Category Archives: Fiscal Freedom

By Peter Franchot

The writer, a Democrat, is state comptroller.

The State of Maryland has a lot of money. And by a lot, I mean a once-in-a-generation unanticipated $5 billion in the bank. Most of this money is tax revenue collected as a direct result of billions of federal and state dollars in stimulus funds pumped into Marylands economy. The stimulus worked. It ignited the economy.

Heres how we got to $5 billion. This past week, my office announced a $2.5 billion general fund balance to close Fiscal Year 2021, as well as an increase of nearly $1 billion for FY 2022s budget projections and $1.37 billion for FY 2023.

However, having billions in surplus in the states coffers doesnt mean all Marylanders are doing fine. How we got here demonstrates that we have, in fact, two very different Marylands.

About two-thirds of our population have been mostly unaffected by the economic calamity of this pandemic. These Marylanders were able to work remotely, invest their wealth in the markets, and run businesses unaffected by the conditions of the pandemic. Wages went up. Spending increased. Capital gains skyrocketed.

But theres another third hundreds of thousands of Maryland families who continue to suffer financial hardship through no fault of their own. Federal unemployment benefits expired last month and many have been unable to return to the workforce. With the moratorium lifted, tens of thousands of Marylanders are facing the devastating prospect of being evicted from their homes.

And its not just workers. Its also mom and pop businesses on our Main streets in the heart of our communities. These family-owned businesses are the backbone of our economy. Most were unable to hire lawyers and accountants to navigate the complicated process for accessing federal and state relief funds. Sadly, tens of thousands of these businesses are now gone forever.

Because these billions of dollars in the states bank account are unassigned, Marylands elected leaders have a unique and rare opportunity to invest in our greatest asset our people.

As this budget surplus proves, their strength is Marylands strength. The more stable their wages, the more robust their savings, the greater their ability to spend as consumers, then the greater our revenues year after year. By lifting up our lowest wage earners, everyone benefits.

The bottom third of wage earners deserve the freedom from want and insecurity that the top two-thirds of wage earners have demonstrated. By achieving this, they too can fuel the financial strength of our state just as the top two-thirds of our wage earners do now.

Lets prevent the economic free fall many still fear today and create the foundation for the economic stability we can foster tomorrow.

Its not enough to say we put money into these programs. We must be able to say we put the money in the hands of those who truly needed it and gave them a ladder to the prosperity they are capable of attaining with a truly level playing field.

Immediately, the governor and General Assembly can pass another state stimulus like we did in February. Our office sent out 431,000 payments of $300 or $500 to our states lower income taxpayers within days of passing the Maryland Relief Act. The second time around however, we can afford larger stimulus payments and increase the number of people who qualify for them. Lets say we set aside just $1 billion for this immediate cash stimulus to our families most in need.

Then we should fortify our Rainy Day Fund, whose balance is currently $631 million and scheduled to be increased to $1.4 billion in the FY 2022 budget already passed. I recommend we divert even more to strengthen that fund now that our projected revenues are significantly higher. Why? Because we know that despite all of the projections, our economy can change in an instant and we are, in fact, still battling an unpredictable pandemic.

Now is the time for the state to come together and decide what truly defines Maryland when it comes to our budget priorities. I strongly encourage that we invest a significant percentage of this surplus in one-time priorities that help stabilize our rental markets and affordable housing, jumpstart transportation projects like Baltimore Citys Red Line, and fund innovative solutions for some of our most urgent environmental challenges.

We also must invest in Marylands main streets our family owned hospitality and retail businesses. These businesses need an immediate infusion of cash, akin to the paycheck protection program, in order to keep their employees on the job while also ensuring they can maintain their bottom line. We should also consider staff signing bonuses to help bring back our main streets while providing those who have been out of work with a needed infusion of funds.

Lets get this right and fix broken systems that have delayed unemployment benefits, rental assistance, child care provider payments and more. We also must ensure that taxpayers dollars are not landing in the hands of fraudsters something the state has not done well during the pandemic.

We cannot repeat the disasters that occurred at the Maryland Department of Labor with unemployment disbursements and we must increase the pace of the distribution of rental relief funds. Hundreds of daycare providers have been waiting for emergency grants from the Maryland State Department of Education for months. We must use some of these funds to fix these systems that are supposed to be providing critically needed funds quickly.

We often hear leaders talk about how COVID exacerbated problems that existed before the pandemic and will linger long after it finally passes. We must stabilize those who continue to suffer while preparing long-term solutions to inequities in our housing and labor markets that have been thrown into full view over the past year.

Marylanders deserve results, not more rhetoric, and this money is an opportunity to finally make good on that charge.

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Franchot: With Good Fiscal News, It's Time to Deliver for Marylanders Maryland Matters - Josh Kurtz

QFest, Houston's International LGBTQ Film Festival, has concluded with AT THE END OF EVIN as this year's recipient of The John Steven Kellett Freedom of Vision Award, the festival's highest honor.

The film, a taut, psychological thriller, centers on Amen, a transgendered female, who has been promised gender reassignment surgery by a mysterious, wealthy benefactor. Asked to live within the benefactor's vast but stark estate, Amen begins losing all sense of time and self, gradually coming to realize their benefactor's outward generosity may actually conceal truly sinister intentions. The Iranian film is directed by Mohammad Torab-Beigi and Mehdi Torab-Beigi.

The Freedom of Vision prize was created to recognize a singular work that the jury has deemed to possess any one or combination of the following characteristics:

a wholly original or unorthodox point of view that resonates as groundbreaking

an aesthetic approach that reinvents, reinterprets, and/or reinvigorates the "language" of film in such a way as if to feel as though it were paving the way towards a new theory or philosophy of cinema

a vision of humanity that transcends categorization, challenges complacency, disrupts the status quo, and/or challenges an audience to reconsider its preconceived notions about a place, a culture and its people, and/or a time in history

2021 QFest Competition Winners

The John Steven Kellet Freedom of Vision Award

WINNER: At The End Of Evin

Grand Jury Prize: Best Picture (Feature Only)

WINNER: When The Olympus Collides With The Pampas

Best Short Film

WINNER: Dearly

Best Featurette

WINNER: The Fish With One Sleeve

Best Director (Feature Only)

WINNER: Virginia Nardelli for "There's A Wolf In The Park Of The King"

Best Performance, Ensemble, or Documentary Subject (Feature only)

WINNER: When The Olympus Collides With The Pampas

Special Jury Prize (Feature Only)

WINNER: Invisible

Special Artistic Prize (Awarded by Artistic Director)

Lulu

Special Humanitarian Prize (Awarded by Artistic Director)

Dealing with Death

Members of the 2021 QFest Juries include:

Byron Canady (Houston, TX);

Founder/CEO: Colorbox Multimedia/Gulf Coast Cosmos Comicbook Co.

