Thank you to the NEPA professionals who participated in the Sources of Frustration & Delay in the NEPA Process survey that came out of the Re:NEPA “50% faster” discussion. As of today, 98 NEPA professionals have completed the survey. Below is an overview of the survey results.
I’m not familiar with this survey
If you’re familiar with the survey, skip this section. If you’re not familiar with the survey, here’s some background information.
The Sources of Frustration & Delay in the NEPA Process survey came out of the Re:NEPA “50% faster” discussion. The purpose of the survey is to identify issues that consistently result in frustration and delay in the NEPA process. All of the issues included in this survey are from comments made in the Re:NEPA discussion . The desired outcome of the survey is to identify 2 or 3 big issues that are driving everyone crazy. Ideally, the Re:NEPA community can then brainstorm ways to address these big issues.
Sources of Frustration & Delay that Impact a Large Number of Projects
How often do you run into the following issues during the NEPA process?
Sources of Frustration & Delay that Stop Projects or Cause Major Delays
On average, what was the level of delay or frustration for projects with these issues?
If you are interested in more detailed results of this survey, email me, and I’ll send you a pdf with a breakdown of the issues and survey responses.
What’s Next for this Project
I heard from several people that this data should be publicized in an article. I personally don’t want to write or read a negative article with only a list of issues that are “broken” in the NEPA process. I think the next step for this project should be to publicize the above 8 issues (well, technically, 7 because 1 issue is repeated on both lists) and get ideas from the NEPA community on how to address these issues. If we get good ideas for addressing the issues, then I will write an article about the survey data along with the ideas for potential solutions.
If you have any other ideas for potential or partial solutions that specifically address the 8 issues above and your ideas should be included in an article, send your suggestions to me privately via email or DM on Twitter (@cubitplanning), or provide your suggestions publicly below.
Sarah presented on the legal framework of environmental justice analysis. You can watch Sarah’s portion of the presentation here:
The Present
Brandy presented on the current state of TxDOT guidance. One very interesting portion of her talk was a list of major elements of environmental justice analysis. Brandy asked a series of questions that I’ve outlined below.
Major Elements of Environmental Justice Analysis
1. Users and Options
Who is using the facility?
What are their choices?
How do you figure out who is using the facility?
Are there free, parallel access roads?
What are the non-toll routes?
2. Accessibility, Policies and Collection Methods
Where is the excess toll revenue going?
What kind of projects are being funding with the toll revenue?
How easy is it to get a toll tag?
Does a toll tag require a credit card?
What are the payment options other than a toll tag?
How far do people have to go to get a tag?
What are the payment choices?
How much more does it cost if users don’t have a toll tag?
3. Economic Analysis
Today, TxDOT uses a simple reasonable scenario analysis to determine economic impact.
How often is someone likely to use the facility?
How many times per year?
How much would a reasonable scenario cost (i.e. likely times to use the facility x number of times per year)?
What percentage of income would the reasonable scenario be for a person of low-income versus a person of medium income?
You can watch Brandy’s portion of the presentation here:
The Future
Finally, Jolanda presented her research on the Appraisal of Available Analytical Tools To Assess Environmental Justice Impacts of Toll Road Projects. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Texas is a leader in analysis of potential environmental justice concerns followed closely by Washington DOT. Learn more about the methods used by the different states in Jolanda’s portion of the presentation here:
Does your company block YouTube? If so, check out the PowerPoint of the presentation here.
On FHWA’s Re:NEPA, there’s a survey based on a long discussion entitled NEPA: 50% faster? The purpose of the survey to identify 2 or 3 big issues that consistently result in frustration and/or delay in the NEPA process. With this information, the Re:NEPA community can then brainstorm ways to address these big issues.
Over 50 people have already responded to the Sources of Delay and Frustration Survey. So far, the 2 issues that are “in the lead” are:
* Changes in project scope or unclear project scope
* Increased documentation levels (i.e. EAs now EIS size)
If you’ve already completed the survey, please email the link above to people whose input should be included. I’ll be sure and post more detailed survey results in the near future.
