This post originally appeared in the June 4 2012 Palladium-Item as a guest editorial. Many who might read this are already very "civically engaged" and so may find it overly simplistic, but there are also many in Richmond who are asking what's being done about our challenges - crime, the economy, etc. - and so I hope this offers at least a starting place for broader recognition that we all have a role to play in answering that.
2012 is a big election year, at the local, state and national levels. The votes cast this fall will shape the government policies and leadership that will, for better or worse, affect our lives for years to come.
It seems like a good time to remind ourselves that putting our chosen candidates in their elected offices is not the endpoint of civic engagement. In fact, it's just the beginning.
If there's any part of you that remains hopeful about what national political systems or government can do for the average resident of this country, I invite you to have your soul crushed by this excellent and compelling hour of reporting from This American Life about the incredible role money plays in U.S. politics and governance today.
Some of the stories and interviews are in and of themselves shocking, but the general theme probably doesn't feel like anything new or surprising: money powers political considerations, political considerations determine who has money. For me, the compelling parts were the simple narratives and examples of just how much time and energy the people who ostensibly represent U.S. citizens spend thinking about and raising money, and what distasteful things they have to do as a part of that.
2012 has been a challenging year so far for the leadership of Richmond Power & Light, Richmond's municipally owned power company.
Most of the strife centers around the firing of RP&L General Manager Steve Saum; the short version is that the Board of Directors unexpectedly removed Saum from his position after a negative performance review, and Saum along with others are concerned that he wasn't given due process. After the story hit the media, there's been additional concern about the way the RP&L Board has (or has not) communicated the reasoning behind their decision and what it means for the future of the utility. There's a story in today's Palladium-Item with some new revelations about the proceedings.
Few are in any good position to pass judgment on these matters. In my limited interactions with Steve Saum I've always found him to be a person of good intent and competence in his leadership. I also know most of members of the RP&L Board well enough to say they are people of good intent and great care for the future of RP&L and the City. (Full disclosure: I ran unsuccessfully for election to the RP&L Board last year.) And no matter what you think of any of their actions or decisions, it's just a painful and messy thing when matters of someone's employment and livelihood (or managerial methods) become a topic of public conversation.
But even with the limited facts available about this series of events, it seems there are some missed opportunities to reflect on moving forward:
As a pat of my role on the Palladium-Item editorial board, I have a viewpoints piece in today's paper about Sunshine Week 2012, a national initiative to promote a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information. Participants include news media, civic groups, libraries, nonprofits, schools and others interested in the public's right to know.
If you've followed this blog you know that I am a consistent advocate for transparency in government leadership, and the topic was raised a number of times during last year's election season. I appreciate the paper bringing focus to this issue, and look forward to the conversations that result.
Here's the full text of my editorial submitted for today's edition:
In December I received the great gift of a 7-week beginner improv acting class, which I've just completed this past week. I'd apparently remarked casually several times in front of Kelly that it might be fun to take an acting class some day, and knowing me as she does around experiences that might be outside my comfort zone, she took matters into her own hands to see that it might actually happen instead of just being talked about.
And outside my comfort zone it was, but also incredibly enjoyable.
The instructor Kevin (a professional actor and playwright in his own regard) has a background that includes the Second City improv comedy theater in Chicago, and so he made heavy use of Viola Spolin's techniques for teaching improv. There were lots of exercises and games designed to train us how to create an environment with only our bodies and maybe the occasional folding chair, how to show a character's age, social status, mood, origin, destination and other qualities by showing instead of telling, and how to build simple objects or circumstances into a full-fledged scene. We didn't really start using dialog until the last few classes; building the foundation of movement and environment had to come first.
There's a new group in town - H.Y.P.E. Richmond - that is working to "connect and mobilize young professionals to make the Richmond area an even greater place to live, work, and play." If you're interested in those efforts, you might consider joining in on the brainstorming session they're having tonight at the Firehouse BBQ restaurant, 5:30 to 7 PM.
I won't be able to attend, but as an employer of some younger professionals who gets to hear some of their concerns and struggles "engaging" in life in Richmond, and as someone who has spent my own young professional life in Richmond, I want to offer a few initial ideas about how to help connect and mobilize that demographic. (This is in addition to the ideas already being submitted and discussed at RichmondBrainstorm.com.) My hope is that others will add to the list over time:
A few weeks ago, one of the online community resources I maintain, ProgressiveWayneCounty.org, soft-launched a new program where we're paying local community members to blog for the site. During that time, we've already had some great contributions with reflections on affordable housing, national politics, over-simplifying our choices in the world, some heartfelt advice on caring for pet dogs, and what the life of Richmondite Esther Griffin White can teach us about how we plan for the future. (Thank you to Matthew Jenkins, Aaron Nell, Cassie Oaks, Robert Hertzog and Anne Thomason for serving as the pioneer contributors and testing out the publishing system!)