Heyd Fontenot - San Antonio, TX

Consulting Director at Sala Diaz; QFest Alum 1999)

James Hays - Houston, TX

Arts Administrator: Rothko Chapel

Kalil Haddad - Toronto, Ontario

Filmmaker; QFest Alum 2019/2020

Mark McCray - Houston, TX

Technical Director: TBWAChiatDay

Debra Miller - Los Angeles, CA

Performer; Writer; Multi-Disciplinary Artist; Film Festival Consultant

Michelle Mower - Friendswood, TX

Independent Writer/Producer/Director; Former SWAMP President

Melelani Petersen - Houston, TX

Houston Media Source; Idea Fund Recipient)

Stephanie Saint Sanchez - Katy, TX

Writer/Filmmaker/Producer; Founder of Seorita Cinema

Emily Sloan - Houston, TX

Mystic Lyon; Curator; Artist

Matt Stenerson - Minneapolis, MN

Screenwriter; QFest Alum 1999

Addie Tsai - Houston, TX

Professor/Houston Community College; Author: Dear Twin

QFest has celebrated a quarter of a century with a final film slate offering the largest selection of films in QFest history (52) and the largest percentage of female-directed work (28) since 2014. Three in-person screenings were presented by QFest Fiscal Sponsor Aurora Picture Show (Competition Shorts on September 24) and original QFest founding partner, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (SWAN SONG on September 26 and October 2). QFest's virtual platform partner Cinenso returned to host the online QFest 2021 competition slate and special feature presentations September 30 - October 4. Please visit at http://www.q-fest.com for additional information.

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The John Steven Kellett Freedom of Vision Award Bestowed to Iranian Film AT THE END OF EVIN - Broadway World

This time, with our environment, our union, and our civil rights on the line, we face a formidable and not necessarily identifiable foe. This is a time for courage, and it is a time for action. Sometimes we forget that democracy is hard work. We must do it together.

Heidi Campbell| Guest Columnist

Tennessee Voices: A conversation with Heidi Campbell

Former Oak Hill Mayor and District 20 state Senate Democratic nominee Heidi Campbell spoke with Tennessean Opinion Editor David Plazas.

Nashville Tennessean

I live on a hill that was and is on a civil war battlefield in the southern part of Nashville, not far from the Davidson county line.

When I drive north to take my son to school, were amongst the masked and the vaccinated. When I drive south to take him to soccer practice in Williamson County, we are in the Bible Belt.

The day after Trump was elected, the halls of the school were funereal. Later that day, at practice, it looked like everyone had won the lottery.

Those were the early daysmy how the chasm has grown.

This past legislative session, in the midst of the pandemic, we passed bills to criminalize teaching about systemic racism, to assault the rights of transgender people, to remove local authority from the cities that fund our state, and to effectively eliminate gun regulations.

It continues to baffle me that this reads like a list of positive developments to some of our neighbors.

My colleagues across the aisle are great people who legitimately care about the welfare of our state. Several of them have told me that they are disappointed with whats happening to their party but that they have to go along with it, or theyll get primaried.

Our state, like much of our country, is being held hostage by a misinformed and outraged minority.

In all fairness, they are beingfed a steady diet of terrifying disinformation. Vaccines cause cancer. Masks make us sick. Our Governor is setting up concentration camps for the unvaccinated. Teachers are trying to make our kids feel bad about being white. Liberals want to turn us into a socialist country. Caravans of brown people are coming to kill us.

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The majority of Senate Republicans are old guard conservatives who believe in strong fiscal policy and would just as soon stay out of peoples bedrooms and personal lives, but the relentless deluge of emails, calls, and social media posts demanding immediate action has changed their priorities over time.

We now find ourselves in a world where an obnoxious minority demands that we exercise identity politics to kill identity politics, that we adopt extreme government overreach to prevent government overreach, and that we employ prejudice to eradicate prejudice.

Everyone loses. Thats the logical consequence of this political calamity. Public health emergencies require mutual sacrifice of the type that the greatest generation offered selflessly. If everyone doesnt meet the moment though, then no one does.

Infectious diseases dont care about personal freedom. Good guys with guns never seem to show up. Environmental disasters are inured to tribal politics, and racism and sexism are not going to disappear because we stop talking about it.

So we end up withone of the highest COVID-19 rates in the world,individuals shopping for groceries getting shot,entire cities experiencing devastating floodsanda school system that isnt allowed to teach about racism or sexism.

This is the state of our state as we head into redistricting. Performative nods towards equitable map-making have been made, withDemocrats allowed a seat at the committee table, preferably seen and not heard. Nobody expects fair maps though. Our state is alreadygerrymanderedto heavily favor Republicans. These are the skirmishes of the modern civil war.

A few days ago, state senators received an email from a colleague sharing a link toan article that advocates for a soft secessionfrom the country.

As with the last civil war, thesecessionists claim thatstatesrights should prevail to protect personal freedoms. Americans see it as a way to oppress minorities, women, and the impoverished.

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Tennessee is a state that is run entirely by one party that has a trifecta, and though we are rated first for fiscal stability, were in the bottom decile for almost every other metric. Our own tax dollars are held in reserve andoften spent on bad contracts. This is a state that does not invest in its people.

State departments are falling apart. All of the alphabet soup; corrections, children services, education, welfare, wildlife resources, energy/conservationand health are underfunded and dysfunctional. The horrible stories of abused children, traumatized caseworkers, indefensible deforestation, and good people getting fired just for doing their jobs are endless. Everyone loses.

It is evident that some Americans are fine with relinquishing our democratic experiment for an authoritarian regime. They identify as Republican,though not all Republicans are on board.

The calculated plan to overturn the November 2020 results were codified in ink with theEastman Memo. In this post-truth era, the radical right liberally invents alternative facts with complete buy-in from constituents.

The rest of us are committed to painstakingly vetting our messages against the rigor of substantiated truth. This puts us at a profound disadvantage, but that is the only way that democracy works.

Every skirmish brings us closer to a critical juncture. Almost eight score ago, Republican President Lincoln ensured that we protected the great democratic experiment.

This time, with our environment, our union, and our civil rights on the line, we face a formidable and not necessarily identifiable foe. This is a time for courage, and it is a time for action. Sometimes we forget that democracy is hard work. We must do it together.

