Politics

snake.eyes, via Flickr by Majora Carter, via the Huffington Post Some would argue — and I’m one of them — that many government programs over the years have had disastrous consequences because they’ve lacked good planning. For example, we have a long and shameful history of dumping coal-fired power plants, along with chemical plants and other poison-spewing facilities, in our poorest urban and rural communities. Those land use decisions made a handful of people wealthy but condemned the millions of people who live nearby to levels of environmental inequality that do not reflect the values of democracy. And they come with huge public health costs that have to be picked up by taxpayers. It doesn’t have to be that way. For more than a decade, I’ve worked with communities across the country to create jobs and social service cost savings through green infrastructure and environmental stewardship. Success in this arena depends on a good plan, developed with all those who have a direct stake...

By Jessica Goad The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Power held a hearing this morning about the differences between drilling for oil and gas on private versus public lands. GOP members of the committee tried to use the hearing to claim the Administration is hampering oil and gas development. However, a number of witnesses testified to the contrary, saying that there is a substantial amount of drilling occurring on public lands.  The Center for American Progress Action Fund’s Christy Goldfuss was one of them: Regarding new lands offered for oil and gas development, the Bureau of Land Management held three of the top five largest sales in the agency’s history in calendar year 2011, and this year, it has approved controversial projects to drill in the Arctic Ocean and close to wilderness areas near Desolation Canyon, Utah. With this level of oil and gas activity on public lands, it is clear why a recent New York Times article about oil and gas production on public l...