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Salem Public Library removing 30% of print book collection. Resistance is mounting.

Trigger warning: if you love books, and hate to see them mistreated, you might want to partially cover your eyes when viewing the photo below. I'm sorry that this blog post has to be so graphic, but as the saying goes, A picture is worth a thousand words.

(And this post is much longer than that.)

Jim Scheppke, a community activist and ardent library supporter, worked for the Oregon State Library for 25 years, 20 of them as library director (this is the library for the State of Oregon, not the Oregon State University library). Today he sent me this photo, along with other information I'm sharing below.

This is how he described the photo of shelves at the Salem Public Library. Again, this is explicit language that may bring tears to the eyes of book lovers. But the truth must be told.

Red Alert Brian! 

At the direction of the City Librarian, librarians have been discarding many hundreds of books since the beginning of October. She disputes that she told the librarians to discard 30% (see below), but according to my sources that was how the instruction was interpreted. 

Here is the beginning of the Dewey non-fiction ranges just after the evil deed was done (they may have spread things out by now). They started at the 000s and have been through the 100s (including Philosophy) and 200s (including Religion). Here is what one range looked like when they were done.

Because I figure that anyone who has read this far is a book lover, so is accustomed to reading words that far exceed what's on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, instead of trying to summarize the Battle of the Books between Scheppke and the director of the Salem Public Library, Sarah Strahl, I'm going to share verbatim the Scheppke-Strahl correspondence, plus some messages that Scheppke sent to me.

I've boldfaced portions of what follows that seem particularly pertinent -- in case I've overestimated the willingness of  some viewers of this blog post to read the whole thing, and they only want to read the especially juicy parts.

First, here's the message that outraged library advocate Scheppke sent to City Librarian Strahl. 

Dear City Librarian Strahl:

Aside from working with Judy Martin to lead the winning library bond measure campaign a couple years ago, I have tried to steer clear of involving myself in issues concerning your library. However, it recently came to my attention that library staff was told in a staff meeting at the end of September that they were directed to withdraw books from the library print collection totaling 30% of the entire collection. 

 

I am very alarmed by this and think it is bad decision for many reasons. I am prepared to advocate strongly to reverse this decision, but first I wanted to give you the opportunity to tell me that I am mistaken about this. I would be relieved to be mistaken. But if I am not mistaken, I would like to know as a Salem citizen whether this bad decision to discard 30% of the print collection was approved by the Library Advisory Board. I would also like to hear an explanation of why the administrative staff at the library feels it is necessary to reduce the library print collection in this radical way.

 

If indeed the SPL is in the process of discarding 30% of the library print collection, I find this to be an clear violation of the recently Council-adopted Collection Development Policy that states:  "The library provides information resources in physical and electronic formats in an effort to deliver the broadest possible access to content both within and beyond the library’s walls. The primary responsibility of the Salem Public Library is to serve the Salem community by providing a broad choice of materials to meet informational, educational, cultural, and recreational needs" (emphasis mine).

 

My opinion is that the library print collection is not too big. On a per capita basis using the most recent data from the State Library for 2016-17, the Salem Public Library holds print items equalling 2.08 print items per capita. I think this figure is overstated because the State Library uses the Salem city population as the service area population. You and I know the service area population of the Salem Public Library is really a lot larger because of all the CCRLS cardholders.

 

Anyway, even using the State Library figures, a collection of 2.08 per capita is below the median for all Oregon public libraries serving populations over 25,000 (27 of them) of 2.33 per capita. If the print collection were reduced by 100,000 the per capita print collection would fall to only 1.46 per capita. This would make it the 4th smallest collection per capita of all Oregon public libraries serving populations greater than 25,000.

 

There are other ways I could argue that our print collection is not too large and should not be reduced by 30% (or at all), but I will stop here and respectfully request that you address the three questions above: 1) Am I mistaken about this? 2) Did the LAB approve a 30% reduction? and 3) For what reasons is this being done?

 

I will look forward to hearing from you.

 

Jim

Next, here's a message Scheppke sent me that contains statistics to back up his assertion that it is wrong to claim that the Salem Public Library has, on average, 30% more print books than peer libraries.

Brian:

To follow up on the email I just sent, the core claim of the City Librarian that is motivating the book removal project is that the library has 30% more books on average that its peer libraries. I did my own analysis of this and it is simply not true. The data here is the latest from the State Library …

 

 

The real number is half of what the City Librarian is going on. And if you add e-books held by these libraries to print books, SPL only has 2% more books that the average for these libraries. So the book removal project has no basis. There is no reason for it.

 

The library is throwing away books that belong to us. I think they have a fetish for a bright and shiny collection, and they don’t want to have to move the books when they move out for the renovation. Those are not sufficient reasons for what is taking place.

 

Jim

Fighting words! (For a librarian, at least.) 

I also received some background information from Scheppke that he didn't want me to share directly. You know, sensitive "sources and methods" stuff, if you've been following intelligence agency goings-on involving the U.S. Congress.

Suffice it to say that according to high, medium, or low-level sources within the Salem Public Library, or maybe somewhere else -- don't want to be more specific than that -- there's reason to question the assertion you can read below by City Librarian Strahl that staff weren't given a clear directive to cull at least 30% of print books from the library's collection.

I will quote the following part of Scheppke's message that is shareable:

What the City Librarian seems to be going for is a “popular materials library,” kind of like a bookstore, but without a “core” of the classics and the canon of our civilization and others.

 

In the past our library had both a core collection and popular materials (sometimes multiple copies) that were removed after a few years when their popularity waned. Maybe because money is tight, she feels, we can no longer afford to have both. I think this is a huge disservice to the community. Call me old-fashioned but I think it’s essential that public libraries provide a place of intellectual discovery in a collection that is broad and deep. To have this and to get rid of it makes no sense.

