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LOCAL POPULATION STABILIZATION
The Small Town Project (http://www.smalltownproject.org/)
An excellent new website (begun July 2005) by John Feeney: Ph.D. psychologist, retired professional poker player, now a part time writer. John grew up in the Phoenix area, spent twenty years in San Diego, and in 2004 moved with his family to Mount Vernon, Iowa “to enjoy the benefits of a classic American small town. From the start of his two year stay in Iowa, he was struck, however, by the effect on the area of ongoing residential development, including changes sure to come if development proceeded as planned. That inspired him to launch this site and sparked a growing interest in environmental issues.” He and his family recently moved to Boulder, Colorado, where he says he’ll maintain this and/or a similar site.
The Small Town Project website is hard to beat – and not just because it provides a link to the ASAP site (“Virginia group with very much the same message as ours.”). The home page states “This site is one of the Web’s most comprehensive sources of information on the problem of needless urban growth and the benefits of a no-growth policy (emphasis mine). It began as an effort to help Mount Vernon and Lisbon, Iowa, preserve their small town characters and open spaces. It subsequently adopted a broader focus on issues of growth, sustainability, and the environment.” The visually attractive and easily navigable site includes articles, informed blogs, book reviews (e.g., of Ed Stennett’s “In Growth We Trust”), links to other sites, etc. It’s fun and informative to spend some time surfing around this site and the interesting places it sends you. It makes me wish Feeney lived in Albemarle County.
Citizens for Responsible Community Planning [CRCP] (http://crcp.cytodesigns.com/index.php)
CRCP has an attractive, lively, education- and advocacy-based website about Kelowna, a city of about 110,000 in British Columbia, Canada, with a built-in on-going blogs on dozens of topics (also separately accessible at http://saveparadise.proboards26.com/index.cgi). CRCP “rejects the population growth rate assumptions for Kelowna implicit in the Kelowna Official Community Plan 2020. CRCP affirms that allowing Kelowna to grow above 150,000 residents by the year 2020 will exacerbate many of the problems Kelowna is presently facing by increasing traffic congestion, further burdening our imperiled eco-system while undermining our cherished sense of community.” The website includes up-to-date City Council voting records on all local growth-related issues, and a quirky page that provides a warning to potential new residents thinking of retiring to Kelowna: given the “crisis” in overcrowding at the local hospital, the community is “dangerous place to be ill.”
Pro-Whatcom (http://www.pro-whatcom.org/)
Formed in 2003 in Bellingham, Washington, and focused on the surrounding Whatcom County, this group is as close to ASAP as any we’ve found in structure and aims. The first sentence in Pro-Whatcom’s vision: “Our community will identify—through a democratic and scientific process—an optimal Whatcom County population size and work to reach and level off at that size.” Among the organization’s objectives: “Expand the growth debate from how and where we should grow to whether we should grow.” Over the years ASAP and Pro-Whatcom leaders have shared ideas; regrettably, Pro-Whatcom has recently become least temporarily dormant, if not semi-permanently moribund.
AGO [Alternatives to Growth Oregon] (http://www.agoregon.org/index1.htm)
Launched in 1999 to “lead a statewide effort to build sustainable communities that recognize limits to growth,” AGO was a model for ASAP until it suspended operations in 2004 when it simply ran out of funding (their website, though dormant, lives on). Andy Kerr, the Chair of AGO until its demise, maintains a lively, informative, and slightly wacky page about population growth on his large website (http://www.andykerr.net/Growth/GrowthPT.htm) headed with the sentence: “The only thing more radical than the end of growth is continuation of growth.”
