Economic Policies to Address a Downturn

I am subscribed to Research Gate, a web-based self-publication journal. Occasionally I visit and today I got engaged in a thread (https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_socio-economic_policy_is_appropriate_for_the_period_of_slowdown_in_economic_growth) that asked 

What socio-economic policy is appropriate for the period of slowdown in economic growth? (Dariusz Prokopowicz, Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw)

In a comment stream with 506 responses, this one by Martha Pantoja is representative: 

In a period of economic slowdown, expansionary monetary and fiscal policies should be applied to boost public and private spending and consumption, which in turn stimulates investment.

I do not want to engage the minutia of these macro-economic policy solutions. The argument is inadequate on its face. 

While macro policies employed by governments and institutions must be correctly adjusted (the topic of so many comments here), we must take heed of the premise which seems to pervade these analyses. There is very little discussion of how to support individuals, families and communities to utilize these expansionary policies, or indeed how to survive during the downturn, or how to structure the economy, wealth distribution, or resource accessibility. They seem all to suppose that economic growth cures all ills, and that the invisible hand of the market place automatically distributes resources where they are needed. 

Since growth is cyclical and constrained by the bio-physical limits of the Earth, there must be downturns and periods during which macro policies have failed and other systems must be in place. Since resources follow wealth, they in fact do not automatically allocate according to need, and the economy must be structured to improve access to resources at all times, including especially non-peak low-growth, non-growth periods. 

The idea that growth must be fostered because in growth there is more wealth to be distributed would be valid if in fact the poor were getting richer and the richer were getting poorer. However, even if the bottom incomes are rising some bit, most increases in wealth are allocated to those who are privileged to already control some wealth, and the flow of wealth increases most with the amount of wealth already in possession (due to exponential return on non-encumbered wealth: poor people cannot afford to invest in growth securities and benefit from exponential growth, but those who are already wealthy can). Therefore the remedy of fiscal and monetary stimulus is inadequate. The economy must in the first place be engineered to ensure that money flows to those without market leverage or high demand skills. The goal is not to make everyone rich, but to stabilize and ensure the distribution of goods that are necessary for health and opportunity. 

The concept of Carrying Capacity predicts that, in the absence of planning and care, there must be pain as populations increase to the margin of resource availability. This pain is universally experienced by the poor, allowing the already rich and thriving to consume and reduce the resources that could be allocated to the poor, without suffering any consequences. This is highly ironic because the response of all humans to insecurity is to have more children, not fewer (contrary to Malthus; consistent with the demographic transition), resulting in more suffering. Since insecurity, and suffering, are concentrated among the poor, extremes of population growth are also concentrated there. However, strategies such as education and access to contraception are very effective ways to help poor people escape the cycle of suffering that results from having too many children, and focus on economic well being. However these strategies require government and institutional action. 

The primary focus of policy makers therefore must be to promote not growth but stability of access to resources. Another view of the stability of access to resources is "justice". In fact these are distributive policies, which seek to "bake in" fairness, to obviate the ages-old pattern of the rich harvesting the bounty of the land while the poor must do the work, without getting the benefit. Growth does not inherently increase access to resources, and therefore policies promoting growth do not either. Policies that promote justice, the distribution of resources, and the security and  stability of access to resources are the proper policies to alleviate the effects of downturns.

Burlington on the Cusp of Trump’s (hoped for ) Defeat

My community development textbook identifies three configurations of the political culture which define the kind of development which is possible.

- No-Growth, led by a cohort of financial interests, who prefer to maintain the status quo. It holds the power and operates to keep people and groups with needs out of the political decision making. This arrangement conspires to keep participation low.

- Pro-Growth, led by a cohort of financial interests, primarily the rentier class, who profit from increasing pressure on the supply of real estate to raise rents and increase the extent of rental properties available for new rentals. Since you must own property to have the cash flow to buy property, this model tends to enrich a few even as the rest of the community is ground into low income employment and poverty. It holds the power and operates to keep people and groups with needs out of the political decision making. This arrangement conspires to keep participation low.

- Smart Development, led by no one and everyone, it depends on the culture of the community that insists on inclusion and participation. Decisions are made in public meetings and infused with listening. There aren't any closed door meetings, and groups with a grievance are heard and included. This arrangement shares the power of community decision making, and operates to increase participation.

This ideal vision is enacted in many American cities, along with the corrupt forms listed first above, and is, I would argue, what we are striving for. But we must keep our eyes on the ball. Since we have a distinctly not machine Council at this moment, Burlington is not solidly in the pro-growth camp, but the mayor is clearly a growth oriented administrator, using the power of his office to make deals and promote the profit making interests of the business class, bulldozing any resistance and shutting out voices of contrary interests. And we must watch our councilors for slippage.

Each of these systems possesses its own homeostatic equilibrium, that it is difficult to escape from. Burlington, prior to Mayor Sanders, was a machine city. Sanders' election instituted some changes that moved Burlington toward the Smart Development vision, but the shift wasn't complete. To complete that shift is our higher mission.

Although I do worry about a Trump coup, at the root of our crisis of civility and radical anger, marginalization of some groups and enhancement of privilege for others, is the failure of the American system to include everyone - including people whose imaginations lean toward fascist, socialist or just criminal - in its prosperity in times thus due, and the costs in times of loss, in short, to promote a vision of a shared destiny. I don't trust the Dems to do the right thing, but our interests do not align with taking power and effecting certain policies at the expense of others. Our interests align with those who share our vision of an inclusive culture that engages everyone, brings everyone into the conversation and promotes solutions which maximizes well-being, opportunity, diversity and participation across all fields of expression. We need to support political leaders who understand that vision, are willing to take chances to increase the franchise of participation, who are motivated by a vision of a community where everyone feels they can find a safe and legal way to make a living and lead the life they want to. The Dems will fail us, the Progs will fail us, but individuals will step forward and no matter their party, we must advance them and hold them to the promise of our vision.