 

Here is another factoid for you. Our library has already be removing books at a rapid pace for the past five years. Here are statistics for the print collection for the past five years:

 

16-17 337,373

 

15-16 341,088

 

14-15 360,969

 

13-14 370,522

 

12-13 394,358

OK. That's Scheppke's side of the story. Here's how City Librarian Strahl responded to his initial message.

Dear Jim:

 

Thank you for your question about our collection policy. You asked about whether there was a directive in place to reduce the collection by 30%. There is no reference to a percentage in the library’s Collection Development Policy or in any specific instructions to staff.

 

I reviewed the minutes from the September 27, 2018 staff meeting you reference (which were shared in writing with all staff), and they say: “SPL collection is 30% larger on average than peer libraries. Sarah clarified that this does not mean that SPL staff will be asked to weed 30% of the collection. This figure gives perspective on collection size and that other criteria will guide any weeding that occurs (condition, use, etc.).”

 

The 30% figure in question was developed in consultation with the State Library of Oregon Data & Federal Programs Consultant Ross Fuqua and a statistical study of nationwide peer library physical collection size. Mr. Fuqua assisted SPL staff in not only gathering statistics but also helping interpret and verify the findings. However, this figure is only a single data point for added context as we start the processing of renewing the collection on the foundation of the Collection Development Policy.

 

The Library Advisory Board (LAB) recommends rules and policies to Salem City Council. The LAB members unanimously approved the library’s Collection Development Policy on August 8, 2018 with the intent to create a vibrant, current collection that reflects the community’s needs and current use patterns. City Council also lauded the newly-created policy. Collection maintenance is incredibly important work that is part of our greater overarching goal of having a modern, renewed library for the residents of the City of Salem. Our focus is on the collection’s quality and ability to serve the needs of the Salem community now and far into the future.

 

Per the policy, the Salem Public Library’s collection is a popular materials collection, with varied and current content on a range of subjects. The library’s collections are dynamic, with an emphasis on up-to-date and in-demand materials. In order to maintain a relevant, popular, and appealing collection, the library engages in ongoing evaluation and updating of owned materials. 

 

The library uses best practices and industry-standard tools to make data-driven decisions about the collection. While working within the framework set out in the Collection Development Policy, we use the CREW method (a national best practice developed by the Texas State Library) to evaluate the collection which allows us to strive to maintain a collection that is vital, relevant and useful.

 

We also use a product called CollectionHQ, which gives us use metrics, turnover rates, and identifies under- and over-stocked subject areas.  With these outlined methods and derived data, we can identify items that no longer circulate, items in poor condition, and outdated information in areas of rapid change such as medicine. We also look for superseded editions, excess copies of previous bestsellers, and worn copies that need to be mended or replaced.

 

In addition to renewing the collection, this type of collection maintenance also frees up shelf space for the constant arrival of new material, provides ease of access to desired materials, and identifies areas where we need to update or add new items.

 

In preparation for the upcoming renovation project and in order to be good stewards of public funds, it is crucial that the library takes a comprehensive look at the entire collection before moving out. This will ensure only current materials in good condition and in demand by our community are moved with the library.

 

As part of the CCRLS cooperative, we have access to resource sharing through the consortium as well as access to the rest of the state through Interlibrary Loan. We rely on CCRLS to help us get materials for our patrons just as other consortial members can use our materials. Ultimately, our collection’s purpose is to reflect the needs of the Salem community.

 

Sarah Strahl

City Librarian

With the book-ball back in Scheppke's side of the court, here's how he responded to Strahl. 

Dear Sarah,

Thank you for this information. I am presently on vacation in Northern Thailand, so I cannot respond to everything in your lengthy email.

 

However, I must point out that the Salem Public Library does not have 30% more print items than your peer libraries in Oregon. The data that you received from the State Library is either mistaken or out of date. Here is my analysis of data from the State Library for 2016-17 that shows that the print items at Salem Public Library are, on average, only 15% greater than your peer libraries:

 

The impression I received from my contacts with librarians on your staff is that they interpreted their instructions as directing them to begin a book removal project roughly equal to 30% of the print collection. I have seen photos of the low end of the Dewey range that show many empty shelves already. I am checking with my contacts (not on their work time) to investigate this discrepancy.

 

In any case, because the book removal project was based on bad or erroneous data, I respectfully ask that it be suspended immediately until there can be a reevaluation of the data that led to your decision to begin this project. I am prepared to take other steps to put a halt to the project if necessary.

 

Jim

OOH! I like that last sentence. It's pleasingly ominous, without being in-your-face attacking. After all, Scheppke used the words "I respectfully ask..." in the preceding sentence. 

This Battle of the Books between Scheppke and Strahl is intense, but since they're both librarians, it's polite -- at least compared to other sorts of political/policy battles at the local, state, and national levels.

(Note: if you've read all the way through this post, congratulations! You've just read 2,344 words. I wish I could give you a sticker that says "I read a REALLY LONG blog post today. Have you?")

Downtown Streetscape plan suffers from Salem's parking space mania

I'm no mental health professional, but I'm prepared to diagnose a malady that is rampant in Salem: parking space mania. Some of the symptoms are:

-- Feeling that something is seriously wrong if it isn't possible to park in a downtown block where your intended destination is located.

-- Driving in circles around downtown looking for an on-street parking space even though a totally free parking structure with plenty of open spaces is close by. 

-- Freaking out at the prospect that any number, even just a few, of on-street downtown parking spaces will be lost, even if this would make the Historic District more attractive and vibrant.

I bring this up because I went to another Downtown Streetscape open house this evening. I've been to the previous open houses, and the notice for the one both intrigued and worried me.

Intrigued, because I was curious about what changes had been made to the concepts that seemingly were in close to final form last April, when I made a web page about them. See:

Worried, because as indicated by the language circled in red in the open house invitation, some unnamed "stakeholders" had a chance to weigh in on the Streetscape plan over the summer. I don't like that term, stakeholders, since I consider that the citizens of Salem are the ones with the biggest stake in every policy issue, including how downtown looks and feels.

I've gotten mixed messages as to who ended up influencing the refinements to the original Streetscape plan recommended by consultants. City Public Works staff reportedly had a say in this. I suppose this makes sense, though I wonder why they didn't provide their input during the lengthy period of public input on draft Streetscape proposals.

Tonight the team of consultants revealed what has been left out of the final design proposals I described in my web page. I wouldn't call these "refinements," but rather selling out to the above-mentioned parking space mania -- since I was told that concerns about losing on-street parking spaces led to the changes above.

They're delicately called "Longer-Term Projects."

What this really means is that the above-mentioned stakeholders, which I suspect includes some parking-space-crazed downtown businesses, put enough pressure on City officials to get the Mid-Block Landscape Pockets, Front Street Crossing, and Parklets Program shelved.

The frustrating thing is that each of these Streetscape design elements makes great good sense. 

Look at the photos of how much better Commercial Street, and also Liberty Street, would look if a couple of parking spaces were used for bulb-out landscaping that would calm traffic (without diminishing the width of traffic lanes) while beautifying the street. 

Likewise, the Parklets Program would utilize a few parking spaces in creative ways, either temporarily or permanently. But somehow parking space mania outweighed the benefits of making downtown Salem a more attractive place to work, live, dine, and shop.

The consultants told me that because Front Street is a state highway, it would take more time to improve pedestrian crossings between downtown and Riverfront Park. But this doesn't explain why those crossings have been removed from the Streetscape plan.

Gosh, would it really be so bad if parents, children, and other living beings were able to walk more safely and conveniently across Front Street to enjoy Riverfront Park, while maybe slowing traffic on that street down a little bit? 

There's no doubt that however the Streetscape project turns out, it will make downtown more attractive. It just is disappointing to see the aspirations for this project diminished due to input from unnamed "stakeholders."

Hopefully the City Council, acting as the Urban Renewal Agency board, will seriously consider reinstating the Longer-Term Projects as immediate priorities. The schedule above shows this could happen on February 19, 2019.

Sunday's Statesman Journal had zero local content on opinion page

Salem's one and only daily newspaper, the Statesman Journal, is falling deeper into a well of mediocrity.

The newest outrage against journalistic excellence was obvious in yesterday's Sunday paper where, for the first time in the 41 years that I've been reading the Statesman Journal, to my recollection, there was precisely zero local content on the opinion pages. 

A post on the Salem Community Vision Facebook page nailed the outrageousness of this:

NO LOCAL OPINION IN THE SUNDAY PAPER
Charles Sprague is turning in his grave today. When he was the editor of the Oregon Statesman he wrote a daily editorial that appeared on the front page of the paper for 25 years. Today the Statesman Journal could not even manage to print one opinion piece by a local author. No staff editorial. No guest opinion. Not even a letter to the editor. Pathetic. The Statesman staff should be ashamed. They've hit a new low.

I too was struck by the absurdity of no local opinions in the first Sunday paper published after the midterm elections. Instead, there were five pieces by national writers, plus four editorial cartoons.

Further, there is no longer an editorial board, just two Statesman Journal staff members who, apparently, are staffing a nonexistent editorial board. (Easy job.)

Hopefully local content on the opinion page will spring back to life before too long. I'm a big fan of opinions, in part because I'm so prone to holding them myself. Along with, of course, almost everybody else in Salem. We all have opinions, and an important role of a newspaper is to provide a forum for them.

I'm not particularly concerned about the lack of a Statesman Journal editorial board.

It was a wise decision for the paper to not make any endorsements in the midterm elections, but rather to publish pieces by rival candidates side by side. Or, singly, if one of the candidates chose not to write a piece. 

There's really no reason now for newspapers to make political endorsements, assuming there ever was. The Internet allows people to have all the information that editorial boards are privy to, and it is more than a little condescending for newspaper employees to consider that they have a special right, or duty, to tell everybody else how to vote.

But I do enjoy reading letters to the editor and opinion pieces about local issues. For example, City Councilor Tom Andersen has made a reasonable proposal that councilors be paid, which would encourage more people to run for the City Council. But Mayor Chuck Bennett hates the idea.

So I'd like to read dueling opinion pieces by Andersen and Bennett on this subject. Along with letters to the editor taking one side or the other.

I'm finding that the new journalistic kid in town, the totally online Salem Reporter, is making it a bit difficult for me to feel close to this Salem news source. I have to remember to visit the web site each day, whereas the Statesman Journal appears at the end of our driveway every morning.

(Well, most mornings.)

Some days there aren't any new Salem Reporter stories. On the plus side, all of the stories are local, or about state government, whereas the Statesman Journal has a lot of USA Today and national content that isn't of much interest to me. I subscribe to the online versions of the Washington Post and New York Times, plus I browse Politico, Google News, and such.

And so far the Salem Reporter doesn't have an opinion section, nor any way for subscribers to comment on stories. Both of these absences are turn-offs for me, though I feel like I'm getting my money's worth from the $100 annual subscription that I signed up for soon after Salem Reporter announced its presence in our town.

UPDATE: Almost forgot to mention that the current Statesman Journal Monday-Sunday home delivery rate is $62/month, which is up from $46/month in June 2017. So that's a 35% increase in a bit less than a year and a half, which is, um, a LOT greater than the overall inflation rate.

My suspicion is that the Statesman Journal's corporate masters at Gannett are trying to squeeze as much money as possible out of subscribers before the paper ceases print publication next year -- and perhaps shuts down altogether. Meanwhile, us subscribers are paying more for crappier content.

Midterm election's meaning revealed by Ed Dover at Salem City Club

There's lots of ways to look at the results of last Tuesday's midterm election. But some ways are wrong -- like the attempt by Republicans to spin the election as a GOP win.


Today Ed Dover spoke the truth about the midterms at an engrossing Salem City Club presentation, "Patterns and Meanings of the 2018 National, Oregon, and Mid-Valley Elections." Dover is a retired Professor Emeritus at the Western Oregon University Department of Political Science and Public Administration.

