Category Archives: Progress

Rep. Geran Tarr, D-Anchorage, speaks during a House Floor sessionin April. Tarr and the House majority havent agreed on an oil and gas tax bill with the Senate majority. (Photo by Skip Gray/360 North)

As of late afternoon Thursday, the Alaska Senate and House hadntmade any public progress on oil and gas tax legislation. They met Wednesday, but they still cant agree on how to replace the state system allowing companies to receive tax credits. Lawmakers only have two more days in the special session.

When oil companies that arent major producers spend money to develop new fields, they get tax credits from the state they can trade for cash. Its an incentive for companies that are smaller or newer to the state to do business here.

Both House and Senate members want to get rid of these cash credits. But House members want to delay replacing these credits. Senators want to allow companies to use the losses to reduce the taxes theyll have to pay in the future.

Sitka Republican Sen. Bert Stedman saidcompanies need to know what will happen when they spend in Alaska. He saidthat wont happen under the Houses revisions to the oil and gas tax bill, known as Version X.

If you want to put the industry in the freezer in Alaska literally, shut it down for expansion into these new, fairly colossal fields that have been targeted, this is how to do it, Stedman said. We need to take this Version X and quite frankly put it into the shredder.

Anchorage Democratic Rep. Geran Tarr saidthe state cant afford to give up a similar amount in future taxes than it currently hands out in cash credits. She saidthe money is needed to fill in the gap between what the state spends and what it raises in taxes, fees and oil royalties. Without any changes, she saidPermanent Fund dividends could be cut further.

Every dollar not earned through a reasonable oil tax puts more pressure on the use of the PFD for state government, she said.

Senators saidthe Legislature should make progress with what both sides can agree on: getting rid of cash credits.

Anchorage Republican Sen. Cathy Giessel saidthe state would be in worse shape financially if uncertainty leads to less oil production. That would meanfewer royalties flowing to the state.

We are focused on making sure that we continue production on the North Slope, because this royalty value is significant, she said.

Rep. Andy Josephson,an Anchorage Democrat, raised the possibility of putting setting an end dateon when companies can use or carry forward their losses from spending on oil-field development or leases to lower future taxes. He saidthat would put pressure on lawmakers to make more changes to the tax system.

We dont know how we can have that serious discussion without further discussion to carry-forward lease expenses, he said.

State Tax Division Director Ken Alper agreed with senators who expressed concern about the uncertainty potentially caused by the House bill.

It does create an uncertainty to not know what sort of value youre going to get for your spending, he said. And so I understand why there is some consternation from the Senate side and from some in industry as to why this House compromise bill might not be a completely viable solution.

But Alper saidtheres still room for compromise between the two chambers.

I encourage the two sides to continue to talk to find some sort of middle ground on the valuation of losses on what some will call cost recovery, so that we can all complete this project for 2017 and move on to whats next in passing a fiscal plan, Alper said.

The special session must end by Saturday.

Alaskas Energy Desks Rashah McChesney contributed to this report.

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Special session nears end without public progress on oil taxes - KTOO

In response to the June 28 letter headlined Moderates block progress (The Daily Progress):

"Progress" is not trying to ram through questionable legislation that has been written in secret surely in cahoots with the insurance industry and Big Pharma that will affect millions of lives.

"Progress" is not chipping away again and again at the financial security of average Americans until all but the wealthy 1 percent are working two or more menial jobs just to pay for food, shelter and high insurance premiums to stay alive.

"Progress" is not treating fellow citizens like they're inferior, a nuisance or a danger simply because they're not clones of you.

"Progress" will be achievedonlywhenmore, not fewer, moderate and measured voices discuss meaningful options that don't hurt, demean or dismiss millions of fellow citizens.

The my way or the highway attitude that has drowned out civil civic discussion in recent years is toxic, self-serving, sophomoric, and disgraceful.

It's time to reclaim and revere what Abraham Lincoln so eloquently called our better angels ... before it's too late.

Kathi Ann Brown, Charlottesville

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Opinion/Letter: That's not progress that's being blocked - The Daily Progress

Firefighters took advantage of cooler temperatures Wednesday and increased containment on several destructive wildfires in California just ahead of another forecast of triple-digit heat this weekend.