Today, I'm happy to publicly invite others in Richmond and Wayne County to join in this effort to raise the level of public discourse in our area. Whether it's commentary on the local arts scene, restaurant reviews, political news analysis, your experiences with religion and spirituality, technology tools, sustainability tips or perspectives on education, we welcome contributions from those who feel they can provide a local connection and provoke conversation that might help move the community forward in some form.
The Indiana General Assembly is advancing the so-called "Right to Work" legislation, with the state Senate expected to vote on the proposal Wednesday that the state House approved a version of last week.
Putting aside the substance of the legislation for a moment, the whole debate has been a fascinating exercise in political framing:
Using "Right to Work" as a label is a clever and strategic way to frame what the legislation is about. If you are "for people having jobs," how could you dare be against their "right to work"? Any critic of "right to work" laws has to try to find some other meaningful label to use for themselves that isn't derived from the original name, but in doing so they lose some of the attention of voters. (From what I can tell, the phrase "right to work" was introduced when a group of business owners in the southern U.S. formed the National Right to Work Committee in the 1970s to try to work against union efforts.)
The "Big Labor" bashing that happened last year across the Midwest set the stage for the "Union" label itself to be tainted to some degree in the minds of many voters ("Wait, are those unionized teachers really just trying to squeeze out every last taxpayer dollar while they sit around in luxury doing nothing? Golly!"), and so at least in part because of this association, I don't think unions have succeeded in being the rallying point for those who oppose these proposals.
I just finished reading Steven Levy's In the Plex, a great history of Google, Inc.'s origins and growth, and a great insight into what the company could look like in the future, or at least how it might get there.
The story of Google that matters for most people is how it affects their daily lives (searching, web browsing, mobile phones, mapping/navigation, email, calendaring, YouTube, news, etc.) but I appreciate that Levy's book focuses on the personalities and processes driving the evolution of what is arguably one of the most transformative corporate and technological entities of our time.
It can be easy to forget that behind some of the game-changing products and services produced by the company, there were real people thinking through issues of privacy, dealing with cross-cultural considerations and navigating interpersonal dynamics all while trying to make a living and find a sustainable business model. They had/have desks, meetings, slide shows to give, families to care for, water-cooler conversations to have, and Levy does a great job capturing and re-telling those stories from the days of "two guys in a garage" all the way through the present days of life as an international corporation. This is not always done with the most critical eye - those with concerns about Google's operations or policies may be put off by the extent to which this book is an homage - but on the whole I think Levy is fair in calling out the moments when individual Google employees or the company as a whole screws up, and placing those in the context of Google's good intentions.
A few themes in what Levy's book revealed about "the Google way":
You might open a newspaper soon to see an ad like the one at right which appeared in my local paper a few days ago. It encourages you to "Stand With Main Street" to protest "special treatment" of Amazon.com that allows them to forgo the collection of sales tax on online purchases, resulting in an unfair advantage over "every Hoosier brick and mortar retailer." I don't usually see full-page ads related to Internet commerce in a market this size, so I thought I'd investigate the issues at stake.
The question of taxing e-commerce transactions is a bit complicated to be sure. If you have a strong and concisely-worded position on it, you're probably running for national political office, or a Libertarian, or both.
On one hand we can see the clear financial and psychological advantage that an online retailer has with customers who are weighing a purchase from a local store that charges tax against an online store that doesn't, and maybe offers the item at a slightly lower price too. At the same time, that online retailer may be benefitting from the infrastructure that sales taxes others are collecting help pay for (setting up warehouses, trucking goods around state roads, etc.).
On the other hand, we know that laws around state sales taxation were created prior to the age of the Internet and that the models of online business and affiliate sales have completely changed the way the world does business, and current attempts to rewrite them in order to create short-term bandaids on ailing state economies are probably not in the best interest of business innovation, especially when they favor large retailers (online and off) and send small businesses and people who make a living as Amazon.com or eBay affiliates into a quagmire of tax collection bureaucracy.