This was Dover's 10th post-election talk to the Salem City Club.

I've heard a bunch of them. Dover has an astounding grasp of political details. He rattles off a rash of numbers, results, statistics, and such without ever checking his notes -- unless he's got an extra set of eyes that were hidden from view.

He started off by telling us that he prefers to focus on the House of Representatives, since all the House members are elected every two years, the number of people in each district is about the same, and it is a national election. The Senate and Governor races, by contrast, don't provide nearly as good an indicator of the nation's political mood.

Dover figures that the Democrats will pick up 35 seats in the House.

This is a conservative estimate since FiveThirtyEight projects a 37 seat gain. In the Senate, the Democrats had to defend 26 seats and the Republicans only nine. Still, Republicans are expected to gain only 1-3 seats.

(FiveThirtyEight predicts two, which will happen if the Arizona Senate race goes to the Democrat, who is leading at the moment, and if the Florida Senate race goes to the Republican, which seems likely, even with a recount.)

Democrats gained seven Governor seats, which brings them almost up to even with Republicans. Currently there are 23 Democratic Governors, 26 Republican Governors, and one race too close to call (Georgia). 

This was a core message from Dover: it no longer makes sense to speak of "red states and blue states" (assuming it ever did). Rather, the Big Political Divide is between the suburbs and rural areas. All 38 House seats that Democrats flipped in the midterms were suburban districts.

The Dems lost three seats in rural areas, leaving them with Dover's estimated 35 seat gain, with several races undecided.

Politics, Dover said, follows Newton's Third Law: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This leads to periodic realignments of the political landscape. The suburbs turning leftward, toward the Democrats, is the realignment much in evidence now. 

Most of the 38 House districts flipped by Democrats were in the further out suburbs.

After his talk, Dover answered questions. One person asked why the Democrats didn't pick up any urban House seats, since big cities lean leftward. His (obvious) answer: those districts already are in the Democratic camp, and rural areas are strongly Republican, so the suburbs became the battlefield that Democrats won in the midterms.

Twenty-one of the 38 House seats flipped by Democrats were won by women. Even more, women dominated in volunteering for campaigns and donating money. College-educated women were especially prone to vote Democratic in the midterms. Why? Because they are repulsed by Trump and they care deeply about health care.

By contrast, the GOP has been pandering to the NRA and religious right, while being anti-immigrant and climate change deniers.

The same pattern, Dover said, has been evident in Oregon.

The suburbs have led to Oregon House Democrats picking up nine seats in the last four elections, with a net gain of eight seats. This year the Dems won three more seats -- women in the suburbs. Democrats are likely to keep those suburban seats, Dover said, citing Paul Evans as an example. 

After the 2020 census, Oregon is expected to pick up an extra House seat (with West Virginia losing one). This seat will be in western Oregon. The boundaries of Oregon legislative seats also will change, with fewer seats in eastern Oregon. 

Dover said that Democrats now have won 10 races for Governor in a row, even though Knute Buehler almost ran as a Democrat.

Regarding the statewide ballot measures, where all but the affordable housing measure failed, Dover observed that it is typical for the Pro side to spend money early, then run out of money late, when the Con side increases its spending.

Looking ahead to the 2020 presidential race, Texas, Georgia, and Arizona are close to becoming "majority minority" states, as California is now. Dover observed that Democrats got 48% in both the Texas Senate race and Georgia Governor race, and in Arizona the Democratic Senate candidate is leading.

So Democrats are going to have a wider political playing field in the next presidential election.

In responding to questions, one of which I asked, Dover said:

-- When it comes to recounts, and voting generally, too many states are using 19th century technology, like punch cards. Counties have to pay for elections, and many are broke. So states and the federal government should pay for modernizing voting.

-- Florida is a strange state, as is Ohio. Their demographics are more important politically than who the Governor is. In various parts of Florida, you can find demographics similar to the Deep South, the Caribbean, Midwest, and East Coast -- because these parts attract people who move to Florida from those places.

-- The infamous "caravan" is being driven by people in central America impacted by climate change, as well as drug violence.

-- Though the Electoral College makes little sense, and is undemocratic (small population states get more votes per capita than large population states), nothing will change until Republicans lose a couple of presidential elections where they won the popular vote, as has happened to Democrats twice recently (Al Gore and Hillary Clinton).

-- Same-day voter registration doesn't make much of a difference, since people who fail to register weeks or months before an election probably won't register the day of an election.

-- MY QUESTION: Why are so many elections so darn close? Like almost 50-50. Does this have something to do with the action-reaction thing? Dover said that incumbents are hard to beat, but I didn't find this answer very satisfying, though it was true. After I asked it, a man sitting in front of me turned around and showed me what he'd written in his notebook: "Evolution."

Naturally I was curious about what he meant, so I spoke with him after Dover finished. 

His idea is that we humans need each other, and we need variety -- like both liberals and conservatives. So the political pendulum swings back and forth, leftward and rightward, often landing right in the middle in races. In general, this makes sense to me.

I also like the action-reaction explanation, which fits with a pendulum analogy. When things go too far in one direction, like the crazy conservatism of Donald Trump, there's a desire among Americans to get things more in balance. As is well known, this typically happens in midterms, with the party that doesn't hold the presidency picking up seats in Congress. 

Neighbors appeal Costco shopping center

Good news. The headline of a Salem Reporter story says, "Neighborhood appeal puts Kuebler Gateway Shopping Center on Hold." Here's how the story starts out:

Costco’s road to a new location in south Salem is not over after neighbors appealed the city’s recent decision to allow the Kuebler Gateway Shopping Center. The appeals trigger what could be months of more deliberation.

The South Gateway Neighborhood Association, and three neighbors acting on their own through an attorney, cited a number of reasons why Salem planners should not have approved the nearly 200,000-square-foot project in late October.

They contend the shopping center project grew over the years into something incompatible with the area, that the city relied on a flawed traffic analysis, that it threatens to uproot protected trees and that it will pollute the nearby air and water.

