The Twisted Logic of Ald. Florida

The West End Word had a recent article on recalls in the city. One part, about 15th Ward Alderwoman Jennifer Florida, caught my attention:

Florida called the recall effort against her a “terrible distraction,” but said that the effort against her has not affected the way she does her job, other than to force her to spend a bit more money producing newsletters and progress reports to explain her position.

Oh my, she must now communicate with her constituents!!! Oh the humanity. How dare folks “force” her to explain her position. Of course, her position in theory should be based on the feelings of the community. Did she think she could just get elected, not communicate anything, and not have any issues arise?

“There’s a lot of misinformation floating around out there, and I have to address that,” she said. “I’m trying to learn how to explain what I can and cannot do.”

The recall effort against Florida has been based on her support of a plan to move a McDonald’s franchise down the street from an existing location. Florida’s opponents say the move would be illegal, as the zoning for the new location does not allow a drive-thru, which is included in the design.

Florida said that the new location is commercially zoned, adding that there’s not a whole lot she could do to stop the move. “I think they thought I had more power than I actually have,” she said. “It’s just a small group of people who aren’t accepting [the move]. It’s like they’re trying to punish me for not getting exactly what they want.

I think someone needs to look in the mirror before talking about misinformation. Florida continues to downplay her role in the McDonald’s fiasco. After receiving substantial financial contributions from the officers of an entity seeking to profit in the deal, Florida took on an active role of making the project a reality. Her support, nearly to the point of being official spokesperson, did help influence the various boards that granted variances allowing the project to move forward. Had she remained neutral or opposed the drive-thru it most likely would not be happening now.

“I was always told recalls are about malfeasance in office or negligence. The reason why it’s in the charter is to cover corruption [in city politics]. But now it’s about not agreeing with an alderman’s position on an issue.”

I think if an alderman engages in criminal behavior we are not going to go through the recall process to remove them. Most often when a politician is caught with his/her hand in the candy jar or some other offense they typically resign amid charges of wrong doing. The recall process is in the charter to allow citizens to remove an elected representative when that person is no longer representing their interests. I believe that to be the case here and in a number of other recent recall efforts (Bauer, Roddy, & Bosley).

Florida said she suspects the recent rash of recalls stems from the citizens’ frustrations with federal and state politics. Because average citizens have little control over national issues, they instead vent their frustrations on local politicians, she said. “If you’re upset about the war in Iraq, you’re not going to recall President Bush,” she said. “Instead, you go after the people you have more control over.”

Florida can’t really be serious with this line of thinking, can she? She is suggesting that to be actively involved in local civic politics, including disagreeing with elected officials, is simply because we cannot impact issues on a state or federal level. Oh please! What a distorted view of the citizens of St. Louis! If we are not involved we are apathetic. If we are involved but disagree we are simply frustrated with others. How convenient for Ms. Florida to be so dismissive of everyone except those that agree with her. Open dialog about issues is the only way we will progress as a city but our elected officials don’t want dialog. They want status quo.

– Steve

GM, Bush & CARB Killed the Electric Car

Man I am pissed off. I just sent an email to General Motors which helped but only a little. Why am I so angry? I saw the documentary ‘Who Killed the Electric Car‘ at the Hi-Point Friday night.

Basically, GM F’d up big time. They started their electric vehicle program in 1988 with a concept car shown in 1990 and entering limited production in 1996 (the EV1). GM was actually out front and ahead of the curve on this one. Toyota & Honda, today’s leaders in hybrid technology, were following GM! In 2000 GM dropped the EV1 in favor of the Hummer and other large gas guzzling SUVs (Ford did the same thing). Today GM and Ford both are struggling to be profitable as free market consumers continue to purchase fewer and fewer of their products. They are scrambling to close plants and fire workers to remain solvent. Meanwhile, other manufacturers such as Toyota and Honda are opening new plants in the U.S. to meet increased demand for their products.

But the stupidity didn’t stop at the GM & Ford Board of Directors. No, the stupidity continued at the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and finally stopping at the Oval office with Dubbya. Before all the free market people start bitching about how we cannot force people to drive tiny cars please read carefully — government policy has been and continues to encourage the use of large vehicles and the burning of fossil fuels. From tax incentives offered for corporate vehicles to not improving requirements for average fuel economy to dropping the Zero Emission Vehicle mandate government policy has encouraged the proliferation of large vehicles and the stagnation of the U.S. auto industry.

Pollution and dependence upon foreign oil continue to be major issues. Had CARB stuck to their requirement for ZEVs (2% in 1998, 5% by 2001 and 10% by 2003) we may be well on our road to cleaner air and not be fighting a war over oil. Instead the Bush administration and others are pushing hydrogen fuel cells as the wave of the future. However, like electric cars, R&D takes time and money. Many experts say affordable fuel cell vehicles are a good 15-20 years away.

