This post is a follow up on yesterday’s blog piece on a UCLA
study which asks LA City mayoral candidates to sign a pledge to implement
various elements in the study, including creation of a new city agency. We noted the idea of a UCLA study – posted on
the university’s “newsroom” website - which asks political candidates for mayor
to sign a pledge raises some issues.
Normally, to the extent that the university has endorsed political
positions, there has been a direct university interest in those positions. For example, the Regents endorsed the governor’s
Prop 30 in the last election because of its budget implications for UC
operations. We noted yesterday that the
idea of a pledge seemed similar to the much-criticized Grover Norquist no-tax
pledge.
Yesterday’s post (which reproduces the pledge) is at:
The UCLA study is at:
KCRW’s “
Which Way LA?”
program yesterday picked up on the pledge/Grover Norquist element. However, the overall program was quite uncritical
although the issue of the cost of various recommendations in the plan was
raised by the guest host, Alex Chadwick.
(Warren Olney was not hosting yesterday for this segment of the
program.) The spokesperson for the UCLA
report was Mark Gold, Associate Director and Adjunct Professor at the UCLA
Institute for the Environment and Sustainability. Although KCRW lists him as Executive Director of Heal
the Bay, he has apparently stepped down from the presidency but remains a board
member of the organization. (Source:
http://www.environment.ucla.edu/news/article.asp?parentid=13657
and
http://www.environment.ucla.edu/people/person.asp?Facultystaff_ID=118)
Below is the write up from KCRW for this
segment:
A Green Political Agenda
for City Elections: Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist won power and
fame by getting Republicans to sign a pledge to never vote for a tax increase.
Maybe that’s what environmentalists should try – a pledge. A new study looks at
how the city could become a lot greener through the next two mayoral terms… cut
carbon emissions, use less water, boost solar and wind, double public transit
ridership…and suggests that anyone who wants to get elected mayor or to the
city council should sign on. One concern – there’s no dollar figure anywhere in
the study.
First, New York has one, San Francisco, Philadelphia – big cities
that also plan to be sustainable cities. Sustainability means living and
working so that the world remains livable for the generations to come. It means
cutting carbon emissions that build a warmer climate, using less water,
generating less waste, while still ensuring an urban life that offers
opportunity and justice.
A new study from UCLA – Visions 2021 LA – A model Environmental
Sustainability Agenda for Los Angeles’s Next Mayor and City Council. It
examines almost a dozen of what it calls ‘goal areas’ – with far ranging green
policy prescriptions that would remake the city. And the study advocates asking
politicians to sign on – a pledge to actually try to make this work if elected.
Guests:
Mark Gold: Executive Director, Heal the Bay [not correct as noted above]
Dakota Smith: LA Daily News
David Nahai: President, LA Department of Water and Power
You can hear the segment on the UCLA report at the link below:
