http://www.dmiblog.com/ All comments, ideas and thoughts on DMI Blog are property of their authors. Reasonable excerpts are permitted on other sites and blogs; otherwise reproduction without the author's permission is strictly prohibited. View our comment policy here. en Copyright 2010 Fri, 12 Mar 2010 17:32:55 -0500 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/?v=3.2 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss afton branche Yesterday, President Obama held three meetings on comprehensive immigration reform; one with immigration advocates, another with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and a third with Sens. Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who are currently working on drafting reform legislation. For advocates, the meeting was an opportunity to convey growing frustration with the Administration's unfulfilled promises to rework our unworkable immigration system this year. For Schumer and Graham, the task of the afternoon was to discuss their outline of a bipartisan reform agreement. According to the Los Angeles Times, the proposal includes increased border security measures and a legalization plan for currently undocumented immigrants, including those with current deportation orders. At the center of the Senator's overhaul plan is a national worker ID card--all legal US workers would receive the card embedded with their own biometric information, either fingerprints or a scan of their hand's veins. Schumer on the ID plan, from the Wall Street Journal: 'It's the nub of solving the immigration dilemma politically speaking," Mr. Schumer said in an interview. The card, he said, would directly answer concerns that after legislation is signed, another wave of illegal immigrants would arrive. 'If you say they can't get a job when they come here, you'll stop it.' After this proposal came out last week, everyone from the ACLU to FOX News denounced the idea as costly and invasive. And I doubt this new, untested policy measure will solve what is really the chief political dilemma for immigration reform--the almost complete lack of bipartisan support in the Senate. In yesterday's meeting, Schumer asked for help from Obama on this very issue. Obama reportedly pledged to do more to win Republican support, but let's not hold our breaths. Strange new policies aside, the politics of immigration reform will almost certainly derail comprehensive action in this election year. In a statement following yesterday's meetings, Obama said: "I told both the Senators and the community leaders that my commitment to comprehensive immigration reform is unwavering, and that I will continue to be their partner in this important effort." Translation: Obama will not be a leader on immigration reform. Will his partnership be enough? http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/immigration_policy_meet_politi.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/immigration_policy_meet_politi.html Fri, 12 Mar 2010 17:32:55 -0500 John Petro For those of you in Denver worried about the future of FasTracks, I've got good news: Los Angeles' mayor Antonio Villaraigosa just took a trip to Washington, DC. I know you're asking yourself, "Why should I care?" But the outcome of Villaraigosa's trip could mean good news for Denver. Just like Denver, Los Angeles has plans for the construction of multiple new rail and bus projects. And, just like in Denver, voters approved a sales tax increase to make it happen. Now Los Angeles wants to complete its transit projects in ten years instead of thirty, as had originally been planned. Villaraigosa is asking Washington lawmakers to extend a loan to Los Angeles to speed up the rate of construction and to build out all of the new lines simultaneously. L.A.'s mayor touted the 166,000 construction jobs that the project would bring to the recession-wracked region. From the Wall Street Journal: Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa insists the deal presents little risk for the federal government. The reason: Los Angeles County voters in 2008 passed a half-cent sales tax to fund the rail project over 30 years. But Los Angeles leaders say it can be done in 10 if they get the money up front. The city would pay back the loans over 30 years using the sales tax. Denver is currently considering raising the transit sales tax from .04 percent to .08 percent in order to complete all of its planned rail projects. Declining sales tax revenue and escalating costs have resulted in a $2.4 billion gap in funding for Denver's ambitious, but much needed, transit plan. If the tax is not raised, several of the currently proposed lines may be eliminated. The Denver Post reported last October: Local officials, RTD and area voters should acknowledge that money from the initial 0.4 percent FasTracks sales-and-use tax, approved five years ago, is flowing into one "bucket," as Tauer called it, to construct roughly half of FasTracks. The other half? Those lines are currently unfunded. Currently there is doubt about the likelihood of voters approving a sales tax increase. As The Economist put it recently, without the sales tax increase, "The project's completion could be delayed until 2035 or scaled back to just one or two new lines." But if voters know that all their rail lines would be constructed sooner rather than later, perhaps public opinion would be behind increasing the tax. And if Mayor Villaraigosa is successful, if the federal government finds a way to extend Los Angeles a loan to complete its project in ten years instead of thirty, the Denver could make a similar ask of Washington lawmakers. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/la_mayor_travels_to_dc_good_ne.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/la_mayor_travels_to_dc_good_ne.html Urban Affairs Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:55:47 -0500 Amy Traub Nearly a billion dollars were stolen in New York City last year, and the thieves aren't even worried about getting caught. If this were an epidemic of street crime, the city and state would have acted long ago. Instead, the crooks in question are corrupt bosses who steal their employees' earnings by paying less than minimum wage, making them work off the clock, pilfering tips, misclassifying employees as independent contractors, and a host of other schemes. As a result, the theft is harder to detect. But Albany is finally on the case. The Wage Theft Prevention Act, introduced this week by Senator Diane Savino and Assemblyman Carl Heastie, stiffens penalties for cheating employees out of wages, encourages workers to come forward, and provides new avenues for investigating and prosecuting wage theft cases - and ensuring violators will pay up. The bill builds on the best practices of states like Ohio and New Mexico to not only punish wage-stealing employers but create a powerful deterrent to cheating employees - and the public - in the first place. The bill is particularly urgent in a time of budget deficits and recession. New York loses hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue when, in the process of stealing wages from their workers, employers also underpay payroll taxes, unemployment insurance, and workers' compensation. Cornell University researchers estimate that between 2002 and 2005 the state lost more than $175 million just from unemployment insurance taxes on employees whose bosses wrongly classified them as independent contractors. As I recounted in January, New York's hidden crime wave was quantified for the first time this year with shocking research from the National Employment Law Project. They found that more than 300,000 low-wage employees in New York City alone are victims of wage theft every week, with annual losses totaling nearly a billion dollars. Workers that average only $20,644 a year see more than 15% of their pay stolen by the boss. But as alarming as these findings are, they don't capture the full scope of New York State's problem. The epidemic of wage theft doesn't stop at the city borders, or end with low-wage employees. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/albanys_new_wage_theft_bill_co.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/albanys_new_wage_theft_bill_co.html Labor Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:39:36 -0500 John Petro In theory, it should be everything that a progressive urban policy analyst like me would want from a new development. Atlantic Yards would create lots of new housing immediately adjacent to mass transit lines. It would be a mix of residential, commercial, retail, and entertainment space. And it would create new affordable housing and green space. But, somehow, Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner got it all wrong. The project required two things to make it feasible: the use of eminent domain to acquire the property and hundreds of millions of dollars in public subsidies. Public officials justified both by proclaiming that the project would also create public benefits. But these public benefits were always dubious. And as the project has progressed, they have all but disappeared completely. Now it seems that the project will be a money loser for the city and will scar the face of Brooklyn for decades. So what went wrong? First and foremost, the moment Forest City Ratner turned to New York City and the state for the use of eminent domain and public subsidies, Atlantic Yards became a public project. This fact has been ignored by the developer and by the public officials who have backed it. In fact, Bruce Ratner, chief executive of Forest City, proclaimed last year, "Why should people get to see plans? This isn't a public project." Because the public--most importantly, those in communities surrounding the project site--were not adequately involved in the planning of Atlantic Yards, opposition to the project was fierce and unyielding. This opposition caused a string of delays that would eventually force the developer to put plans for office and housing towers on hold indefinitely. The result was, to the extent that there ever were any public benefits, those benefits have now disappeared. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/a_sad_day_for_brooklyn_atlanti.