Heidi Campbell, D-Oak Hill, represents District 20 in the Tennessee Senate.

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State Sen. Heidi Campbell: disinformation has taken control of Tennessee politics and created a modern 'civil war' | Opinion - Tennessean

By RICK BRUNDRETT

When S.C. lawmakers in 2009 first approved massive taxpayer-backed funding for aerospace giant Boeing to build an assembly plant in North Charleston, the state estimated it would spend nearly $34 million over 15 years for worker training.

But over the past 10 fiscal years, the state has spent $58.3 million an approximately 70% hike over original projections to train Boeing workers through the S.C. Technical College Systems readySC program, according to information provided this week by the college system to The Nerve.

The average per-worker training cost to the state also jumped significantly, from about $8,950 as initially estimated to approximately $12,100 a 35% increase.

In an email response this week to The Nerve, Technical College System (TCS) spokeswoman Kelly Steinhilper said the readySC program trained 4,831 Boeing workers from fiscal 2012 through last fiscal year, noting that employees on average participated in 30 classes over multiple phases and years. The states original projections covered training for 3,800 workers.

The $58.3 million in training costs over the 10-year period included instructor salary/benefits, equipment and consumable supplies and materials for training, Steinhilper said. Currently, 53 readySC staff are assigned to the Boeing project, she said, with training provided at Boeings plant site or Trident Technical Colleges Aeronautical Training Center in North Charleston an $80 million facility that opened in 2019.

To put the $58.3 million into some context, its more than the entire current budgets of about 60 state agencies or divisions, state budget records show. In comparison, revenues last year for the Chicago-based Boeing totaled about $58.2 billion, company records show nearly $26 billion more than this fiscal years entire state budget.

From fiscal years 2016 through 2020, lawmakers designated a total of more than $43 million for the readySC program out of state general and surplus funds, budget records show.

Effective Jan. 1 of this year, Boeing agreed to begin paying the TCS for worker training, according to documents provided recently to The Nerve by the S.C. Department of Administration under the state Freedom of Information Act.

Those records show that the TCS was authorized to receive about $1.9 million from Boeing in the last half of fiscal 2021, which ended June 30, and another nearly $5 million for this fiscal year.

The State of South Carolina and Boeing have been partners for the last 10 years during which time readySC has provided training for all Boeing production employees under a contractual commitment made when Boeing first began production in the State, according to other-fund authorization requests by the TCS to the Department of Administration. Consequently, readySC now has a highly skilled staff specializing in training of aircraft production employees.

The TCS requests, the latest of which was dated July 12 and approved on July 20 by Brian Gaines, director of the state Executive Budget Office, said Boeing will pay the TCS for all costs incurred to provide this training. Steinhilper said Boeing is paying the personnel costs associated with that (readySC) staff.

Boeing has more than 7,500 workers in South Carolina and about 160,000 worldwide, according to the S.C. Department of Commerces website.

The Nerve launched publication in January 2010 with a week-long investigative series on the Boeing incentives package, conservatively estimating that the cost of all taxpayer-backed freebies totaled at least $500 million. The true cost to taxpayers likely will never be known in part because of state privacy laws protecting companies receiving certain incentives.

Of the state and local incentives offered to Boeing since 2009, state bonds collectively make up much of the taxpayer cost. The general obligation bonds sold to benefit Boeing will cost taxpayers a total of $483.3 million, including $119.3 million in interest, through June 2025, according to information provided this week to The Nerve by the S.C. Treasurers Office.

In a special session in October 2009, lawmakers rushed through an incentives package for Boeing that included approval of an initial $170 million in bonds under a section of the S.C. Constitution that allows legislators to disregard debt ceilings.

Other taxpayer-backed goodies provided to Boeing under a 20-year state incentives agreement provided to The Nerve in 2010 by the Department of Commerce included:

In addition, Charleston County at the time offered Boeing a number of incentives, including, according to county agreements:

Boeing had two existing North Charleston facilities before constructing the 11-football-field-size 787 Dreamliner assembly plant, which started operating in June 2011. In addition, Boeing in 2014 broke ground on a 256,000-square-foot airplane paint hangar, and in 2015 opened a propulsion engineering and assembly facility in North Charleston, according to Commerces website.

Brundrett is the news editor of The Nerve (www.thenerve.org). Contact him at 803-254-4411 or rick@thenerve.org. Follow him on Twitter @RickBrundrett. Follow The Nerve on Facebook and Twitter @thenervesc.

Nervestories are free to reprint and repost with permission by and credit to The Nerve.

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Public cost of training Boeing workers far higher than projections - The Nerve

The axe has finally fallen on the first of the U.S. Navys problematic Littoral Combat Ships, with the decommissioning of the USS Freedom (LCS-1) after a less-than-stellar career lasting just 13 years, during which it was mainly used as a test and training vessel. The removal of the Freedom from the fleet continues a process of retiring these warships, which begun with the former USS Independence (LCS-2) being decommissioned on July 31, and plans are meanwhile afoot to potentially deactivate another three Freedom-class shipsand one Independence-class vesselby March next year.

The decommissioning ceremony for Freedom, the lead ship of its class, took place yesterday at Naval Base San Diego, California. COVID-19 restrictions meant it was a closed-doors event, but it seems possible the fanfare surrounding the decommissioning would have been muted in any case, with both LCS classes having suffered a catalog of problems and the service finally having run out of patience with at least a portion of the fleet.

U.S. Navy/MC2 Vance Hand

Capt. Larry Repass, USN, commanding officer of the USS Freedom delivers remarks during the decommissioning ceremony on September 29.

Nevertheless, retired Rear Admiral Donald Gabrielson, the former commander of U.S. Naval Forces, Southern Command/Commander, U.S. Fourth Fleet and the commanding officer of the Freedoms 2008 commissioning crew highlighted the warships achievements:

I have never in my life seen or served alongside a more capable, dedicated, devoted, talented, and inspiring group of people than the sailors I served alongside with LCS and what I have watched in every day since, said Gabrielson. As we acknowledge this bittersweet moment, I hope well all remember that this ship was a vehicle to learn and innovate by doing and to make real progress in a short amount of time, and that doesnt happen with other ship concepts.

At the time of its decommissioning, the Freedom had a crew of nine officers and 41 enlisted sailors. Built in Marinette, Wisconsin, by Fincantieri Marinette Marine, the warship had originally been commissioned in November 2008.

