Green Leader

A 1000 or 1300 page Climate Bill not even off the copier is bad government, but at least we have a first step Climate Bill in progress. In the last month I had begun to sour on the Climate bill due to its length and not being able to get adequate assessment of the details and deals included in the bill. I certainly didn’t have the time and wouldn’t read the over 1000 pages of the usual legal language our government speaks. My husband, a not so active climate change action supporter, took me to task saying that all of us have fooled around with climate change action for years and have not done anything. Whatever this bill does, it is better than doing nothing and doesn’t preclude us from doing more as soon as we muster the political will to do more. He got me.

I called my reps all week to demand passage and even got to talk to a staffer for Grayson (a first). The US House of Representatives finally took a visible step on Climate Change for this country and for our responsibility to the rest of the world. Let’s hope the Senate can improve the bill and make it require more change and fewer deals .

Why was this bill, the Recovery Act, even the Credit Card Protection bill bad government?

• Clear principles of each bill are not clearly defined, articulated, and policed throughout the total bill or legislation. The total reduction required from the US, the future we desire, is not met by the bill.
• Our representatives aren’t systems thinkers and are not trained to understand complex systems. The most important things in complex systems is to understand and have measurements of the problem(s), define the future you are trying to create, and then clearly define the science-based, economic-based, and/or social-based principles that will be the guide for the results we desire and the decision-making on all the details of the bill and the work throughout the country that supports the bill.

Good legislation articulates its goal(s), sound principles, provides details aligned with those principles, but not details better left to people expert and accountable in the details of specific areas or expertise, . It defines accountability, measurement, and thresholds or action if the results aren’t delivering some or all of the results we desire or intend. Like principled centered leadership, principle based legislation makes for more transparency. With a principle based approach to legislation, Congress could improve its image significantly. Our Declaration of Independence and Constitution with the Bill of Rights has served us so long because they address principles, not details. Details change. In modern society with such complexity, NO ONE knows the answer for all the details. Strategy and decisions on details have to be made by informed people with expert support based on clear articulation of principles. 1300 pages of legislation leads to lack of understanding, months of analysis, activity to find the loop holes, and most importantly doesn’t broadly communicate the change desired.

Most of us will go on our way without understanding the bill with no means to hold the actions prescribed in the bill accountable to the results we desire. The public was left out of the responsibility for greenhouse gas emissions both due to the size and complexity of the bill, and also because there were no requirements for lifestyle change required of the public.

Without the upfront work on principles and then policing the specific legislation for alignment with the principles of the bill, we get

• A gun provision for national parks in a Credit Card Bill:
• Although I don’t like the idea of guns being allowed in our national parks, I don’t really have a strong enough feeling to deny it to others. BUT, didn’t it merit national discussion before becoming law?
• Do we want important legislation held hostage to get amendments that are not related to the goals and principles of the specific legislation?
• A Recovery Act that no one truly understands, includes a huge amount of pork, that gets lost in details, and has insufficient measurements and results reporting to ensure it is accomplishing what we need and action if not. We can’t tell what has been spent on what and what results the Act is and will accomplish.
• Huge legislation with no legislative rules for public, and even representative review and comment time is absolutely not transparent government:
• Huge bills make me even more dependent on the news media and NGOs to give me assessment and analysis of legislation. I want their input, but I am an informed layperson that can make decisions on my own. I truly appreciate Obama communicating a lot to us, the public, as well as listening. The American public is not respected by Congress or its leaders. We are sharp and want to participate. Congress needs to take a page out of Obama’s book, Democrat or Republican. Huge sprawling, make a deal legislation doesn’t let me or the public participate.
• I do hold President Obama and Congress equally accountable for poor legislations. I forgave Obama for not vetoing the Recovery Act because it was too big, had too much pork and earmarks because he had to act to save the economy or at least restore some confidence, although more than $1 Trillion for confidence is ridiculous. I forgave him for not vetoing the Credit Card bill due to the extraneous gun provision because I rationalized that consumers needed at least the modest protections the bill provided(credit card interest rates in the high teens and higher is usury in my book). I don’t expect just issue change from Obama, I expect system change. So far, he is my hero because he has done a lot in terms of getting us to focus more on our core values and principles, has reached out to the rest of the world with strength but humility, and has driven some key changes through Congress. I don’t expect to see real results from his presidency for awhile. Having worked for AT&T, any actions take a long time to move through the bureaucracy and bring change. However, I am not in a forgiving mood anymore. If Obama is serious about government transparency, the approach to legislation is a lot more important than access to government information and data. Obama must direct Congress with visible direction and rule changes for principle based legislation that is not a legal treatise, very focused and succinct. I need to see vetoes of bills that have pork, earmarks, are not principle based and are huge, if he can’t drive the change any other way. We have to be willing to wait on some important legislation to get the kind of legislation we need.
• I can’t trust a Congress that is willing to accept a 300 page amendment issued at 3AM of the morning that an important bill is passed. You know and I know, most of those representatives didn’t know the full details, never mind have analyzed the impacts of all the language in the bill. I am sure they had their staffers working overtime to give them what assessment they could, but that is not good enough. I have never been in a business where major decisions were regularly made without at least some time for review and analysis. Government should be no different as long as we don’t allow it to become analysis paralysis.
• Huge legislation without pilot programs and trials is negligent. Complex systems are not predictable and one thing that is sure about complex systems is that they surprise you. Complex systems work based on the health of its sub-systems and all its moving parts an understood set of goals supported by principles. Complex systems are all about relationships or connections which are very hard to predict. Pilots, trials, tests of changes are vital to learning what works and ensuring we are addressing root causes versus fixing symptoms. A fun example from my own career:
• Years ago I led the AT&T team that developed and introduced the telephone voting service now used so commonly on shows like American Idol. Our code name was Peaky/Bursty Service because we knew that the calls would hit the network in big peaks or bursts of calls. We decided we needed to try the service before announcing it as a new service. NBC said we could trial it with Saturday Night Live with Eddy Murphy asking viewers if they wanted him to boil ‘Larry The Lobster’ alive or not. Sounded great because 11:30pm at night has very low call volumes and calling would only be from SNL viewers.