Attorney Karl Anuta’s appeal on behalf of the three neighbors — Lora Meisner, William Dalton and John D. Miller —  also claims the city didn’t disclose the pertinent documents before its decision and argues “the public was likely misled.”

I like to see people in Salem standing up against development that threatens their neighborhood's livability. Growth is going to happen. But it needs to be smart growth, not dumb growth.

Plunking a giant Costco Big Box store, complete with a high traffic fueling station, right next to a residential area is dumb. Hopefully the City Council will hear the neighbors' appeal of the City of Salem's approval of the Kuebler Gateway Shopping Center and make things right.

The appeals and City approval document can be read here.

Progressives, here's some cheerful midterm election commentaries

In a Washington Post piece I read today, I saw a saying: "Republicans are naturally triumphal even when they lose and Democrats tend to get depressed even when they win."

This seems generally true.

But like I said last night, I'm pleased with how the midterm election turned out. Sure, it was distressing to see Andrew Gillum, Stacey Abrams, and Beto O'Rourke fail to win their races. But here in Oregon we enjoyed a genuine Blue Wave, and Democrats taking control of the House of Representatives is a really big deal. 

FiveThirtyEight.com is projecting a gain of 37 House seats, which is impressively close to their pre-election forecast of Democrats getting an average gain of 39 House seats.

Plus, even though currently Democrats are down three Senate seats -- Republicans flipped North Dakota, Indiana, Florida, and Missouri, while the Dems flipped Nevada -- there's a lot of votes left to be counted in Arizona, so there's a decent chance that Sinema could overcome McSally's lead, which would reduce the Democrat net loss to two. That'd be a good outcome for the Dems, given how many seats they had to defend in Trump territory. 

But this barely scratches the surface of the progressive wonderful'ness that marked yesterday's midterm results.

Here's links, and an excerpt from each, of informed commentary I came across today that should cheer up anyone who believes the Democrats didn't fare very well in the midterms.

First, an encouraging tweet from Nate Silver. It shows that if a presidential election happened with which party won the popular midterm vote in each state, the Democrat would have won the presidency with 314 electoral votes. Great news for 2020! 

Then there's a way-cool New York Times analysis of how the vote in each congressional district changed in comparison to 2016. A blue arrow pointing left, not surprisingly, indicates a shift toward the Democratic party. A red arrow pointing right indicates a shift toward the Republican party. The length of the arrow shows the degree of the shift.

The online story has some animations to it, plus some additional maps. Keep in mind that the story says only 30 districts actually flipped from red to blue (so far). This image only shows the direction of the shift: several dozen districts became more Republican, while 317 districts shifted toward the Democrats. 

For us progressive Oregonians, the marked blue shift in eastern Oregon is encouraging. Even though Republican Greg Walden won re-election, his Democrat opponent did much better than Clinton did in 2016. 

Greg Sargent, a Washington Post opinion writer, said this in "Three of Trump's biggest fables died last night."

The 2018 elections are being widely painted as a “split decision” for President Trump — Democrats won the House while losing seats in the Senate — but this framing actually undercuts just how much there is for Democrats and progressives to celebrate about the results.

Three of the biggest narratives driving our politics now lie in ruins, and their deaths carry important implications for the future of the Trump presidency, public opinion in the Trump era, and the character of our country.

Trump has magical political powers, and his lies are “working.”...Democrats have no answer to the nationalist backlash...Democrats can’t assemble a multi-racial majority to confront Trumpism.

Paul Waldman, also with the Washington Post, wrote "Yes, it was a wave. Here are all the other ways progressives won." I'll quote it at some length, given how positive it is.

There’s a strange character to the post-election analyses of the moment, in which a wave election for Democrats where they won back the House of Representatives is being characterized as something like half a win. That’s partly because a number of dynamic young Democrats who had raised perhaps unreasonable hopes for victory fell short, but it’s also because Republicans are naturally triumphal even when they lose and Democrats tend to get depressed even when they win.

So in order to put the election in perspective, I’d like to widen our gaze beyond a few Senate and House races and look at some of the other results, particularly at the state level. When you do that, you see that Democrats have an awful lot to be happy about even beyond taking the House. Let’s break it down.

Democrats won in key governor’s races. While much of the attention was focused on the campaigns of Andrew Gillum in Florida and Stacey Abrams in Georgia, both of which fell just short (though Abrams still hopes to force her opponent into a runoff), Democrats won a bunch of key governor’s races around the country. They flipped seven seats: Nevada, New Mexico, Kansas, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and Maine.

...Democrats won big in state legislatures. You’ve probably heard that over the eight years Barack Obama was president, Democrats lost a net of almost a thousand seats in state legislatures. Which is bad, but last night Democrats gained about 300 seats, so they’re well on their way to reversing those losses.

...Democratic women won everywhere. As of now, 95 women have won or are projected to win seats in the House, 82 of whom are Democrats. That includes the first two Muslim American women and the first two Native American women; a record number of women of color will be serving in the next Congress.

...Americans’ health care won big. Voters in the conservative states of Idaho, Nebraska and Utah passed ballot initiatives to accept the Affordable Care Act’s expansion of Medicaid, which will bring coverage to hundreds of thousands of their citizens.

...Voting rights and democratic reforms were expanded. Voters in Michigan passed initiatives that will turn over redistricting to a nonpartisan commission and allow for automatic voter registration, same-day registration, no-excuse absentee voting, and straight-ticket voting. Voters in Colorado and probably Utah (votes are still being tallied) approved nonpartisan redistricting commissions, Nevadans approved automatic voter registration, and Maryland voters approved same-day registration.

...Other progressive ballot measures won. A strong gun safety measurepassed in Washington state. Michigan voters legalized recreational marijuana, and medical marijuana was approved in Missouri, Oklahoma and Utah. Voters in Missouri and Arkansas passed increases in the minimum wage.

This really was a blue wave. There’s no question that Republicans won some key victories, but that shouldn’t distract us from just how big a blue wave this was — even if gerrymandering and geography helped contain its effects.

Midterm results: I predicted I'd be sad, but actually I'm happy

A few days ago I predicted how I'd feel given certain results of today's midterm election. Below I've highlighted in green the outcomes that became reality. I added the Beto O'Rourke loss to the last two scenarios, having neglected to include it in my original post.

You can see that right now -- 10:07 pm -- I thought I'd be in a mood of Sad, but things could have been worse. But actually I'm feeling Happy, though mildly disappointed. Here's my best guess why.

(It has to be a guess, because it's difficult to pin down emotions.)

First, I spent a lot of time this evening flipping back and forth between MSNBC and CNN. So I heard the commentators discussing what Democratic control of the House of Representatives means. In short, it's a big deal.

Subpoena power. Ability to conduct investigations into Trump administration misdeeds. Veto power over legislation. A much louder voice for Democrats on the national stage. 

Sure, it would have been good if the Democrats could have held onto Senate seats in Indiana, North Dakota, and Missouri.

But those are red states. Not long ago there was talk of Democrats losing as many as eight Senate seats in states that went for Trump. So tonight's Senate outcome isn't that bad. And as I write this the Nevada and Arizona races are still up in the air, which could be Democratic pickups.

Second, as soon as I perused the Statesman Journal's Oregon election results shortly after 8 pm, my mood brightened. Yes, I still was disappointed that Andrew Gillum and Stacey Abrams lost their races.

However, seeing that Kate Brown easily won re-election as Governor, and that each of the "bad" ballot measures (103-106) appear to have been defeated handily, with the "good" affordable housing measure (102) passing, made me feel happy that I live in a progressive-leaning state where voters usually make wise decisions. 

Here's how my pre-midterm emotional predictions turned out. Again, green shows the prediction came true.

Ecstatic beyond all bounds
Democrats win both the House and Senate
Kate Brown re-elected Governor of Oregon
Beto O'Rourke defeats Ted Cruz
Stacey Abrams becomes Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum becomes Governor of Florida
Oregon voters protect abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Happy, though mildly disappointed
Democrats win the House, but not the Senate
Kate Brown re-elected Governor of Oregon
Beto O'Rourke loses to Ted Cruz 
Stacey Abrams becomes Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum becomes Governor of Florida
Oregon voters protect abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Sad, but things could have been worse
Democrats win the House, but not the Senate
Kate Brown re-elected Governor of Oregon
Beto O'Rourke loses to Ted Cruz 
Stacey Abrams loses race for Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum loses race for Governor of Florida
Oregon voters protect abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Deep depression
Democrats lose both the House and Senate
Kate Brown loses Governor race to Knute Buehler
Beto O'Rourke loses to Ted Cruz 
Stacey Abrams loses race for Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum loses race for Governor of Florida
Oregon voters turn down abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Ecstasy or agony? I forecast my midterms reaction.

Looking back, I realize that my despair over Trump beating Clinton in the 2016 election was caused in part by my failure to anticipate what I thought was unthinkable: Donald Trump becoming the President of the United States. 

So this time around, I'm going to envision various emotional states of mind I might be in late Tuesday night -- election day -- or on Wednesday morning, if voting results of the races I most care about aren't all in before I go to bed.


I need to say that while I just said races I most care about, the absence of certain races from the following emotional forecasts doesn't mean that I don't care a lot about them.

For example, I'll be really happy if Shelaswau Crier and Bill Burgess win their races for Marion County Commissioner here in Oregon. Ditto if Danny Jaffer wins his Oregon house race.

I'm simply aware that the results of these local races don't have quite the same emotional pull for me -- probably because these seats have been held by Republicans for quite a while, so if Democrats fail to win this time, it won't be a big surprise or major disappointment for me.

So here's my projected emotional frame of mind given various election outcomes.

Ecstatic beyond all bounds
Democrats win both the House and Senate
Kate Brown re-elected Governor of Oregon
Beto O'Rourke defeats Ted Cruz
Stacey Abrams becomes Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum becomes Governor of Florida
Oregon voters protect abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Happy, though mildly disappointed
Democrats win the House, but not the Senate
Kate Brown re-elected Governor of Oregon
Beto O'Rourke loses to Ted Cruz 
Stacey Abrams becomes Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum becomes Governor of Florida
Oregon voters protect abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Sad, but things could have been worse
Democrats win the House, but not the Senate
Kate Brown re-elected Governor of Oregon
Stacey Abrams loses race for Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum loses race for Governor of Florida
Oregon voters protect abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Deep depression
Democrats lose both the House and Senate
Kate Brown loses Governor race to Knute Buehler
Stacey Abrams loses race for Governor of Georgia
Andrew Gillum loses race for Governor of Florida
Oregon voters turn down abortion rights and sanctuary state status

Of course, likely there will be "mix and match" in the actual outcome of next Tuesday's election results. My emotional state could be improved, for example, if Crier, Burgess, or Jaffer win their races. And while it is very unlikely that control of the Oregon House or Senate is turned over to the Republicans, if the GOP gains some seats, this would be a downer.

I'm betting that Happy, though mildly disappointed most likely is going to be how I'll feel after the midterms.

Each of the outcomes I listed in that category seems eminently possible. And if Iowa's right-wing-wacko House member, Steve King, somehow loses his race, that would take away the "mildly disappointed." 

Salem Futures project was killed by clueless conservatives

Echoing a Who song: Salem, let's not get fooled again. In the early 2000s a pioneering, far-reaching, creative Salem Futures project was killed by clueless conservatives. Our town has been paying the price ever since, as I'll discuss below.

Here's how someone active in land use issues at the time recently described to me the ax'ing of Salem Futures. (Note: LCDC stands for Land Conservation and Development Commission. It oversees the Department of Land Conservation and Development, DLCD.)

