Daily Archives: July 19, 2017

Please enable Javascript to watch this video

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind.-- Downtown Indy, Inc., is spearheading a campaign to convince residents and property owners in downtown Indianapolis to voluntarily tax themselves $3 million a year to pay for maintenance and services the citys core demands but the municipal budget cant afford.

The first of three public invitation-only meetings is being held at the Columbia Club this evening to introduce the Economic Improvement District (EID) concept to downtown stakeholders.

The intent of the EID is to raise money within the Mile Square of downtown for projects at the heart of the Crossroads of America to be approved by an appointed board of downtown property owners.

Its a place for most of the commerce that occurs in our regional area. Its also a place for millions of visitors to come on an annual basis, said Sherry Seiwert, President of Downtown Indy, Inc. This is the fastest growing neighborhood in all of Marion County. We also probably need to be thinking about all the amenities that need to be provided to those residents.

The Downtown EID would focus on enhanced safety and security, including addressing Indianapolis homeless and panhandling challenges in the central core of the city, improving streetscape maintenance, beautification and cleanliness, enriching the downtown-user experience and developing marketing and planning strategies.

The difference with an EID is that the revenue that is generated within that footprint is employed back into that footprint and not to the remainder of the county, said Seiwert. We think that it would raise just over $3 million annually and the determination for residents themselves, for resident owners, would be a flat fee of $100 and then for commercial property owners it would be 1/8th of one percent of their assessed value on each parcel that they own.

If 51 percent of the property owners and those representing at least 51 percent of the assessed value approve the EID during an upcoming petition drive, the proposal would still require approval by the city county council and the mayor and lead to the naming of a board that would set a budget, file an annual report and undergo a yearly audit.

Seiwert would like the EID to begin work in 2018.

The only other Marion County community to vote itself a tax increase through an EID is the Woodruff Place neighborhood of the near east side.

Residents determined several years ago that the city would not pay for the upkeep and repairs to its 19th century fountains, planters, statuary and ornamental lights.

We got the owners of 76.8 percent of our parcels to approve it so it was pretty overwhelming that people agreed we need to take responsibility financially as well as from a historic statement to take care of our infrastructure, said longtime resident Tom Abeel. I have looked at this always as making life extension investment in the infrastructure.

Abeel said each of the approximately 250 property owners are taxed $165 a year to fund a $45,000 annual budget matched by an equal amount from the city.

The big project for the fountains was we got brand new electricity all the way from the town hall to the middle and the west drive fountains. All brand new electrical. Weve also been able to rebuild the pumps and the pump motors, said Abeel. We kind of knew that at some point it was just a matter of time before another life extending investment would have to be made and the EIDs been a terrific way to do it and the best thing is everybody in the neighborhood participates in it.

Abeel said the greatest challenge to a downtown EID will be setting priorities that reflect both needs of private residents and those of large commercial property owners.

For more information on the Economic Improvement District, click here.

Excerpt from:

Residents in downtown Indy to decide on voluntary tax for maintenance, services - Fox 59

The Trump administration wants to revitalize the coal industry, but they will not do so by imposing regulation on the natural gas industry, Secretary of Energy Rick Perry told reporters July 18 at a joint press conference with International Energy Agency Executive Director Fatih Birol.

Would the Department of Energy (DOE) be a participant in putting regulations into place to protect a particular energy sector?, Perry said. The answer is no.

Though he firmly stated that DOE will not increase regulation on energy sources that compete with coal, he was unclear about how the administration intends to make coal competitive again.

He seemed to suggest that exports, either of coal or technology, would play a large role in a revitalized coal industry. Noting that coal still accounts for roughly 40% of worldwide energy generation, Perry stated: Its not like coal has been pushed out of the marketplace, I mean you are going to see coal used in the world. Our goal is for us to use the cleanest technology that we can and generally speaking, that technology is going to come from the U.S.

Investments in Technology Will Continue

Perry also stated that the government intends to continue to invest in technology in an attempt to solve the problem of the dying coal industry. I dont think its necessarily governments role to be picking winners and losers, he said. Are we going to spend dollars on technologies to see if they work, to be gap funders, if you will, in places? I dont have a problem with that.

Interestingly, the administrations fiscal year 2018 (FY18) budget proposal requested only $280 million, for fossil energy research and development, a decrease of 44% from the fiscal year 2017 omnibus funding level.

As congressional appropriators work through the budget process, however, it seems unlikely that cut will take effect. The House FY18 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill, which funds DOE, was reported out of committee on July 12 and would fund the fossil energy program at $635 million, a decrease of $33 million below the fiscal year 2017 enacted level and $355 million above the budget request.

Addressing Loss of Nuclear Should be Priority, Birol Says

While Perry ruminated on the future of coal in the U.S., Birol was more concerned with the future of the nations energy fleet, noting that a loss of zero-emission baseload generation would have a negative effect on the nations emissions track record.

Today about 20% of the electricity in the United States comes from nuclear generation, and the challenge in my view in front of the U.S. government is that a significant amount of them, about 50GW of nuclear power plants, in the next 10 years will come to their time of life extension or not, he said. In the absence of extension of nuclear power plants lifetime, we may well see this encouraging CO2 emissions transformation [in] the United States may take a different shape.

Birol had noted that U.S. emissions have declined more than those of any other nation. The large decline mainly is the result of shale gas, renewables, the [integrated gasification combined cycle] plants, the nuclear power, they all played a critical role here, and as a result of that, the United States brought emissions down by more than 300 million tons, he said.

Abby L. Harvey is a POWER reporter.

Read the original post:

DOE Won't Increase Regulation on Gas to Boost Coal, Perry Says - POWER magazine

Reprinted with the kind permission of LIfe Extension.

July 5 2017.A randomized, crossover trial reported on June 27, 2017 in the journalPLoS Oneresulted in a reduction in symptoms ofdepressionand anxiety among participants who received magnesium for a six week period.

The trial included 126 men and women diagnosed with mild to moderate depression. Sixty-two participants received a daily supplement that contained 248 milligrams elemental magnesium from magnesium chloride for six weeks followed by a six week period during which no supplement was consumed. The remainder of the group received no supplementation during the first six weeks and a magnesium supplement during the latter portion of the trial. Questionnaires in which subjects rated their depression and anxiety were administered at the beginning of the study and every two weeks during the treatment periods.

Six weeks of magnesium supplementation was associated with a significant reduction in depression scores, however, scores did not improve during the control periods. Anxiety also improved during magnesium supplementation, but worsened during the control portion of the trial. In addition, headaches were less likely to be experienced in association with magnesium supplementation in comparison with no treatment.

This is the first clinical trial done on magnesium for depression in the U.S., authors Emily K. Tarleton and her colleagues at the University of Vermont announce. There are many barriers to treatment for depression including stigma associated with diagnosis, cost, side effects, non-adherence, and loss to follow-up. Magnesium supplements do not come with the added stigma associated with other therapies and, while monitoring response is still important, the risk of side effects is not as great as from antidepressants.

Although improvement in symptoms occurred within two weeks and was maintained while on treatment, long-term effectiveness is unknown and longer trials are needed, they conclude.

See original here:

Trial finds reduction in depressive symptoms following magnesium supplementation - ProHealth