An Unscientific Survey of Real Estate Data in 14 EISs published in January 2010
I read 14 EISs from the NEPA Library to see what real estate data was being included in these documents. Below are the results of my unscientific survey.
The chart above indicates that:
5 EISs had homeownership rates (i.e. 70% homeowners, 30% renters);
5 EISs had median home value/price data (i.e. $200,0000 per home);
4 EISs had total number of residences in the project area (i.e. 150 homes);
4 EISs had vacancy rate data (i.e. 12% of homes were vacant);
4 EISs had average household size data (i.e. 3.1 people per household); and
3 EISs had new building permits counts (i.e. 100 permits in 2008).
Real Estate Data Sources
The majority of the documents used city and county level data. The US Census 2000 was the most often referenced data source by far.
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So What Now?
I’ve been trying to decide what current real estate data to include in Cubit’s Housing and Regional Economic report. Based on my survey, I’m going to add homeownership rates, median home value/price, total number of residences, vacancy rates and average household size data to the Housing and Regional Economic report.
I’m going to use 2006-2008 American Community Survey data, because 1. it’s more up to date than 2000 Census data and 2. it’s available for large counties/cities (which are the project areas that were most likely to be used in the 14 surveyed documents). I’ll also consider adding permit counts from US Census Bureau’s Building Permits data.
Small Area Median Home Values
Small area home data is often difficult to find.
But I am disappointed that more of the documents didn’t include small area real estate data, like for zip codes or Census tracts. When I was writing NEPA documents, I needed small area data. Sure, county level data was helpful. But if a project was going to displace a home, I needed real estate data about that specific neighborhood or zip code to determine relocation opportunities. So I’m debating adding median home values for small area geographies like Census tracts to the Housing and Regional Economic report.
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Would median home value data for geographies smaller than cities or counties be helpful? Or is city/county level data sufficient for your analysis? Or maybe you’d like a blog post on good data sources for small area real estate data? Let me know what you think in the comments below, or contact me.
The Obama administration may soon issue an executive order adding climate change to the list of factors federal agencies must take into account when evaluating projects and policies.
Environmentalists have pushed for the expansion of the 40-year-old National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which currently requires agencies to consider environmental factors such as land use, biodiversity and air quality.
“People will think longer and harder and smarter about what they build when they understand that the environment around them is changing,” said David Bookbinder, chief climate counsel at the Sierra Club.
Business groups have opposed the revision, saying the stricter requirements will slow down federal approvals and ultimately hurt the economy. Some state and federal agencies already consider climate impact when analyzing projects.
“Requiring analysis of climate change impacts during the NEPA process … will slow our economic recovery while providing no meaningful environmental benefits,” wrote Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe (R) and Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso (R) in an October letter to Nancy Sutley, head of the White House Council on
Environmental Quality.
“Projects across the nation are already experiencing delays or being canceled due to inappropriate and inefficient implementation and litigation from existing environmental regulations,” they added.
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Also, if you are interested in learning more about climate change issues and NEPA, the DEL Program will be holding the upcoming course “Considering Greenhouse Gases and Climate Change under NEPA,” March 3-5, 2010. See this website for more information and registration: http://nicholas.duke.edu/del/continuinged/greenhousegasMar10.html
The other 79 pending permits in the area could be sent back to go through the public process again as well, according to the Sierra Club spokesman, Oliver Bernstein.
Judge Chambers said that the US Army Corps of Engineers’ public involvement was lacking on two fronts. First, he ruled that the information released to the public at first was unclear and inadequate. Secondly, once the Corps released hundreds of pages of information actually relevant to the environmental assessment, it was released post-notice and post-comment.
The public notices would have been sufficient if they had included practical information, such as the type of plan proposed, the location, a map, information regarding topography, and historical background of the area. “Plaintiffs are not requesting engineering-level detail,” Chambers said. “However, conceptual analysis is necessary… to intelligently comment on a public notice.”