Mayor [Janet] Taylor killed the Salem Futures project after almost two years of work and a million dollars. LCDC was giving Salem grants to create a model comprehensive plan for the State. 

Taylor decided to have a public meeting prior to the public hearing. Some property owners had heard about a proposal to do an overlay zone not unlike what just recently was recommended for the State Street area.

She went in unprepared. She did not lay the groundwork with staff. The business people got upset after they felt blindsided. Too much seemed predetermined to them and she did not handle the meeting well. She got into a shouting match with a couple of big owners and then she stormed out of the meeting. I think there was a newspaper article at the time.

Anyway Taylor unilaterally cancelled the project. There was a very angry city council session. A rep from LCDC was present and tried to convince council to not cancel but Janet Taylor would not listen. I recall the man saying that if Salem cancelled after they had given the city a million dollars they would never approve a grant again. She didn’t care. The council did not overturn her decision. So all that work never moved to the next phase. 

 

I can send you the only document that made its way to print. It was to have three phases. This first one talks about current scenarios and goals. It was very progressive for the times and talked about quality of life issues and maintaining livability. Cecelia Urbani, now retired, was the Chief Planner for the city. 

 

You can read the June 1999 document, "Salem Futures: Thinking About Tomorrow Today -- Phase 1 Report" by clicking on the PDF file below. 
Download Salem Futures:Phase_1_Report_Community_Profile_Vision_Statement_Conceptual_Alternatives

And here's another 2009 document that summarizes the Salem Futures project in eight pages.

Download Fregonese Associates report 

I said let's not get fooled again because the City of Salem is embarking on another effort to update the Comprehensive Plan that guides land use patterns and future development in Salem. This time the project is being called Our Salem: Planning for Growth.The first meeting of a Stakeholder Advisory Committee meeting is next Monday.

Already there are danger signs about how the Comprehensive Plan update will be conducted.

As noted in this post, the membership of the Stakeholder Advisory Committee has come in for well-deserved criticism. It is stacked with members of the Powers That Be, who tilt toward making Salem comfortable for special interests rather than making our town livable for everybody. 

 

Also, this description of the project on a City of Salem web page shows a bias toward the status quo -- which clearly isn't meeting the needs of everybody in Salem. 

 

So City officials have decided to start -- and maybe also to end -- with a study of different scenarios regarding how Salem could grow under current policies. This is the only phase that has been committed to. 

Astoundingly, there may never be a Phase 2 that examines the community's vision for future growth and development. And there may never be a Phase 3 that updates the Comprehensive Plan to implement the community's vision.  Instead, this plan indicates that the Our Salem project could only look at current growth patterns, and apparently leave the current Comprehensive Plan as is, with no update.

This is astoundingly short-sighted and limiting.

 

I invite you to look at the Salem Futures report and see how a genuine effort to involve the community and plan for sustainable, livable, vibrant growth over a 50 year time span was conducted. Yes, it then was killed, which left us with the sprawling, ugly, poorly planned mess that marks too much of Salem.

In contrast with the current Our Salem project, Salem Futures started with both a baseline look at current growth patterns, and alternative growth scenarios. Here's screenshots of the alternatives. I haven't shown the maps and photos that accompany the discussion of each alternative. 

 

The degree of community involvement in fashioning Salem Futures seems to have been markedly greater than what is planned for the Our Salem project. Here's an excerpt from the Salem Futures document.

The project began in late-November 1998 with a public lecture by Gordon Price, Vancouver B.C. City Councilor and noted lecturer on urban affairs and design. Councilor Price presented a talk titled “Vancouver BC and Lessons for the Future of Salem”.

This talk was followed by three Community Forums to discuss what makes Salem a unique place and what should be the guiding principles for future growth. During this time, the Statesman Journal published a Community Questionnaire as another opportunity for citizens to express their views about the future.

The CAC [Citizens Advisory Committee] used this public input to draft a Vision Statement. In January, 1999, a town hall meeting was held to discuss the draft Vision Statement.

Since then, the Vision Statement has undergone numerous refinements to ensure it reflects what is important to Salem’s quality of life, such as a vibrant downtown, safe and friendly neighborhoods, and the preservation of the natural environment. It also addresses future change, such as ensuring quality design for new development, saving mature trees, and making it easier to walk, bicycle or ride transit.

Inspiring. Which makes it so disturbing that Salem Futures was killed by Mayor Janet Taylor and failed to be revived by what I assume had become a conservative City Council.

 

I wasn't involved with Salem Futures.

 

However, I do remember coming across crazy talk about Salem Futures by Rodney Stubbs, who viewed "sustainability" as a United Nations plot to take away our freedoms.

 

And I'm assuming that while Stubbs was farther out in crazy land than most of his fellow Salem conservatives, a key reason why Salem Futures was put to death was a fear that if ordinary citizens in our town get to decide how growth and development should take place, Salem's rich and powerful won't be as rich, or as powerful.

 

You can read how Stubbs viewed things here and here. It pains me to share his words, but I'll copy in some excerpts to show that when it came to crazy conservative thinking, he was ahead of his time -- but pretty much in the mainstream of current Republicanism. 

Salem, Oregon

At 0900 hours Saturday 28 September 2002, the Progressive Liberal Democrats, Greens, Socialists, and Communists will launch an attack on unsuspecting citizens in cities throughout America. Their objective is securing the signatures of millions of Americans endorsing the Earth Charter Initiative.

Their purpose, abdicate individual freedom and the Nation/State that made America one the greatest Nations in history.

In a desperate last ditch effort the Democrats hope is to garner the signature and votes of millions of unsuspecting Americans who do not have a clue that the Earth Charter is a declaration designed to destroy America and supersede the Declaration of Independence signed in 1776.

...The proponents of the Earth Charter fail to disclose that the authors of the Earth Charter are in fact representatives of the United Nations. The Earth Charter Summit propaganda proclaims:

The Earth Charter is an international people's (not governments, UN or organizations) agreement for a compassionate, just and sustainable world that was written by thousands of folks in 78 countries over the course of 12 years and was launched at The Hague Peace Palace in June 2000. It has the core value of interdependence and calls for economic and social justice, peace, democracy and ecological integrity.

