GrowSmart Maine’s monthly “Charting the Course” column in Mainebiz is now available online.
This month’s column discusses some of the opportunities of building a new energy economy in Maine, a central theme of last month’s Summit.
Here’s another perspective from the October 10th Summit from Brenda Peluso, Director of Public Policy at the Maine Association of Nonprofits. These notes are cribbed, with her permission, from Brenda’s highly-recommended “Policy Pulse” newsletter. To subscribe, send your e-mail address to advocacy@nonprofitmaine.org.
For those of you waiting for the audio recordings and slideshows from the day’s keynote speakers, we expect to have those ready and up on our blog in the next couple of days. Thanks for your patience!
Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution led off the morning reviewing the findings of the “Charting Maine’s Future ” Report. “The next administration - whoever is elected - will institute change. The Federal Government has been on a frolic and detour - they’ve been asleep at the wheel. They have no serious policy on renewable energy, no policy on manufacturing - they will need to become a grown-up,” says Katz. He believes that Maine needs to be at the table when budget decisions are being made - not to grab earmarks, but through a disciplined approach to stimulating innovation for sustained prosperity. “Maine needs to continue to build on its niche - what we are good at and known for. We shouldn’t look to other states for solutions.”
Jim Chrisinger from the Public Strategies Group followed Mr. Katz and spoke about the need and ways to reinvent government . “Lack of money is not the reason we don’t have the government we want.” He asserts that our current bureaucratic system was built for an agrarian economy and was exactly what we needed 100 years ago. We moved from the spoils systems to our current system based on the way many businesses were being run. The idea was that if we have a good machine (bureaucracy) we will have good output. This focus on “running an organization” or “running an agency” has only gotten us so far - now we need to de-emphasize the machine and emphasize the output. He suggests that we ask different questions to start to shift the paradigm. Instead of asking, “How do we run this hospital?” let’s ask, “How do we improve health outcomes in our community?” The answers to these questions may be very different; underscoring that the emphasis on a better machine may no longer be a good proxy for meeting community needs.
At the morning session, “Innovating our Way out of Fiscal Crisis” there were several panelists including Jim Chrisinger, Ryan Low of the Maine Revenue Services, Representative John Piotti, and Senator Christopher Rector. Rep. Piotti called for “better taxes” and stated “How you structure taxes is as important as how much revenue they raise.” Taxes can encourage economic development and be more fair than the current system. Ryan Low noted that 80% of the State’s budget goes to education and health & human services, and while the cost of providing human services has increased by 6 - 7%, the budget will not increase over last year. Jim Chrisinger noted that nonprofits should be a strong partner with government to produce better outcomes. He asked, “How does the sector align its resources to do what it does best, while the government does what it does best?” The inherent question in this question is how do you determine what each does best? One idea proposed to help us “innovate our way out” was to fix the budgeting system so that investments could be made now that we know will produce savings later. Currently fiscal notes are attached to bills and if there were a way to “capitalize” the investments - spreading them out over many years - innovative legislation that would die because of a large fiscal note under the current system could survive under a different system.
For the past five years, we’ve had the professional readers from Books, Etc. selling topical books at the GrowSmart Summit. Their booth is always popular, so we’re happy to see that they’ve posted the list of titles they were selling last Friday on a special section of their website. Here’s a sampling (visit their site for the full list):
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Confluence: Merrymeeting Bay By Burroughs, Franklin Perry, Heather 2006/07 - Tilbury House Publishers 9780884482826 - Trade Paper List Price $30.00 Allow Two Business Days from our SuppliersThere are said to be only four places in the world where two major rivers, with entirely separate watersheds, converge at their mouths to form a common delta. Three are famous, having loomed large in the histories and economies of their regions: the Sacramento-San Joaquin delta in California, Tigris-Euphrates delta in Iraq, and the Ganges-Brahmaputra delta in Bangladesh. The fourth is Merrymeeting Bay in Maine. It is unfamiliar to most people, even within its immediate vicinity. Frank Burroughs has lived and knocked around on Merrymeeting Bay for three decades, gaining a familiarity with its natural and human history, with its birds, fish, and mammals, and with the local people who know it best. His wonderfully fluid essays explore the ecology, environment, and activities in this unusual bay, as Heather Perry’s beautiful photographs show us the details. Franklin Burroughs taught English literature at Bowdoin College from 1968 to 2002. He is the author of two books, The River Home: A Ret …More |
