Politics and the Housing Crash
The world wide credit crisis started in the heart of America suburbia itself, and primarily through the politics of suburban development that radiated from South Florida. The story of subprime mortgage mess has not yet meshed with the campaign finance supply chain that wrapped up Florida production home [...]
A Thanksgiving Tirade
Skyrocketing land prices and other costs have jeopardized the likelihood that the Everglades restoration project will ever be completed, a federal engineer said,” to the AP on Thanksgiving Day, 2007. I hope its timing stirs the ire of Americans.
Snagged on the Precipice
In the Friday pullout real estate section of The Miami Herald, local Latin Builder Association member Caribe Homes announces it is throwing in a swimming pool and 3 percent off closing costs and “no builder’s fee”, for its stale inventory: Antilles Isles.
But throwing in the kitchen sink or swimming pool won’t be [...]
Tangled Up in Blue
Last week, Congress handed President Bush the first override of a presidential veto. The issue was the Water Resources Development Act– and for Florida, what was at stake was reviving the federal half of Everglades restoration.
In 2000, Congress set out to solve the Everglades restoration riddle (in the last WRDA Act) that [...]
To Bee or Not to Bee?
Colony collapse disorder sounds so elementally human. A recent 60 Minutes segment featured the disappearing bees. Too bad bees can’t talk. Come back, bees! You’re part of the hive that humans have made of the planet. I was thinking about bees last night, driving and at the same time looking at [...]
From AAA to Junk
Congress and the White House, state governments, local legislatures and lobbyists are vested to the hilt in denial: that the downgrade by Moody’s of at least $50 billion in collateralized debt from AAA to junk is a verdict on an economic model-suburban sprawl-that is torpedoing America’s middle class.
At the heart of sprawl [...]