Operational limitations meant that Freedom deployed only once in its career, otherwise being primarily engaged in test and training duties. The first two examples of each subclass were completed to different standards than the subsequent examples, further reducingFreedom's operational relevance. According to Navy officials, it would have cost another $2.5 billion to make the first four ships two from each class combat-ready. Thats roughly the cost of buying four brand-new LCSs.

The decommissioning of LCS-1 supports department-wide business process reform initiatives to free up time, resources, and manpower in support of increased lethality, the Navy wrote in an official statement. The LCS remains a fast, agile, and networked surface combatant, designed to operate in near-shore environments, while capable of open-ocean tasking and winning against 21st-century coastal threats.

Despite that positive spin, the utility of the LCS remains hampered by its controversial mission modules, which were originally designed to be switched in and out of the hulls rapidly while in port, before the idea was abandoned, leaving each ship with a single module to be installed. As it stands, only the anti-surface warfare version of these modules is fitted on some of the hulls, with the anti-submarine warfare and mine countermeasures modules not yet available.

U.S. Navy

Former Rear Admiral John Neagley, Program Executive Officer for Unmanned and Small Combatants, poses with sailors from the USS Forth Worth (LCS-3) at a test event for the Dual-mode Array Transmitter (DART) Mission System and ASW Mission Package.

The Navys statement on the decommissioning of USS Freedom alludes to the costs that will be saved as a result, reflecting the higher-than-anticipated expenses involved in operating these warships. Indeed, its been reported in the past that the LCS is almost as expensive to run as the far more capable Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer.

At the same time, problems with the propulsion systems on the Freedom class have continued. In particular, this has affected the combining gear, which links the two main diesel engines to a pair of gas turbines to its water jet propulsion system. Having this machinery function properly is critical to the vessels being able to reach a speed of 40 knots, which was a requirement from an early stage in the program.

U.S. Navy/MC3 Katarzyna Kobiljak

USS Freedom underway during a 2014 Independent Deployer Certification Exercise (IDCERTEX) off the coast of Southern California and Hawaii.

Meanwhile, despite the removal of earlier units in the two subclasses, production of the LCS continues. There are now 21 LCSs in service, following yesterday's decommissioning. These include nine of the Freedom class, of which there are five more under construction or in the process of fitting out, and one more example on order. There are also 12 Independence-class warships in service, with five more under construction or fitting out, and one more on order.

Problems with the drive train led to the Navy putting a pause in deliveries of Freedom class ships earlier this year.

Now, with the first ship in each LCS subclass having been decommissioned, the Navy has its eye on the deactivation of three Freedom-class ships, the USS Fort Worth (LCS-3), Detroit (LCS-7), and Little Rock (LCS-9), plus one Independence-class vessel, USS Coronado (LCS-4).

U.S. Navy/MC1 Jay C. Pugh

USS Fort Worth (LCS-3), left, arrives in Singapore as the Arleigh Burke class guided-missile destroyer USS Sampson (DDG-102) gets underway.

The service hopes to be rid of these next four vessels by March 22 next year, as part of its latest budget request for Fiscal Year 2022, but that will depend on Congressional approval.

Of the next vessels destined for disposal, LCS-7 and LCS-9 have been earmarked for decommissioning due to problems with the combining gear. As for LCS-3 and LCS-4, their retirement has been recommended due to the expense of upgrading them to a configuration that would provide commonality with other more recent LCSs.

If the Navys plans for these four ships are approved, they will be placed in Out of Commission, In Reserve status, meaning they could theoretically be reactivated if required.

U.S. Navy

USS Independence (LCS-2), the lead ship of the class, was the first of the Littoral Combat Ships, to be decommissioned, at Naval Base San Diego, on July 29.

While the Navy remains committed to building its troublesome LCS vessels, at the same time it is planning to introduce a new class of frigates, the FFG-62 Constellation class, with construction expected to begin on the first hull imminently. However, the new warships are not expected to enter service until the late 2020s, meaning there is still a requirement for the LCS, at least on paper, even if only as a stopgap measure.

U.S. Navy

An artists conception of the forthcoming FFG-62 Constellation-class frigate.

As if to demonstrate growing confidence in the LCS vessels, the Navy has announced plans to deploy six LCSs before the end of this year. This would be a significant milestone for the ships, which have so far deployed only sporadically, with more than one of those cruises being interrupted by embarrassing mechanical failures. To this date, no Littoral Combat Ship has deployed to the Middle East, including to the tumultuous Persian Gulf, an area where these giant jet boats were supposedly designed to dominate.

There are also hopes that new capabilities will increase the operational value of the LCSs, including the planned addition of the Naval Strike Missile, or NSM, on all of the hulls. Thought has also been given to adapting the ships to suit the expeditionary advanced base operations (EABO) concept, currently being developed by the Navy and Marine Corps. Some have suggested the LCS might be used in a role akin to a fast troop transport, to move small groups of infantry around the Indo-Pacific theater.

U.S. Navy

The Independence-class LCS USS Gabrielle Giffords (LCS-10) launches a Naval Strike Missile (NSM) during exercise Pacific Griffin.

The decommissioning of the USS Freedom, coupled with the removal of the first of the Independence-class vessels, brings at least one chapter of the LCS saga to an end. At the same time, with a stated ambition to reach a total fleet size of 355 ships, the decision to remove any hulls prematurely that would help reach this total is not one taken lightly. While the Navy has not entirely given up hope in these warships, it seems clear that the services future priorities lie elsewhere.

Update, October 1: Following a request from The War Zone, the Navy has confirmed that the former USS Freedom will be placed in Out of Commission, In Reserve (OCIR) status, as is also planned for the other four LCSs that the service wants to withdraw. OCIR ships are stored in Bremerton, Washington.

Contact the author: thomas@thedrive.com

Originally posted here:

The First Littoral Combat Ship Has Been Decommissioned After Just 13 Years Of Service (Updated) - The Drive

How do you say no constructively?The increasingly influential Congressional Progressive Caucus faced that question this week as tensions among Democrats mounted over two bills central to President Joe Bidens agenda: a bipartisan infrastructure bill and a $3.5 trillion budget to fund sweeping social reforms.

The standoff underscores both the opportunity and challenge that progressives face. They seek to exercise newfound influence to the maximum benefit of their voters and their party, without sparking a backlash that could hurt both.And damage the Biden administration.

Amid deepening polarization, both parties have had to contend with increasingly feisty wings. The infrastructure bill shows how Democrats are managing theirs.

It would be a huge blow if this just collapsed on them, saysMatthew Glassman, a senior fellow at Georgetown Universitys Government Affairs Institute in Washington. Conversely, he adds, if both bills pass, Democrats could tout a significant list of achievements in their upcoming campaigns.