One of the failures of previous Progressive administrations was that they fell into the no-growth mode. They built very little housing, and allowed voices of resistance to take priority. A healthy city doesn't exclude business interests and rentiers from its decisions, secondly because this would inspire sabotage, but firstly because it would violate the principle of inclusion. A healthy city allows organic growth without prioritizing growth. A healthy city does not call for stasis, it promotes thoughtful change. Until we are able to institute property-ownership-in-common, and set up a coop-model and employee-ownership model of every different kind of business, so that private profit making isn't the primary model of economic activity, we'll need to work with these groups - the vision of an inclusive city simply does not tolerate exclusion of them. The key difference is that an inclusive city is one in which private wealth accumulation is not the reason and cause of all decisions. It is simply one of the normal features of living, which occurs in many ways. We need to normalize business activity as not an evil, but as an activity that is sometimes conducted in evil ways, and whose evil ways must be ended. What these are then become a matter of agreement in an inclusive community. We must promote the marketplace of ideas, and let the best ideas surface, always with our eye on the prize - a city that is peaceful because the people are happy and able to live full lives as members of a community that loves them, which they are able to love in return.

My Statement To Charter Change Committee, City of Burlington, Vt.

Every status - banker, landlord, tenant, advocate, lawyer, owner, renter, homeless - is a category we engineer into our laws. We can change those laws to ensure that everyone is protected equally and to maximum well-being. By requiring a reason to evict, the law would only be telling property owners "you can't do this for emotional reasons (you don't get along with your tenant), or on a whim. If you must have a substantial reason, your rental business will not be harmed, your business will be more stable, the community your properties are in will be more stable, and the lives of your tenants will improve." Moreover, such a requirement reminds us that being a property owner isn't just to benefit you - you are renting to human beings who need the services you are offering, and once you do rent to them, you must afford them the justice of never evicting them without them having already done you harm. To demand that dignity is not such a huge ask, as these are members of your community. To require a just cause for an eviction is simply to give the tenant the dignity of calling their rental their home.

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The Era of Democracy Has Closed. Long Live Democracy.

 

Democracy is the luxury of elites who have plenty to share between them, who feel they are safe to share their power. Then, who is "elite" in this democracy can be defined to include non-property owners, non-men, non-whites, non-cis-gender, the non-wealthy, even non-nationals! Who is elite, and for whom democracy operates, can be defined to be an entire nation, as long as there is enough to share, and as long as everybody is ok with sharing. Correction: Capitalist Democracy is a luxury of elites. 

Unfortunately, as the Non-s proliferate and demand shares of the fruits of a democratic society, some folks freak out. Their freedom, wealth and privilege having been premised on the oppression of some of these Non-s, and they get less willing to share. They see all these OTHERS, all these Non-s, gathering around, and they see the water rising around them, in many cases very literally, while others escape in their yachts, sometimes literally, and they see the value of their wages going down, and their health care getting too expensive to use, they’re losing their homes and jobs and they’re not better off than their parents, and the for-profit system is stripping all the value out of their paychecks and they’re feeling super-stressed and when they look for a reason for this stress, the words of a demagogue are soothing. Don’t practice humility, don’t be vulnerable, don’t ready yourself to take responsibility for unspeakable horrors, don’t ask “What can I do better?” Blame everyone else. Blame the OTHER. Blame the Non-s. Blame for your embedded guilt for the acts of genocide and slavery of your ancestors, blame for your embedded guilt for hoarded wealth, everyone else. But don’t blame the elites. Don’t blame them with the bullhorn. Don’t blame them with the checkbooks. Don’t blame them who can do something about it. They have what we want. And why would that include democracy for everyone else?

And while some people freak out because the Non-s are coming for their share, the Non-s might have some pent up rage, and hate at them who ain’t willing to share. So there might be some tension in the air. And danger of riots. 

And if we get Donald Trump for another term, it may be a very long term, maybe the terminal term, not just because he has so cleverly crafted his rhetoric and used his powers of manipulation, but because the conditions under which democracy, and sharing, are possible, are collapsing from our self-serving neglect of our democracy.

How is it that democratically controlled town boards cannot set building standards for the residents of their towns, so that when fires rip through, those houses will not be destroyed? If this is democracy, democracy is about to kill itself on the altar of personal freedom to choose to die in an inferno. If a scientific fact cannot be accepted by the democratically elected Congress, and that Congress cannot write legislation to fight global warming, what good is democracy? Correction: capitalist democracy.

Because democracy doesn’t work when you’re selfish, when you’re only asking “Where’s mine?”.

Meanwhile, autocratic China is able to declare — credibly — that it will be net carbon zero by 2060. Meanwhile, research I have read informs China policy makers on how to preserve ecosystem services by reducing sprawl. I hate the genocidal aspect of the Chinese government, I hate their brutal methods of restraining population growth, but it may be the autocratic Chinese government that saves most of the people of the capitalist, individualist west from their own self-annihilation. But only if the Chinese succeed soon enough.

How to avoid both of these possibilities? How do we avoid both democratic-hedonistic self annihilation, and autocratic assimilation? We have to do things I don’t count on us to do. We have to share: political power, wealth, food, opportunity, the benefits of trust and caring. Radical equality. The rich have to give their money away, have to unwind the privileges rigged into the system, to make the system work for everybody. They have to pay very heavy taxes, so we can have health care, affordable housing, The best child care and education for every child in America and the World. We have to live by the maxim “I can only be safe if I am safe for you.” We have to stop hating on each other. We have to listen to those who oppose us, who want to hurt us. This lesson from the prophet Jesus redounds brilliantly to this moment. We have to vote for leaders who will act in the best interest of the country and the world, we have to ask ourselves “Which candidate is the best for everybody?”. 

We have to give up on our own personal importance. We have to re-imagine our personal value as the value we derive from the happiness and survival of everyone we know — including those we used to hate on. Please stop hating. Time is running out. When you are staring into your own death, don’t your priorities get reset? When you are staring into the death of your planet, could it be time to reset how we, as humans, do things?

Because every other path leads to Global Flood and Global Inferno, leads to the planet purging us, and all of life as we know it, in a great fever.

Pop-quiz! List everyone you know. Include yourself. Imagine a car careening at this huddled group, and one person could stop that car by standing in its path. Would you step forward?

 

Stephen Marshall, Who am I?

 

Assignment for CDAE 351 

Who I am, right now, is entangled with the volume and complexity of the work we are expected to do. I am wondering whether this was a good idea after all. But I will fight, I will muster any energy I can find, to do the work.

I grew up in a post-WWII development neighborhood in Yonkers New York, that was mysteriously free of black or colored folks (whom I met on the bus to the YMCA summer camp), which was safe and gave the illusion that somehow the world would keep going as it was. When I learned about the collapse of the Roman Empire, and the idea of the collapse of American democracy formed in my mind, I thought it was inevitable, given enough time, but not in my lifetime. Not understanding the injustice and inequality supporting the world that I lived in, or the depravity of the human soul, the promise of American democracy seemed perfect. I would never see its end. There was genocide and racism, but placed in my consciousness as side shows, that I could safely ignore.