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/a_sad_day_for_brooklyn_atlanti.html Fri, 12 Mar 2010 10:10:04 -0500 Harry Moroz Former House majority leader and presumed head of the Tea Party movement Dick Armey should perhaps be congratulated for excommunicating the anti-immigrant zealot Tom Tancredo. When I talked several weeks ago with Freedom Works, the group Armey leads that is behind much Tea Party activity, a representative authorized to speak for Armey expressed similar sentiments, telling me that they were "worried about Tom Tancredo" who could alienate the "libertarian branch" of the movement. The spokesman contrasted the failed candidacy of the (very) culturally conservative gubernatorial candidate Ken Blackwell in Ohio in 2006 to the surging (by his account) campaign of the (very, like eliminate the state income tax) fiscally conservative John Kasich. The implication is that Tea Party candidates will succeed if they can focus attention on so-called pocketbook issues, such as cap-and-trade, the stimulus package, and earmarks. But if attention turns to divisive cultural issues, of which immigration is presumed to be one, the Tea Party will shatter like so many delicate teacups. But Armey, calculating strategist that he is, is not merely protecting his movement from the internal fissures that might result from disagreement about a single issue (and from a debate that would likely feature fear mongering, false patriotism, and overheated, mean-spirited rhetoric). Instead, he is protecting the very strategic consistency of the movement. The Tea Party's success, in fact, depends on stoking Americans' distrust of government by framing issues negatively, by presenting what the federal government should not do: own auto companies, pick winners and losers in the financial industry, "kill jobs" by passing cap-and-trade legislation. Debating immigration reform would concede that the federal government can and should do something. There is no "get the federal government out of immigration" position available to the Tea Partiers. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/you_and_what_armey.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/you_and_what_armey.html Governmental Reform Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:04:05 -0500 John Petro "Sometimes I really love Ed Glaeser." Most urbanists, city lovers, and urban policy wonks would probably agree with this recent tweet by blogger Ryan Avent, but with a heavy emphasis on the "sometimes." Ed Glaeser, urban economist, Harvard professor, and writer for the conservative City Journal, can be very perplexing to those of us who want to make cities a better and more practical place for Americans to live. For example, take this op-ed authored by Glaeser in the Boston Globe last Friday, "Why the Anti-urban Bias?" Here, Glaeser chides the federal government for its policies that favor suburban development, often at the expense of central cities. Over the past 60 years, cities have been hit by a painful policy trifecta: subsidization of highways, subsidization of homeownership, and a school system that creates strong incentives for many parents to leave city borders. Glaser argues that federal investments should be focused on central cities because cities are the nation's economic engines. Obama needs to fight for cities, not just as a matter of justice, but because cities, and the creativity that comes when humans connect and learn from each other in dense areas, are the best hope for the country. Hooray! Good one, Professor Glaeser! High five! Well, actually, I might have to leave you hanging. Just four days later, writing for the New York Times' Economix blog, Glaeser seemingly has an about-face. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/post_79.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/post_79.html Urban Affairs Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:04:34 -0500 Karin Dryhurst The administrator of the Federal Transit Administration has laid the smack-down on a Texas Congressman's attempt to block light rail in Houston. FTA appreciates the detailed points that you provided...However, as described below, some of the information included in your letter is outdated and incorrect. The letter goes on to disprove five points made by GOP Rep. John Culberson in his objection to the project, including the cost and revenue figures he provided. But instead of covering the FTA rebuttal, the Houston Chronicle interviewed a light rail critic, who claims a 2003 referendum blocks Houston Metro from taking on the debt it needs for the new project. The referendum asked for voter approval of a rail expansion plan. Oddly enough, the referendum was forced by language Culberson inserted into the 2003 federal transportation bill tying federal transit funding for the city to voter approval. What a coincidence. Unfortunately for Rep. Culberson, and for Rep. Tom DeLay who pulled a similar stunt in 2000, the FTA has decided that the project does not violate the referendum. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/outdated_and_incorrect.