Many see themselves, and the country, as standing at a pivotal moment in which government has a moral responsibility to step in and help. And they believe their policies could energize the Democratic base and prevent a Republican resurgence at the polls in next years midterm elections and the 2024 presidential race.

But if they overestimate the countrys appetite for such sweeping reforms, at a time when Democrats only narrowly control the House and Senate, it could damage their own goals and President Bidens agenda.

Washington

At the start of this crucial week for Democrats, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Ilhan Omar walked out of the House of Representatives with arms wrapped around each other, looking more like longtime pals than politicians engaged in a high-stakes negotiation.

Its a scene that would have been hard to imagine not long ago, when the speaker issued arare public rebukeof the Minnesota lawmaker, who during her three years in Congress has tangled not only with then-President Donald Trump but also with her own party.

But Representative Omar is also the whip of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, responsible for corralling its members when it comes time to vote. And that caucus has grown dramatically from a once-marginal group to nearly half of House Democrats today, giving it significant leverage.

Amid deepening polarization, both parties have had to contend with increasingly feisty wings. The infrastructure bill shows how Democrats are managing theirs.

Late Thursday afternoon, Ms. Omar and fellow progressives were holding firm in their threat to torpedo a vote on the $1.2 trillion infrastructure billthat had passed the Senate with full Democratic support and 19 Republicans. Though progressives have agreed to support that bill, they aim to force moderate Senate Democrats to first back their massive Build Back Better Act, which includes sweeping social reforms and climate change measures.

The standoff underscores both the opportunity and challenge that progressives now face. They are seeking to exercise their newfound influence to the maximum benefit of their voters and their party, without sparking a backlash that could hurt both. And damage the Biden administration.

It would be a huge blow if this just collapsed on them, saysMatthew Glassman, a senior fellow at Georgetown Universitys Government Affairs Institute in Washington. Conversely, he adds, if both bills pass, it could offer Democrats a significant list of achievements to tout in their 2022 and 2024 campaigns.

Many see themselves, and the country, as standing at a pivotal moment in which government has a moral responsibility to step in and help. And they believe their policies could energize the Democratic base and prevent a Republican resurgence at the polls in next years midterm elections and the 2024 presidential race.

But if they overestimate the countrys appetite for such sweeping reforms, at a time when Democrats only narrowly control the House and Senate, it could damage their own goals and President Joe Bidens agenda.

The caucuss willingness to blockone of the presidents key priorities even temporarily has led to comparisons with the GOPs conservative Freedom Caucus. In members effort to promote small government and fiscal discipline, they frequently bedeviled their partys leadership over the past decade, dooming Republican legislation on health care and immigration, and provoking government shutdowns.

Progressives, not surprisingly, reject that comparison. They insist theyre not seeking todisruptthe Democratic Party orundermine its leadership, but to influence it in a constructive way.

We are for advocating for government to fully function on behalf of the people, says Representative Omar. Our role here is to try to remind our caucus that if we say we are the party of the people and of working families, then our policies should reflect that.

Or asRep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington, who heads the Progressive Caucus, put it: The Freedom Caucus is a caucus of no; were a caucus of yes.

Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington testifies about her decision to have an abortion, on Sept. 30, 2021, during a House hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. Representative Jayapal, who heads her party's Progressive Caucus, rejects comparisons with the Republican Freedom Caucus, saying it "is a caucus of no; were a caucus of yes."

Still, for all their projected optimism,Democratic leadershipmight privately disagree with Representative Jayapals assessment. The longer the current stalemate drags on, the greater the chance that Senate moderates could respond to the lefts hardball tactics by simply walking away from the budget negotiations.

The Build Back Better bill would deliver on many progressive priorities. It includes initiatives ranging from expanded health care benefits and paid maternity leave to free community college and climate change measures. A pollcommissionedby progressives showed that 54% of voters in 10 battleground states supported the $3.5 trillion bill, compared with 43% who disapproved. The poll had a margin of error of 4.5 points.

Democrats plan to pass the bill through a process known as budget reconciliation. But they will need the votes of every Senate Democrat, and on Wednesday Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginiacalled it fiscal insanity to spend so much in the wake of already massive amounts of government spending to address pandemic-related needs.

He and Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who helped negotiate the bipartisan infrastructure bill,had not made anydefinitive counterproposals for a budget dealuntil Thursday, when a memo leaked showing Senator Manchin had told the president this summer that his top line was $1.5 trillion. The Democrat from West Virginia also said any expansion of Medicaid in the reconciliation bill would have toincludethe Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funds from being used to cover abortion expenses.

So on the last day of fiscal year 2021, Democratic leadership was facing an unenviable trio of challenges: passing a bipartisan infrastructure bill; scrambling to fund the government temporarily to avoid a partial shutdown (this bill cleared Congress late Thursday); and raising the debt ceiling before Oct. 18, when Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned all extraordinary measures would be exhausted and the United States would default on its debt.

Were a big-tent party, and were going to get this done, said Rep. Josh Gottheimer, the moderate Democratic co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus earlier this week. Speaking to progressives role, he added, I think theyve been very constructive in our conversations.

In the past, Democratic leadership has tended to cater to party centrists, who often hail from swing districts or states and face tough reelection battles. At times, that has meant weakening or even stripping out progressive priorities from Democratic legislation.

But as progressives have grown in numbers and gained more leverage within the party, theyve become increasingly bold in asserting their demands.

Theyre stiffening their spine, says Professor Glassman of Georgetown.

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont talks to reporters ahead of a test vote on the bipartisan infrastructure deal that senators brokered with President Joe Biden, on Capitol Hill in Washington, July 21, 2021. Senator Sanders has urged fellow progressives in Congress to link passage of the infrastructure bill to success on passing a budget with new spending on health care and climate change.

One reason is that Democratic voters themselves have shifted significantly to the left in recent years. Some of that may be credited to Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the first chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which he co-founded in 1991 with five other representatives. Back then, the democratic socialist whoembraced a crusader rolesaw very few of his proposed laws passed.

But after two surprisingly successful presidential campaigns that drew legions of young supporters and arguably shifted the center of gravity in the Democratic Party, Senator Sanders now chairman of the Senate Budget Committee and his allies find themselves in a very different position.

Many progressives have been pointing out that its President Bidens agenda not just their own that theyre fighting for.This agenda is not some fringe wish list; it is the presidents agenda, said Representative Jayapal earlier this week.