But then there was the Vietnam War ("American War" to the Vietnamese), there was poisoning of the planet, overuse of resources, there was the Civil Rights movement, and invisible to me, the crass pursuit of personal wealth at the expense the lives and health of other people. There was the rise of the xenophobic, demagogic, racist politics of the Republican party under Newt Gingrich and his successors, then the continuing genocide and betrayal of the native Americans, and police brutality to support institutionalized racism, then global warming, and then there was Donald J. Trump. Apparently the liberal world order is fragile, apparently there are many people who feel they are getting shafted and that the liberal world order is to blame. Apparently the collapse of American democracy is possible, and it may occur within my lifetime. Apparently the "liberal world order" was a front for privilege and an excuse for doing nothing to help other people lift themselves out of poverty.

I imagine a world in which WE, humanity, turns toward helping each other. In which WE decide to arrange the economy and our relationship to the planet to provide means of survival for every person, and minimize harm to the planet. "I can only be safe if I make the world safe for you." In which every day our leaders are driven by the question, "How can I make the planet and my community safer, more healthy, more verdant and sustainable, today?"

Human beings have an instinct to address danger: the tribalistic impulse. When in danger, gather your people around you and put up defenses. A skilled manipulator, a proponent of the inequality and injustice that caused that danger, can take that fear and use it to destroy the last remnants of your impulse to share the American promise, can use it to destroy the hope of generosity and cooperation promised by the hypocritical liberal world order.

There was always inequality and it never mattered who was in charge, because the laws are always written to protect the wealth of the wealthy and drive the middle class into poverty. Democrats used a hypocritical allegiance to African Americans, poor people, and labor, to systematically hold onto their privilege, they used the promise of "growth" to defer justice, just like the Republicans. Republicans, without nuance or shame, disavowed any policy that would reduce the capacity of business to concentrate wealth for the few, and motivated their electoral base with the illusory notion of "freedom" and the right to get wealthy. By declaring for the right of each individual to act in their own interest, the Republicans have given Americans no opportunity for collective action except that which they, the Republican elites, would find useful. The Republicans have set up Americans for only one form of unity: the unity of war against other Americans.

Everyone is justified to be angry. The elites at universities, in government, in corporate boardrooms, have systematically deprived us all of a sustainable, just world, in service to their personal aggrandizement. Democracy in America was a hoax, just as the promise that "growth" will lift everyone out of poverty is a hoax. As a leftie from the '60's, I have been waiting a long time for the revolution. Revolutions are ugly and can't produce justice or sustainability. But justice wasn't, isn't, going to happen on the path we are on. Somehow, WE have not learned how to manage our affairs to make the world safe for everyone.

In ecological economics, we talk about cooperation and how to achieve it. As if the world is full of individualistic, self-fulfilling "rational actors" who don't know how to cooperate. But that is wrong. Those "individuals" are forming into a massive human action. We better get our heads out of our butts. Our current theory does not explain this.

So you can see what my interests are in a broad sense. I have been trying to understand what is worth fighting for, for my entire life. Science, anthropology, history, have informed my quest. At its root is the question, "How can I explain everything I am observing so that these beliefs and actions make sense relative to each other?" So my explanation does not depend upon someone else being wrong or the demon in my universe? So that we all emerge with a logical and purposeful intent, even if our concepts of the universe are in conflict with each other?

I read Paul Collinveux's Introduction to Ecology in 1988, and became fascinated by the r-K description of population growth. This dynamic, the variable strategies of rate of growth or sustainable maintenance, I thought explained a lot of human behavior. Also in my bundle of interests is the problem of Carrying Capacity. (Although I am an avowed liberal, the knowledge I propose to create could be used to justify genocide. But to me, it demands a just world, which makes conscious choices, allocates resources fairly.) This knowledge would help us to bring humanity into balance with the planet, could not operate without justice. That is what I care about.

"Natural Sciences and Social Sciences", For Graduate class Research Methods

The distinction seems so obvious I'm not sure I have anything to add. Science is a method of investigation. It puts evidence and rationality ahead of instinct and emotion. Science declares that there is a universe that is real and potent apart from the desires or needs of any human. Socio-religious knowledge puts human needs and desires at its center. Science recognizes that the universe is knowable but not perfectly knowable. Socio-religious knowledge expects the universe to be knowable and seeks to find a moral order that is absolute. Science posits that we can know what is real and true, if we are willing to observe, take evidence, and form our models from these observations and this evidence, if we are willing to let ourselves be wrong. Socio-religious models depend on the need of humans for explanations where the only evidence is contingent, emotional and instinctive, and since that knowledge is created under threat of not surviving, it cannot be wrong.

The greatest distinction is between socio-religious reasoning and scientific reasoning. Religious ideas are always produced as an answer to the contradictions found between the existing vision and the current circumstances (Karen Armstrong, A history of God, 1993). Scientific ideas are produced to address contradictions in evidence. So the critical difference is that while all reasoning is driven by the quest to explain human experience, pain, death, birth, creation and loss, scientific reasoning is limited to using models built from evidence that can be observed by any observer. Many, probably most, people can't step aside from the evidence of intuition and emotion, and their knowledge is cultural. It promotes survival. (When it stops explaining, when survival cannot be secured through it, its holders will become more and more erratic and desperate.) The activity of Science is engaged without the certainty that it will be useful or consistent with prior knowledge.

The paradigmic natural science is physics and the earliest employers of the Scientific method were studying the physical world. Copernicus, Galilei, and DeVinci, and before them Islamic scholars and the Greeks of classic Athens, are exemplars of this method, who studied the physical world. The success of the method of observation (such an astounding privilege to study the world without expecting your knowledge to have immediate utility!) set the pattern for later investigators, including biologists, medical practitioners, and social scientists.

Social scientists are people who study the person and processes of the same subject that would create socio-religious knowledge. They reflect on questions held by all of their subjects, but the evidence they use must be empirical, based on repeatable observations. They investigate a universe, human relationships, structures, arrangements, cultures, institutions, that are amorphous and changing, and their results could threaten someone's access to wealth. They can never create a unified and final theory of all things social, in contrast to physicists, who can hope for a near approximation of a perfect model. They hope to provide some insight that will help reduce the misery that people create for each other, but the evidence of the social scientist, carefully gathered through methods that seek to eliminate the bias of emotions and culture, are not understood by the majority of people who are trying to survive with their wits and culture. All of the dangers the scientific method overcomes pushes back against the efforts of the social scientist. Thus anti-vaxers and Q-anonymous.

