"there isn’t a single US county where a full-time minimum wage worker can afford a modest two-bedroom rental"

"Nearly half of American workers do not earn enough to rent a one-bedroom apartment, according to new data.

Rents in the US continued to increase through the pandemic, and a worker now needs to earn about $20.40 an hour to afford a modest one-bedroom rental. The median wage in the US is about $21 an hour.

The data, from the National Low Income Housing Coalition, shows that millions of Americans – from Amazon warehouse workers to cab drivers to public school teachers – are struggling to pay rent. For the poorest Americans, market-rate housing is out of reach in virtually all of the country."

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/aug/12/housing-renter-affordable-data-map

Guardian graphic. Source: National Low Income Housing Coalition. Note: In 2021 dollars

International Panel on Climate Change - report released

"Human activity is changing the Earth’s climate in ways “unprecedented” in thousands or hundreds of thousands of years, with some of the changes now inevitable and “irreversible”, climate scientists have warned.

Within the next two decades, temperatures are likely to rise by more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, breaching the ambition of the 2015 Paris climate agreement, and bringing widespread devastation and extreme weather.

Only rapid and drastic reductions in greenhouse gases in this decade can prevent such climate breakdown, with every fraction of a degree of further heating likely to compound the accelerating effects, according to the International Panel on Climate Change, the world’s leading authority on climate science."

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/aug/09/humans-have-caused-unprecedented-and-irreversible-change-to-climate-scientists-warn

Visit the IPCC page for section of or the full report   https://www.ipcc.ch/report/sixth-assessment-report-working-group-i/

International Panel on Climate Change - report released

The Guardian: "COVID-19 discoveries: what we know now that we didn’t know before"

"How COVID spreads

When COVID first hit the UK, so too did sales of hand sanitiser. On 28 February, Boris Johnson said: “The best thing people can do to prevent the spread of coronavirus is wash your hands.”

The emphasis was, in part, because it was thought one of the key routes by which COVID was spread was by people touching contaminated surfaces and then touching their own face – so called “fomite transmission”. Websites even appeared designed to alert you should you reach for your features, while many people became concerned about whether to disinfect groceries and parcels.

But experts now argue that the role of tiny virus-containing particles called aerosols, emitted along with larger droplets when infected people breathe, speak or cough, were overlooked – and that ventilation in indoor settings is crucial to reduce the spread of COVID."

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/06/four-areas-where-what-is-known-about-the-covid-virus-has-evolved

The Guardian: "COVID-19 discoveries: what we know now that we didn’t know before"

The Guardian: "Small farms vanish every day in America’s dairyland: ‘There ain’t no future in dairy’"

“Look at that sweet heifer, high, tight udder, in her first lactation, idn’t she sweet?” auctioneer Tom Bidlingmaier shouts as his son Cory plods and slips and pushes the cow around a pen.

Watching it all are about 65 people, mostly men, mostly other small farmers in rubber boots, standing in mud and manure as they murmur their bids. Ron Wallenhorst, the farmer auctioning off his herd of 64 milking cows, is pacing and tapping an empty water bottle against his thigh. He has milked cows in his barn twice a day, every day, after taking over the farm from his father 32 years ago. By the afternoon, all the cows will be gone.

“This is our 401k,” said Ron, 55 years old, his tall frame still hearty though he’s 15 pounds lighter from stress."

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jul/21/small-farms-vanish-every-day-in-americas-dairyland-there-aint-no-future-in-dairy

photo by Greg Kahn/The Guardian

"we need to reach a new level of public understanding about health, disease, risk and probability"

We’re soon going to have to make our own choices about social distancing, wearing masks and travel. When the legal enforcement of rules is lifted, the way in which each of us deals with the risk of Covid-19 will be down to personal judgment. But how well equipped are we to make these decisions?

Graphs and data can help explain things, but what’s also needed is a deep understanding of how science works, and, perhaps most important of all, a sense of how to weigh up the odds of coming down with the disease and how it might affect us. Not in an abstract way, but in our day-to-day lives. And what many people don’t realise is that COVID-19 is just the start. 

.... 

To equip us for all this, we need to reach a new level of public understanding about health, disease, risk and probability. Some of this should be taught in schools, colleges and universities, of course, but there needs to be more. During the pandemic, we have seen a huge increase in the number of scientists discussing their work in public. Now, as the UK government formally lifts restrictions, we must not retreat from this exposure. Rather, we must embrace science as a vital part of our culture even more than we do now. At stake is not just our health and wellbeing, but our sense of what it means to be human.

