Another city, another study

The mother of all farmers markets, even on Wednesday
temporary(?)public bathrooms with handwashing in front of city hall

So, am sitting at the fair trade coffeehouse, having my iced espresso, typing away. Sounds and feels familiar, just this time, I'm in Madison Wisconsin, not in MidCity New Orleans. Can definitely feel the difference by air density!

Jim Hightower, the great populist Texan, once said something like if a town has a locally owned coffeehouse or pub, a locally owned bookstore and a farmers market downtown, I know they're doing fine.
I use that series of indicators and also add:
bicyclists
skateboarders (in evenings)
bulletin boards (and with more on them then just flyers for businesses)
small hardware store
knowledge among residents of items their city makes or distributes well
bus stops with places to be out of the weather
many colors of people on both sides of the counter
different types and sized of grocery stores
rent diversity
storefronts for repairs or to buy used items
different ages of people at events like open air concerts
public space around town being used


With that series of indicators, not many cities make it into my top list and maybe not many should. It is (in my estimation) a city's job to balance needs, look at who is not using services (but is in the demographic, so can be served), and also work to replace needless imports.

Madison does well in many categories by my one short visit, but missing in some others. I stayed near the University with lovely friends (who made it as easy as pie for me) so I didn't see the whole shebang. Clearly.

In the wonderful book The 9 Nations of North America, Wisconsin falls squarely into The Breadbasket Nation, of which the author says "It's the nation most at peace with itself". A city with 4 murders in 2006 (a little smaller than New Orleans post-Katrina)? wow. I would think so.
Certainly true- the level of agitation seems mild, and why shouldn't it be? low crime, high employment still and lots of cheese to boot.
I did feel some attention to bridging, when I biked over to Williamson Street. At the Willy Street Coop, I was impressed with the diversity both in front and behind the counter (and in the free seating outside and around the area), in age and in ethnic makeup. I think it means a great deal when you go to a store and see people that look like you behind the counter-especially when in many other places around town, you would not feel as comfortable as around there. I also like that they do not sell liquor as there is a small store down the street that they encourage you to shop. The thrift store down the street from the Coop had lots of different people throughout and had good prices.

More on price- for me, the needle is in the middle; some free stuff and lots of public space, but for a small town, I was surprised at the food prices, taxi prices etc.
Beer was pretty cheap.
Level of awareness in ecological systems is high, but social justice issues seem lower. Many panhandlers around State Street and I saw few resources for them around there and a cop endlessly questioning one. (Hey, he doesn't have a particular reason to be there, you're right. Do you?)
Not many people were very happy or talkative when I shopped-although not a surprise in a high transient area like a university/state capital area.

Bus system seemed good, but the senior pass seemed a bit high (with 62 and over being about 20% of the population). High-tech industry, Oscar Meyer and the university seem to make for a good economy.

Overall, a pleasant city for a bicyclist, beer drinker and a walker. I enjoyed the beautiful views everywhere. If you want to see the MidWest in its full glory, I recommend Madison.

Logic of Sufficiency

Great book. I think the framework of scale is so necessary for all of us involved in community organizing to study- and this book approaches it from the elegant language of sufficiency (as opposed to efficiency) as the measure. The author argues that efficiency was useful for single mechanical solutions, but is not useful to use as a gauge to build complex systems. Looking at productivity alone as a measure leaves out whose benefit, level of finite resources used and the costs to extract in future.
Truly, efficiency is simply another arbitrary measure with its own hidden costs and subjective ratios applied. As the author says: " it has been elevated from a common sense idea to a dominant social principle." A good example is car use: often miles per gallon is used as an "efficiency" standard, even though dozens of other externalities change the true mpg of your car-from how your tire pressure is kept, to the type of roads you drive on, to the speed at which you drive. In other words, we use the term efficiency to showcase the best available system, and it does not always lead to that.
Farming is another excellent example of that, when"get big or get out" was the 1970s serious (and mostly well-meaning) idea of the industrial food system to feed more people and create wealth at home and yet, those efficiencies have led to more health dangers in food preparation, less farmers and farmland in most regions, leading to higher prices and mono cropping.

"(this book is) for those who accept the world's ecological constraints and believe human endeavor should be rated on quality of life issues."
More:
"we need to build sufficiency into decision-making and realize the logic of empire is the accumulation of private wealth, efficient extraction (being constant) and technological mastery.
Modern industrial society pays homage to the market, the factory and the laboratory.
The author looks at a few concrete examples of self regulating bodies using sufficiency as a organizing principle: Early timber company that added sustainable growth policies decades before others were forced to, lobstermen in Maine opting to catch seasonally and to ask for federal rules to self-manage those waters year round, residents on Ward's Island on island that decided to do without cars. I also liked the description of shotengai (mom and pop Japanese shopping districts) how they managed much of civil society post WW2, organizing festivals, supporting schools and being (as JJacobs has said famously) being the eyes on the street.

His chapter on the history of efficiency is charming and appropriate to study, especially the insight that Aristotle showed efficiency not as about speed or costs but that it was about the appropriateness of using the correct process.

I highly recommend this- although I am always aware of the danger of asking Americans to reduce anything or to slow things down. Resource management, dignity for labor and direct relationships between the users and the producers of goods is what goes along with sufficiency.
The Logic of Sufficiency

Save Society, not newspapers

UtneArticle

State of Sustainability 2009 | GreenCityBlueLake

Okay, I do NOT believe that we can cut and paste work from other cities (especially one in The Foundry Nation!) but this site is an excellent one to see how one can start to manage the information useful to a region. I must say, I am often impressed by the leaps that Cleveburgh is growing in sustainability projects, if only they would deal this way with the social justice issues...State of Sustainability 2009 | GreenCityBlueLake

Too complex to exist - The Boston Globe

Too complex to exist - The Boston Globe

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Holiday people

I really like July 4 weekend in the Quarter. Not only do we have relaxed summer people walking around (as opposed to those intense visitors who think they're supposed to drink to excess, throw up to excess and scream in excess since they are in the Quarter) we also get the older, more professional visitors for Essence Festival. I like the idea of this festival and know many people who go and spend the day at the exhibits, seminars and networking before even going to the music event in the evening. You see many different groups of friends just walking around on Thursday and lots of couples who are carrying lots of shopping bags and look very glad to be in our city. I am pleased to see that most businesses in the Quarter have stopped their ridiculous behavior from the first few years of this event (closing for the weekend), and instead seem to be welcoming these visitors, just as they have always welcomed JazzFest visitors. You can thank Marc Morial for putting his foot down on that subject long ago... the diversity on this weekend is pretty wonderful, much like it is on Bayou Classic weekend, Southern Decadence or Mardi Gras.

I spent the day packing my car for a cocktail party I am throwing in the Lower Garden District, but after this is over tonight, I will stay in the Quarter hanging out for the rest of the weekend. Come get a muffaletta and a Barq's and watch the river go by, or for the fireworks tomorrow night, so go sit at the new restaurant at the French Market (Galvez) and have a cool drink while you see the show. Best of all, just mingle with your fellow citizens in the public square that is your French Quarter.