The slight cool-down kept fire activity at minimal levels and allowed firefighters to improve containment lines around the blazes. The fires, which erupted over the weekend amid a searing heat wave, have destroyed more than four dozen homes statewide.

Wildfire risk will increase this weekend, as a massive high-pressure system settles over the American Southwest. That system is expected to raise temperatures in Northern California by as much as 10 degrees and 3 to 6 degrees in Southern California, according to the National Weather Service. The high pressure also will generate breezy conditions that can fan wildfire flames.

Light sundowner winds could be problematic for firefighters battling the 11,920-acre Whittier fire in Santa Barbara County, forecasters said. The strong offshore winds are formed by a building high pressure, which pushes the northerly gusts through canyons and passes in the Santa Ynez Mountains.

This will make conditions in and around the Whittier fire worse, meteorologist Andrew Rorke said in a weather statement.

Fire crews tackling the Whittier fire in the Los Padres National Forest put out hot spots overnight and constructed new containment lines to hold the massive blaze, according to the U.S. Forest Service. The fire was 48% contained.

The blaze, which started Saturday along Highway 154, has destroyed eight homes and 12 outbuildings south of Lake Cachuma, and prompted the evacuation of more than 3,500.

Another massive fire burning near Santa Maria, the 28,687-acre Alamo fire, has destroyed two structures, including one home. The blaze, which was 65% contained, continued to threaten 133 structures, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

Aided recently by light cloud cover and increased moisture levels, more than 2,200 firefighters have tackled flames smoldering in steep, rugged terrain.

Mandatory evacuations have remained active for residents living in the Tepusquet Canyon area. Hundreds of residents fled the remote area when the fire broke out Thursday off Highway 166 near Twitchell Reservoir in San Luis Obispo County.

In Butte County, some residents returned to their neighborhoods only to find their homes destroyed by the 5,800-acre Wall fire.

After inspecting the fires damage, Cal Fire determined that 41 homes had been destroyed. An additional 57 structures were damaged.

Steve Orsillo told KRCR-TV his home was one of 41 gutted by the blaze near Oroville. Orsillo built the house 25 years ago and shared it with his wife and four children.

My heart sank, he told the television news station. We raised all of our children there. Just a lot of life there.

Despite the warm temperatures and low humidity, nearly 1,700 firefighters have surrounded the blaze, strengthened containment lines and slowed its growth, Cal Fire said. The fire, which was 60% contained, still threatens 606 structures.

Elsewhere in the state, the Lariat fire, which broke out Tuesday afternoon, charred 100 acres in the east San Jose foothills. The fast-moving blaze destroyed one home and damaged another.

In the Central Valley, nearly 900 firefighters continued to battle the fast-growing Garza fire after it broke out Sunday afternoon near Tar Canyon in Kings County.

Flames were threatening five structures and power lines near Avenal.

The blaze, which was 24% contained, has scorched 18,666 acres of tall grass and brush in an area not easily accessible to firefighters, Cal Fire said.

Firefighters in San Diego County stopped a blaze from spreading into the community of Lakeside. Officials said three firefighters were hurt, and of those, two suffered moderate injuries and were taken to a hospital. The third was not hospitalized.

The 400-acre Jennings fire broke out Tuesday afternoon off Interstate 8 and triggered an hours-long freeway closure.

By Wednesday, one lane of eastbound Interstate 8 was reopened.

veronica.rocha@latimes.com

Twitter: VeronicaRochaLA

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Residents return to fire-gutted homes as California firefighters make progress on massive blazes - Los Angeles Times

BBC News

Call to build on NI parades progress after 'peaceful' Twelfth BBC News Northern Ireland should build on the progress it has made after what was hailed as the "most peaceful" Twelfth of July commemorations in years, a north Belfast priest has said. Fr Gary Donegan was involved in talks to help resolve a long-running parade ... and more »

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Call to build on NI parades progress after 'peaceful' Twelfth - BBC News

TULSA, Oklahoma -

Tulsa Mayor GT Bynum said he wants to get city street work done faster.

He wants to change the way projects get done, and he shared his ideas at Wednesday's City Council meeting.