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/16/well-soon-know-more-about-our-bodies-than-ever-before-but-are-we-ready

Progress in human biology is accelerating at an unprecedented rate, and there’s no sign of it slowing down.’ Photograph: Yuri_Arcurs/Getty Images

The Guardian: "the dozen are responsible for 73% of all anti-vaccine content"

"The vast majority of COVID-19 anti-vaccine misinformation and conspiracy theories originated from just 12 people, a report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) cited by the White House this week found.

CCDH, a UK/US non-profit and non-governmental organization, found in March that these 12 online personalities they dubbed the “disinformation dozen” have a combined following of 59 million people across multiple social media platforms, with Facebook having the largest impact. CCDH analyzed 812,000 Facebook posts and tweets and found 65% came from the disinformation dozen. Vivek Murthy, US surgeon general, and Joe Biden focused on misinformation around vaccines this week as a driving force of the virus spreading.

On Facebook alone, the dozen are responsible for 73% of all anti-vaccine content, though the vaccines have been deemed safe and effective by the US government and its regulatory agencies. And 95% of the COVID misinformation reported on these platforms were not removed."

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required) 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/17/covid-misinformation-conspiracy-theories-ccdh-report

The CCDH report  https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/21011322/disinfo-dozen.pdf
   

On Facebook alone, the dozen are responsible for 73% of all anti-vaccine content, though the vaccines have been deemed safe and effective by the US government and its regulatory agencies. Photograph: Science Photo Library/Alamy Stock Photo

The Guardian: "only 15 cents of every dollar we spend in the supermarket goes to farmers"

"A handful of powerful companies control the majority market share of almost 80% of dozens of grocery items bought regularly by ordinary Americans, new analysis reveals.

A joint investigation by the Guardian and Food and Water Watch found that consumer choice is largely an illusion – despite supermarket shelves and fridges brimming with different brands.

In fact, a few powerful transnational companies dominate every link of the food supply chain: from seeds and fertilizers to slaughterhouses and supermarkets to cereals and beers.

The size, power and profits of these mega companies have expanded thanks to political lobbying and weak regulation which enabled a wave of unchecked mergers and acquisitions. This matters because the size and influence of these mega-companies enables them to largely dictate what America’s 2 million farmers grow and how much they are paid, as well as what consumers eat and how much our groceries cost"

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2021/jul/14/food-monopoly-meals-profits-data-investigation

More info about Food and Water Watch -> https://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/

consumer choice is largely an illusion

The Guardian: "Why declining birth rates are good news for life on Earth"

Given that there is a discussion about Franklin's population and rate of growth, putting our stats in context with national and world trends should help. 

"Fertility rates are falling across the globe – even in places, such as sub-Saharan Africa, where they remain high. This is good for women, families, societies and the environment. So why do we keep hearing that the world needs babies, with angst in the media about maternity wards closing in Italy and ghost cities in China? 

The short-range answer is that, even though this slowdown was predicted as part of the now 250-year-old demographic transition – whose signature is the tumbling of both fertility and mortality rates – occasional happenings, such as the publication of US census data or China’s decision to relax its two-child policy, force it back into our consciousness, arousing fears about family lines rubbed out and diminishing superpowers being uninvited from the top table. 

The longer range answer is that our notion of a healthy, vibrant society is still rooted in the past. The inevitable byproduct of the demographic transition is that populations age, in a chronological sense, but life expectancy, and particularly healthy life expectancy, have increased dramatically over the last half-century, and the societal definition of “old” has not kept up (though artistic experiments such as casting 82-year-old Sir Ian McKellen as Hamlet might help to challenge age-related stereotypes)."

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/08/why-declining-birth-rates-are-good-news-for-life-on-earth

 

Davis Thayer Facility Analysis Subcommittee meeting of Oct 2020

https://www.franklinmatters.org/2020/10/facility-analysis-subcommittee-long.html

You can find the demographics study on the Town of Franklin page
https://www.franklinps.net/district/meeting-packets/files/demographic-presentation

The Comprehensive Facilities Assessment

https://www.franklinmatters.org/2020/10/school-committee-comprehensive.html

Download your copy of the detailed report here: 

https://www.franklinps.net/district/davis-thayer-facilities-analysis/files/facilities-assessment-report

screen grab of DTFA meeting in Oct 2020

Catching up to some National news

‘The Great Resignation’: June’s US jobs report hides unusual trend 

"The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday (07/02/21) that the US economy added 850,000 jobs last month. Hidden by this encouraging figure is the hint of an unusual trend: people are beginning to quit their jobs in extraordinary numbers.

June’s numbers, in combination with last month’s figures, suggest that the economy is continuing to recover at a steady pace. The rate of unemployment was 5.9% and 9.5 million people remain unemployed."