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Earth Then and Now: Amazing Images of Our Changing World By Pearce, Fred Goldsmith, Zac 2008/09 - Firefly Books 9781554074211 - Trade Paper List Price $29.95 Allow Two Business Days from our Suppliers 300 before and after photographs that show how the world has changed. Each paired image is captioned and tells a story. Chapters include environmental change, industrialization, urbanization, natural disasters, war, travel and tourism.…More |
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Investing in Renewable Energy: Making Money on Green Chip Stocks By Siegel, Jeff Nelder, Chris Siegel, Jeffrey 2008/10 - John Wiley & Sons 9780470152683 - Hardcover List Price $27.95 Allow Two Business Days from our Suppliers An expert in the area of renewable energy shares his profitable investment ideas. Filled with in-depth insights and practical advice, this work shows how to tap into this market early, and logically, in order to capture unparalleled profits.…More |
The Central/Western Maine Workforce Investment Board maintains an excellent blog, Working in Maine, that’s primarily written by Jim Baumer. We were lucky to have Jim at the Summit on Friday morning, and he took excellent notes. Quoting extensively from his “Notes from Summit 2008″ blog post:
Adaptation and Building a Green Innovation Economy featured a panel made up of Ned Raynalds, Union of Concerned Scientists, John Dorrer, director for the Center for Workforce Research and Information/Maine Dept. of Labor, and Commissioner John Richardson, Dept. of Economic and Community Development.
The breakout was well-facilitated by GrowSmart’s Bruce Hyman, and included opportunities for members of the audience to ask questions, and posit some of their own ideas about how Maine responds to climate change, high energy costs, as well as seizing opportunities to utilize green solutions in growing our state’s economy.
I’m going to focus mostly on the workforce emphasis of the panel. I don’t want to slight Mr. Raynalds, but you can read the gist of his orientation by reading, Confronting Climate Change in the U.S. Northeast fact sheet.
I thought Mr. Dorrer was particularly strong on the panel. He contextualized well the intersection of the often talked about, but rarely defined, green jobs. In the midst of our current financial crisis, Dorrer believes that looking forward could be Maine’s “salvation.”
Dorrer expressed concerns about the capacity and skill makeup of Maine’s current workforce. Given the state’s demographics, the state’s labor supply continues to be constricted. He spoke of the need for a “massive inflow of capital,” which he believes is necessary to “engineer our future.” Rather than the typical call by government officials merely for capital, Dorrer also indicated his belief that there must be transparency when it comes to accountability and by extension, accounting structures must be in place to provide that to taxpayers, as he said “we owe that to them.”
With so much hype being made about jobs that are green, what specifically are they? Dorrer maintained that “many of these new jobs will look like the old jobs.”Engineers will be needed (for R & D) and fabricators will be required to construct alternative energy infrastructure, like windmills. To match the capacity that will be required to meet the opportunity, Dorrer believes that it is essential that many more Maine students are channeled into science and engineering, which currently is not happening. I agree with Dorrer’s views, but without some type of change in our current emphasis at the state level, this is not going to happen. This is very much tied to the idea that Maine needs to orient its education to where are jobs are in the future, and by-and-large, this isn’t occurring now.
Commissioner Richardson spoke about the book, The Clean Tech Revolution: The Next Big Growth and Investment Opportunity, saying that “Maine is positioned nicely” to seize upon many of the tenets of this book.
Richardson, who resides in Brunswick, cited the efforts to develop the former Brunswick Naval Air Station as a “center of excellence” for alternative energy and innovation.
Some of the audience comments were very good. One young man asked about “Maine’s load capacity” as a state. How many people can the state support and still maintain a sustainable level of growth?
Another young professional spoke about the need to “bridge the gap” between the green social movement and the economic development model that leans green.Discussion about the amount of total household income Mainers spend for energy (40 percent) was talked about. This is a significant issue, as it impacts any discussion about growth.
Ron Phillips, president of Coastal Enterprises, Inc. mentioned that today’s green movement is similar to the 1960s movements for change that he came out of, as a boomer. He mentioned the need for both state and federal tax policy to be adjusted to “promote green policies.”
Brian Doyle, a business development specialist for DECD, said that Maine’s youth need to be encouraged to move into the area of skilled trades, the earlier the better.
Not to overly emphasize Dorrer, to the exclusion of others, but he talked about Maine’s hope for success in the area of green technology requiring a “systems solution” resonated with me. Maybe it’s because I’m confronted (and frustrated) daily by systemic issues affecting workforce development, but I recognize that Maine has to meet this challenge and seize this opportunity, or, as Dorrer said, we’ll face “dire consequences.”