Throughout the show with his comic genius, Eddy Murphy made it hysterical to call and vote. The viewers called and called some more. The network went red, into overload. There were so many calls that the huge AT&T network (remember at this time the other telecoms were not as big) was seeing record traffic. The volume was so high that in some areas the public couldn’t get dial tone because so many were picking up the phone to vote. If you can’t get dial tone, you can’t get to 911 either. The FCC was all over us for good reason. Needless to say we learned a lot, including reconfirming pilots are not optional, the service had definite appeal to viewers (good news), we had to design and develop a lot more controls in the network to ensure call voting did not block access for normal or emergency calling, and that the actual vote count could not be considered an accurate vote because we had to block calls to control the volume we were willing to accept into each level of the network. We quickly redesigned and introduced the service resulting in today’s successful service. Funnily enough, Peaky/Bursty Service gave us one more problem because in the SNL rerun of the ‘Larry The Lobster’ program, they forgot to remove the phone number and the network was overloaded again, but that was the last time.

• ‘Larry the Lobster’ call volume prediction and management involves complex systems, but is a lot more containable with visibility into the system than the legislative work we need to happen doesn’t have. It is incomprehensible to me that these bills don’t include more testing of actions, phasing of implementation, and regular evaluation of results. In any business you know that the plan (the legislation) is just the start of the work. The real work is in the implementation and actions you take to deliver the charter and scope of the work (legislation) with the results desired.
• Line item veto is required for any President to effectively manage our government no matter what party he/she hails from.
• Besides campaign reform and a lot more restrictions on business and special interest group lobbying, line item veto is a key tool for the president to manage the government, manage the federal budget, and improve government effectiveness. If your amendment can’t fly unless you basically hide it in some omnibus legislation that earmark, pork, item should not be there.
• Line item veto is about government transparency and accountability. The public has a hard time holding representatives responsible for this kind of thing because there is so much of it, a lot of it is not known by the public, and a lot of it doesn’t happen right at the time of a specific election. At least with line item veto, we get two things:
• Representatives more aware that their amendment, pork, earmark or whatever may be vetoed if not related to the bill, if too expensive, if it hasn’t had analysis, etc. We would see reduction in the wasteful pork, earmark, and unrelated amendments that in bankrupting us today.
• With line item veto, we would know at least one person, the President, has reviewed the legislation. If he or she doesn’t review and exercise line item veto on unacceptable pork, earmarks, and costly or irrelevant amendments, the public has someone to hold accountable at the time.
• There is a lot more about the Climate Bill that is bad government when you get into the details. But, again it is a first step that has been a long time coming. Hopefully, the Senate can get us final legislation that:
• Is more principle based with the future we want clearly defined in its goals
• Requires more radical action from all of us
• Recognizes that nuclear and coal power are not foundations we want to invest anymore money in—although tough on these industries and a plan would be required for transition. What if we didn’t build even a single additional coal or nuclear plant? Acknowledging the hardship on fossil fuel industries and potential for energy shortage in some places, two clear things would happen:
• Energy efficiency would become the order of the day—we use more than twice as much energy as the average European
• Natural Gas and Renewable Energy Deployment will radically accelerate due to energy demand
• Eliminates all subsidies to oil, coal, and nuclear power. Think of the money for renewable energy deployment and retraining or deficit reduction!
• Simplifies without reduction of intent and is in language all of us can read with time for analysis, review and comment
• Recognizes this is just a start that needs a high level of monitoring and subsequent scheduled review and action
• Uses pilots and phasing to inspire learning and success