Whether it was the primary campaign, or whether this is where [Mr. Bidens] heart always has been, he has genuinely adopted a lot of progressive goals, says Rep. Ro Khanna of California, who co-chaired Mr. Sanders 2020 presidential campaign. And so we have supported the president.

Now the president is in a bind, however, with progressives vowing not to support the infrastructure bill unless or until Senate Democrats commit to the much larger reconciliation bill. Much of the presidents domestic agenda is included in these two bills, and he has been hosting a flurry of meetings all week to try to persuade the different wings to come together.

Senator Sanders, the sole member of the Senate in the Congressional Progressive Caucus, has been urging his fellow caucus members in the House not to support the infrastructure bill until the budget is passed. We had a deal, he said, referring to Democratic leaders agreement that the bills would advance in tandem, to assure passage of both.

In light of that, progressives refusal to support an infrastructure bill before the other is agreed on could be seen as an effort to hold colleagues to their promise, says DeWayne Lucas, associate professor of political science at Hobart and William Smith Colleges.

Their main concern right now is theyve made these deals with moderates, says Professor Lucas, noting that in the past when progressives had smaller numbers, their fellow Democrats didnt always make good on such deals. Now one of the issues for the progressive caucus is how to ensure that they get what was promised to them. If anyone is a disrupter, he adds, its Senator Sinema, who may be embracing the maverick brand of Arizona.

Part of the reason progressives are holding firm is the pressure from grassroots activists. About a dozen protesters chanted outside the Senate today as Senator Manchin spoke to reporters, saying he would be willing to support a $1.5 trillion budget a quarter of the $6 trillion that Senator Sanders originally wanted.

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This package as it is at $3.5 trillion is already the compromise, says David Winston, co-chair of the Medicare for All working group of the metro D.C. Democratic Socialists of America, who sports a Sanders shirt. Fellow protesters held a pink heart with the handwritten slogan, Invest in people not war and a largebanner reading, No reconciliation, no deal!

Staff writer Dwight Weingarten contributed reporting.

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Are progressives the bloc of no? They say no. - The Christian Science Monitor

Mitsubishi Motors Corporation (MMC) will use an evolved version of the Super-All Wheel Control (S-AWC) system in its plug-in hybrid (PHEV) model of the all-new Outlander crossover SUV, which is scheduled for launch in Japan in the second half of this fiscal year and in the US in the second half of calendar-year 2022.

The S-AWC system is all-wheel control technology that offers integrated control of Active Stability Control (ASC), Anti-lock Braking System (ABS) and Active Yaw Control (AYC), which controls the left and right wheels via braking.

The new S-AWC integrated vehicle dynamics control system will provide safe, secure and comfortable driving in various weather and road conditions.

The all-new Outlander PHEV model features twin-motor AWD that consists of one motor at the front and another one at the rear of the vehicle. By taking advantage of the electric motors characteristic high response, high precision and freedom in controlling the front and rear motors, the system optimally distributes the driving force between the front and rear wheels according to road and driving conditions.

Combining this with S-AWC increases vehicle maneuverability in driving, cornering and braking. Conventional models employ a braking control system to control the brake forces in the left and right wheels only on the front, but the evolved S-AWC adds a braking control system for the rear wheels.

This reduces the load on the front wheels and makes it possible to extract the maximum performance from all four tires in a more balanced manner and delivers handling true to the drivers intent for safe, secure and comfortable driving in various conditions.

In addition, seven drive modes can be selected depending on road conditions and driving style. Normal, the basic mode, is optimized for normal driving on paved roads. Gravel mode provides balanced operability and road handling ability on unpaved or wet paved roads, and Snow mode delivers stable vehicle behavior on snowy and other slippery roads. In addition, there are Power mode, which offers powerful acceleration, and Eco mode that prioritizes economic and environmentally friendly driving.

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New Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV to adopt an evolved all-wheel control technology - Green Car Congress

The federal government will narrowly avoid another shutdown as Congress plans to approve funding for agencies and operations through early December.

Congressional leaders came together on a band-aid solution just hours before the end of the fiscal year Thursday night, as spending was set to expire. Because Congress only agreed to a temporary solution, lawmakers will have to address it all over again in 65 days.

And there's scant time to start on a long-term spending solution because there's no shortage of other pressing issues on Capitol Hill: Lawmakers will need to raise or suspend the country's debt ceiling by mid-October. Democrats are trying to cobble together enough votes to pass a massive bipartisan infrastructure bill and a separate economic package, two of Biden's top priorities. And major voting rights and election reform legislation also lies in wait.

Partisan disputes in Congress kept lawmakers from reaching a solution earlier. Leaders of both parties said they wanted to avoid a government shutdown, but disagreed on how to do so. Democrats tried to pass a measure earlier this week that both funded the government and suspended the debt ceiling, but Senate Republicans blocked the effort.

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has said if Democrats want to raise the debt ceiling, they'll have to do it on their own. By forcing the issue to a party-line vote, Republicans hope to use the higher debt ceiling as evidence of out-of-control Democratic spending during the midterm elections even though a significant portion of the debt accrued came from spending and tax breaks approved by the GOP during the Trump administration.

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Thursday's vote on a stopgap spending bill will provide interim funding for the government and keep critical services running during the Covid-19 pandemic. Before it spending expires Dec. 3, lawmakers will need to either approve another short-term solution, known as a continuing resolution, or approve appropriations to fund the government through the end of 2022.

Close calls like this and actual government shutdowns have become increasingly common over the years. In the last decade, there have been three government shutdowns, including a 34-day closure in 2019, the longest one in American history. Since the current budget process was introduced in the 1970s, there have been 20 funding gaps four of which have resulted in shutdowns lasting more than one business day.

The last time Congress approved federal appropriations before the fiscal year ended, with no need for continuing resolutions, was 1997, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

Because Congress is so polarized, it's tough for legislation to garner the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster in the Senate. This hurdle is especially difficult "when you're talking about things in the budget process where Congress first has to agree on big, top-line numbers for how much they want to spend across the board and then they actually have to proceed to the hard work of dividing up the pie," said Molly Reynolds, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution.

Appropriations measures also become popular targets for other, unrelated issues because of their "must pass" status, which can ramp up the drama. These combined challenges are why Congress finds itself flirting with shutdowns so often, Reynolds said.

To make the federal budget process more functional, Reynolds said, Congress should develop the appropriations bills individually in their respective subcommittees and bring them to the floor in "minibus," or smaller, packages rather than omnibus packages that put all the appropriations bills together.

"In 2018, we had both the start of a record-long government shutdown and also, earlier in 2018, we had Congress's most productive appropriations year in several decades. Part of what made that happen was this minibus strategy," Reynolds said.

