A constitutional amendment approved in 2014 by 75 percent of voters requires fragile environments be conserved. Citizens have spoken, so why isn’t government responding?
According to the article, Florida Forever, the state’s environmental conservation initiative, has identified 118 projects, totaling nearly 2.2 million acres, that should be kept natural. But, not enough money has been appropriated to buy this acreage.
Since 2008, average cost to buy such land has been $6,400 per acre. On the other hand, the state could have bought the development rights for this same land for $1,700 per acre via conservation easements.
This means almost four times as much environmentally sensitive land could be protected from development in perpetuity for the same amount of money. Plus, the land remains in private hands.
So, why isn’t the Legislature urging state land managers to purchase conservation easements from willing landowners instead of buying the land outright?
Hillary Clinton easily leads Donald Trump in Washington State, new NPI poll finds - NPI's Cascadia Advocate
Presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton has a double digit lead over presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, according to a survey conducted this week by Public Policy Polling for the Northwest Progressive Institute.
If the candidates for President this fall were Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump, who would you vote for?
49% said they would vote for Hillary Clinton, while 37% said they would vote for Donald Trump. 13% said they were not sure.
This survey of 679 likely Washington State voters was in the field from June 14th-15th, 2016; all respondents participated via landline. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 3.8% at the 95% confidence level.
These results are not surprising, as Washington is considered to be a blue state. Washington voters have supported the Democratic nominee for President in every election going back to 1988. Michael Dukakis, Al Gore, and John Kerry each carried the state, and so did Bill Clinton and Barack Obama — twice.
The results of last month’s presidential primary show that Clinton and Trump are also Washingtonians’ top choices to be the 2016 nominees of the Democratic and Republican parties. Hillary Clinton received 52.38% of the vote on the Democratic side, while Trump received 75.46% of the vote on the Republican side.
Republicans are using the primary results to allocate all of their national convention delegates. The Democratic Party opted not to use the primary results, and instead utilized caucuses to determine how many delegates each candidate would receive.
Republicans recently held their state convention in the Tri-Cities and selected their delegates. Most of those delegates personally favor Ted Cruz, but under current Republican rules, are required to vote for Donald Trump on the first ballot.
Democratic congressional-level delegates were selected on May 21st (I was chosen as a delegate for Bernie Sanders from WA-01). The state’s at-large and PLEO delegates will be chosen this weekend by those members of the Washington State Democratic Central Committee who represent a legislative district.
I represent the 45th Legislative District on the WSDCC, so I will be spending most of my Sunday listening to speeches by people who wish to represent our fine state in Philadelphia for either Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders.
As a reminder, NPI will be offering live coverage of this weekend’s 2016 Washington State Democratic Convention in Tacoma. Join us here on the Cascadia Advocate to keep track of all of the goings-on live from the City of Destiny. And be sure to join us early next week as well, because we’ll be releasing more results from this survey.
North West REC works closely with our power supplier, Northwest Iowa Power Cooperative (NIPCO), to operate the load management system and to reduce power costs for our members.
Ideally, an electric generation and transmission system operates most efficiently when the load remains constant 24 hours a day. However, reality has shown electricity use varies from hour to hour, creating peaks and valleys in the load pattern. Load management switches, installed on equipment such as water heaters, air conditioners, crop dryers, irrigation systems, qualifying large loads and heat systems can help level the load pattern.
Electric load levels are continually monitored through a substation at NIPCO. During peak periods, when the load reaches a predetermined level, a radio signal is sent to the switch from the NIPCO control center to interrupt power. When the signals cease, the controlled equipment returns to normal operation.
North West REC has installed more than 5,000 load management switches in our service territory since the program began in 1985. Customers report they have experienced little or no inconvenience with Switch Makes Cents; most say they have not noticed their equipment being controlled. By controlling load use, we realize savings on our wholesale power costs, allowing us to pass that savings to our members through the lower, Switch Makes Cents rates.
Members who have electric heat as their primary heat source in their home or commercial or agriculture building, may qualify for Switch Makes Cents electric heat rates. This reduced sub-metered rate applies to all electricity used for electric heat and air conditioning, as well as electric water heater use. The primary heat source must be electric, and electricity is wired to load management.
• The rate is $.049/kWh for electricity used for the water heater and electric heat and air conditioning; the primary heat source must be electric
Another way our members save with Switch Makes Cents, is through our rebate program, which helps with equipment purchase and installation costs.