Washington, Day 2

The morning of the conference wasn’t terribly exciting. It could have been, considering that a) we were supposed to have been at the AED Conference Center earlier to set up for the fair and b) we didn’t hustle, but it turned out not to matter - the conference started late. Our five-person gaggle even had time to stop at a Starbucks on the way for “breakfast.”

There was a bunch of stuff that happened - you can look at the agenda to see what went on. I managed to hash up the presentation of our water policy at the fair, and nobody actually went through my PowerPoint, but I got something out of it all. Not only did I get to tell some people about the policy, I also learned that tiered pricing for water has been implemented in Tucson and in Austin. (Later searching on the internet led to the discovery that Cary and Durham have such pricing systems as well.)

There were also three separate panels to which the attendees could at some point go. I chose “Policy 101.” I took some notes, but I won’t bore you (or I) with them. One of the panelists was interesting, though - she was a higher-up in the AFL-CIO’s policy branch. I talked with her about jobs and the environment a bit.

Towards the end of the conference it was revealed to us that the national Roosevelt Institution is splitting up into policy centers (as we have). There will be six, one of which was on energy and the environment. The organizers gave the attendees a chance to break up into these centers and strategize for the year ahead. Beforehand, a person relevant to each field spoke briefly. Ours was a man who had just testified before Congress about government subsidies for oil or something; anyways, his speech centered a lot on independence from oil. -- But, to get back on track, each center’s action plan would be voted on by the delegates, and the winners would get $1000 to work with.

In our center we ended up deciding to focus on encouraging conservation in the communities near our colleges. Our idea was to form a “Town Green Textbook” of these programs as a guide. This wouldn’t really work with water in Chapel Hill, of course, but we could probably do something in Raleigh, in Apex, or on the state level (even if a drought bill has passed). When it came down to a vote, we came close to winning, but the education center won in a run-off by five votes. It sucks that we didn’t get the money, but at least a lot of people like sustainability.

Later on there was a party for all the Roosevelters. It took place in a modestly spacious townhome in Georgetown. There was plenty of alcohol to be had, but, of course, none for me; nonetheless I got by decently through a little chit-chat. It even turned out that there was another UNC Roosvelter at the conference whose presence I “discovered” at the party. (There were also at least two people at the expo who had been to a Roosevelt conference in Athens, GA which I had attended in April.)

Something curious happened outside, though. Someone backed into someone else’s parking spot, and apparently some kind of trouble occurred - the driver of the offensive car was handcuffed. I’ll never know why, but he ended up being taken away in a squad car.

Overall, the expo was a good experience. I think it gave me some ideas about where to go with the environment, water, and public policy in the short term, and I may even have some long-term ideas about my distant future as well. In any case, soon you will hear about the thrilling events of Day Three - and they did seem thrilling for a bit. Stay tuned.

By the way, to get my visa for Japan, it looks like I have to go to a regional Japanese consulate. The one for our area of the country is in Atlanta, so it looks like this blog just expanded.

Washington, Day 1

I’m going to do a three-part series on my trip to Washington. Day 1, I’ll do Thursday, Day 2, Friday, and Day 3, Saturday.

On Thursday I left on an American Airlines flight and arrived an hour later in DC without incident. At that point, I checked my messages on my phone and found something from Karl Stark, who arranged the meeting with the Agriculture person. It turned out that, although the meeting was scheduled for 1:30, I needed to be at the Roosevelt offices by 12:00 or 12:30. This was not cool, as I arrived at Reagan International a bit after 11:00. After taking the blue Metro line to Foggy Bottom station, I walked a few blocks through Washington with a rolling suitcase. Thankfully, I wasn’t wearing my suit, so that at least didn’t get sweaty.

I took a cab to the USDA building, which is near the Smithsonian. It is a large building, and fairly old. I met with was Doug McKalip, a man with the resources branch whose job involves telling congressmen about what the Department does. I sat down with him and discussed the water policy my center had worked on (though I’m afraid I did a poor job at that). He had several suggestions for working on the policy. After the meeting, I returned to the Roosevelt offices for a debriefing.

I should note here that there was a bit of an assumption by others, to some extent, that I would continue on with the water policy. To be honest, I really hadn’t intended to - I guess I figured that I was done with it. However, I assented, to some extent, to continue working on it and to get it into place (not in Orange County, of course, where such a system is already used), and I think I might well try to do so before I head for Japan. This issue will pop up again this blog.

Next, I went to my host’s residence. I was unable to reach her by phone, which was a bit problematic considering that I was supposed to contact her before arriving. Regardless of that, I took a taxi to her place and went inside her townhouse to find that she was not there. It was a rather awkward situation, but it turned out all right in the end.

In the evening, there was a reception/office warming party in the Roosevelt offices. The walls, as was pointed out in a speech the next day, are a bizarre shade of green, and there is little space - particularly for the purpose of holding a large number of students for an event. Hanging on the walls were poster-board print-outs of some of the 25 Ideas; I later noticed (with pleasure) that ours was the one facing the entrance to the office. There was wine, sparkling grape juice, sparkling apple cider, and hors d’oeuvres for consumption. I met a number of people there, including the people involved with the student-run sustainability journal at Columbia.

I left the reception with Elise, my hostess, and two other guests of hers, Brenden and Olivia. Olivia goes to Michigan State, Brenden goes to Columbia, and Elise goes to Harvard. Brenden was also an author featured in one of the 25 Ideas publications. (There are actually multiple 25i publications this year - one on equal justice, one on democratic reform, and one on community development (in which my center was published).) Olivia herself had participated in (and, I think, been published as a result of) a conference on the Great Lakes. Later, a student named Lateisha joined us from CSB-SJU. There is no Roosevelt chapter at her school, but she would like to start one.

I went to bed too late that night, but I managed not to fall asleep at the expo the next day. I will talk about Friday in my next post.

Introduction

I will be taking three interesting trips within the next seven months. The first will be to Washington, DC; the second will be to Tokyo, Japan; and the third will be to (again) Washington, DC.
The first trip is the most imminent. It is connected to the Roosevelt Institution, a national, student-run think tank with chapters at many schools. This includes mine, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where I am a co-director for the Center on Environmental and Energy Policy. (We are a small policy center, but we make up for that by being the coolest.)
During the fall semester of last year, we mainly worked on a policy for dealing with the nasty drought that was in NC at the time. Our basic policy proposal involved creating a tiered pricing system whereby customers would, for using more water, pay higher rates per a given amount. The advantage to this system was that it would make people conserve, but they could choose how. (If you want, I can send you a copy of our policy brief. It will also be available in the national Roosevelt Institution's "25 Ideas" publication - see below.)
Anyway, we sent our policy brief to the national Roosevelt Institution in the hope that they would publish it. It turned out that there were few submissions to the "25 Ideas" publication, so our paper was picked. That by itself was pretty sweet.
Then, late last month, I got an email invitation (as a 25i author) to the 2008 Expo the national organization is holding in DC. Fortunately, I had enough money saved up to get a plane ticket to DC (and the national organization is also giving me a $100 stipend). Housing will be provided by another Roosevelter in the area.
I will be on this trip from July 10-12. I'm coming in early on the 10th and (in order to allow for touring) am leaving in the early evening on the 12th. The actual expo is on the 11th, but I might be able to meet with a policy-related person on the 10th. Unfortunately, the people who might have come with me could not (for various reasons), so I will be by myself. Those who can't attend know who they are, and they deserve just as much (or more) credit than I do for the policy brief.
I'll post a blog (and, maybe, photos) for each of the days I am at this conference. I'll also tell you about the other two trips (and maybe even a past one) sometime in the near future.