Continue reading about this job report at The Guardian 

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/jul/03/us-jobs-report-june-trend

The battle for Mount Rushmore: ‘It should be turned into something like the Holocaust Museum’

"The national memorial draws nearly 3 million visitors a year – and Native Americans want the site back with a focus on oppression

Mount Rushmore national memorial draws nearly 3 million visitors a year to its remote location in South Dakota. They travel from all corners of the globe just to lay their eyes on what the National Park Service calls America’s “shrine of democracy”.

Phil Two Eagle is not opposed to the fact that the giant sculpture of American presidents is a major tourist attraction but he thinks the park should have a different focus: oppression.

“It should be turned into something like the United States Holocaust Museum,” he said. “The world needs to know what was done to us.”

Continue reading the article online (subscription maybe required)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jul/03/mount-rushmore-south-dakota-indigenous-americans

"at some point, surplus became more important than feeding people"

"The global, industrialized food system faces increasing scrutiny for its environmental impact, given its voracious appetite for land is linked to mass deforestation, water pollution and a sizable chunk of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.

The implied trade-off has been that advances in agriculture have greatly reduced hunger and driven societies out of poverty due to improved productivity and efficiencies. But Mark Bittman, the American food author and journalist, argues in his new book Animal, Vegetable, Junk that these supposed benefits are largely illusionary.

In a sweeping deconstruction of the history of food, spanning the past 10,000 years of organized agriculture, Bittman takes in everything from Mesopotamian irrigation to the Irish famine to the growth of McDonald’s to posit the rise of uniformity and convenience in food has mostly benefited large companies, fueled societal inequities and ravaged human health and the environment. Al Gore, the former US vice president, has called the book a “must-read for policymakers, activists and concerned citizens looking to better understand our food system and how to fix it”.

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/25/our-unequal-earth-mark-bittman-cheap-food-american-diet

For more about Mark visit his web page  https://www.markbittman.com/

Mark Bittman, the American food author and journalist - "Animal, Vegetable, Junk"

The Guardian: "US Postal Service reportedly tracking social media posts"

"The US Postal Service has reportedly been monitoring social media posts, with a focus on people planning protests.

The surveillance procedure, known as the Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP), tracks social media activity that it describes as “inflammatory” and shares that information to government agencies, according to a government bulletin from 16 March obtained by Yahoo News. The program is part of the efforts of the United States Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), the law enforcement arm of the USPS.

The USPIS monitored social media accounts regarding planned protests occurring internationally and domestically on 20 March, when the World Wide Rally for Freedom and Democracy was scheduled to take place, according to the bulletin."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/apr/23/usps-covert-program-postal-service-social-media

What background disqualifies a reporter from a story?

"Felicia Sonmez had to flee her home. In early 2020, after the death of the basketball player Kobe Bryant, Sonmez, a longtime breaking news reporter at the Washington Post, tweeted a link to a Daily Beast story about the 2003 rape allegation against Bryant. The tweet had no commentary and no editorializing by Sonmez, and yet on the day it appeared online, it was a lonely acknowledgment of Bryant’s compromised legacy amid a sea of uncritical praise for the dead athlete. In response, the reporter received a deluge of abuse from Bryant’s fans. They were angry at what they saw as Sonmez besmirching Bryant’s memory by acknowledging the accusation that he had been sexually violent towards a Colorado woman; they were willing to avenge this disrespect, or so they claimed, with more violence against women. The name-calling escalated into threats, and some of those threats seemed credible. Her home address was published online. For her own safety, Sonmez went briefly into hiding.

The story is sadly familiar to female journalists, who face harassment, threats, stalking, and other digital hostility as a strange and uncompensated condition of their jobs. But in many cases, these female journalists are defended by their employers. Such was the case for Taylor Lorenz, a New York Times reporter on digital culture who was targeted by Tucker Carlson and other rightwing instigators last month: the Times issued a statement standing by their reporter, and condemning the attacks against her."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required) 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/30/washington-post-felicia-sonmez-sexual-assault-sexism

 

On National Pay Day women in sports highlight inequality

 

Megan Rapinoe has taken her fight for equal pay to Congress as she testified on Wednesday in front of a committee examining “the economic harm caused by longstanding gender inequalities, particularly for women of color”.

The Olympic and World Cup champion testified at a hearing by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform. In her opening statement, the soccer star told the committee that: “I am here today because I know firsthand that this is true. We are told in this country that if you just work hard and continue to achieve - you will be rewarded, fairly. It’s the promise of the American dream. But that promise has not been for everyone.

