This is kind of unbelievable. State legislators in Oregon are going to use electricity ratepayers’ money to pay down a loan for the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry.

Portland General Electric customers may be bailing the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry out of a $4.6 million delinquent loan with state money intended to fund efficiency measures and renewable energy.

Opponents of the measure say using that money to pay off OMSI’s debt to the Department of Energy amounts to a legislative raid on ratepayer money.

[...]

Lawmakers insisted that using surcharge money to pay down the loan was consistent with the intent of the original proposal because the loan was given to OMSI based on energy conservation efforts made at the museum’s new building.

And then finally,

The bailout would only affect PGE customers in the Portland metro area because that’s where OMSI is located, but it amounts to a 16 percent overall decrease in the Energy Trust’s state funds.

In other words, it isn’t your money. It belongs to the legislature and the government to do with what they will.

What are we really going to do with the GET surcharge?

Don

Wrong.

A Cybercast News Service analysis of EPA records found 73 biorefineries – more than 60 percent of those operating – were cited by state or federal agencies for environmental violations in the last three years. The vast majority involve state or federal clean air laws.

Full story here.

don

Will Honolulu learn from Portland’s mistakes?

Probably not.

After years of expanding light rail, streetcars and commuter rail in the Portland Metro area, the money is drying up.

Tri-Met’s fare box only returns between 18 to 21% of the operating cost and that does not include capital construction. Metro has put all our transportation eggs into rail projects that are very expensive and unsustainable.

The answer? To raise taxes!

Honolulu can look forward to a 5% GET if Portland is any example.

Link here.

Don

Must see articles on public transit and urban planning (unless you are an environmentalist who wants to build on forest land.)

Link here.

don

Between $376 billion and $872 billion per year is fiscally transferred from middle-aged groups to the youngest and oldest Americans each year through government taxes and spending, according to a new Tax Foundation study of taxing and spending by age groups.

America’s youngest households, those headed by someone 25 or less, receive $2.32 in government spending for each dollar of taxes paid, and households aged 75 and over receive $4.93 per dollar of taxes paid. Meanwhile, in the middle, households aged 45 to 54 received 73 cents per tax dollar.

In other words those of middle age are subsidizing the lives of the young and the old. If you look at the figures quoted above these subsidizies constitent a rather substantial amount.

The whole Tax Foundation article can be found here.

Don

Sam Staley at the Reason Foundation has an article on Planetizen.com that details the inefficiencies of rail transit.

His facts are accurate and consistent. What is almost as interesting is the ignorant comments that follow his column. The uninformed never cease with meaningless blather.

Whole article here.

don

The following link is a perfect example of just how eletist the Greens and Enviromentalists truly are. The want all the modern conveniences for themselves but the poor, downtrodden villagers must be maintained in noble savage poverty.

A few pertinent excerpts:

“People here have no jobs,” Mark Fenn admitted, after taking documentary producers on a tour of his $35,000 catamaran and the site of his new coastal home.

The whole attitude of Green-Envios is disgusting.

Full article here.

don