Be sure to visit the Working In Maine blog for the rest of Jim’s reactions to the Summit. If you’re a frequent reader of this blog, I’d also highly recommend subscribing to the Working In Maine RSS feed as well.
Thanks for sharing your notes, Jim!
Here are a few of the news stories we’ve generated in the past week:
Thursday, October 9th: “Conference Speaker Touts ‘High Road’ To Economic Development.” MPBN radio interview with Summit keynoter Joel Rogers. Listen here.
Friday, October 10th: WCSH/WLBZ NewsCenter Summit coverage, by reporter Don Carrigain.
Here’s the video clip:
Saturday, October 11th: “Keep Investing in Maine, Expert Urges at Summit.” A Bangor Daily News story focused on Bruce Katz’s keynote address [a copy of this article is archived here]:
“…this is exactly the wrong time to skimp on investing in a progressive vision of Maine’s future, argued an expert from a Washington, D.C., think tank Friday at the 2008 GrowSmart Maine Summit at the Augusta Civic Center.
“‘The current crisis has not repealed the fundamentals,’ Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution said. ‘Innovation matters. Quality of place matters. … This is not just a frame for good times. This is a frame for bad times.’”
“Enthusiasm electric at GrowSmart session on energy”. A second Bangor Daily News story focuses on our Summit workshop on the growth and opportunities of the “green innovation” economy in Maine [a copy of this article is archived here].
“People spoke boldly and seemed excited about the notion of Maine being an energy exporter and an industry leader, putting the ‘I lead’ back into the state motto.
“’This is the next huge opportunity,’ [former Gov. Angus] King said. ‘For wind, for geothermal, for conservation, we have an opportunity to lead the country.’”
We just got back from lunch and an extremely entertaining and informative keynote by Joel Rogers, the cofounder of the Apollo Alliance and a researcher at the Center on Wisconsin Strategy. I won’t attempt to do justice to Joel’s address here, but instead I’ll post his whole presentation as an audio slide show sometime early next week. We’re also hoping to get the recording of him and the day’s other keynoters on MPBN’s “Speaking in Maine” program soon.
Now the day’s afternoon workshops are underway, and I’m blogging from a discussion on smart growth and transportation solutions to Maine’s climate and energy challenges. Kate Rube, a guest from Washington’s T4America coalition, just gave her 5 minute talk, which focused a lot on the fiscal challenges facing state and federal departments of transportation. The federal government recently had to bail out the federal highway fund, which is paid for by the gas tax, in order to keep maintaining the national highway network. Kate argues that the money needs to be spent more efficiently, with more accountability; at the same time, our infrastructure needs to be kept in a state of good repair with a more reliable, more diversified source of funding than the gas tax alone.
Tony Donovan, a strong advocate for train travel in Maine and also a commercial realtor, is now speaking about the tremendous opportunities for transit-oriented development in Maine. Tony is currently marketing the proposed Maine Street Station TOD project in downtown Brunswick: several new mixed-use buildings within easy walking distance of Brunswick’s downtown and the Bowdoin College campus will soon be built around Brunswick’s new train station. Thanks to last winter’s Legislature, Maine’s Downeaster passenger rail service will be extended to Brunswick (with a stop in Freeport) on newly-rehabilitated rails for service by summer 2010.
Here’s a rendering of the proposed mixed-use station:
Speaking now is Tex Haeuser, city planner for South Portland, Maine. Tex speaks of his growing interest, over the course of the past summer’s record gas prices, in making a major investment in a transit line for his city. For Tex, the benefits extend far beyond the ability to get around town without burning expensive gasoline: a major transit line would also spur redevelopment and decrease the city’s reliance on parking lots (besides being an expensive, unproductive land use, parking lots are also a serious source of pollution in their own right: the expansive lots around the Maine Mall are the major reason why the city’s Long Creek watershed is the most polluted water body in the state).
Our last panelist, Kristina Egan, is here for her fourth Summit and is also a former director of the Massachusetts Smart Growth Alliance, our counterpart organization in the Bay State. Kristina is now directing Gov. Deval Patrick’s highest-priority transportation project: the South Coast Commuter Rail project. The proposed rail project is the state’s third-largest public works project in recent history, behind the Big Dig and Boston’s new sewage treatment plant. It will cost $1.4 billion for 50 miles of new rail from South Station to the RI border. Here’s a map of some of the routes under consideration (click it to enlarge):
Opening it up to public comments: first up is Gerard Roy, Augusta’s economic development director, who grew up in Boston and notes the cultural and economic importance of neighborhoods. He’s working in Augusta to reduce traffic in a particular neighborhood, and notes that many are too concerned about safety to walk anywhere - how can a train station be successful if everyone drives there? He wonders about getting neighborhood feedback and support in transportation investments.