The State of Vermont, and the people of the state, fit the pattern of the liberal vision: a free press, secure and popularly accessible ballots, use of data to make decisions, transparency wherever possible in government, and the commitment of its leaders to that liberal vision. Social Scientists are welcome and esteemed here. The elite conspiracy to hoard wealth exists, but it is less prominent. There are good people in government and our communities who protect the liberal traditions of openess, democracy, public trust, and a commonwealth. Here, the evidence of the Social Scientist is welcome, even if they do rely on a socio-religious construct that esteems them.

Burlington Mayor Solves Homeless Camp Problem by bulldozing it under pretense of building a shelter.

On Tuesday I learned of a plan to build the low barrier shelter in the Sears Lane campground. Later in the day, Jay Diaz of the ACLU sent a photo of a poster announcing the meeting in the Lakeside Commons on Wednesday evening.On Friday we learned just how far the planning had advanced, behind City Hall doors.

The original poster for the meeting announced that it would be a “Discussion about what is happening on Sears Lane and a vision for the future that is both compassionate for people in need of help and for neighbors who expect civil order and laws to be respected.”Demagogic language if ever there was.

If you are familiar with the Sears Lane Camp Parking lot, you will know there are several residents with trailers, campers and lots of stuff. The project calls for about 26 steel storage containers, which have been converted into housing and other facilities, to be placed in the lot. I have not seen a plan to show where those units would be, or whether they would displace the residents who are there now. But on Friday, July 17, engineers from a construction company visited the site and told residents that the plan was to bulldoze the entire site, wooded portion and parking lot. End of Sears Lane Camp.

Whatever the word “discussion” might have implied, there wasn’t any. Joan Shannon introduced the topic, and introduced Kevin Pounds, director of ANEW Place, who described for the audience the Low Barrier Shelter that has been proposed for the Sears Lane camp parking lot. Apparently the solution was in hand even before hearing the concerns of the area residents. Members of the audience shouted out their complaints as the presentation went on, and it became evident that the purpose of the meeting was to introduce a development project as a solution to the issues the community was experiencing, not to listen or discuss. When the Mayor showed up, Councilor Shannon yielded the mike to him and he also pitched the project. When he was ready for questions, I raised my hand.

I rose to speak and took the mike. I observed that Councilor Shannon and the Mayor had conflated the solutions the community needed with the development project the Mayor has in mind, entirely bypassing more obvious solutions. Instead of talking with the community about creating policies to address their issues (security, trash, xenophobia), the mayor took advantage of community distress to build support to bulldoze the homeless camp. (Though he never said as much, we learned yesterday that this is exactly their plan.) Thus instead of a conversation that might have allowed the citizens to vent their frustrations and concerns, and instead of creating an opportunity for healing, the development project was used to obviate any conversation and cause a festering of the worries of the neighborhood. The development project allows the mayor to say “We have addressed the needs of the neighborhood” without actually giving the members of the neighborhood a chance to express themselves. This emotional stuff might be a little stressful for him. Or just inconvenient.

The Mayor needs a location for the Low Barrier Shelter, since the South Winooski site is no longer viable. But why here? Kevin tells me that there are sewer and water lines under the lot and that zoning and permitting are low barriers. But apparently the Mayor wants to bulldoze the existing camp. He wants to end once and forever the use of the camp by homeless folks, further forcing those who have no place to live into the shadows. He hasn’t sent anyone to negotiate with the campers, or offered the campers any services, and he hasn’t even threatened to close the camp if they don’t clean up. This group of homeless folks isn’t even on his radar. They are a blight and an obstacle. They figure nicely into his calculations, for how to move this project, by letting the community demonize them.

This of course is interesting because in effect the mayor is proposing to bring thirty to forty homeless folks into the camp where now there are 4 or 5. Kevin Pounds tells me that none of the neighbors of the North Beach Campground have complained about that low barrier camping project, implying that we can expect equal docility toward this project, but there is a significant distinction that alters the chemistry. This is a neighborhood that has to be pitched, and promises made to. What if it all goes bad?

But obviously the Mayor wants the community to support the project, because if there is opposition, this is where it would come from. Here, in the Lakeside neighborhood, he can sell the project as a solution to their perceived problems.

He wants residents of the city to believe that he cares about homeless folks, but he funnels the whole question into whether there is enough housing and shelter. He wants to move them off the street and out of the abandoned lots. His “caring” does not include communication, negotiation, trash pickup, porta-johns, or other services. Better to cast the homeless as a problem to be removed, not people with problems to be addressed.

When I discussed the project with Kevin Pounds, he didn’t seem to need to evict the campers, but, from Miro's POV, that's the whole point. And right now he's feeling lucky because he gets to use a development project that serves the homeless to evict the homeless. Playing us against ourselves.

We need to disaggregate the solution from the problem. The humane solution to the problems presented by the Lakeside neighborhood is to recognize independent homeless camps and to provide services. Not everyone wants to be housed and not everyone can be. So just make sure their living conditions are healthy!

If ANEW Place were to operate the Sears Lane camp as a camping shelter, my vision for the camp would be fulfilled. The Mayor's plan calls for the entire lot to get shut down. This might make the Mayor and his business constituency happy, but it does not respond to the needs of either the campers or the Lakeside neighborhood.

The Mayor knows there is a fuse on this plan. He is acting quickly. It is imperative for us to decide whether and what we will do.

Winter Images of Sumac

As I described in my previous post, Sumac is ready to harvest before the spring leaf-out. These eight images display various features of the sumac in winter, which is harvest season. I can post other images for other seasons as they come up.

These images may be distributed with courtesy of notice, may not be given in exchange, and must include this notice in its entirety, copyright 2020 by Stephen Marshall. Please write to comments. 

demonstrates the
male plant in winter

Female plants with fruit of the year's labor.

male plants in the rhizoid form developing
into dendritic form

Detail of male flower stem at end of winter

Current year drupes with remnants of
prior year drupes

Eponymous "Staghorn" pattern of growth

Drupes held high to the sky

Looking carefully, viewer can see that each drupe is on the end of its stem, to maximum elevation.  