• Takes initial, impactful, but simple steps to involve every citizen in climate change action:
• Close all drive-throughs nationwide by 1/1/2010 to reduce significant greenhouse gas emission that car idling causes and to signal to the world that we are serious about our commitment to lifestyle change.
• Require all states and localities to have ‘no idling over a minute’ statutes with significant fines by 1/1/2010.
• Require all new buildings be built to LEEDS platinum standard with required focus on energy and water efficiency and management and use of renewable and recyclable materials. The increased cost for building in energy and water efficiency and management is no longer an excuse because it doesn’t cost a lot more now and because there are significant lifetime savings.
• Make water drought restrictions standard everywhere, everyday, 24 hours/day with provisions and support for enforcement at the local level
• Schedule the next phase, e.g., define a schedule for the following legislative next steps plus others, so people know that this is a journey of changing the way we live, but allow time for analysis, development of principles, rules and incentives:
• Add a vehicle gas, electricity (these could be considered the carbon tax), water tax for all businesses and consumers with three elements, including tax deduction for some of that tax for families making under $250,000, tax deduction or incentive for businesses that significantly reduce their energy and water consumption, and put these taxes are on a schedule that increase every year for the foreseeable future. BUT dictate that all this additional tax money must be separate from general government funds and restricted for renewable energy deployment, some new technology support, energy efficiency retrofits, infrastructure maintenance (absolutely NO new roads), funding for mass transit, power for those that cannot afford it (our energy poor), strong support of preserving forests, especially rain forests, worldwide, as well as providing funding for toxic clean-ups. This should be the first step in relooking at our tax and economic system to understand how to restructure it to cover the cost externalities of using ‘the commons’ (the relatively free ecosystem services we take for granted) and better alignment of tax to cost causers.
• Ban all corporations, the Federal Government, states and municipalities from non-commercial flying. Add significant tax to airplane gas for private flying. If you love flying, you can fly for now, but you have to contribute to the oil and greenhouse gas emission cost all of us have to live with. Sure there would have to be some exceptions for the President and other defined security risk situations. However, the greenhouse gas emission and the use of foreign oil to support private flying are not supportable. There is no reason that government or corporate officials should fly privately or first class when the rest of us are not flying to save the emissions and/or are sitting in coach to save our government or business money. I know not a chance in hell this would ‘fly’ (pun intended), but worth mentioning. If you aren’t leading change by example, you aren’t leading Mr. President, Mr./Ms, Representative, and Mr./Ms. Business Executive. By the way, I was a low level executive and did not eat in executive dining or fly first class.

I know it is not realistic to think the Senate will accomplish any or all of the above. I do hold President Obama accountable for being more active with the Senate on driving them to change their system, so that we get better legislation that puts us all on account. We know the parts per million we have to get to in the short and longer term to prevent a lot of the devastation of climate change. We know the 7 or more wedges we have to drive into our system to achieve radically reduced emissions, e.g., renewable energy deployment, energy efficiencies, increased mass transit, higher mileage/gallon, sequestering carbon, etc. I am not sure we know the extent of our responsibility to the world. Europe is more committed and showing results to reduce their emissions. Since our emissions today are double theirs, the change required from us is huge, but I hope like with WWI, WWII, and putting a man on the moon, we can rise to the occasion. Hurray for the first step on climate change action and a lot more action to come.

By Debbie Deland, Director of The 10% Initiative. She works with Green Cities Florida, the Chamber of Commerce, and NetImpact.

Tags: Climate Change Bill, Policy, United States

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 30th, 2009 at 9:27 am and is filed under Uncategorized, United States. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.