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kbaril january 27 2006 audio #1

Try more democracy!!

Collaborative effort
WSU-UW policy consensus
center renamed
By Denny Fleenor
College of Agricultural, Human and Natural Resource Sciences

Bill Ruckelshaus believes that the best approach to tackling tough policy issues is more democracy, in other words informing and involving more people in addressing the issues that affect their lives.

In 2003, Ruckelshaus worked with the presidents of Washington State University and the University of Washington not only to establish a joint program to apply their resources to addressing contentious public policy issues, but to provide funding for its launch.

Originally named the WSU-UW Policy Consensus Center, its mission is to act as a neutral resource for collaborative problem solving by bringing the capabilities of the two research universities to bear on policy issues.

At a recent reception, WSU President V. Lane Rawlins and UW President Mark Emmert announced the renaming of the center as the William D. Ruckelshaus Center.

Ruckelshaus is highly respected for his public, corporate and community leadership. He is best known as the first director of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a post to which he returned during the Reagan administration. He has served as a senior vice president of the Weyerhaeuser Corporation and chairman/CEO of Browning Ferris Industries, and currently is a partner and principal in Madrona Venture Partners.

“There’s no one like Bill Ruckelshaus,” Gov. Chris Gregoire said at the reception. “Governors, as well as several U.S. presidents, have called upon him to work on problems that have eluded resolution by the best and brightest.”

The governor complimented the two university presidents for their foresight in forming the center to apply the resources of both universities to addressing vexing policy issues.

“Everyone will know what the center stands for when they see the name William D. Ruckelshaus on the door: Integrity, clear and practical thinking, good humor, respect for all, and civil solutions that create a better future for everyone,” the governor said.

In accepting the honor, Ruckelshaus, who chairs the center’s advisory board, said that he views the center’s mission as important to ensuring that our democracy works.

“The missing element is strong public understanding of issues. We need an informed public who can demand decisions from our leaders and that’s what you are up to,” he said. “The center doesn’t solve problems. Its success is in providing help for the people involved to solve them, and those are the most durable solutions.”

Ruckelshaus praised the role of Extension, the WSU home for the center.

“Extension is an important place for the center to be, and a natural place,” he said. “Extension has people all over the state who see the problems every day. If this effort results in a better place for us to live, we’ll have really accomplished something.”

More information about the Ruckelshaus Center and its work can be found at www.ruckelshauscenter.wsu.edu.

Podcast

Farm to cafeteria gets boost this fall

Schools go on health kick as federal law takes hold

ST. PAUL, Minnesota (AP) -- They're promising to keep closer tabs on student lunch trays, pull sugary treats from vending machines and classroom celebrations and encourage more pulse-raising activities during the school day.

The nation's public schools are under orders to adopt nutrition and exercise goals before classes resume in the fall. The written wellness policies are required by a federal law that took effect July 1.
"Some school districts and school buildings have already made a lot of these changes and some have done nothing just because they've never been required to," said Alicia Moag-Stahlberg, executive director of Action for Healthy Kids, a 50-state nonprofit network. "Frankly, schools that have never had this conversation are having it."
The law's primary objective is straightforward: combating rising childhood obesity rates. Overweight children miss more school than their average weight counterparts, according to the National School Boards Association. Backers also argue that reducing sugar in students' diets leads to greater focus in the classroom.
Some states are making similar efforts through new laws and policies, and the federal law gives school boards wide latitude, causing vast differences in their approaches.
In Tennessee's Williamson County, for instance, the broadly worded policy runs 23 lines; in Hampton, New Hampshire, the five-page plan is so detailed it suggests elementary students have "at least two colors other than white and brown as part of their lunch meal."
Committees comprised of administrators, teachers, parents and students are looking well beyond the cafeteria for ways to promote healthier eating habits and more physical activity.
In St. Paul, students will find water, fruit juice and milk in vending machines that used to dispense soda. In Farmington, Utah, schools are holding recess before lunch so kids don't give short shrift to their meals in the race to the playground.
Teachers in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, will encounter restrictions on goodies they can give out in their classrooms. Lollipops and sodas will be no-nos.
Rhonda Dunham, a principal at an elementary school in the district, will try other rewards for students who meet homework goals or display good behavior. One plan is to set up elegant lunches, where kids get specially prepared meals at tables with linen cloths, china and glassware.
"They feel a bit more grownup that way," she said.
Classroom candy also has lost favor in the northwestern Minnesota district of Perham Dent.
"The truth is, one Jolly Rancher isn't bad, but 13 years of several Jolly Ranchers a day is a bad habit to learn," said superintendent Tamara Uselman.
Her district is incorporating more movement into the school day as well. One geography teacher is setting up stations in her classroom so students are on the move every 20 minutes.
Many school districts are making clear that recess is valuable exercise time and shouldn't be withheld as punishment.
While school leaders and health advocates generally laud the law's intent, concerns do exist.
Congress didn't give schools money to implement the policies or offer compensation for the potential loss of vending sales proceeds.
An Illinois education panel noted another barrier: Schools have difficulty setting aside time from their other pressing priorities such as the federal No Child Left Behind law, which carries consequences if students don't show progress in core subjects.
The wellness directive requires school districts to measure progress but doesn't contain consequences for those that don't live up to the law.
"I don't think the federal government put enough teeth into this," Dunham, the elementary principal, said. "We are accountable basically only to ourselves. In some school districts, I could see this going by the wayside."
And don't expect the wellness policies to, um, bear fruit overnight.
"It's like eating an elephant," said Brenda Greene, the National School Board Association's director of school health programs. "You need to do it one bite at a time."
Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.