Tom Rumpf of the Nature Conservancy (and a GrowSmart board member) asks whether commuter rail projects like Mass. South Coast are really feasible in Maine. Are there better models for rural areas?
Henry Hayburn of Brunswick, who works on Brunswick’s bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, would like to see more focus on local connections - bikeability, and rail lines with more frequent stops (so a worker in Portland can commute back and forth to Brunswick via the railroad line, e.g.).
James Francomano, a planner from Presque Isle, would like to have more support from the state.
David Knapp, District 7 legislator, has worked on the Route 113/Mountain Division planning project (a rail corridor that connects Portland to North Conway, NH via South Windham, Standish, Baldwin, Brownfield, and Fryeburg). Talks about the economic development opportunities of that line (cruise ship excursions can take train rides to the White Mtns., for example), and the potential advantages to commuters. “It’s not the job of government to create jobs, it’s our job to create opportunity by putting the infrastructure in place.”
John Misener of Portland: what is the tipping point for bus service? If buses were extremely reliable and went by every five minutes, how many more people would take it?
Robert O’Brien of Portland: can transit overcome families’ “caravan culture”? How likely is it for a family with three kids in tow to get a week’s worth of groceries on a bus or a bike?
Steve Hinchman, Conservation Law Foundation: we’re still making 20th-century investments. The Skowhegan Bypass, for example: estimated at $50 million now, but costs will inflate. If over-the-road trucking is becoming less feasible as diesel costs rise, why are we still fixated on projects like this one, or the east-west highway? There’s already an east-west rail line - why aren’t we investing (at lower costs) in that existing infrastructure?
Fred Michaud, MDOT planner: is conducting an east-west transportation study, looking at both rail and highway options. Rails don’t go everywhere though: you need some trucking to distribute goods from ports and rail depots. Cites the potential of alternative fuels for motor vehicles. “Rural Maine will not benefit from transit,” he says.
Sally Oldham of Portland: cites the importance of quality design, quality places in transportation planning. Requiring urban design and landscape architecture professionals to be involved in infrastructure design and construction.
Back to the panel: Kate addresses the most recent question: their T4America platform doesn’t explicitly include design requirements, but does include recommendations for “context-sensitive solutions,” an approach to infrastructure design that actually respects and incorporates the public’s feedback and concerns (as opposed to the status quo, in which bureaucratic engineers determine 95% of road design). The new transportation bill will also include provisions for “complete streets,” streets that include facilities for pedestrians and bicyclists.
Tony responds to the feasibility of transit in the “caravan culture”: there aren’t any families with three kids that walk to the soccer field together for a game - everyone drives. That’s something that can change, and has to change. A family can take the Downeaster from Portland to Old Orchard Beach for the day, for less than the cost of a tank of gas (and no charges for car parking).
Tex H. addressing the need for neighborhood involvement: agrees that if a neighborhood doesn’t want it - whether it’s a train line, or increased density - it won’t happen. But neighborhoods can also take the initiative to create positive change.
Bonita Pothier, who’s moderating this discussion, notes that the two Maine panelists and most participants in the discussion are from the Portland area. What about rural areas? She used to visit a sister in Van Buren, Maine - a long drive, but once she was there they were able to walk everywhere. Now Van Buren is a lot more spead out and auto-reliant. What kinds of transit can support the kind of development we have now?
Kristina Egan talks about the important of historic land use patterns: many Maine villages grew up around old train stations. Rehabbing those rail lines for passenger service can take advantage of and revitalize those villages.
Kate Rube also responds: 2/3 of all auto trips are less than 2 miles. We drive because walking, cycling aren’t safe, and transit isn’t convenient. Tex adds that where there are opportunities, as with the Mtn. Division line, “we have to do everything possible to get the land use in line, the comp. plan, the zoning (if there’s zoning)… we can’t miss these opportunities.”
Kevin Donoghue, city councilor of Portland, responds to Robert O’Brien’s earlier point. Neighborhoods need convenient retail and services nearby, close to where people live. Economic development efforts should strive to provide commercial services that will service neighborhood residents, both to reduce auto use and to improve quality of life and convenience for neighborhood residents.