The mayor's plan will impact the time projects will take to finish.

Tulsa is the city of the Orange Barrel Alert. Project after project can be seen at intersections across the city and street projects are labeled 'progress as promised.'

Now, Bynum said he wants that progress to go a little faster.

"We've all heard the concerns about a street being torn up and then how long it takes for that street to be repaired," Bynum said.

In a presentation to the city council, Bynum said the engineering department is working to decrease the time frame for individual street projects by 15 to 20 percent.

"If we can still get bids that are within what we have budgeted for those projects then we will move forward with those overall time frames," he said.

Bynum also wants to make road construction on arterial streets and at intersections 12 and 24-hour projects, meaning, crews would work longer days or around the clock to get the work done in a shorter amount of time.

Bynum said some signs are hard to read and are basically just a billboard with city councilor's names on them.

Now, he wants something more clear, concise and a way to show drivers exactly how far the project has come.

No word on when exactly the new signs will be put into place.

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Tulsa Mayor Wants Quicker Progress On City Street Work - News On 6

After the state legislature passed its first large transportation package in years, members of the U.S. Highway 14 Partnership gathered in Owatonna on Wednesday to discuss the legislatures actions and chart a course forward.

The Partnerships primary goal for the 2017 legislative session was to obtain additional funding for the Corridors of Commerce program. The Legislatures transportation package, which Gov. Dayton signed into law, includes $50 million in cash over the next two years and $300 million in bonding over the next four years for this key program.

The U.S. Highway 14 Partnership is committed to the expansion of Highway 14 to four lanes all the way from New Ulm to Rochester, said Mankato City Councilor Karen Foreman, President of the U.S. Highway 14 Partnership. We support any funding source that helps move us toward that goal.

Significant progress has been made in recent years, but two sections of the highway remain unfinished:12 miles from Nicollet to New Ulm and 12.5 miles from Owatonna to Dodge Center. The Partnership believes that the injection of bonding and cash into the Corridors of Commerce program will help, but falls short of an ultimate solution.

We are pleased that the legislature made a serious investment in Corridors of Commerce, but our work isnt done, added Foreman. These funds will keep us moving forward, but arent enough to get us to the finish line.

Corridors of Commerce was established in 2013 as a statewide program designed to fund transportation projects that reduce barriers to commerce by expanding capacity and/or improving freight movement. Several U.S. Highway 14 projects have received funding through the program, including the expansion of Highway 14 from North Mankato to Nicollet, the two-mile expansion west of Owatonna, and significant land acquisition.

This year, the Partnership was particularly instrumental in helping to secure a cash appropriation for the program. Its crucial for Highway 14 that Corridors of Commerce have cash available because the projects include a great deal of land acquisition, which bonding funds cant be used for, said Owatonna City Councilor Kevin Raney, Vice President of the Partnership.

The Partnership also played a central role in re-shaping the language that governs how Corridors of Commerce projects are selected. When Legislators sought changes to the way Corridors of Commerce doles out money, the Partnership supported language that requires funding be regionally balanced, ensuring that Highway 14 projects will remain strong candidates for these funds.

According to Partnership members, the expansion of Highway 14 is long overdue and the need will only get greater over time. In addition to safety concerns, communities along the corridor fear theyll miss out on vital economic development opportunities.

Expanding to four lanes is essential to keep communities along Highway 14 moving forward, said Raney. Businesses will be hesitant to move in or expand if southern Minnesotas largest cities continue to be connected by two-lane roads.

We have seen the impact of Highway 14 expansion in Mankato, said Foreman. Wal-Marts Mankato Distribution Center was made possible by the progress weve made, and now more than 400 people go to work there every day. We want to see that kind of success all the way across Highway 14. We will continue to work with legislators from both parties until that happens.

-KEYC News 12

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Highway 14 Advocacy Group: State Transportation Bill is Progress, But Not a Solution - KEYC

Relief was arriving after a rough stretch of wildfires all around the U.S. West, with firefighters slowly surrounding once-fierce blazes and evacuees starting to stream back home.

OROVILLE, Calif. Relief was arriving after a rough stretch of wildfires all around the U.S. West, with firefighters slowly surrounding once-fierce blazes and evacuees starting to stream back home.

