods and How They Grew. The author argues that local vs. organic is a false choice.
Hybrid Trucks
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports that the Northwest's two big truck makers PACCAR (of Bellevue) and
Freightliner (of Portland) are developing hybrid-electric drives for their step trucks and other mid-sized
vehicles. That's a bigger deal than you might imagine.
As Clark noted here, improving the fuel economy of low-mpg vehicles actually matters a lot more than improving the fuel economy of high-mpg vehicles. The fuel savings are much larger.
(We touched on the energy security benefits here: Cascadia Scorecard 2005 (pdf, see page 50).)
Selling the Farm - #9
Note: This is part of a series. Here's how Measure 37--the progenitor of a new wave of more aggressive initiatives, such as I-933 in Washington--is affecting Oregon's farm economy.
In windswept northeastern Oregon, the farmers of rural Union County are feeling the sting of Measure 37. A landowner-turned-speculator there recently made a claim to subdivide more than 1,400 acres of rural land into hundreds of 5-acre buildable lots.
Farmers nearby are outraged.
In a preliminary hearing, the county commissioners denied the claim on an important technicality: the property's ownership had transferred from a family to a family corporation in 1976, after Oregon's land-use laws went into effect. Had it not been for that transfer, the commissioners would have almost certainly approved the developments, despite the serious concerns of local farmers and landowners.
Washington's I-933 contains no such safety net for rural people and farmers. I-933 will have land-use laws waived for anyone owning property before 1996, not the early 1970s as in Oregon. And there's reason to think that I-933 is written so clumsily (or deceitfully) that it may allow waivers for any property owner.
Farmers in Union County are not happy with the effects of Measure 37; and farmers in Washington are even less likely to be happy with it's juiced-up son, I-933. They won't get a say as farm country is diminished and farming gets marginalized by a devil-may-care land-use regime. But their voices are worth hearing.
Below the fold, in their own words, rural landowners from Union County get their say...