“The United States women’s national team has won four World Cup championships and four Olympic gold medals on behalf of our country. We have filled stadiums, broken viewing records, and sold out jerseys, all popular metrics by which we are judged.

“Yet despite all of this, we are still paid less than men – for each trophy, of which there are many, each win, each tie, each time we play. Less.”

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/mar/24/megan-rapinoe-equal-pay-day-us-congress-white-house-visit

"The NCAA’s handling of the women’s basketball tournament is either malpractice or malfeasance. It’s one or the other. The issue is not just petty skimping on food, the withholding of the March Madness brand, the willful lack of promotion. Something much bigger is going on here, a kind of larceny. And Congress should make the NCAA crack open the books on it.

Short of stifling Geno Auriemma with a pillow while stealing his diamond championship rings, the NCAA could not work harder to smother the potential of the women’s tournament and rob it of revenue. This week, in response to a query about its financials, the NCAA insisted again that the women don’t turn a profit. This is patently unjustifiable. You know how much revenue NCAA Division I women’s basketball generated collectively in 2018-2019? Almost a billion dollars. "

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2021/03/25/ncaa-women-basketball-tournament-revenue/

"the guilty seem to have no capacity even for remorse"

 

"After last week’s exhaustive inquiry by Clive Sheldon QC into how young people in football have been subjected to horrific sexual abuse during 25 years with no child protection, the nation this week will hear from survivors. In the testimony they give to a devastating BBC documentary series, they emphasise a constant theme: that their enforced silence for years did further dreadful damage to them, and how liberating it has been to speak out."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/mar/21/you-cant-carry-it-how-the-victims-of-footballs-darkest-scandal-found-peace-by-speaking-out

"Oil firms knew decades ago fossil fuels posed grave health risks, files reveal"

"The oil industry knew at least 50 years ago that air pollution from burning fossil fuels posed serious risks to human health, only to spend decades aggressively lobbying against clean air regulations, a trove of internal documents seen by the Guardian reveal.

The documents, which include internal memos and reports, show the industry was long aware that it created large amounts of air pollution, that pollutants could lodge deep in the lungs and be “real villains in health effects”, and even that its own workers may be experiencing birth defects among their children.

But these concerns did little to stop oil and gas companies, and their proxies, spreading doubt about the growing body of science linking the burning of fossil fuels to an array of health problems that kill millions of people around the world each year. Echoing the fossil-fuel industry’s history of undermining of climate science, oil and gas interests released a torrent of material aimed at raising uncertainty over the harm caused by air pollution and used this to deter US lawmakers from placing further limits on pollutants."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/18/oil-industry-fossil-fuels-air-pollution-documents

National News: no mail fraud in PA found; check on your IRS stimulus payment; intelligence report highlights terrorists threats

"Postal Service finds no evidence of mail ballot fraud in Pa. case cited by top Republicans"

"U.S. Postal Service investigators found no evidence to support a Pennsylvania postal worker’s claim that his supervisors had tampered with mail-in ballots, according to an inspector general’s report — allegations cited by top Republicans to press baseless claims of fraud in the presidential election."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/17/usps-ballot-fraud-investigation/

 

 "The IRS has sent out 90 million stimulus payments."

"The Internal Revenue Service told financial institutions to expect roughly 90 million direct deposits amounting to $242.2 billion on March 17 in the initial distribution of the American Rescue Plan stimulus payments, according to a banking industry group.

Following the deposits, the IRS mailed an additional 150,000 checks amounting to $442 million, with a pay date of March 19, according to the Independent Community Bankers of America, based on a briefing from the IRS.

“Additional batches of payments will be sent in the coming weeks with the vast majority sent by direct deposit,” the group said in an online update to banking members. “Payments will also be sent through the mail as a check or debit card.” 

• How to check on your status ->  https://www.irs.gov/coronavirus/get-my-payment

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/16/irs-stimulus-payment-tracker/

"Racist extremists pose most deadly terrorist threat to US, intelligence report warns"

"Racially motivated extremists pose the most lethal domestic terrorism threats to the US, according to an unclassified intelligence report that warned that the threats could grow this year.

The blunt assessment, in a report released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, echoes warnings made by US officials, including the FBI director, Christopher Wray, who testified earlier this month that the threat from domestic violent extremism was “metastasizing” across the country."

• Direct link to report => https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/UnclassSummaryofDVEAssessment-17MAR21.pdf

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/17/racist-extremists-us-domestic-terrorism-intelligence-report

 

National News: FBI facing challenge on background check; wood stove certification found lacking

"FBI facing allegation that its 2018 background check of Brett Kavanaugh was ‘fake’"

"The FBI is facing new scrutiny for its 2018 background check of Brett Kavanaugh, the supreme court justice, after a lawmaker suggested that the investigation may have been “fake”.

Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democratic senator and former prosecutor who serves on the judiciary committee, is calling on the newly-confirmed attorney general, Merrick Garland, to help facilitate “proper oversight” by the Senate into questions about how thoroughly the FBI investigated Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearing. "

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/16/fbi-brett-kavanaugh-background-check-fake

 

"Natural but deadly: huge gaps in US rules for wood-stove smoke exposed"

"In 2015, the US government required that newer models of wood stoves perform better and began spending millions of dollars to subsidize the transition away from older models. Now, an investigation by state environment officials is revealing a critical flaw in that plan: the latest stoves might not be any less polluting than the previous ones.

A review of 250 wood-burning stove certifications found unexplained data omissions and atypical lab practices. When the officials retested about a dozen of the heaters in their own labs, they were not able to reproduce the certification results. They found many stoves were polluting as much as the previous models. One was producing so much pollution that it wouldn’t have met the Environmental Protection Agency’s first-ever standards from 1988."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/16/wood-smoke-alaska-state-regulators-air-quality

Toronto's urban center "grappling with a housing shortage and affordability crisis"

Before I retired I had the opportunity to visit Toronto a few times. As Canada largest city, they have rejected a technology based development to take a more human approach. As Franklin continues the discussion on development and affordable housing, their work may provide some ideas we can use.

"Canada’s largest city is moving towards a new vision of the future, in which affordability, sustainability and environmentally friendly design are prioritized over the trappings of new and often untested technologies.

In announcing its new vision this week for Quayside, Toronto has backed away from many of the previous plan’s most futuristic promises, a move experts say reflects growing skepticism over technology’s role in urban planning decisions."

What is the new vision?

"Waterfront Toronto today launched an international competition to secure a development partner for the Quayside lands. The first step in this effort is to issue a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) to identify potential development proponents with the proven experience, design portfolio, financial resources, and shared vision necessary to bring Quayside to reality.  

“The people of Toronto have told us that they want to see a bold vision realized on the waterfront that reflects the confident, welcoming, and imaginative civic spirit of our city,” said Stephen Diamond, Chair of the Board for Waterfront Toronto. 

“We are looking for leaders in the development field that will share our ambition to create a place that fuses Quayside to the water, and provides more beauty, utility, and originality than previously imagined. We want Quayside to be timeless, adaptive, and to propel us into our rightful place among the great waterfronts of the world,” Diamond concluded. 

Quayside will usher in a new chapter in Toronto development. It will remind people of everything they want from living in the city and demonstrate what is possible when vision, passion, and design excellence are brought together. " 

Continue reading about the development planning for Quayside:

https://waterfrontoronto.ca/nbe/portal/waterfront/Home/waterfronthome/newsroom/newsarchive/news/2021/march/waterfront+toronto+launches+international+competition+for+quayside+development+partner

Opening quote from The Guardian gets into more of the background on the rejected development approach: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/12/toronto-canada-quayside-urban-centre

The Guardian: "What if the most important election of the year is happening right now in Alabama?"

 

"This month, 5,800 Amazon warehouse employees in Bessemer, Alabama, will be voting on whether or not to unionize with the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union in what could turn out to be the most important election of the year.

While the Bessemer fulfillment center itself is a drop in the bucket when compared to Amazon’s roughly 500 facilities around the country, this could be the ballot heard around the world. If successful, this election would mark the first unionized Amazon facility in the US.

Over the past 26 years, Jeff Bezos has built himself a private empire. Amazon is now the second largest employer in the US, after Walmart, and the fifth largest in the world. The more than 800,000 Amazon employees across the country represent a population between the size of Maine and Montana. Globally, the company employs more than 1 million workers."

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/11/amazon-bessemer-alabama-union-election

"human operators will do little to offset the biases of AI programming"

"The New York police department has acquired a robotic police dog, known as Digidog, and has deployed it on the streets of Brooklyn, Queens and, most recently, the Bronx. At a time that activists in New York, and beyond, are calling for the defunding of police departments – for the sake of funding more vital services that address the root causes of crime and poverty – the NYPD’s decision to pour money into a robot dog seems tone-deaf if not an outright provocation.

As Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who represents parts of Queens and the Bronx, put it on Twitter: “Shout out to everyone who fought against community advocates who demanded these resources go to investments like school counseling instead. Now robotic surveillance ground drones are being deployed for testing on low-income communities of color with underresourced schools.”

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/02/nypd-police-robodog-patrols