Two comments on national politics

The blog focuses on urbanism, placemaking, metropolitan and regional planning, transportation, and local governance, so I try to not comment on national politics except in how it impacts these matters, but two things are worth mentioning, because of how they are portrayed in the media.

1. The Special Elections, especially in Georgia, as a thermometer of support "for the Democrats" or "for President Trump."

If the special elections were in districts where Republicans had previously been elected on very close margins, it would be reasonable to say that they are good indicators for the tenor of the electorate. Plus they are elections run on a much shorter time line than the traditional election process.

The Kansas State Legislature is about 80% Republican, so expecting a Democrat to win in a special election, on a short time frame, is unrealistic. The same with Wyoming. Georgia may be a little different, but over the last couple decades, Georgia's Sixth Congressional District has been represented by pretty conservative guys, Newt Gingrich and Tom Price. Expecting it to flip was unrealistic. That Jon Ossoff did as well as he did sets him up to run again next year.

I do say that there are things to be learned from each of these elections, especially Georgia's since that is a district in a metropolitan area, which should be going "Democratic" in theory, but isn't.

cf. Jennifer Rubin's Washington Post blog entry, "Is victory in Georgia race of great consequence, or none?"

2. Making the Congressional Budget Office out to be a political animal against Republicans is about denying factual and objective research and analysis.

The New York Times reports ("Little known agency, striving for neutrality, finds itself under withering attack") on how Republicans are attacking the CBO for telling the truth about the impact of Republican proposals for changing health care, etc.

The CBO traditionally has been seen as a nonpartisan, objective, fact-driven organization. So why should Republicans not want such an organization to be seen as credible? Because they are pushing forward legislation that is mendacious and they want to be able to deny it ("CBO Has Clear Message About Losers in House Health Bill "NYT).

Remember the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment?

I finally understand, 20 years after the fact, why the Newt Gingrich led Congress abolished the OTA ("Bring Back the Office of Technology Assessment, NYT; and "The Much-Needed and Sane Congressional Office That Gingrich Killed Off and We Need Back," The Atlantic).

It's because Gingrich, despite having a PhD and being a college professor, wasn't favoring facts and knowledge, but ideology. An independent assessor of technology and science was seen as a threat, not a capacity builder.

The same is now true of the CBO. Hopefully, the same won't happen to the Congressional Research Office.

A follow up example with regard to Metropolitan Revolutions: the National Science Foundation moving to Alexandria

As a follow up to the previous entry, it's worth discussing the federal government's role in fostering research and discovery in the context of seeding innovation districts in the National Capital Area.

The fact that the Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency, a USDA experimental station, NIH, FDA, NIST, the Naval Research Laboratory, and other federal research agencies are located "here" is one of the reasons that there is a big research and technology community here, aided by the fact that DOD and the federal government in general are large customers for information technology and telecommunications, hence the large presence of such companies in this region also.

The book focuses on academic, medical center, and private industry research.  But there are scads of federal government laboratories and research centers, dating back to the 1800s, when military-related research and then the creation of the Extension Service of the US Department of Agriculture and federal financial support of agriculture colleges were elements in research-based investment in the nation's future.  Comparable to how USDA funds research at Ag Schools and Experiment Stations and communicates it out through the Extension Service, the US DOT funds research at universities and research centers around the country also, and communicates it out as well (I get publications from some of these centers, based in Minnesota, New Jersey, and California, and try to keep up with the output of the Volpe and Mineta Centers).

Most of the research installations of the federal government are campuses and research laboratories set apart and alone, and mostly they don't function as anchors of "innovation districts."  This is an issue that should be addressed going forward generally, because by re-orienting these facilities to the world, likely we will get greater return on investment.

(Partly this happens because Congressmembers see such installations as "economic development" for otherwise forlorn places, although there are some instances where the remote location was chosen for security reasons, such as for various federal labs like Oak Ridge, Sandia, etc.)

I've been putting off writing about how it has been announced that the National Science Foundation is moving from a very connected location in an innovation district it anchors on Wilson Boulevard in Arlington County (where other science organizations and contractors have located, including DARPA, a research campus for Virginia Tech, the Center for Defense Innovation, and the Arlington campus of George Mason University) to a disconnected location somewhat office-park-y, in Alexandria ("National Science Foundation moving headquarters from Arlington to Alexandria," Washington Post).

This was predicted because of how Congress is so f*ed up that the General Services Administration isn't seeking the approval of what are called "prospectus leases."  GSA has a set rent schedule of something under $45/s.f.  To lease space at higher costs--and higher costs are typical of closer in locations in Arlington and DC specifically--Congress has to approve the lease.  That's not happening in the current political environment.  (Wilson Boulevard as a discovery-innovation district  and the benefit of urban locations as innovation districts is discussed in this blog entry, "The state of Arlington County Virginia's commercial real estate market: 2012 and the future.")

So Arlington wasn't in the position of being able to retain NSF.  Because NSF is being offered what I would consider to be a marginal location, although it is directly across the street from the Eisenhower Avenue Metro, which is probably the only advantage present in the new location other than cheap space--well, it's not too far from the Wilson Bridge/I-95/I-395, although the current location is close to I-66.  (Note that the Ruby Tuesday's located there right now has really marginal food.)

On the other hand, most of the agglomeration economies of being located in an "innovation district" are lost, reducing the spillover benefits from the research and knowledge networks that are presently based in Arlington.

Arlington, Alexandria, and DC face further competition for federal agencies from Fairfax and Loudoun Counties, which through the January 2014 opening of the Silver Line subway extension, will be able to offer to the GSA low rent space with subway transit access. ("Short term vs. long term thinking: transit, the Washington Examiner, Fairfax/Loudoun Counties vs. DC")

So a focus on the short run cost of space and Congressional logjams mean that agglomeration economies from research clusters anchored by federal agencies are likely to be dissipated for the next 10 years.

Another example of how the Federal Government is too focused on the here and now and not investing in the future.

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And also counter-examples of how not to organize research organizations spatially.