Staghorn Sumac, Harvest in Winter Fruit

I discovered sumac tea about nine years ago. I was visiting a family whose yard was over run with sumac and they had started cutting it down. Whereas the drupes (sumac produces a cluster of densely packed seeds) are usually at the ends of branches high in the air, in this case I was able to easily gather all I wanted at waist height. 

Following recommendations, I broke up the drupes, put the seeds in a large jar, filled it with water, and allowed it to soak over night. 

I was stunned. It was so delicious! and yet I had never known anyone, personally, who had tried it. I vowed to popularize sumac tea, and set about to learn all I could. I began to look for stands) whose owners I could contact and from which I could arrange to collect. This endeavor was surprisingly difficult, but I learned a lot about sumac.

Drupes propped up for visibility (S.Marshall, 2013)

“But isn’t Sumac poisonous?” No Grasshopper, you needn’t worry. There is a poisonous variety of Sumac with berries, which are white, not red. Our variety is called staghorn, produces a seed cluster that is dark red and fuzzy, and has no berries. No subtle discernment is involved, the difference is quite obvious.

Rhizoidal Growth pattern

Sumac, up here in Vermont, grows in two forms, the rhizoid form and the dendritic (tree) form. They seem to have distinct genetics, even though they are known as one species. I cannot prove this, but I suspect an epigenetic adaptive mechanism. In any event, the tree, which provided the seed source of the sumac in that family’s yard, grew to 50 feet. However, when the plant begins to send out roots, and begins to grow new sprouts from the roots, it takes on a form called rhizoidal, a little like a field of grass, except the stems are an inch or more in diameter at the bottom, and spaced a foot or more apart.

There was something else odd about these two forms of sumac. In the vast majority of cases, the rhizoid produced small drupes, about two inches in diameter and 4 to 7 inches in length. Again, the drupes being at the end of the stalk, high in the air, it was difficult to harvest these drupes. In contrast, the drupes produced by the dendritic form were at times three inches in diameter, and would grow to 8 or 10 inches in length. This is why I think there are two genetic forms, but there’s nuance. The rhizoid form of the sumac that were cut down in that yard produced large robust drupes, like the tree nearby. And I have found rhizoid stands with these large drupes. I don’t know that I’ve seen a tree with the small drupes, but the large drupes are definitely delivered by both patterns of growth. I traveled around Addison County Vermont for a couple of years, and at first I wanted the difference in size to be a result of their local conditions. But if this were true, the size of the drupes would vary continuously across the entire range of sizes. But they did not. The variation was bimodal. Hence I wonder if the species has two varieties.

This is important for you when you go to search for sumac drupes to turn into tea. You can search for the large drupes. They are better in other ways.

There is an insect, or perhaps a mite (it is very small, and I have not taken it to a lab), which feeds on the sap of the sumac plant and favors the warm safe enclosure of the drupe (I’m inferring). They tend to favor the small drupes. Or perhaps the small size is a result of the loss of plant energy to the arthropod. This bug also explains some of the popular aversion to sumac tea. One Vermonter I spoke with told me his family didn’t like sumac because it had all of that insect detritus in it. This is a significant barrier. It is possible to produce good tea with these drupes, but the thought of it is disgusting. But again, there are strategies to over come this obstacle, which I will review when I tell you about making tea. It’s important to realize that not all drupes are infested with this bug. They have to disperse, and presumably when sumac colonizes new soil (they are a pioneer species), they do not have the bugs, and if you find them, you will have sumac in its pristine form. On the other hand, my experience is that the larger drupes tend not to be infested so often. So that is what I look for when I want sumac!

Sumac Drupes high in the air

There is another very significant factor in the collection of sumac. The species is called “staghorn” for a reason. The drupe stands tall at the very end of the branch on which it grows, or perhaps near the end of the branch. If you have found a tree, you will wonder how to collect the drupes without cutting down the tree. If you have a yard and your own sumac, you can cut it down to chest height, to collect the drupes, because they will grow back, and next year the drupes won’t be out of reach. I have tried cutters on the end of a pole, which was very expensive of my time. The best thing might be a ladder, though I have not had one to use. On this point, it is up to your ingenuity.

Staghorn sumac has a unique ecological niche, which explains some of its superb qualities. One year I began watching the growth and development of drupes from their first appearances in the spring. The flowers were a pale green (it doesn’t want any attention at this point), and gradually grew pink over the summer and red late in the autumn. But ripening did not follow the usual pattern of a fruit that ripens in the fall and is ready to be eaten. Sumac is still not ripe in November, when it is still green inside of the drupe. It’s essentially ready late in December, but the best time to harvest is late in the winter.

What is the point of this? Sumac’s unique strategy is to provide an over-winter food to birds. A berry would not be suitable to this strategy, because berries have water in them, which would be frozen and suck heat out of the target customer, the over-wintering birds. Instead, the seeds are produced with a fuzz which is suffused with this plant’s unique formulation of nutrients. And in this form, it lasts all winter. Indeed, drupes can be found which, sheltered from rain, are two and three years old, and still suitable for making tea. I recently made tea with drupes that I have kept in my closet for three years. It had no mold, and had lost only some of its flavor.

This is the reason for sumac’s amazing properties. A plant whose strategy for propagation is to feed birds over winter must formulate it’s nutrient offering to persist over a significant period of time. Hence, it is hypothesized that the staghorn sumac contains a rich variety of anti-oxidants, starches, and other substances, which preserve the fruit, and do not age or grow stale (the sparse literature is ambiguous about the nutritional contents of the suffuse). Sumac may be the only fruit engineered by nature to persist as a viable food across such a span of time. (Grains and beans are easily preserved for this length of time, but nature did not engineer them to be viable as food for this span of time.) The current attention to antioxidants gives sumac a special nutritional value. It may be the richest source of antioxidants in nature. I can’t prove that.

Collecting sumac can be impossible if you try to do it with leaves on the plant. Since it remains fresh all winter, the best time to collect it would be a warm day in January or February, but definitely before the leaves come out.

Some people worry about the nutrient broth being washed away by rain, and if you find drupes from the previous year, the exposed portions of the drupe will have been rinsed by rain to a point where the drupe turns grey. But this fruit is engineered (by nature, through natural selection) to provide a tasty treat to the birds who might stop by for a meal, all winter long! I don’t worry about rain damaging the drupes before I collect them in their first year. The prize is a large drupe without the detritus of arthropods. If a little rain has fallen on them, they are still abundant with nutrients. Here is a piece done by Vermont Public Radio, with some great photos: foraging-vermonts-surprisingly-scrumptuous-sumac.