STATE OR REGIONAL POPULATION STABILIZATION
Californians for Population Stabilization [CAPS] (http://www.cap-s.org/main.html)
CAPS was organized in 1986, when it split off from ZPG (Zero Population Growth) because that organization, like many other population groups, decided to focus on the politically safer issue of global overpopulation (which obviously focuses on fertility rather than, more provocatively, migration). While agreeing that global overpopulation is a problem, “CAPS works to formulate and advance policies and programs designed to stabilize the population of California at a level which will preserve a good quality of life for all Californians.” “Since nearly all of California’s runaway population growth comes from immigration, CAPS focuses largely on this issue: sponsoring public and media awareness campaigns, working with lawmakers to promote more responsible policies, maintaining a growing network of member-activists, and conducting research.”
Vermont Earth Institute (http://www.vtearthinstitute.org/about.html)
Founded in 1994 as Vermont Citizens for Sustainable Population to promote a better understanding of how population growth and resource consumption affect the environment and the quality of human life, the organization changed its name in 2000 when it became one of some 20 “sister” institutes to the Northwest Earth Institute (NWEI). Its focus is to educate and support Vermonters to reduce consumption and adopt environmentally sustainable practices in their homes, workplaces and communities; its discussion courses and educational programs bring people together, raise their ecological awareness and facilitate profound change in values, habits and actions in caring for the environment. My perusal of the VEI website indicates that over the years the organization has shifted the balance of attention away from population growth issues toward almost exclusively resource consumption issues.
The New England Coalition for Sustainable Population (http://www.necsp.org/pages/1/index.htm)
NECSP, founded in 1996, is a network of organizations and individuals that, according to the website, are “committed to achieving a sustainable human population at the local, state, regional, national and global levels.” It appears from the site, however, that the definition of “sustainable population” does not necessarily mean a stabilized population size. NECSP supports population organizations and activists in the region and regularly exchanges information regarding legislative and other initiatives which affect population in New England, nationally and globally; and plans and supports state and regional population-related events.
Floridians for a Sustainable Population (http://www.flsuspop.org/)
FSP is a statewide organization that believes “unrestrained population growth is the chief factor in the development sprawl that is eating up our wetlands, our forests and our necessary agricultural acreage.” The concern is well-taken: the website notes Florida’s annual 4.8% growth that leads to a doubling in 15 years (Albemarle’s rate leads to doubling in about 33 years). I’m a little uneasy about FSP’s focus almost exclusively on foreign immigrants: “Because the major propellant of U.S. population growth is our current U.S. immigration policies, both legal and illegal (which is also pushing the 1,000 a day influx into Florida), FSP is committed to urgently advocating immigration reforms this year.”
NATIONAL OR GLOBAL STABILIZATION
Growth Education Movement (http://www.growtheducation.org/staticDocs/Home.htm)
GEM was founded in 2002 by Ed Stennett, a retired electronics engineer. Like Stennett’s excellent book published the same year (In Growth We Trust: Sprawl, Smart Growth, and Rapid Population Growth), this website aims at educating the general public about the impacts of U.S. population growth, and argues that our mushrooming population is neither inevitable nor economically necessary. The key message: growth must stop, and U.S. population stabilization can be achieved by voluntary means supported by the vast majority of Americans.
Optimum Population Trust ( http://www.optimumpopulation.org/index.html)
This U.K.-based organization, founded in 1991, claims to be the leading think tank in the UK concerned with the impact of population growth on the environment. Focused on national U.K. and global issues, it campaigns for stabilization and gradual population decrease globally and in the UK, and undertakes research on population in relation to climate change, energy, resources, biodiversity, development impacts, ageing and employment and other environmental and economic issues.
CASSE [Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy] (http://www.steadystate.org/Index.html)
Population stabilization is a logical – though perhaps secondary – goal of this new organization, primarily intended to (a) educate citizens and policy makers about the fundamental conflict between economic growth (increasing production and consumption of goods and services) and environmental protection, economic sustainability, national security and international stability, and (b) promote a steady state economy of stabilized, mildly fluctuating size as a sustainable alternative to economic growth. CASSE founder and president Brian Czech, an Ecological Economist, is author of Shoveling Fuel for a Runaway Train.