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Cultural creatives make good neighbors and good economies!

Maine Issues Guide for the Creative Economy


Maine Gov. Mark Baldacci has unveiled a new handbook intended to help communities to capitalize upon their cultural resources to spur economic growth. Maine's Creative Economy Community Handbook: Maine State Government Resources for Communities offers advice for community leaders interested in building a creative and dynamic workforce. The guidelines it gives for designing a strategic plan could benefit communities across the country interested in similar initiatives.

The handbook is the result of two years of work by Maines Creative Economy Steering Committee following a 2004 conference on the future of the state economy. The study was requested after it was reported that the creative economy was generating $6.6 billion annually in cultural tourism dollars. The committee has drawn upon the work of Richard Florida, who has theorized that networks of educated and entrepreneurial citizens lead to dynamic local economies.

The state's Creative Economy Council estimates that 8.3 percent of Maine's workforce is made up of creative workers. These workers include artists, artisans, engineers, entrepreneurs and researchers. In Maine, this group has an average income 33 percent higher than the rest of the workforce. Florida and other theorists have described this creative class of workers as a decisive factor in determining regional success.

The University of  Southern Maine's Muskie School of Public Policy has developed the handbook's most useful tool for communities in other states, a section entitled "Ten Building Blocks of the Creative Economy" that gives economic development groups a starting point to assess and cultivate their creative resources. These building blocks represent vital qualities of a growing creative economy. Each is accompanied by a series of questions, which can illuminate a regions creative strengths.

The Muskie School has assembled these blocks into a model of creativity-led sustainable growth. Two qualities, time and money, are "enhancers," elements that build on a community's pre-existing strengths. With time and money, regions can become more attractive to highly-skilled and creative workers by building upon pre-existing "assets." Creative people, centers of education, cultural/natural amenities, business engagement, and infrastructure are the foundations of the creative economy. They are linked by "connectors," such as leadership, networks and strategies, which determine the availability of enhancers and lead to the effective use of assets. Together, these building blocks can be used to design strategic assessments and plans based on attracting a creative workforce.

To read Maine's Creative Economy Community Handbook: Maine State Government Resources for Communities, visit: http://www.econdevmaine.com/resources/default.asp

 <http://www.econdevmaine.com/resources/default.asp> Links to this report and more than 4,000 additional TBED-related research reports, strategic plans and other papers can be found at the Tech-based Economic Development (TBED) Resource  Center, jointly developed by the Technology Administration and SSTI, at: http://www.tbedresourcecenter.org/.

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Local 2020 July 28th

CATEGORY: Local 2020

mark your calendar . . .July 28th at noon at the Masonic Hall in Port Townsend I will be giving a presentation on BALLE- the Business Alliance for a Local Living Economy and Think Local First. .plan to attend. . please let me know if you have any specific questions that you'd like to be sure that I answer.

thanks!

Lost on the Metro? Whip Out Your IPod

CATEGORY:Technology

Downloadable July 4th Map Previews Things to Come, Transit Official Says

By Mike Musgrove
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, July 1, 2006; B01

Metro has a plan to help the confused, iPod-carrying tourist on Independence Day: The service has put a map with its Fourth of July schedule and service changes online, in a format intended for downloading and viewing on the popular digital music player.

The file, which Metro has dubbed "The Revolutionary Map," is compatible with any color-screen iPod or Nano that lets users view photos or video.

Metro riders will need to keep a number of holiday schedule changes in mind, whether they carry an iPod or not: The Smithsonian station will be closed, the Blue line will be truncated, and the Orange line will alternate between New Carrollton and Largo Town Center, just to name a few examples.

Cathy Asato, a Metro spokeswoman, said she does not know how many times the map has been downloaded since it was posted on Tuesday. Metro usually gets fewer riders on the holiday; last Fourth of July, for example, there were 541,101, compared with about 700,000 on a typical weekday.

The downloadable map is just one new tool that Metro is using to get information to riders about the service, she said. Metro also lets riders get service updates sent to their cell phones, and more iPod compatible maps are on the way this fall. "People have been asking for easier access to information on Metro," she said.

Asato has not downloaded the map herself, alas: Her iPod is too old.

Metro has been getting the word out about the map by giving local bloggers a heads up. One blog, Metroblogging DC, rated the map as "swank" though it also complained that "the fonts are jaggy and a bit hard to read."

This is not the first time mass transit maps have appeared on Apple's popular music player. The San Francisco area's BART system, for example, has an iPod version of its maps online.

A software designer in New York started scanning in and posting transit system guides on his site, http://www.ipodsubwaymaps.com/ , last year. The site now has 23 subway map files, on systems from Singapore to Salt Lake City.
Metro's map is available at http://www.wmata.com/ipodmap .

© 2006 The Washington Post Company

Jennie Watkins Ananda Hill Farms

Jennie Watkins, Ananda Hill Farms talks about her French Chickens on the opening day of the 2006 Port Townsend Farmers Market.

Interview: Susanne, Tradewind Farms

CATEGORY: Food and Farms



Susanne, Tradewind Farms, talks about her new goat farm on opening day of the Port Townsend Farmers Market.

4-H News: Pamela Roberts Interviews Blair Wolfley

Pamela Roberts, 4-H Jefferson County Coordinator, interviews Blair Wolfley, SW District Director WSU Vancouver (Research & Extension Unit), at the 2006 WSU Research & Extension Westside Agriculture and Natural Resource Days in Puyallup, WA.