So you found some Sumac to harvest, and you have at least three large drupes. I get a big pot (two or three gallons), add a gallon or two of water, and heat it to 150 degrees (use a thermometer). I do not have the science to prove this is the best protocol, but it works great for me. (If you want to experiment, bear in mind that you want the nutrients to dissolve in the water, not get cooked, and high temperatures will cook them.) Now, you could just add the entire drupes to the hot water, but I use another method, described below. Using a porous fabric (my favorite I stripped from a large hi-fi speaker) to hold the drupes, I dunk them until the water turns a dark red, in about a minute, and then I remove the drupes. I now have sumac tea.

An option, which I prefer because I want to unpack the seeds and expose every side of them to water, is to break up the drupe. This can be done by hand, which is work and will make your hands stronger, but I prefer a piece of hardware cloth or kitchen bread rack with 3/8 or ½ inch pitch, which provides an easy way to break up the drupe. Like grating a carrot the long way, I scrape the drupe on the wire mesh, against the direction of the stems, and the seeds quickly fall through. I use a large rectangular cake pan to catch the seeds. However you do this, be watching for the detritus of the arthropod inside the drupe. An advantage of breaking up the drupe in this way is that as soon as you see the brown stuff exposed, you can stop grating, leaving the detritus attached to the stem for convenient disposal!

But suppose you weren’t so lucky and you could only collect some of the smaller drupes. You will find some that are free of bugs but frequently are not. You have two strategies. Use a screen, to separate the seeds from their stem, which allows you to collect seeds without disturbing the bug stuff inside. Or, you could dunk entire drupes in the hot water. The seeds are so densely packed that there is typically no danger of the bug stuff inside coming in contact with the water before you are finished steeping your drupe. But you must be careful. I don’t think there is any actual danger from this stuff, but it’s gross. And if you wanted to make tea for sale, you would have to answer questions from food safety people. So consider your goals and the condition of the drupes, use your judgment, consider the preferences of your consumers, and do what feels right to you.

If you wanted to propagate sumac, you could find some plants that you like and transplant them. They are pioneers and will grow easily in disturbed soil. I don’t know, but it is possible that all you need is a few pieces of root. If you have the idea that you want to grow from seeds, you want to consider this: it may be necessary for seeds to be digested by birds to activate them. I was once offered hundreds of seedlings – which were growing in a pile of pigeon poo. I couldn’t use them, but I was intrigued by the idea that the seeds, produced by a plant that uses a strategy of attracting birds in winter to disperse its seeds, need to be digested by the birds, in the same way that some plants will only grow after a fire. Maybe someday I will be able to experiment.

That’s my accumulated wisdom on the subject of Staghorn Sumac. Oh, one more thing. I always thought the flavor would be great to add to other beverages, beer for example. A month ago, I made a batch and added a kombucha starter. Do you want to know what was better than Sumac tea?

Sumac is known in the literature to have huge tannin levels in the bark, and sumac tea that is steeped for too long will acquire the bitter, sickening flavor of tannin. That is why we only steep for a minute, two at most. Meanwhile, why do they say that Kombucha cannot be made with herbal tea, but must be made with Camellia sinensis teas? Sumac, apparently an “herbal” tea, may have some of the secret mojo needed to make Kombucha, and that mojo may be tannic acid. Any food chemists who want to look into this? If you want to make Sumac Kombucha, add some sugar (all Kombucha requires this), let your tea cool to room temperature, add the starter, and let it ferment for a month. Get the details by reading about how to make Kombucha.

So experiment. There is information out there and you can look it up. One article I found very informative was from the Pakistan Journal of Nutrition, 2009, called Comparative Study on the Chemical Composition of Syrian Sumac and Chinese Sumac, by Kossah, Nsabimana, Zhao, Chen, et al. Sumac isn’t an easy fruit to harvest and use, but it is highly rewarding.

#SAVEVERMONT #SPREADTHISFASTERTHANTHEVIRUS

Guest writer, Stanton Eddy

Wait a Vermont Summer Minute! We CAN do something!

WE CAN SAVE VERMONT!

Future Headline: "How in the world did Vermont do it?"

We can save incredibly large amounts of lives of our loved ones and our friends' loved ones.

We can drastically shorten the time our businesses will be shut down and our kids out of school and ourselves out of work!

But we MUST do the following immediately!  Go ahead and post this everywhere you can, but DO NOT stop there! You MUST also EMAIL all your Vermont contacts that you have, plus your Legislators and the Governor!

https://governor.vermont.gov/contact-us/message
Why immediately? Have you heard about all those other countries, and even now some of our beloved fellow states, who did not start soon enough? Hospitals completely overwhelmed, having to choose who they can save and who must die. Vermonters DO NOT want to have to make that choice. Other countries and states started mandating Shelter in Place much too late. And we are only a few short weeks behind before the same happens to us.

We heard "Groups no more than 250." Then it changed to no more than 50. Then no more than 10. Do you see the pattern? You know what's next. In NYC and elsewhere, no groups allowed at all. Shelter in Place. Everything is shut down. And for these places, it will last a very long time, with great destruction to businesses, and astounding amounts of unnecessary loss of life.

Vermont must do this now. We love Vermont and we love Vermonters. We cannot wait for our Governor and Legislators, they are waiting far too long, and by then it will be too late.

You will be affected. Your family and your friends' families will be affected. So do this right now: SHELTER IN PLACE. Go out only for groceries and medical needs and essential workers only. No visits from anyone. Force your children and adult children to do this also. Force your parents too! Go out and get food only when you really start to run out. Food will be there. Only one person should go get it. Then get home, sanitize, and shelter in place.

We can only avoid catastrophe if ALL VERMONTERS do this! And we CAN do it! But you must spread the word. Spread it faster than the virus.

And after, when we see on the national news that they are searching for how VERMONT was able to so successfully minimize the damage to businesses and families, and our elderly and fragile made it through, and what should have been an inadequate number of respirators and hospital beds were somehow able to manage to save so many more lives than other states and countries…
We can all say that WE VERMONTERS did our part to Save Vermont!