The Sustainable Scale Project (http://www.sustainablescale.org/AttractiveSolutions/ASustainableScalePerspective.aspx)
“The goal of The Sustainable Scale Project is to provide educational resources and support regarding scale issues and policies to organizations which share our Mission, and are capable of promoting these ideas to either government decision makers, or the general public.” With Brian Czech a (the?) main player in this project and website, it’s not surprising that there is considerable ideological overlap with the website for CASSE (Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy). It’s not always clear to me how to translate the website’s issues – the focus is at a global, big-picture, level – down to a practical, operational, community level. For example, “Optimal Scale is the key policy objective for a sustainable future. It integrates the goals of ecological sustainability and social justice…” Important, and tantalizing; how do we use this in Albemarle County?
NPG [Negative Population Growth] (http://www.npg.org/index.html)
At one time the radical population organization in America was ZPG [Zero Population Growth], founded in 1968. In the 1990’s ZPG – like the national Sierra Club more recently – started to fear that any talk of limiting migration into the USA would sound xenophobic and scare away big donors. To shed ZPG’s radical reputation, leaders in 2002 renamed the organization “Population Connection,” and it now focuses almost exclusively on fertility regulation at a national and global level. NPG, formed in 1972, is now one of the cutting-edge national-level anti-growth outfit. Though NPG has expressed little interest in growth at the local community level, it has long examined the concept of optimal population size (see, for example, the 1989 article “How to Get There From Here: The Demographic Route to Optimal Population Size” by Leon F. Bouvier (http://www.npg.org/forum_series/there_here.htm).
Sierrans for U.S. Population Stabilization [SUSPS] (http://www.susps.org/)
Since 1996, leaders of the Sierra Club have refused to admit that immigration driven, rapid U.S. population growth causes massive environmental problems, a position that SUSPS argues is a sop to a super rich donor who demanded this position in return for huge donations. SUSPS is a splinter group of Sierra Club activist who advocate a return to traditional (1970-1996) Sierra Club population policy which included both birth rates and immigration levels as needed to achieve U.S. population stabilization as quickly as possible.
The Population Coalition ( http://www.popco.org/)
Started in 1994 within local chapters of the League of Women Voters, this nationwide grassroots organization promotes awareness of population pressures and overconsumption on a sustainable future. In their statement of core beliefs, “population stabilization” is listed as one of the three most significant issues facing the human race today. Nearly all of its focus is on global and US national-level population issues. The Coalition produces a bi-monthly journal -- the Pop!ulation Press – and booklets, brochures, and guides for activists. Coalition members organize community forums, educational outreach programs, and promote public dialogue.
Population-Environment Balance (http://www.balance.org/ )
This D.C.-based national non-profit membership organization is “dedicated to maintaining and improving the quality of life in the U.S. through population stabilization”. It aims to safeguard the carrying capacity of the United States, defined as “the number of individuals who can be supported without degrading the physical, social, and cultural environment; i.e., without reducing the ability of the environment to sustain the desired quality of life over the long term.” Most of its activities focus on changing national policies and laws so that legal and illegal migration into the country will be significantly reduced. Balance explicitly supports a moratorium on all immigration in excess of 100,000 a year – the maximum level of legal immigrants which would allow the U.S. to achieve population stabilization. The organization publishes its own “Action Series”, and reprints “classic monographs” (e.g. Herman E. Daly’s 1987 The Steady-State Economy: Alternative to Growthmania, and Garret Hardin’s 1968 The Tragedy of the Commons).
Carrying Capacity Network (http://www.carryingcapacity.org/)
Another D.C.-based national non-profit advocacy group working to secure the sustainable future of the United States. It is “committed to national revitalization, immigration reduction, population stabilization, economic and environmental sustainability, and resource conservation.” CCN defines “carrying capacity,” always changing, as “…the number of individuals who can be supported in a given area within natural resource limits, and without degrading the natural social, cultural and economic environment for present and future generations.” The organization argues that most of America's main problems have deep roots in our unsustainable population growth. The most visible work of CCN deals with US migration reform; they also distribute useful publications.