Authorities surveying the damage from a blaze in Northern California said Tuesday that at least 41 homes and 55 other buildings had been destroyed near the town of Oroville.

Some residents had returned home after fleeing the flames in the grassy foothills of the Sierra Nevada, about 60 miles north of Sacramento, but thousands remained evacuated as the fire entered its fifth day. The blaze burned nearly 9 square miles and injured four firefighters. It was 55 percent contained.

Crews were making progress against dozens of wildfires across the western U.S.

In Colorado, crews were winding down the fight against a wildfire that temporarily forced hundreds of people to evacuate near the resort town of Breckenridge. Firefighters built containment lines around at least 85 percent of the blaze.

In Arizona, recent monsoon rain has helped stop the growth of a wildfire in mountains overlooking Tucson and an evacuation order for the summer-retreat community of Summerhaven has been lifted.

In Nevada, fire crews were getting the upper hand on a wildland blaze that shut down U.S. Interstate 80 along the Nevada-California line most of Tuesday.

Three new California fires made trouble Tuesday.

One of them, just east of San Jose, destroyed two homes before its growth was stopped.

Another broke out in San Diego County and quickly surged to over half a square mile. It forced the temporary closure of Interstate 8 and the brief evacuation of 15 families in Alpine, a town of 15,000 people about 50 miles northeast of San Diego.

In Northern California, the Placer County Sheriffs Office issued mandatory evacuations along four roads near a 2-acre fire burning north of Auburn.

In Santa Barbara County, at least 3,500 people remained out of their homes due to a pair of fires. The larger of the two charred more than 45 square miles of dry brush and has burned 20 structures since it broke out. It was 60 percent contained. To the south an 18-square-mile wildfire that destroyed 20 structures is 48 percent contained.

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Crews make progress against dozens of fires across western US - Las Vegas Review-Journal

Two years into its agreement with the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, Rochester Public Schools say the district is making progress.

Superintendent Michael Muoz read through a seven-page, 18-item update to report to the school board that the district is in compliance with the federal office's requirements for monitoring how it handles discipline and other things during a three-year period.

The agreement stems from a September 2015 finding that students of color in the district were disproportionately disciplined compared with their white peers.

Muoz said the district still needs to talk with OCR about how it analyzes discipline data at each school building and has to make additional updates to policies in the student handbook.

While specific details of how both of these will be resolved weren't provided at Tuesday's meeting, Muoz said he's confident in the district's progress.

"We see this as a very good report," Muoz said. "But that doesn't mean our work is done. We'll continue looking forward on the work that we're doing, but it's good to know that we're meeting the requirements of the agreement."

School board members were pleased with the progress, and asked the district to make the letter public by posting it on the district's website.

"I think you get an idea of the depth of reporting ... and how we're doing this systematically throughout the whole district," school board member Gary Smith said. "I think sharing it would be a good thing."

School board members added that even though requirements of the agreement were met, it doesn't mean the work of the district will stop.

"I know that we feel strongly that we're just beginning," said school board member Jean Marvin. "But until we can we can really show that our kids have equity, both in terms of achievement, and referral, that this district is not going to rest."

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District makes progress in discipline equity, superintendent says - Post-Bulletin

Every night on Broadway, thousands of people line up to see Hamilton, The Lion King, Hello Dolly or some other high-profile, elaborate musical.

And just a few blocks away, there are more Broadway hopefuls: the writers and composers presenting shows at the New York Musical Festival.

Now in its 14th year, the festival is dedicated to new musicals that are very much works-in-progress. Some are no more than staged readings. Others have costumes, props, sets and a small band of musicians. All of the shows have one thing in common theyre trying to move up the musical food chain.

The showcase includes dozens of productions, many of which feature relatively well-known performers on stage. In the audience are agents, producers, casting directors and theater-lovers hoping to see the very first staging of a new work that could be a future Next to Normal or "Title of Show, two musicals that started at The New York Musical Festival before they made it all the way to Broadway.

Rachel Sussman, producing artistic director, and Dan Markley, executive director of the New York Musical Festival, talked with The Frame host John Horn about what it's like to curate a festival of unproduced musicals.