...All across the Nation the Trojan horse for the Earth Charter campaign is buried in the Smart Growth program that encourages cities and counties to foster land use planning programs that reach into neighborhood watch organizations. Federal dollars from the Clinton-Gore administration funded local initiatives for livability and transportation. Professional land use planning organizations were co-opted and facilitated the movement using tax payer dollars for a political purpose.

A beachhead was secured in Oregon, when on July 3, 2001, the Oregon Legislature adopted the Oregon Sustainability Act.

In Salem, Oregon Mayor Mike Swaim is rapidly moving the implementation of the Sustainable Development program through a project called Salem Futures and in the Willamette Valley the program is known as the Willamette Valley Livability Project. The Mayor and a committee of the League of Oregon Cities drafted a Template for Local Government Sustainable Development Initiatives.

...In Salem the Progressives or their sympathizers dominate (66 percent) of the Salem Futures Citizen Advisory Committee. On Saturday 28 September 2002 the Progressives are sponsoring through the Oregon Peace Works a program titled "ALL ABOARD THE LIVABILITY EXPRESS!" The focus is to create a community-wide democratic platform so that "We the People ... " can focus and direct "the Will of the People" into our City government.

OMG! Salem Futures wanted to represent the Will of the People! That sounds... um... WONDERFUL. We can only hope that the Our Salem project has a similar aspiration, even though like I said, it doesn't look that way at the moment. 

 

Cycleshare program will show how difficult it is to bike in Salem

It's great that a bicycle sharing program, Capitol City Cycleshare, is set to begin around late January to mid-February.

Aside from giving people in Salem an easy and inexpensive way to cycle, another benefit is that the program will show how difficult it is to ride a bicycle in most parts of our town. 

An email message I got from Evan Osborne, who is leading the Cycleshare effort, says that seven stations are planned, with money currently available for six stations. 

Hello Cycleshare Sponsors and Advocates,

I am happy to announce all legal teams are in consensus with a formal agreement giving permission for our cycleshare program to operate within Salem's public properties! This agreement has been put on the agenda to be approved by the City Council, November 13th. Once approved, we will be moving forward with station installs. Our vendor has made a tentative 60-day install commitment. This means we are looking at a late January to mid-February launch!

 

Currently, we have six of the planned seven stations accounted for financially. If you know of other organizations and/or individuals who may want to align with our efforts in growing the program, please send them our way!

 

Thank you for your continued advocacy and support. 

 

Kind Regards,

Evan

The Cycleshare web site shows the location of four stations. A Statesman Journal story says these will be at: Salem's Riverfront Carousel, the Union Street Railroad Bridge, Courthouse's West Salem location and the Downtown Transit Center.

This makes sense, since it is the only part of Salem with access to safe, pleasant, easy-to-ride multiuse trails at Minto-Brown Island Park, Riverfront Park, and Wallace Marine Park. 

But that leaves almost all of Salem as almost entirely lacking places to ride a bicycle that, at best, are denoted by painted lines on a busy road filled with vehicles whizzing by a few feet (or even a few inches) away.

In a post today, "What should we expect from a Public Bikes Program," the Salem Breakfast on Bikes blogger did his usual excellent job writing about transportation and land use issues in this town.

After noting the usage of bike share programs in Portland, Eugene, and Corvallis -- 1 to 3 trips per day per bicycle --  came these observations about Salem's program, which will start with 30 bikes from the ridesharing company Zagster:

So if we expect something more like one trip per day per bike, that's 30 new bike trips each day.

That might be a nice amenity for tourism marketing and cachet, but that's not a meaningful difference in downtown transportation.

So, you know, start small, hope for success, and build off of that. But we should be clear this is a perk or amenity, not a difference-maker for mobility.

It's an ornament.

It's also not clear that there will be much riding outside of the Wallace-Riverfront-Minto Park system. To be sure, that the Union and Minto Bridges connect them all is a great boon! But that's recreating, not commuting or utility cycling.

You might remember the piece from a couple of years ago about an attempt to bike downtown. There will be a station at the transit mall, but how will users ride?

From the piece:

I'll confess that our tour was a combination of cycling and walking. This mom errs on the side of caution when it comes to bicycling with kids. I'm very thankful for the new bike lanes recently created in downtown Salem, but when the map took us on busy streets where bikes and cars travel together, we walked our bikes on the sidewalk. [italics added]

One of the probable consequences of having a public bike system downtown without also adjusting the streets, especially for east-west travel, is that we will have more sidewalk biking.

Certainly there will be more path riding in the park system.

Altogether, what I see is a city that likes the idea of being able to say it has a bikeshare system, as a kind of symbol of hip culture, but not a city that's really very passionate yet about making it easy to bike and ensuring that riders have the right infrastructure, especially downtown where the stations are clustered.

Right on. 

Earlier this month I noted in a blog post that the 2018 City of Salem Community Report had only one mention of bicycling, and that was in a section about LED street lamps. 

I searched the report for every mention of "bicycle." There was exactly one. Here it is. LED lamps provide good lighting for bicycles, along with cars and pedestrians. Whoopee.

Of course, that assumes it is safe and easy to read a bicycle in Salem, which it isn't. The absence of any mention of bike paths or dedicated multiuse paths shows how autocentric City of Salem policies are. We're way behind other cities in Oregon in this regard.

Hopefully Capitol City Cycleshare will help spur a redirection of resources away from hugely expensive road projects to much more cost-effective protected paths for cyclists, pedestrians, skateboarders, scooter riders, and other alternative ways of getting around town.

When people sign up for the Cycleshare program and start riding the bikes, they're going to find that it's neither easy nor safe to cycle in Salem in most places outside of the "tri-park" area where the first stations will be located.

Complaining to City officials and city councilors to do something about this will be in order.