“SMART” GROWTH ORGANIZATIONS
The vast majority of groups concerned with local population growth – there are hundreds of them throughout the U.S. – subscribe to the approach of the “smart” growth movement. This effort, first articulated roughly 30 years ago to cope with sprawl, is today the conventional wisdom within planning departments of most thoughtful American localities (and increasingly co-opted by pro-growth forces).
“Smart growth does not seek to stop or limit growth, but rather to accommodate it…,” as the pro-development Urban Land Institute, an advocate of “smart” growth, honestly explains. Premised on the myth that growth is inevitable, but wary of the more noticeable impacts of relentlessly expanding populations, “smart” growth builds on the well-intentioned but short-sighted concept of ‘sustainable growth.’ “Smart” growth strategies aim at managing how and where growth should occur, NOT whether it should occur.
ASAP, and similar groups that seek to stabilize (i.e., stop) population growth at some point short of catastrophe, argue that “smart” growth is necessary but not sufficient. Until growth stops, we point out, it should be “smart.” The tools ASAP advocates to slow population growth and gradually level off are nothing more that the tools long encouraged by the “smart” growth movement: zoning, voluntary conservation easements, development buffers, purchase of development rights programs, urban growth boundaries, minimum density requirements, cluster development, etc.
Thus we in ASAP try to maintain close contact with our “smart” growth colleagues, with whom we agree on far more than we disagree.
To keep up with what they’re doing around the country, the Smart Growth Network (http://www.smartgrowth.org/default.asp) can be helpful. The Network, set up in 1996 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “works to encourage development that serves the economy, community and the environment.” A free subscription to their monthly e-mailed catalogue of Smart Growth related news, events, information and resources, called “Smart Growth Online”, can be had at the website.
In our Charlottesville/Albemarle area, the main “smart” growth standard-bearers are:
Piedmont Environmental Council [PEC] (http://www.pecva.org/index.php)
The dominant environmental group in nine counties of Virginia’s Piedmont, with a focus on protecting rural areas from sprawl, PEC has a strong staff at its Warrenton, VA, headquarters and field offices stretching between Loudoun and Albemarle. Jeff Werner, the Field Officer of the Albemarle office (based in Charlottesville) is a knowledgeable and tireless advocate of smart growth, and generous with his prodigious information about local population growth and land use. He recently issued a valuable report examining the huge amount of residential development in the City and County “pipeline” (http://www.pecva.org/counties/albemarle/index.php).
Southern Environmental Law Center [SELC] (http://www.southernenvironment.org/index.htm)
The Virginia office of SELC, the biggest environmental organization headquartered in the South, is in Charlottesville, where an environmental lawyer focusing on our local issues has recently been added. SELC’s work is based on “using the power of the law to conserve healthy air, clean water, wild lands, and livable communities.” The organization recognizes that these laudable environmental conditions are threatened by population growth, but in classic “smart” growth terms their website states “The problem is not that we are growing, but how we are growing.” Nevertheless SELC has made valuable contributions, both directly and indirectly, to efforts supported by ASAP.
Charlottesville Tomorrow (http://action.cvilletomorrow.org/cvilleaction/home.html)
Charlottesville Tomorrow is dedicated “to informing public opinion and policy on land use, transportation, and community design issues to ensure sensible growth and to realize the best possible future for the Charlottesville-Albemarle area.” Though local population growth is a major focus of its activities, it operates only though the most traditional “smart” growth ideology, and has avoided taking a public stance on most of the local controversial growth decisions. However in its first year, through its website, blogs, podcasts, radio appearances, etc., Charlottesville Tomorrow has succeeded in making available to the public up-to-date information about local growth and development issues.
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Advocates for a Sustainable Albemarle Population |