To hear the full interview, click the blue player above.

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Works-in-progress hit the stage at the New York Musical Festival - 89.3 KPCC

JULY 11, 2017

IN HER 1954 MEMOIR Many a Good Crusade, Virginia Gildersleeve, long-time dean of Barnard College, lamented:

Married or unmarried, womens chances of getting professorships in colleges or universities have deteriorated, I fear, during the last thirty years. Most colleges for women, which during their early decades had a large majority of women on their faculties, have during the past quarter-century made great efforts to secure a considerable proportion of men. As it is far from easy for women to obtain a post [] in a co-educational institution, this has made the situation rather worse than it used to be. (emphasis added)

Gildersleeve, who was born in 1877 and attended the Brearley School in New York (founded to prepare girls for Harvards entrance examination), had seen conditions for professional women change over the course of her storied lifetime not, as she observes above, for the better. She went on to attend Barnard College, then housed in a cramped brownstone on Madison Avenue, and was part of a freshman class of 21 girls. By the time she graduated in 1899, the college had moved to its new spacious accommodations in Morningside Heights, across the street from Columbia University. The new halls seemed huge at first but were quickly filled with an increasing number of female students.

Gildersleeve taught at the college, received her PhD from Columbia in 1908, and was appointed dean of Barnard in 1911, a position she held for 36 years, until she retired in 1947. Despite having fought to allow married women and mothers on the faculty, she noted with dismay in her memoir that she had recently asked a young woman a junior with top marks at one of the countrys best universities whether shed ever had a woman professor. No, [the young woman] answered. I havent. I never thought of a woman professor. I dont believe I should like to study under one.

The phenomenon Gildersleeve witnessed an explosion of women faculty in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, followed by an alarming decline was mirrored in other professions such as medicine. In her 1985 study In the Company of Educated Women: A History of Women and Higher Education in America, Barbara Solomon relates the observations of a 1913 Radcliffe graduate who claimed that her decision to pursue a medical career was inspired by the many women physicians practicing in Boston when she was a child. The number of women doctors in the United States ballooned from under2,500 in 1880 to 9,000 in 1910, amounting to six percent of all doctors a proportion that fell steadily thereafter.

The idea that opportunities had been better for professional women in the early years of the 20th century, but went downhill in the following decades, might seem strange. Its common to believe that social progress moves in one direction upward and to conflate different kinds of freedoms: political, social, economic. Since women won the right to vote in 1920, one might assume that they continued to make considerable professional gains in the aftermath of suffrage. As Gildersleeves remarks show, however, this was not the case. Opportunities declined in the 1920s, despite the previous three decades being something of a golden age for career-minded women.

Social optimism regarding the new careers for women found expression in the little-known silent-era action films of the 1910s that I have written about elsewhere. In these thrill-filled serials, women had ambitions that took them out and about in the world, like the aspiring journalist in The Perils of Pauline (1914), the working journalists in Dollie of the Dailies (1914) and Perils of Our Girl Reporters (1916), the railroad telegraph operator in Hazards of Helen (19141917), or the businesswoman in The Haunted Valley (a late example of the genre in 1923). The daring protagonists of these movies openly courted adventure: they drove cars, flew planes, battled villains on top of moving trains, even brandished guns when necessary. The actresses who played the leads were themselves examples of what women could do if given the opportunity: they performed their own stunts, and even contributed to the scripts. As Helen Holmes of Hazards of Helen put it: if a photoplay actress wants to achieve real thrills, she must write them into the scenario herself.

These adventurous onscreen women were matched by their colleagues behind the camera. During the first two decades of the 20th century, women worked in all aspects of film production from writers, directors, and producers to exhibitors, editors, and script supervisors. For instance, Alice Guy Blach, one of the earliest filmmakers ever, was head of production at the Gaumont Company in France from 1896 to 1906. She married a fellow filmmaker, moved to the United States, and started Solax, her own production company. The firm was so successful that she built her own studio in Fort Lee, New Jersey, in 1912. According to film historian Alison McMahan, the studio cost upward of $100,000. It was here that Guy Blach filmed her most expensive and ambitious Solax project, Dick Whittington and His Cat, which cost $35,000.