NEPA Lesson Learned: Include practical information such as scope, location and a map with public notices.
The 9th Circuit Appellate Court reviewed the EIS prepared for the exchange of land in Joshua Tree National Park between the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Kaiser Eagle Mountain Inc. and confirmed that the EIS violated NEPA. Specifically, the EIS:
used too narrow purpose objectives that resulted in a flawed alternative analysis, and
didn’t adequate address eutrophication or the introducing of new chemicals or nutrients into an ecosystem.
The court determined that the purpose and need in the EIS was more beneficial to the private Kaiser Company than the general public. As a result, the alternatives that stemmed from the purpose were too narrow as well. Even though 6 alternatives were considered, the alternatives were focused on benefiting Kaiser instead of the general public and were written under the assumption that the land exchange would occur.
The court also decided that eutrophication was not properly addressed in the EIS. Instead of having an eutrophication section of the document, the EIS addressed eutrophication in a piecemeal fashion by referencing impacts in other sections of the document like air quality and disease vector control. This piecemeal approach failed to be a thorough look at how new nutrients would affect the ecosystem.
Scopion in Joshua Tree Park
NEPA Lesson Learned: Eutrophication should be addressed in its own section of the EIS when new pollutants will be introduced into an ecosystem.
The Highlights Handbook presents background data and studies, explains the different lifestages of children, lists the fundamental principles of exposure assessment and cumulative exposure, and provides references for all these components.
These tools are becoming increasingly handy to planners and evaluators of environmental effects as they are taking on the role of health risk assessors. In the actual CSEFH, there are specific chapters that are most likely pertinent to planners. These would the chapters devoted to non-dietary exposures:
The NASA Twitter Bird. Even NASA uses social media websites.
Ryan Link, a Planner with Michael Baker Jr. Inc’s (Baker) Richmond, Virginia office, got hooked on social media over a year ago when working with the non-profit Athletes for a Cure. He immediately made the connection that sites such as Twitter and Facebook could increase public engagement, involvement and outreach for NEPA and just about any planning project.
Recently, Baker has had the opportunity to use these social media sites for the Loop 1604 EIS in San Antonio, TX. The Alamo Regional Mobility Authority (ARMA) is undergoing a 3 year environmental study for Loop 1604 around San Antonio, Texas. In addition to traditional public involvement and outreach like a “More for 1604” website and public meetings, Baker and the Alamo RMA are using 4 popular social media sites to communicate about the EIS: Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Below is a little more information about these sites and how they are being used by Baker and the Alamo RMA to increase engagement during public involvement for the Loop 1604 EIS project.
Facebook is the most popular social networking site in the world, boasting 300 million users. Users stay current with friends and colleagues via messages, status updates, blog posts and photo galleries. Facebook provides one of the most efficient and free services to stay current in your social world and in the outside world.
The “More for 1604” page Facebook page invites visitors to “Become a Fan”, and join 257 other fans. The “About Me” section tells me that the purpose of the Facebook page is to enhance communication in the community and to make their EIS process transparent.
Scrolling down the news feed, I can find pictures of the meetings or submit my own photos. Status updates include invites to submit articles, blogs, and editorials about the Loop. There are polls and “Questions of the Week”, one of which was “What are your to 3 reasons for using Loop 1604?” The page also cross-references their Twitter page.
Twitter is another successful free social networking site that provides a mini-blogging service. Users set up profiles, add “followers,” and then send messages to their followers. The 140-character mass messages to followers, called “tweets,” vary in purpose: announcements, questions, answers. Tweets can be passed along (”re-tweets”) and replied to creating distributed conversations.
The More for 1604 Twitter page gives their bio as, “The latest on the Loop 1604 Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).” The project has 36 tweeps or Tweeter followers as of today. A recent tweet, from only a few hours ago, gives a link to some materials that will be available at an upcoming meeting:
Flickr is a free picture-sharing website, on which users sign up, upload pictures, and share them in a “photostream”. “Geo-tagged” photos may be displayed on a map. Flickr users have the ability to comment on photos, bookmark them and share with others.