The minibus strategy allowed some of the appropriations bills to pass that year, keeping significant parts of the government funded, even though other parts shut down.

"We don't live in the political world that we lived in when Congress wrote the Congressional Budget Act of 1974," Reynolds said, adding that lawmakers should try to figure out "what are the things about the 1974 process that we think are valuable and that we can keep, and then how do we adapt other parts of the process to recognize the [current] political realities."

While Congress has skirted another government shutdown for now, the debt ceiling deadline still looms. If the debt limit isn't raised or suspended by Oct. 18, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, the U.S. won't be able to pay its bills and the country could default for the first time ever. Because so many countries rely on the U.S. economy, such an outcome would have dire and unpredictable repercussions around the globe.

Democrats could raise the debt ceiling on their own through a process called reconciliation, which only requires a simple majority to pass in the Senate, rather than the usual 60 needed to overcome a filibuster. However, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has refused to resort to reconciliation, calling it "risky" and "uncharted waters."

The reconciliation process can only be used once per fiscal year and Democrats are already considering using it to pass their $3.5 trillion domestic policy package. However, the fate of that legislation and the $1 trillion infrastructure bill remains uncertain as the Democratic party is divided over how much money to spend on what programs.

And amid the drama over the federal budget and infrastructure package, two landmark election reform bills have taken a backseat, despite voting rights advocates' urgent calls for passage. The Freedom to Vote Act was introduced earlier this month as a compromise version of the For the People Act. Both the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act face long odds in the Senate if the filibuster remains intact.

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Congress narrowly averts a shutdown but is still mired in legislative dysfunction - The Fulcrum

The Afghanistan government was the latest addition to the dustbin of failed American diplomatic ventures. As Thomas Meaney said in The London Review of Books, the former president Ashraf Ghani has now joined the ranks of Washingtons failed proxies: Ng nh Dim, Ahmed Chalabi, Nouri al-Maliki, Hamid Karzai. Why did this happen again?

The Taliban created a successful narrative for themselves while enjoying close access to many ordinary Afghan communities and foreign funding. Meanwhile, the U.S. policy of implementing a whole new political arrangement from above proved to be impractical, while there were also too many contradictions in their interventionist policy.

War, nowadays, is about the confrontation of ideologies. A nation has finite resources, but resources of an ideology can be boundless. The Taliban continuously attracted new members by portraying themselves as the defenders of Islam against the godless imperalist American forces. At the same time, they played on the locals instinctive dislike of having their country occupied by foreigners.

In contrast, the U.S. could not spread an effective counter-narrative. Sulaiman Assadullah, an MU graduate student from Afghanistan with experiences in development work in his home country, said that the dream U.S. brought into Afghanistan democratic elections, political freedoms and womens rights had never penetrated into the rural areas and provinces. They may have built Kabul into a metropolitan liberal city, but the extent of modernization was far too little.

The Taliban also operated among the ordinary masses. After getting ousted by the U.S. in December 2001, surviving members of the Taliban simply went back to their villages. They dressed the way ordinary people dressed and lived in houses ordinary people lived in. Patrick Cockburn, a veteran Middle East correspondent, said that throughout the 20-year period, the Taliban commanders were still in the villages and remained very undefeated.

Funding is another important factor. The Taliban was nurtured and backed by Pakistan. The country had tolerated religious schools that trained new Taliban recruits; their security service, ISI, was known to send the Taliban military assistance. The porous border between Afghanistan and Pakistan meant that Taliban leaders and fighters could simply cross over to Pakistan to bide their time.

There may be an ethnic factor in Pakistans calculation of supporting the Taliban. The Taliban was mostly made up of people from the Pashtun ethnic group, the largest in Afghanistan. The Pashtuns are also the second largest ethnic group in Pakistan. The Americans backed the Northern Alliance, which was largely made up of northern Tajik and Uzbek warlords. Foreign involvement in Afghanistan had led that war to become increasingly ethnocentric. This had the potential effect of decreasing trust in any national government.

The policy of promoting freedom and democracy abroad adopted by the U.S. sounded great in theory. However, it wasnt that easy in practice. Afghanistan was a largely rural and traditional country. Many had never really experienced democracy. Assadullah said the U.S. didnt educate the Afghan public adequately on running democratic governments. The Afghan government post-2001 was imposed upon from above. It was not something the people had fought for the way Americans and the French did. Assadullah mentioned stories of local government officials leaving their posts before the Taliban came to their areas.

The U.S. also had to balance bringing freedom and democracy with their own national interests. These two considerations often didnt coincide. Professor Heather Ba, who specializes in international political economy, said that Afghanistan didnt have much strategic value in Americas foreign policy plans. She said even though there are mineral mines in the country, nobody has ever accessed them. As time passed, people in America started questioning the purpose of going into that country. One ought to remember that the U.S. only toppled the Taliban after the 9/11 attacks. Back in the 90s, they were supporting the equally undemocratic mujahideen.

Assadullah repeatedly pointed out the irony of the War on Terror since the U.S. would not confront Pakistan despite knowing the latters role in sponsoring the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Championing freedom and democracy certainly gave the U.S. a moral high ground, but that ground can be quite shaky when they also have close relations with dictatorships such as the Gulf monarchies and the Central Asian states. There are American military forces in Kuwait, Qatar and others; a report from the Department of State said that the country had spent over $50 billion in economic assistance in countries like Kazakhstan and the Kyrgyz Republic. It was exactly this kind of hypocrisy that made people lose faith in the U.S.

The humanitarian work carried out by the U.S. was often unsatisfactory. For instance, Assadullah remembered a time when he worked on an USAID project for upgrading the technology in local universities in Afghanistan. Most of the budget ended up paying for international consultants and the team working on the project, with only a fraction of the original budget going into actually developing the local universities.The ineffectiveness of foreign aid diminished public support for their supposed liberators. A 2019 report from USAID showed that an estimated 43% of the 2,231 USAID awards in fiscal years 2014-2016 only achieved half of the expected results in their projects, but they still got paid in full. Such a military-and-humanitarian-aid complex left even an experienced aid worker like Assadullah disillusioned.

This only touches on the surface of why the U.S.-backed Afghan government fell so quickly when left alone. The causes of this failure are debatable, but the consequences are beyond doubt. Scenes of people hanging onto the wings of airplanes, pouring into refugee camps and women burning their clothes and diplomas were the undeniable results.

