Luke, What are you Thinking?

Here’s a snap-shot of my internal monologue shortly after my 3^rd cup of coffee this morning.

Luke, WTF? This blog started because you wanted to try and live off the land in an off-grid Yurt, and now you’re writing about the positive effect that growth has had on Hawai’i? Have you looked around? The endless growth paradigm is driving us into the ground. I’ve heard you say that! Asshole, you’re giving me whiplash. After all that you’ve written about the status-quo, about climate change, the loss of open space, declining local agriculture, and waxing poetic about what happens when the black dust fences come down. Now, you have the schizophrenic nerve to write that the end of growth may be more worrisome than the slew of problems that we’ve inherited through our endless population growth?

Huh, schizophrenic? Really? Not only is that incorrectly used, but it's a terrible and offensive word choice for a post on an imaginary internal dialogue. All I’m saying is that we need to accept that our society is based on economic growth. Have you ever gotten a loan? Bought a house? Purchased anything on a credit card? The near certainty of future growth makes all of those things possible. And, it’s important for us to recognize that the main drivers of economic growth since the industrial revolution have been the population explosion and cheap energy in the form of stored carbon.

What about the endless expansion of agricultural subdivisions? What about the fact that nobody my age can buy a house? What about our lack of water? And, traffic! I’m going to sit in traffic for two hours this afternoon to go paddle in Hanalei Bay where there’s been a sewage spill because Princeville can’t handle their own shit. Are you telling me that these aren’t problems of too much growth?

Sure they are. But, don’t you live in an agricultural subdivision? It’s easy for you to say ‘no more growth,’ but what about all those people who don’t own homes? Who don’t have decent paying jobs? What would the end of growth mean for them? The last time the world was in a state of no-growth was feudalism. Do you know what broke the back of feudalism in Hawai’i and Europe? Trade, economic growth, the birth of towns, and economic mobility. When there’s growth, you can move out of the strata of your birth. How can we begin to solve our mounting inequality in a stagnant economy? How can government preserve open space? How can they invest in renewable energy and public transportation? We need economic growth. Population growth ensured that we now have a 35% better chance of owning a home and 62% more income than we would've in the '60s.  Would you give that up? 

Ok. So, what are you saying? Have more kids?

No. Not at all. The population will keep growing for at least another forty years. There are about 400 more births than deaths every year on Kaua’i. Even without immigration, people are going to keep making plenty of babies for awhile. We need to do a better job of managing growth and infrastructure now, so that we can decouple economic growth from population growth in the future. I know that you read that article in yesterday’s New York Times about how Japan’s population is declining by .8% per year, and they are having to cut services and abandon built infrastructure. Those are the results of ignoring the future threat of population decline.

And what about decoupling economic growth from carbon emissions first, shouldn’t that be a priority? If we don’t do that, we won’t even have the chance to figure out the population problem later. Democracy doesn’t think long term.

They happen simultaneously. The solutions for decoupling economic growth from carbon are the same as population. We need to continually invest in technology. And, though I know you have mixed feelings on this as well—that means supporting high tech industry on Kaua’i like the seed companies so that we're not so dependent on tourism. It also means supporting renewable energy. When we spend money on oil, that money leaves our local economy forever. When we spend money on renewable energy, that goes to KIUC, land owners, and local entrepreneurs. And, because they are a co-op, when KIUC makes a profit, they distribute it to every one of their customers/owners. And, most importantly, we need to support locally owned businesses. Spending $200 locally can generate as much as $500 for our economy. The emphasis on technology and local production leads to a smaller reliance on population growth while simultaneously getting us off of fossil fuels.

This is all easy for you to say. You’re sitting in an armchair at your desk. Have you driven down Puhi Road? We can’t even maintain our current infrastructure in the face of population growth. How can we hope to decarbonize and plan for a future of limited population growth?

As a rural community, we spend a disproportionately large amount of money per person. On O’ahu, the county spends $2,196 per person—on Kaua’i our county spends $3,035 per person. The difference being that we expect the same level of government services, but we’re more spread out. Every new agricultural subdivision of multi acre lots costs the county significantly more to provide service—water, roads, fire and police protection, etc—than it does for a home in the heart of Lihu’e. While we need to incentivize density and mixed use construction, our current zoning codes leave it up to the whims of the market to dictate development patterns. It’s in the best interest of the large land owners to continually rezone land to residential in order to cash out on their long term investments. And, because we’re short on housing, the Land Use Commission is inclined to always agree. Check out Numila’s re-designation to urban and the surrounding area being designated a “high growth area” in the South Kaua’i Community Plan. While that is a gift to the landowner, it’s also borne out of the housing crunch. We need more houses, and that is how the market provides them. However, there is a  different solution. Form Based Code gives the Planning Department the regulatory ability to control the “form” of development on Kaua’i. They can promote mixed use development, density, and livability so we don’t fall into the the same problems of every American suburb since the advent of the automobile. While it's a dirty word on Kaua'i, promoting density around our urban areas such as Lihu’e and Kapa’a would decrease commuting to Lihu’e and decrease our per-capita infrastructure cost of far-away developments. Traffic and high county expenditures start and end with planning.

Sorry I fell asleep. What were we talking about? Chem trails? Just kidding. Maybe I missed it, but why would we give more power to our county to control development?

Whether you like it or not, we’re going to have 15,000 more people on Kaua’i over the next twenty years. We need to accommodate that growth, yet plan for the flow to eventually stop. If we continue with business as usual, we can expect to continue to lose ag land and create far away subdivisions that cost a lot for the county to maintain.

Ok, I’m with you to a point. With traditional zoning codes, we know what we’re getting—residential here, commercial there, and agricultural way over there. Development forms and patterns are guided by the developers, not by the planning department. But, by attempting to manage development form, aren’t we giving a lot of undue power to the planning department? Sure, we may have a pro-active planning department now, but what if the next administration is financed by developers, and they don’t like the restrictive nature of Form Based Code? Can we really afford that inconsistency?

Of course that’s a risk, but that’s the inherent danger of democracy. Which is the best argument there is for getting engaged.

And, on that note, I guess you're going to post this on Facebook? Do you really need to post every single thought that you have? Is nothing sacred anymore?

Welcome to the 21st century buddy.