In her essay Womans Place in Photoplay Production, published in The Moving Picture World in 1914, Guy Blach exhorted women to become film producers:

It has long been a source of wonder to me that many women have not seized on the opportunities offered to them by the motion picture art to make their way to fame and fortune as producers of photodramas. Of all the arts there is probably none in which they can make such splendid use of talents so much more natural to a woman than to a man and so necessary to its perfection.

The transition to the studio system, however, made it more difficult forwomen filmmakers to access the large budgets and distribution system needed to make and sell successful movies. By the late 1910s, Guy Blach was working for hire; by the 1920s, she had stopped making films entirely. A similar fate befell Lois Weber, who in 1916 was elected to the Motion Pictures Directors Association, the only woman to receive such an honor. She went on to form her own production company in 1917, Lois Weber Productions, but her career slowed down after 1922 and she didnt direct films after the late 1920s.

The same fate also befell relative unknowns like Madeline Brandeis, who used the fortune from her divorce settlement to finance her own Hollywood movies. Brandeis directed, wrote, and/or produced well-received short films for children in the 1920s, then went on to make educational films for Path in the later part of the decade, which she wrote, shot, and edited in foreign locations. By the 1930s, however, her filmmaking career had ended and she was writing childrens books, including one called Adventure in Hollywood (1937), in which the two main female characters dream, not of working behind the camera and making their own movies, but of becoming actresses within the studio system. One hundred years later, rather little has changed: in its 2016 Celluloid Ceiling report, the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film found that women comprised 17% of all directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors, and cinematographers working on the top 250 domestic grossing films.

All this raises the question: What precisely happened to cause career opportunities to dry up in so many fields? Womens success in different professions wasnt merely a wartime phenomenon as the numbers show, women were prominent in fields like higher education, medicine, and film well before World War I broke out. One possible reason for the contraction in opportunities may have been societal backlash against womens success. Certainly, the increasing enrollment of women in co-educational colleges and their growing academic achievements set off alarm bells. Quotas were enforced for women students, certain scholarships were designated off-limits, and junior colleges were established as more conducive outlets for gentler temperaments. In some fields, the mechanisms of professionalization created barriers to entry, requiring specialized studies or membership in guilds that expressly excluded women.

Books like Dr. Edward Clarkes influential Sex in Education: or, A Fair Chance for the Girls (1873) had argued that, while it was perfectly reasonable to afford educational and employment opportunities to women, the usual timing was wrong for their gender. Clarke claimed that excessive study during adolescence diverted energy away from a young womans developing sexual organs, possibly leading to an inability to bear children and to consequent mental illness. Presumably it would have been acceptable for a woman to study or work during her 20s, after her reproductive system had matured, but by then she would be too busy as a wife and mother.

As Clarke puts it: The fact that women have often equaled and sometimes excelled men in physical labor, intellectual effort, and lofty heroism, is sufficient proof that women have muscle, mind, and soul, as well as men; but it is no proof that they have had, or should have, the same kind of training; nor is it any proof that they are destined for the same career as men. This is a wonderful way of both having ones cake and eating it. Clarkes theories allow him to claim that women arent in any way inferior to men, but because of the preexisting condition of being women, they should not receive the same training or have the same career opportunities as men.

Weve come a long way from Clarkes views, but not as far as we might hope. Pernicious undercurrents of gender bias continue to undercut professional womens accomplishments. Women still earn less for comparable work than their male counterparts. Realizing that progress ebbs and flows, that gains made at a particular moment in time arent automatically protected, that they may be lost and have to be won again, is both demoralizing and inspiring. The fact that Gildersleeve, writing in the 1950s, lamented the professional setbacks for women shed seen in her lifetime suggests that things were once much better and that the forward march of progress isnt a given. Rather, it takes constant vigilance and dedicated effort to achieve and maintain.

Radha Vatsal is the author of A Front Page Affairand Murder Between the Lines, mystery novels set in World War Iera New York City, and co-editor of the Women Film Pioneers Project.

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When Progress Ebbs: Career Women at the Turn of the 20th Century - lareviewofbooks