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/outdated_and_incorrect.html Transportation Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:06:18 -0500 Karin Dryhurst New York Mag has already shown itself to be a magazine that cares about the big issues--health care, Mike Bloomberg, and urban education--along with all things glitzy and foodie. But this week a city and regional magazine association named finalists for its 2010 awards and seemed pretty psyched about the coverage of unemployment and the Mexican border. With urban reporters at the daily metros covering oh about 10 beats, it's easy to see where reporters at magazines like Texas Monthly and Los Angeles Magazine can step in even though their outlets often talk restaurants, shopping, and travel. The same has been said about community newspapers that occupy a niche left behind by metro reporters covering an entire county rather than one city. In this way, the breakdown of institutional journalism has resulted in a new diversity of voices in print media just as on the Internet. But just as media critics complain about the echo chambers of the Internet, niche audiences in local print media may mean echo chambers in urban communities. The magazine association, which represents 97 city and regional magazines, commissioned a study, no doubt to entice luxury advertisers, that found subscribers had a median income of more than $145,000 and 71 percent had a college degree. Metro dailies often fail to represent the diversity of the community, but niche media has failed to expose that diversity to different readers. And though niche media appears to be necessary to keep local coverage alive, but the worst echo chambers will be the ones separated by purchasing power. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/urban_echo_chambers.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/urban_echo_chambers.html Media Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:26:56 -0500 Cristina Jimenez According to Joe Strupp from Media Matters, there is significant evidence that Newsday, the largest daily newspaper on Long Island, reassigned two reporters because of complaints from Steve Levy, Suffolk's County Executive. Levy is widely known for his anti-immigrant views. Strupp cites Newsday's reassignment of immigration reporter Bart Jones to the religion beat, implying that pressure from Levy was the reason for the change. Levy has publicly admitted that he submitted complaints about Jones. Levy's efforts to control the press also "extend to others who are quoted or not quoted." Patrick Young, Long Island Wins blogger told Media Matters: We have heard he [Levy] tries to keep immigrant rights advocates from being quoted,...As soon as there is some negative story about him, he calls to try to set the record straight. Based on Levy's record, this is not a surprise. Read more of this story here http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/is_newsdays_immigration_covera.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/is_newsdays_immigration_covera.html Immigration Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:43:29 -0500 Harry Moroz Below, Karin writes about the impact that cuts in state aid to city and local governments are having on budget deficits. The National League of Cities demonstrated this point in a recent report revealing that such cuts could total between $21 billion and $30 billion in fiscal years 2010-2012. These cuts are not only big, but could have lasting consequences for city budgets. In recent years, state governments have become the primary benefactors of city governments, making up for the federal government's diminishing support. As Brookings Bruce Wallin points out, federal aid decreased from 17.5 percent of city general revenue in 1977 to 5.4 percent in 2000. But he also points out that: Equally noteworthy was the increase in state aid over this time period, which in the aggregate substituted for the decline in federal aid, allowing the overall level of city intergovernmental aid to return in 2000 to 1977 levels in real dollars per capita. Gaping state budget deficits will lead more and more states to cut aid to city and local governments, placing more of the burden of revenue raising on local governments, which in many places are already limited in how they can do so. This creates an opportunity for the federal government to reestablish its financial relationship with city governments, one that could be based as much on revenue sharing as on a recognition of the important role cities play as economic engines. However, if the federal government does not step in to assist urban areas, fiscal austerity measures taken by cities in times of economic stress will persist in times of economic recovery. Finally, though direct aid for cities would be preferable, the Obama administration's extension of Medicaid assistance for states - which the Senate is considering this week - will assist cities by easing the fiscal pressure on state governments. Presumably, the lower the deficit at the state level, the less aid to cities state governments will cut. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/why_cuts_in_state_aid_to_citie.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/why_cuts_in_state_aid_to_citie.html Cities Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:15:52 -0500 Karin Dryhurst Philadelphia is not alone. The Philadelphia Inquirer painted a picture of cities sharing the pain last week--and pointed out that unlike New York, L.A., Phoenix and San Diego, Philly hasn't proposed handing pink slips to city workers. Mark Muro from Brookings says that Mayor Nutter will need to continue to come up with creative solutions for Philadelphia and that leaders might need to consider current service cuts the "new norm." But the Inquirer fails to mention that these crises aren't just in the hands of mayors and that some of them are passed on down from the state government. Take San Francisco, which had funding cuts handed to them from the Governator and now has announced 15,000 layoffs at the city level. The Inquirer names Chicago as one city that has avoided layoffs, but Gov. Quinn has threatened to slash funding for cities, claiming they need to "share the pain," by giving up $300 million in income taxes. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/do_cities_need_a_support_group.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/do_cities_need_a_support_group.html Cities Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:36:38 -0500 Dan Morris Elizabeth Green's New York Times Magazine cover story on improving teaching could be read as a slap in the face to education reformers who pray at the conjoined altars of financial incentives and data. The title of her piece, "Building a Better Teacher," refers to the shift from merit pay schemes and quantitative performance metrics that have produced limited results toward a less flashy approach capable of sustained progress: understanding and replicating what the best teachers in different schools already do well. She breathes new life and meaning into the mechanics of teaching--the subtle techniques, decisions, and "bite-size moves," as she calls them, that keep students engaged and focused. She examines in great detail the fact that "getting students to pay attention is not only crucial but also a skill as specialized, intricate and learnable as playing guitar." She reveals it's a skill the vast majority of teachers can acquire, even master. One academic expert tells her: "[W]e could ensure that the average classroom tomorrow was seeing the types of gains that the top quarter of our classrooms see today." http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/the_difficult_misunderstood_wo.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/the_difficult_misunderstood_wo.html Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:34:03 -0500 Amy Traub "Laid-off professionals line up for part-time census jobs," reports the Washington Post. Out-of-work lawyers, business consultants and other professionals are lining up for positions to knock on doors and collect census data. It's not a surprising headline at a time of persistently high unemployment, but it should be a provocative one. Consider what's going on here: unemployed people get a much-needed paycheck; taxpayers pay for it, and benefit as a constitutionally-mandated public need is met. The American population will get counted, and unemployment will decrease as a result. As a public jobs program, it's far from ideal: the census jobs are temporary, they don't fully utilize the skills of many job seekers, and it's limited by nature - not many public functions, like the census, are mandated by the constitution. But its efficiency and effectiveness should make us think again about the opportunities to put people to work performing services the public needs. No massive federal bureaucracy would be necessary: provide funds to the nation's cities, where local officials are already steeped in the most immediate needs of their communities, and municipal governments will put local residents to work. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/the_census_in_a_time_of_unempl.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/the_census_in_a_time_of_unempl.html Employment Mon, 08 Mar 2010 11:39:51 -0500 Dan Morris A big story in education right now is the Race to the Top, something Chadwick Matlin described as a grand experiment in behavioral economics: a big incentive (or cudgel, really) of millions in federal dollars to force states to enact the Obama administration's education reform agenda, which is driven almost entirely by market principles and values: entrepreneurship, innovation, deregulation, and the most punitive form of accountability. This is why conservatives like Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for George W. Bush and now a Washington Post columnist, love this agenda. Gerson gives it an A+. The federal government is expanding the bounds of privatization at the local and state level, and school leaders must form coalitions of the willing, or else. Well, the first group of finalists for the Race to the Top has been announced. But as Matlin pointed out months ago, the Race to the Top is really a Slide to the Bottom. There's only $4 billion overall that will be awarded--a relatively small amount, when you remember that virtually all states are expected to compete and the winners are supposed to use the money to do very costly things like lengthen school days, increase standardized testing, and undertake more rigorous, data-driven performance assessments of teachers and school leaders (nevermind that data is hardly a panacea.) http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/a_race_to_where.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/a_race_to_where.html Education Fri, 05 Mar 2010 18:09:53 -0500 afton branche On Monday, President Obama met with members of his Domestic Policy Council to discuss how to move forward with a comprehensive reform of our federal immigration system. The LA Times reports that the White House may recruit Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to craft a "blueprint" that could be used for legislation. Ultimately, Obama will leave it up to Congress to overhaul our immigration laws. http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/immigration_reform_in_2010_a_l.html http://www.dmiblog.com/archives/2010/03/immigration_reform_in_2010_a_l.html Immigration Fri, 05 Mar 2010 17:42:30 -0500