In the meantime we are supposed to continue burning fuel in internal combustion engines using alternate fuels. The 85% ethanol blend E85 is being promoted as a green product for flex-fuel vehicles and Biodiesel has similar claims. Here is the problem, it takes a lot of energy to grow corn or other products and process them into the so-called green fuels. With the exception of biodiesel made from waste, both are at best a break-even in terms of overall energy consumption and offer little difference from gasoline with respect to emissions.

We were so close and GM was leading the way. Yes, GM a leader! The movie assigns blame to GM, big oil and others for killing the electric car. I pretty much agree with their conclusions.

Of course, electric vehicles are not dead. What is dead is the mandate for a percentage of a manufacturer’s vehicles to be zero emissions. With that GM and Ford can talk about their hybrid vehicles that don’t get as good of milage as my ’06 Scion or even a 10-year old Saturn. Good job guys!

Zap (Zero Air Pollution):

First I want to disclose that I have a miniscule amount of stock in this company. They’ve got some interesting products, including a cute new 2-seater. Alas, some of these are way above average in cost. ZAP is also an importer of the Mercedes-built smart that I am quite fond of.

GEM (Global Electric Motors, LLC):

This company makes the electric vehicles you may have seen around downtown of late. A couple of developers have these and I know at least one loft owner that does. These are considered a Low Speed Vehicle (LSV) which has less requirements for being driven on the road. They are electronically limited to 25mph. This class of vehicle are often referred to as the Neighborhood Electric Vehicle (NEV) as use is often limited to the immediate neighborhood. This company is a subsidiary of DaimlerChrysler.

A number of vehicles exist on the market, some costing well over $100,000 but offering performance that you’d expect from a car costing that much.

GM is responding to the film with their own take on the situation (click here). Here is what GM says are the facts:

GM invested more than $1 billion in the EV1 program, which included money for installing a charging infrastructure and for marketing the product.

Even with extensive publicity, award-winning advertising and customer incentives the Electric Vehicle program was not a commercially viable business.

GM leveraged advanced technology to create the Saturn Vue Green Line Hybrid. It will hit showrooms later this summer, incorporating a new, more affordable gas-electric technology.

Nobody is disputing GM’s investment. However, the film disputes claims about demand, basically saying the advertising campaign was botched and that GM discouraged anyone from leasing an EV1. GM is not making a very good case in my view for disputing this claim. And finally we have a hybrid version of an existing Saturn Vue SUV that GM says will get 27 city and 32 highway (read review). Wow, those are horrible numbers. GM’s advantage is the Vue’s pricetag being about $7,000 or so less than the nearest competition, the Ford Escape Hybrid. However, the Saturn is considered a “mild” hybrid as it uses a regular gasoline engine for acceleration from stop rather than electric motors as on more traditional hybrids. It is the use of the electric motors to accelerate that enable cars like the Toyota Prius to get their outstanding milage.

I have to wonder what if CARB hadn’t lessoned the requirements and the various manufacturers had met the 10% rule by 2003. Would 10%+ of us in present day 2006 be driving electric cars? If so, things would certainly have come to a halt after our recent power outages caused by storms. How sad would that be to not be able to leave your hot house because your electric car needs charging?

The big downside to full electrics over hybrids like the Prius is battery life. With hybrids it is thought the batteries will actually last the life of the car as they are never fully charged or drained. When it comes to disposal of the vehicle that is a good thing. With full electrics I have to wonder what the environmental impact would be with all those batteries being manufactured and then disposed of every 2-3 years.

Ultimately the most sustainable car will combine a number of technologies, we’ll have the flex-fuel (or biodiesel) plug-in hybrid. What’s that you say? Imagine a future generation hybrid that uses E85 for the internal combustion engine (or a biodiesel) but needs very little because you plugged the car into the grid allowing it to act as a full electric until the batteries are nearly dead. That, combined with a solar roof, will be the car of the future. It will not be hydrogen powered. For a list of manufacturers that make electric vehicles, including scooters, see the Electric Auto Association.

Simply replacing our existing vehicles with some new technology isn’t going to solve many other problems and it may in fact create others. Reducing auto trips and distances traveled must be part of a bigger picture.

– Steve

Preservation Board to Review Proposed Changes to Forest Park’s Government Hill

The St. Louis Preservation Board reviewed a radical proposal at their June 2006 meeting (see post). The board at the time deferred any recommendation to Forest Park Forever and instead asked them to reconsider the concept. And it worked.

Last week I heard about a special meeting of the Preservation Board being called to consider the revisions. On Saturday morning I ran into Board Chair Timothy Mulligan at Soulard Market and he wanted to make sure the public was aware of the meeting.