A sobering thought to close: Sara Trafton, Maine Transit Assn., notes that Mainers are getting old. A growing number of us are “aging out of driving.”
Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution:
Jim Chrisinger of the Public Strategies Group:
Growing the economy and adapting to climate change workshop:
Today we’re at the Augusta Civic Center for the long-awaited Summit 2008. I’ll be trying to live blog at least some of today’s workshops as they happen. Here’s a quick summary of the morning’s first two keynote addresses, by Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution and Jim Chrisinger of the Public Strategies Group.
Bruce gave the morning’s first address, and noted that as a result of his work in Maine two years ago, his 16 year-old daughter is now obsessed with Maine’s “quality of place,” going to an Outward Bound trip this summer and gunning to attend college here. A great example of how Maine’s “brand” exerts a pull on people all over the state.
Bruce then gave a quick rundown of the Brookings report’s recommendations, which, he maintains, remain the same two years later, even amidst the remarkable economic changes we’re going through right now.
In fact, Katz maintains that challenging economic times make the Brookings report’s recommendations more timely than ever: now is the time to recommit to the fundamental strengths of Maine’s economy. Those are Maine’s “brand,” its quality of place, and its entrepreneurial, frugal culture. By leveraging those strengths, Maine’s economy will thrive in the long term.
Katz then gave us a “report card” on how well we’ve implemented the strategies contained in the report, and what still needs to be done. Although the state has made some laudable investments in research and development, quality places, and efforts to streamline government, Katz notes that the state needs to make a long-term commitment to those investments, by finding a dedicated source of funding for investments and freeing up more resources from a leaner government.
Jim Chrisinger spoke next. His first line: “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.” The crowd chuckles, and Chrisinger notes that it’s a reliable laugh line. But as a former public servant, he’s troubled that it’s such a reliable laugh line. Why should government be such a joke?
Chrisinger’s current employer, the Public Strategies Group, works all over the world, at all levels of government, to try to make government more effective and cost-effective to its public “customers.” He gives a quick history of the history of our current model of government: the top-down, rigid bureaucracy had its genesis in the old progressive era, as a solution to the spoils system that had generated so much corruption and failures at the turn of the century. Back then, “bureaucracy” wasn’t a dirty word: it was seen as a vital solution, and it was the standard model in private enterprise at that time as well (think of Henry Ford’s assembly lines).
But after nearly a century under the bureaucratic model of government, it’s time to adapt: become less rigid and rules-based, and allow more creativity and entrepreneurial action in governments. Chrisinger gives a quick example: customer service standards at the DMV, so that if your license isn’t renewed within 30 minutes, you won’t pay for it. Instead of having a supervisor work as a (not very effective) cheerleader, DMV workers in this model have a real financial incentive to serve customers quickly and efficiently.
Chrisinger notes that there’s no shortage of creative ideas for entrepreneurial government: the “supply” side is strong. There is a shortage of demand for better government. He thanks GrowSmart Maine for getting involved in generating more demand, and asks the audience to demand the same of their candidates before election day.
Chrisinger and PSG will be working with GrowSmart to generate an “action plan” for better government in our upcoming “Governing Maine in the 21st Century” project.
Have you registered for the 2008 GrowSmart Summit, which is coming up on October 10th at the Augusta Civic Center? We still have plenty of room for more people, but the registrations are coming in at fast pace, so be sure to register your spot soon. If you have a credit or debit card, you can register online via our secure webpages.
This year’s event will feature big discussions and three nationally-known speakers with big ideas. In this blog post, I’d like to highlight our “Climate, Energy, and Prosperity” keynoter: Joel Rogers, the co-founder of the Apollo Alliance.
The Apollo Alliance is a coalition of business, labor, environmental, and community leaders working to catalyze a clean energy revolution through focused research and development initiatives on the scale of the Apollo space program. Rogers is very well-versed in the economic opportunities of the imminent shift to cleaner, more innovative approaches to producing goods and services. He is also a director at the Center on Wisconsin Strategy, a national policy center and field laboratory for “high-road economic development.”
Joel’s morning keynote will frame some of the issues and discussions for later Summit workshops on energy, climate, and prosperity in Maine, including a workshop focused on the possibilities of growing a renewable-energy cluster here in Maine.
Don’t miss out on this event - register for the Summit today! You can learn more about the event, and look at a full program of the day’s events, at http://growsmartmaine.org/programs/summit.asp