Don't waste a minute. It took me less than an hour to write this, then create my SAVE VERMONT email group and select all my Vermont contacts. Cut and paste this email, it will take you less than a half hour, and you will then be saving MANY VERMONTER'S LIVES!  Vermonter's inboxes should be flooded immediately with this email, from all their Vermont friends and family.  I promise you that you have nothing better to do than save the lives and businesses of your fellow Vermonters. Including your own.

If I'm wrong about any of what I've written, I will change my name to Mr. Frickin' V.T. Idiot.  I absolutely promise.

If we try this and it doesn't catch on, at least we can all say we didn't sit on the sidelines. We tried to Save Vermont.

And if it works, we will all tell the National News in unison that we Vermonters DID THIS TOGETHER!  Because we care about every family, business, health care worker, and person in Vermont.

Violate company email policies and EMAIL this to EVERY VERMONTER you know.

Remember these Vermont sayings as you get started immediately:

"You can't keep trouble from coming, but you don't have to give it a frickin' chair to sit on."

"Vermont is our cow. But we have to do the milking."

With much love for all my fellow Vermonters. And you are a Vermonter if you are in Vermont at this very moment.

The Covid Opportunity

The recession of 2008 resulted in a major transfer of wealth from low and middle income people to rich people.  We must insist on specific measures to place the burdens of economic distress on those who have wealth to spare. Cancellation of rent and mortgages for those who are unpaid over the recession is one way.  Another is to channel aid through unpaid workers, so there is no cause to evict or foreclose. 

There is an important principle here: the  response to the mortgage crisis was to give money to the banks,  which proceeded to foreclose on all the people who couldn't pay mortgages. Had they given money to the mortgage holders, home owners would have kept their homes and the banks would be paid and survive.  We need to ensure that the recession does not result in the poor getting poorer and the rich getting richer.  

This apolitical disease exposes a plethora of social inequalities and vulnerabilities. It provides a rare moment when the vulnerability of one group is shared by all groups.  This moment therefore is a unique moment to transcend divisions and do what is right for the health and safety of all.  Health care for all, abundant and inexpensive housing. 

Safe Parking, Safe Camping, Proposal to the Vermont Legislature

Given that the lack of a consistent, private dwelling place to support life functions, recreation, relationships and employment is traumatic and problematic, for any member of the community of Vermont,

Given that the state sees a persistent stream of persons without permanent, stable housing,

Given that the quantity of housing has not been sufficient to accommodate everyone who lives here, and

Given that the cost of housing exceeds the available funds of many Vermont households,

It seems self evident that many persons are forced to live outdoors, to endure the elements and dangers to their persons and property, and

Given that if there were enough affordable housing, living outdoors would not be necessary,

It seems further self evident that persons so compelled depend upon the compassion and efforts of the community, state and local governments to provide safety and minimal services to maintain any semblance of normality, dignity and hope of a better life.

Therefore it is requested and proposed,

That the State require all municipalities to create plans to protect the safety and dignity of those forced to live outdoors;

That the State set standards for these plans, and create a method of review of these plans.

Writing such a plan:

The foundation of such a plan is an assessment of the number of homeless persons in the various categories of homelessness, both as a proportion of the statewide count and through direct assay of the town's residents. The plan would be based on a reasonable compromise between these numbers.

Rural, suburban and urban areas are not likely to distribute the homeless population proportionally, and the nature of homelessness varies dramatically across these community types. Moreover, the costs of planning for and accommodating a small and evanescent homeless population might be a burden for very low population towns. A few strategies are proposed to relieve this burden:

• The plan detail for each “provision” (below) may be scaled to the needs of the town, with appropriate evidence and testimony, and as agreed to by state reviewers. ¹
• Town plans may be consolidated into regional plans. A consolidation plan that includes all community types would be expected to provide more opportunity for efficiency in the delivery of services.
• A town might rely on a standard plan or template created by the state or regional planning commission,
• “Best practices” will provide guidance.

The environment in which homelessness occurs is complex, thus such plans must address:

• Where someone who is without housing can rest and reside without danger of being told to leave. There must be a viable, useful and specific alternate location.
• What the police response to encounters with the homeless wil be, and training in relation to.
• Provision of sanitary facilities, and disposal of surplus property and trash, including cleanup of abandoned camps.
• Assistance for medically endangered persons (example: insulin).
• Protection and recovery of vehicles and property contained within.
• Approach to non-permitted constructed housing.
• Provision of and engagement with social services.
• How the municipality proposes to address persons not compelled to live outdoors, who choose to.
• Procedures for giving notice when a campsite must be moved.
• Best response when criminal activity is discovered.
• Public review of the plan and the town's fidelity to it.

This proposal recognizes that persons are already camping and parking across the state, and rather than devise an entirely new system, proposes to add protections and employ existing services, to ensure that, when campers, parkers or other non-housed person is discovered, they can remain where they are or there is a location to which they may viably go.

This proposal contemplates State level review, but does not propose how. Some combination of human services, economic development, public safety, and advocates is suggested, and the Vermont Council on Homelessness might be the logical seat of oversight.

The intent of this proposal is to give rest and comfort to those who are homeless, by asking towns to address the concerns listed here, and commit to “best practices”.

1The homeless population for purposes of making this assessment should include all of those who live on public property or without permission on private property, generally: outdoors on the ground, in tents, in cars, campers or trailers, places of public accommodation such as an ATM or stairwell, and in abandoned properties without facilities. Housing which is unsuited to human habitation but is located on property owned or rented by the resident would not be included for purposes of plans to protect those who are forced to live outdoors. Protections for the housing marginalized are in order, but not under this proposal