The prior concept can be seen in the June 2006 report and the latest design can be seen here.

It is hard to make out the new design from the images in the PDF agenda but the description from the staff is helpful. One key part is making the area ADA compliant without regrading the entire hillside:

The revised design incorporates accessibility features in a manner that blends these features into overall design of the space rather than designing the space around the accessibility features. The accessibility features are now made a part of the landscaping and have gentle slopes that do not require ramp treatment—an accessible route with a slope of less than 5% will be integrated into the design of the rooms. The accessible paths will not be visible from Government Drive because the revised plan no longer involves extensively regrading the hill.

The meeting starts at 4:30pm this afternoon at 1015 Washington, 12th floor.

– Steve

Gambaro Gets Ugly in State Senate Race

Derio Gambaro’s conservative campaign for Missouri’s 4th Senate District has gotten ugly with a mailing that allegedly calls into question the sexuality of opponent Jeff Smith. The piece asks voters if Smith has been “straight” with them on all the issues [paraphrasing, my quotes].

I’ve personally asked Jeff Smith about his sexual orientation and he happens to be one of those not so masculine straight men. As there a good many hyper-masculine gay men out there it makes sense some of the straight men aren’t quite so straight in appearance. How this is relevant to the State Senate race is what I am curious about.

Clearly Gambaro is looking to get undecided voters in his camp. Will this tactic work or backfire?

More to follow as I obtain a copy of the mailer…

Update 7/31/2006 @ 8am:

See Travis Reems’ commentary on a push poll being conducted:

Gambaro Caller:
Would you be more or less likely to vote for a candidate if you knew he was paying somebody to pretend to be his girlfriend to cover up the fact that he is gay?

The implication that someone is gay simply because they have a certain appearance, mannerisms or a higher voice is offensive. Gambaro is trying to fit Jeff Smith into a roll of a stereotype that by many accounts doesn’t fit. If he can produce a boyfriend then I’ll believe him.

In this day and age it is often the person you least expect to be gay (or bisexual) that actually is. Examples include several Republican Congressmen; Jim Kolbe from Arizona, and in the 1990s you had millionaire Michael Huffington and Steve Gunderson. In the last 20 years we’ve also seen numerous anti-gay religious leaders caught with their pants down. Let’s not forget leading men such as Rock Hudson, Tab Hunter and Montgomery Clift or former major league baseball player Billy Bean.

If you want to let the Gambaro camp know just what you think of this tactic you can call their campaign at 314-773-6008.

– Steve

Mr. Smith the Movie, A Must See!

Can Mr. Smith Get To Washington Anymore? offers so much for the moviegoer: interesting characters, great story, humor, and emotion. The creative team behind this documentary have managed to highlight the workings of a congressional campaign without focusing on the political issues. This documentary is about people.

The story involves two different families. One is the Carnahan family with a long political history in Missouri with Russ Carnahan seeking to fill the congressional seat held by Dick Gephardt for 28 years. The other family is that of Jeff Smith, a young guy seeking to challenge the political establishment and the Carnahan family name.

Director Frank Popper followed Jeff Smith during the latter part of his bid to become a U.S. Congressman in 2004. With this we get to see the colorful side of a campaign, usually hidden to all but the insiders. More importantly we get to see real people working hard to make a real difference.

As a former candidate, albeit in a exponentially smaller race, I could completely relate to the issues faced by Smith and his team: honing message, persuading voters, making calls, going door-to-door, raising money, coordinating volunteers, and seeking endorsements. Working closely on my March 2005 aldermanic campaign was the film’s co-producer Mike Kime and another of Jeff Smith’s opponents, Corey Mohn. During my race I was having talks with Jeff Smith while he was teaching at Dartmouth, late at night we’d be instant messaging back and forth and he’d be pushing me on how many calls I made or how many doors I knocked on.

One of the hardest things I had to accept in my race was coming from nowhere, making a good challenge and yet not winning. It is very emotional. In the film we see this emotion from the candidate, staff and volunteers. This is the human side to this multi-layered story that is so compelling. During the film you are taken along for the emotional ride — you feel anger, excitement and disappointment along with the characters.

The pace of the 82-minute film is excellent with never a dull moment. Those who aren’t into politics, or even documentaries, should give this film serious consideration. And while I happen to know many of the people in the film it will be compelling to those that have never even set foot in Missouri.

Can Mr. Smith Get To Washington Anymore? is showing now through Thursday August 3, 2006 at the Tivoli on Delmar in University City. Click here to buy tickets online.

For those in other states you can see too:

• Los Angeles; August 18-24; Nuart Theatre
• Washington D.C.;September 22-28; E Street Cinema
• Boston; November 3-9; Kendall Square Cinema

For a few photos from the premier click here.

– Steve