_In pursuit of racial and social equity, The Maneater encourages its readers to donate to NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, a legal organization dedicated to fighting for racial justice through litigation and education. Donate at: https://engage.naacpldf.org/dBCvDTd9IEiXX_jPkmkT_w2

Edited by Cayli Yanagida | cyanagida@maneater.com

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The 20-year itch: Reasons behind the US withdrawal from Afghanistan - The Maneater

Mobility is freedom, but just as the slaveholders who founded this country never believed in liberty for all, today too one need only look at a map of Richmonds bus system to see the limits of many folks freedom. Routes that end at the county line and buses that only run once an hour are two of the most visible boundaries that fence in Richmonders freedom. The most ubiquitous and all-too-often unquestioned limitation on our freedom, however, is the farebox. If we want to liberate ourselves from car-dependency, save the planet, and right the wrongs of the past, the bus should be free.

Public good, private payment

The bus doesnt care if you cant afford a car, if your disability disallows driving, or if youve just had one too many drinks. As long as youre waiting at a stop, the bus will pick you up and carry you homeno questions asked. The bus epitomizes a public good: its available to all, and society is better off the more people use it. The problem is that we treat the bus like a private company (and in Richmond it actually is). Unlike other public services such as libraries and schools, we expect the bus to pay for itself, largely on the backs of the working poor who take it.

Most Richmonders dont ride the bus regularly. Many residents of the surrounding suburbs never have. But whether you even know what GRTC stands for or not, you and your lifestyle are transit-reliant. The nurses in your hospital, the clerks at your local supermarket, and the custodians at your office or university represent just a fraction of the folks that rely upon the bus every day to get to work, to pick up their kids from school, and to shop or to seek out healthcare. Without access to fast, frequent, and reliable public transit, much of our economy and our society would come to a screeching halt.

The crucial role high-quality transit plays in our daily lives is easily overlooked by those who dont regularly ride the bus. When youre passing a Pulse on Broad Street or waiting behind a bus stopped to let folks on and off, public transit feels like little more than another vehicle in your wayan inconvenience to your personal commute. From the outside, you can only vaguely make out the bodies of those on board. You know nothing of their lives and their stories. Take a trip with the Greater Richmond Transit Company (GRTC) and you begin to see, understand, and empathize with your fellow passengers.

A dollar and fifty cents to ride may not seem like a lot, but for Tarrance Bryanta new GRTC riderthat amount is the difference between a reliable route to work and walking. It can take up to three weeks to get your first paycheck at a new job, and many people just starting their careers or rejoining the workforce dont have money on hand to finance their commute in the meantime. Thats why Tarrence supports zero-fare transit: I like that its free because at this time I just started working, and if it wasnt for it being free I wouldnt really have a ride to work. I would probably have to walk.

No respect for riders

Politicians can always find funding to address the needs of the wealthy and well-connected. Issues important to those who take transit are often just as ignored as those who tend to ride the bus most: the working poor, the disabled, the elderly, teenagers, and people of color.

Twenty-seven percent of bus riders in Richmond have a combined household income of less than $10,000 per year. Over half earn less than the federal poverty rate for Virginia of $26,500 for a family of four, and a full 89 percent of GRTCs riders have household incomes below the state median. If bus riders lacking affluence werent already enough of a reason for the powers that be to ignore their plight, nearly three quarters of those who take transit are people of color.

In America, we all agree that talk is cheap. For all the verbal praise heaped upon our essential workers throughout the course of the pandemic, we didnt do enough to keep folks on the frontline safe. Instead of introducing substantive policy changes in response to the racial reckoning that was the murder of George Floyd, our society settled on BLM book clubs and empty promises of equity.

The complexities of race, class, and poverty in the United Statesmuch less in the former capital of the Confederacyseldom allow for simple solutions. If our goal is to expand the freedom of our friends, family, coworkers, and neighbors, then eliminating bus fares is one of the most straightforward and equitable actions we can take.

Fund our future

The cost of a years worth of access to GRTC adds up to $720. Scraping together the $60 needed for a monthly pass often proves so impossible for many poor riders that they end up spending roughly $1,000 a year on fares, paying $1.50 each time they ride. If the bus were free like many other public services we all rely upon, Central Virginias poorest would get to keep that cash to pay for other essential expenses like housing, food, and healthcare. Going fare free functions as a backdoor boost to wages by allowing those who take transit to work to keep more of their money.

Eliminating fares may sound like an expensive endeavor, but in actuality the cost is minor. In fiscal year 2019, GRTC collected $4.5 million in revenue from local routes in the City of Richmond, the same routes which are primarily frequented by low-income people of color. That means for roughly five million dollars a year, we could all ride the bus for free whenever we want, as much as we want. Going fare free would also allow GRTC to end fare enforcement, protecting passengers from over-policing and empowering bus operators to avoid conflict with riders who cant afford their fare.

Five million dollars is a lot of money. However, compared to the $33 million the City of Richmond plans to spend on road repaving this year, the $170 million raised annually by the Central Virginia Transportation Authority, or the seven billion dollar budget the commonwealth gives VDOT each year, five million dollars is practically a rounding error. Any or all of these sources could easily eliminate bus fares in Greater Richmond, but we must demand it of our local leaders and state representatives.

The New York Times estimates that 100 cities around the world offer free public transit, with many of them in Europe. But recently, cities in the United States, Kansas City, Mo and Olympia, Washington have begun to implement fare free transit as well. Why cant Richmond be the next city to embrace free public transit? Its easy to tout an equity agenda or hire a diversity and inclusion officer, its much more meaningful to put your money where your mouth is. If we want to honor essential workers and invest in eliminating racial inequities, then we must prioritize the needs of our neediest neighbors and make the bus free permanently.

This essay is part of the Richmond Racial Equity Essays series exploring what racial equity looks like in Virginias capital, but we think the ideas here have implications for cities all over the country. It is reprinted here with permission. Check out the full project, the accompanying videos and the podcast.

Wyatt Gordon is a born-and-raised Richmonder with a masters in urban planning from the University of Hawaii at Mnoa and a bachelors in international political economy from the American University in Washington, D.C. He currently covers transportation, housing, and land use for the Virginia Mercury. He also works as a policy and campaigns manager for land use and transportation at the Virginia Conservation Network. Wyatt is a proud Northsider you can find walking, biking, and taking the bus all over town.

Faith Walker grew up in Richmonds East End and still calls the area home. She currently serves as the Director of Community Engagement for RVA Rapid TransitVirginias only public transportation non-profit, which represents transit riders. Faith has a long track record for using creative solutions to address systemic issues, community engagement and commitment to cultivating long-lasting partnerships.

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The Bus Should Be Free - Next City