Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 30, 1994 TAG: 9412050010
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: F-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CATHRYN McCUE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
It sure sounds good, but is it true? The Durham, N.C.-based Institute for Southern States says it's so, and has just issued a report to back that up.
The study, called "Gold & Green," uses two sets of indicators to measure economic and environmental performance in all 50 states. Guess what - states that ranked high by one factor usually ranked high in the other. And vice versa.
The report debunks the "jobs vs. the environment" myth, says its author, Bob Hall, research director for the institute. "The states that do the most to protect their natural resources also wind up with the strongest economies and best jobs for their citizens."
Among the top ranking states are Hawaii, Vermont, New Hampshire, Colorado, Minnesota and Maryland - states that tend to have more progressive politics, Hall said.
Conversely, those at the bottom are generally more conservative, and many are in the South: Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, South Carolina, Arkansas and Louisiana, which is dead last in both.
Virginia ranks smack in the middle in both gold and green lists.
Out of 50, with 1 being best, our highest economic score is 4, for households with income below poverty level. Our lowest economic score is 39, for unemployment for youth.
Other Virginia scores on the gold list:
12 for employment growth between 1985 and 1993;
30 for job growth in new business;
32 for the rate of workplace deaths per 100,000 workers.
On the green list, our highest score is 10 for recycling. The lowest is 40 for hazardous waste generated. Other scores include:
34 for hazardous liquid spills between 1990 and 1992;
31 for pesticides per acre of harvested crop;
31 for emissions to jobs ratio.
Stephen Meyer of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has studied economic indicators for 20 years. In the report, he says that states with stronger environmental records tend to have higher growth in their gross state product, total employment and labor productivity.
Another contributor, Michael Kinsley of the Rocky Mountain Institute in Colorado, says: "When we use our resources and other assets faster than we renew them, we treat them as if they're income, which is lousy accounting. Like a dairy farmer selling her cows to buy feed."
In other words, don't eat your seed corn. Don't sell the family silver.
Now the question is, how to achieve this balance? How do we get to the top of the green and gold list?
Sustainable development - a concept that has sprouted from the United Nations and international banking world all the way to the tip of Southwest Virginia.
The Clinch Powell Sustainable Development Forum draws on a cross section of people in Virginia and northeast Tennessee to find creative ways to combine economic development with environmental protection.
For example, the project teams youths with unemployed loggers who teach kids how to log with horses, a more ecologically sound way to get timber than clear cutting and other modern methods. With a grant from the state Center for Rural Development, a solar kiln will be built in the community to treat the wood. The finished product will go to woodworkers, cabinetmakers and craftspeople - again, all within the community.
In addition, the kids are learning to make professional-quality videotapes of the horse logging to teach others to log and market environmentally sensitive wood products. The Clinch Powell forum is one of three examples discussed in the fall issue of "Southern Exposure," published by the Institute for Southern Studies.
Notwithstanding such initiatives, sustainable development has yet to really take root in Virginia. Last year, the General Assembly created a task force to study the concept and develop a statewide plan to implement sustainable development. Its recommendations are due at the 1995 assembly.
The group will meet for the first time Nov. 23 in Richmond, mostly because of a delay from the governor's office that didn't appoint the six citizen members until September, said staffer Frank Munyan. The task force also has six delegates and four senators. The secretaries of commerce and trade, and natural resources are nonvoting members.
Donnie Slusher, a Bedford County land surveyor, is one of the citizen appointees. He doesn't know who nominated him, although he is active in the county's Republican Party. When the governor's office called, he'd not heard of sustainable development. Since then, he has read up on it.
"I've got some definite ideas," he said. "I'm not a radical environmentalist. I'm an environmentalist to a point, but people come first, in my way of thinking."
Another appointee is Robert M. Hall, who owns a coal trucking business in Buchanan County. Like Slusher, he is active in his county's GOP party, and was nominated to serve on the task by a friend.
Also like Slusher, Hall had not heard of sustainable development prior to being appointed. "It's pretty complicated to understand," he said. He, too, plans to be at the November meeting, even though "It's already messed up my deer hunting schedule," to learn more about the issue.
Other citizen members include David Bowerman, who owns a fitness spa in Charlottesville; Carol Foster, an executive with Chesapeake Corp.; W. Michael Peirson, who raises cherrystone clams on the Eastern shore; and David A. Tice, president of a forestry, wildlife and environmental consulting firm in Charlottesville.
Munyan, the staff person, said the task force will hear presentations from several people who have been involved in sustainable development projects, including lawyers from the D.C.-based Environmental Law Institute, which last year wrote "Blueprint for Sustainable Development of Virginia."
Cathryn McCue covers environmental issues for the paper. With this column, she joins the business staff for occasional columns in the Sunday Business section.
by CNB