Public Scoping Meeting from More for 1604 Flickr website
The More for 1604 photostream on Flickr displays a large grid with 38 photos of recent public meetings and the project study area. Unlike Twitter and Facebook, this website does not provide links to their website or any other social media site. Poking around, I find that the account has only been set up in August 2009, so time will most likely bring a more developed site.
YouTube is another extremely popular website that enables users to upload and share videos. Again, you can create a profile, upload your videos, and others can save them as favorites, comment on them and share them.
The More for 1604 Videos page encourages community participation. It displays a video screen with a 19-second clip of a recent public scoping meeting with 22 views as of today.
On the right side, there are more videos of the scoping meetings, showing more interactions with the public, as well as videos of the current traffic conditions of Loop 1604. I scroll down, and there is their profile, showing the number of channels and videos watched, as well as subscribers. The most popular video on the site has over 70 views.
So, Is It Working?
Ryan Link
Link is pleased with the follower and fan counts for the different sites. Residents seem to be using social media to stay informed about the project. Link hopes that residents will use social media channels to communicate and engage with the project team more in the future.
Administrative Record
It is interesting to note that none of the comments made using these methods will be included in the administrative record. Recent discussion about this controversial subject on the Re: NEPA website debates whether the the public discourse contained in such media outlets should be considered for the administrative record. The Federal Highway Administraion (FHWA) is still working on an official policy to address the use of social media in the EIS process. Hopefully, FHWA and other government agencies will expand their public involvement guidance to address social media in the near future.
But for now, The More for 1604 website provides a disclaimer on “usage of social media websites and tools”:
“Comments made on these sites (Twitter, Facebook, Socializer, blogs), herein called ‘social media sites’ will be not be included or evaluated as part of the ongoing Environmental Impact Statement decision-making process… These social networking tools are only intended to encourage public dialogue about the project.”
This statement means that these comments will not be recorded or officially included in the administrative record for the EIS. Only the traditional ways like calling their hotline, sending an email, or submitting a comment at a meeting or at their office, will provide official documentation of the public’s thoughts and input.
HELPFUL RESOURCES PROVIDED BY ALAMO RMA
Social Media Training Guides: One for Facebook, one for Twitter, and one for Flickr. Each guide give links to how to get started with these sites, how to set up accounts and how to use them.
Are You In the Loop?: A small tutorial about these social media sites for those unaware of what they are and how they can be useful. Click on “Social Media 101 Classroom: Handouts” and download the .pdf.
On October 9, Administrative Law Judge Harvey C. Sweitzer found the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to be in violation of NEPA. The Byner Cattle Corporation was proposing grazing permits in the state of Arizona, and the BLM drew up an environment assessment (EA) that the judge found to be seriously lacking a “reasonably thorough discussion of the significant aspects of the probable environmental consequences.”
In September of 2008, the BLM issued a proposed action that vaguely mentions that it would include the construction of “certain springs”, but fails to even mention their existence in the EA. Obviously, this means an analysis of the potential environmental effects of these new waterways is lacking. The Western Watersheds Project (WWP) appealed to the Department of the Interior because they claimed that these new water facilities could “dewater” the Big Sandy River, and the EA did not analyze these effects.
The proposed action for the grazing permits calls for 5 new wells, 11 new troughs, and 12 miles of pipeline. But the EA did not include the locations for any of these new waterways, or whether they would be connected to the Big Sandy River, which could cause serious environmental degradation.
The judge upheld the claims, saying that these water facilities need to be reported and analyzed also to allow for “informed decision-making” and sufficient public discussion. If this is left out of the EA, reviewers of the document “would not be aware of the springs developments, their environmental effects, or the significance of those effects.”
NEPA Lesson Learned: All potential infrastructure associated with the proposed action alternative should be analyzed in the environmental assessment.