Address to the joint Committees of the Vermont Legislature, January 19, 2020

I do not sit before you armed with piles of facts and figures, prepared to speak to specific legislation. I come before you to share my insights as an advocate who listens to, serves, and lives with those known as “homeless”. Since the day, at the age of 15, that I protested the abuse my father heaped on my brother, I have identified with the powerless, and fought to bring safety and dignity to them. Thus I come before you today, to address a specific source of danger and harm, in the relationship between the community of the unhoused, and the larger community.
If you attend our vigil later, you will hear my lyric portrayal of what it feels like to live unhoused. Here and now, I want to put before you the abject danger into which our society is plunging.
When young, old and middle aged lose the safety of their domicile with regularity, from illness, relationship disruption, and the failure of families to cohere and provide mutual support,
When opioid dependence and alcoholism plague the bodies and minds of so many,
When fear and stigma of those who dwell on the street is rising,
we are not facing a momentary, transient glitch in the functioning of our society and community.
We are confronted by the effects of the broad and pervasive social policy that underwrites our law and economy;
We are confronted by the consequences of our choice to privilege private wealth and ambition over the collective well being.
Not to say You are able to change these rules unilaterally; they are written at a federal and global scale, and come to us from human nature and history.
But you and we suffer the rot those rules promote: You and we, are the tree whose limbs are green and appear healthy, while the trunk rots from inside, and you, and we, must address that rot, because it affects you, and us. Homelessness isn’t just a problem, it’s a signal, And I am here to ask you to look at homelessness this way.
Recently in Burlington tensions have been rising between some who panhandle and use alleyways to eliminate waste, and the businesses nearby. The panhandling has grown aggressive, and the mess offensive. With some hand-wringing, and much real desperation, more privileged members of the community ask “What are we going to do?”. What if we do not look at this behavior as something to be corrected? What if we ask “What are we doing wrong?”. To this I would answer: raise the floor on the quality of life. Start by installing or opening bathrooms which can impart to the entire community the dignity of a place to eliminate waste in a socially acceptable way. These street practices are signals of rot, and if you want to arrest the rot, start by insisting on the social solidarity which provides dignity to the lives of those so situated.
Another way to arrest the rot of social indignity and loss of safety is to accommodate those who resort to living outdoors with policies I call “Safe Parking, Safe Camping.” You will have before you my brief of such a policy. It does not represent the only approach, but as an activist in the homeless community for four years, this is what I think will work. Essentially, the strategy is to recognize, in some form that is legal and provides safety to those who cannot afford housing, what already exists: people living in campers, cars, and tents, or sleeping on church lawns and in ATM booths. Already in some ways and in many communities, people are allowed to rest in peace, but in many ways and communities, they are not, and I am here to ask you to insist on safety and dignity for those who must live outdoors.
I am asking you to require every town to create a plan that provides “Safe Parking, Safe Camping”. I would give them a year to create a draft, a second year to evaluate their plans, a third year to implement them. The social and cultural challenges are significant; we are seeking to address the causes of social rot, we cannot expect instant changes.
I would also like you to pass the Homeless Bill of Rights, these are obvious measures to combat the rot that is signaled by homelessness, but after reading again the Homeless Bill of Rights, I don't think Safe Parking, Safe Camping fits as a "right". To state it as such would place a precipitate burden on towns, forcing them to respond without due planning or guidance. I think a separate bill, addressing public safety and accommodation of folks living desperately, would provide more time to listen, and find locally meaningful solutions. I think many municipalities do not have a problem because they are not hassling people, so their planning would be nominal, but in many others people who cannot find a place to live cannot get a good night sleep.
I do not want to create, under present conditions, a network of identified, specified homeless camps. I want to recognize current responses to the loss of housing, and bring them into relationship with the law and the communities in which they are. I want to add a layer of safety, and allow the practice of these policies to guide us as we respond to changing conditions. Allowing and expecting towns to write plans forces them to think about the most vulnerable, and consider their needs in the conduct of municipal business. It invites innovation, and allows us to discover "best practices", through the multiplicity of solutions from the multiplicity of towns.
Thank you for considering my testimony.

Address to the Vigil, Homelessness Awareness Day, Vermont Legislature, 2020

Yea! I love you!

Thank you for coming to our Vigil for the homeless, my friends.
Thank you, legislators, advocates and esteemed guests,
Thank you to the fourth graders who chose homelessness as their topic to study,
for standing with the community of those we call homeless.
Thank you, Especially, those of you who are without housing,
Who are here today.
You made a special effort to get here, and this vigil is for you.

We are here today to think about, feel about, and remember, you,
the Vermonters who in their daily lives have to ask
“How will I stay safe today?”
“How will I keep my possessions safe?”
“How will I eat today?”,
“Where can I park my car so it won’t get towed away?”,
“How can I get my car out of impoundment?”.
“How can I get my children to school?”
“Where will I sleep tonight?”
We are here today to remember you.
Because being Homeless is a condition of desperation,
And we want better for you.

So let us remember,
People who pay into the engine of profit
– those who rent and those who pay mortgages –
are given permission to claim a space as their own.
But if you can't work, and if you can't pay,
If you refuse to work two jobs,
just to give all your money to a landlord or a bank,
If you can't manage your life, wracked as you are by trauma,
or living in the misery of mental illness,
If you are broken, and have no resources,
Or if you have been driven from your home by domestic violence,
You can't get that permission.

So you sleep in places that aren't your own.
You sleep in public, on a sidewalk or in a parking garage,
where someone who is cruel can kick you, or worse,
where someone also desperate can steal your few possessions,
where someone, too privileged to see themselves in that huddle on the ground,
might complain to the police;
You sleep in public, in a car where you worry about being rousted from the depths of sleep,
You sleep in a dumpster that is warm, yet deadly,
You sleep scrambling from couch to floor from friend to friend.

And the question "Where can I sleep, that is safe?”
hangs like a cloud over the entire day,
because there is no place for you to rest,
that is your own.

Your community does ASPIRE to house you in hard-wall housing.
But if your community had the will, a sufficient will, to build that housing,
a sufficient will
to make that housing affordable to people living on Social Security,
or a minimum wage job,
if your community had the will to produce housing,
That someone working from her car
Or bouncing from couch to couch,
could afford,
if your community had the will to produce housing a drunk or an addict would want,
then we could put everyone in hardwall housing,
then we could impart to all of you the dignity and safety
of your own locked door,
and then the sidewalk, lawn, ATM booth, tent or broken-down camper,
would not be part of our continuum of housing.

But they are,
And living outdoors, under bridges, in tents, cars, campers, and dumpsters,
Sleeping on a blanket thrown on the ground,
are solutions we resort to,
are solutions in our continuum of housing,
and are solutions we, your community, need to plan for :

With safe places for camping, parking, and bedding down.
With enough safe, humane, shelters,
For adults, couples, dog owners, youth,
For she or he fleeing domestic violence,
For the addicted, the person in recovery, that person with social anxiety, or disability,
For the LGBTQ person, the traumatized, the mentally ill.

So let us write a homeless bill of protections
that guarantees safe parking and safe camping,
in every community across the state of Vermont,
Let us write a homeless bill of protections that can comfort you,
as you search for that safe place to sleep each night.

Thank you!

[this proposal serves as an accountability device. The protection of human rights isn’t always comfortable. But the protection of human rights may compel the just solution that is also preferable.]