Robert Paterson's Weblog

Food on PEI - What about Just in Time Delivery?

It seems so normal today that when we need food - we just go to the supermarket. Robin is doing just that as I type this post. But the supermarkets are designed to work on the Just in Time delivery system. You don't see any warehouses alongside do you.

As oil prices have jumped, a group that has got very squeezed are truck drivers - most of whom are independents. In Spain they have bought the nation to a halt. In the UK they have forced many gas stations to close.

I am told that our supermarkets have about a 2 day inventory. So if the trucks stop running across the bridge, the shelves will be stripped bare in a few days.

Does it make sense to live in an agricultural landscape and have this kind of risk?

Can the just in time system survive expensive oil?

Is buying local more than just a nice slogan - or is having a self sufficient food system going to have to be more than a few people at the Farmers Market?

School on PEI - Peak Oil and Fewer Kids

Even without Peak Oil - We face a school infrastructure crisis on PEI. Here are the anticipated numbers of High School enrollments (Source UPEI). Of course the primary school situation will be even more dramatic.

Our system of centralized regional schools means that already some primary schools are becoming marginal using traditional cost benefit accounting.

The traditional modern "solution" will be to centralize even further where we end up with maybe 2-3 primary schools and very long bus journey's and the same for high schools.

Fortunately Peak Oil makes this choice impossible.

So what to do with shrinking enrollment and higher oil costs? Here are a few ideas - what are yours?

• See the school no longer as a dedicated school but as a community resource - could mean this is where people work if there is a big push for telecommuting and people don't drive all the way into town but join their kids on the bus for school?
• See the school buses as the core of a new public transportation system - where the fleet is optimized to serve the wider needs of the community
• Bring back the One Room School House in communities where kids can walk to school - but with a difference - this one room school is linked to the web so that the kids are in connection with all kids on PEI and to many resources from all over the world
• Build on school at home - where many things are done by the kids at home online - no more "snow days" After all the kids do so much online now any way

What do you think we should do as we face both rising costs and shrinking enrollment?

Father's Day - Tempus Fugit (Time Flies)

One of the themes of Father's day is a sad one - lost Dads. Dads tend to die earlier than mums.

Mine died when I was 31. He was 55. I will be 58 in a couple of weeks. It is strange to be older than he was. My mother on the other hand may outlive me!

Most of the writing about lost Dad's is of course written by sons and daughters. Today I am musing about how much time I may have to see grandchildren grow up.

Doc Searls is a bit older than I and has been having a lot of health problems. Terry Heaton has his share too. I have to lose 30 pounds.

At the end of this week I go to Knowlton to spend almost a week with both my kids just hanging out. Maybe this is the answer - don't waste any opportunity to share our lives.

How precious life is when experienced at my age.

What about subsidizing oil?

As people begin to wonder how they are going to cope with higher gas and heating oil prices - I am sure that there will be calls for a cut in taxes and also even a subsidy. Here is how Tom Friedman has seen the consequences of such a policy in Egypt:

From Shubra we drive into the desert toward Alexandria. The highway is full of cars. How can all these Egyptians afford to be driving, I wonder? Answer: The government will spend almost $11 billion this year to subsidize gasoline and cooking fuel; gas here is only about $1.30 a gallon. Sounds like a good deal for the poor — only the poor have no cars, and the fuel subsidies mean less money for mass transit.

Think about these numbers: This year Egypt will spend $6 billion on education and $3 billion on health care, far less than the subsidies for fuel. This is a terrible trap. The subsidies should have been phased out when food and fuel prices were lower. Now that they have soared, the pain of removing the subsidies would be politically suicidal. So education and health care get killed instead.

Owning a car costs about $6 -$10,000 a year if you add in all the costs.

I am starting to think that a public transport system will be essential for PEI. I will be the only way that we can all afford mobility.

But what about all the costs of installing such a system?

We have one already - we just call them school buses and we only use them for a fraction of the time. Imagine if we "saw" the fleet as a public transport system? It would need a lot of changes to deploy its full power - but most of the capital costs have been paid for.

Hey how about a system powered by fry oil?

What do you think?

Winter 2009 - On an average wage on PEI of $26,000

I am just playing with some numbers - Please help me make them correct.

The average wage on PEI is $26,000. After tax this is close to $19,000 - again help me here - lets get this right. Lets' look at some key household items and see what happens at current oil prices

• Rent/Mortgage - $500 a month - $6,000 a year
• Property taxes -                       - $1,500 a year
• Car Truck Insurance                  - $1,000 a year
• Car payments - $300 a month   - $3,600 a year
• Gas - $150 a month                  - $1,800 a year
• Heat - 3 tanks of oil                  - $3,000 a year
• Food - $500 a month                 - $6,000 a year

We are $4,000 over our net already and we have not bought on article of clothing or done anything that is not basic.

Rises in oil and food hit this kind of budget really hard.

Running a vehicle is especially onerous - what if you live in the rural areas as so many do.

Is there any chance of a big wage increase for people in the kind of work that pays this kind of wage? No I doubt it.

Can the government afford to subsidize oil? Not without going broke.

So what will happen and what can be done?

The worst thing is surely to not think about these questions.

Running a car seems to stick out - a case for public transport?

The Housing Crisis - It's not just about "Them" but also about "Us"

Here is the overall view as seen by Pew.

Oil Prices and being a landlord - what will higher oil prices mean this winter

Currently on PEI it will cost about $1,000 to fill a heating oil tank. In 2004 the same 700 litres would have cost about $500. What will a tank cost in February of 2009?

I was talking to a friend this week who has an apartment building. The standard rental contract on PEI includes Heat. He has no way of seeing what each tenant uses. His tenants have no stake in reducing their consumption. He recalls seeing the windows wide open in one flat in January!

What will happen in the rental market? My friend is thinking of mothballing his building!

There has to be a new deal or both tenants and landlords will be in a mess. I face the same conundrum with out granny flat. There has to be a way for the tenant to become part of the process....

What do you think can be done that will serve both?

The Housing Crisis - A Social Crisis demanding a social solution? KETC's new Project

How would you feel today, if you stood to lose your house and all around you the media were labeling you as stupid and deserving of being put on the street?

How would you feel if you were struggling to save your house, but all around you those  who said that they were there to help you, were really just jackals waiting to prey on your carcass?

How would you feel if you have lots of what you thought was equity in your house, if 20% of the houses in your community were being sold at auction for a few thousand dollars?

What kind of city or place will you live in if say 20% of the people there have learned that they have been fooled, betrayed and abandoned by their society?

This is a graph of how the SARS epidemic spread. This is how all social epidemics spread. This is the risk before us!

I think that if lots of people feel this way that there is going to be hell to pay. For I think that the real threat of the subprime crisis is social.

The science behind the Tipping Point tells us that if there is momentum and and if the "Chasm" of about 15% is crossed the system Tips. If 15-20% of the people in your city feel that they have no support or hope, then there is a good chance that your city will Tip.I am saying that if you think that you are OK while large swathes of your city become ghost towns - watch out for the Zombies and watch out for your tax base, your own equity, crime and your way of life.

I am not saying that the "Cure" is to save every person's house. I am saying that if people affected cannot get Trusted help and in the end trusted support, they will not only lose their house but get very angry. This is when the pitchforks and torches come into town.

So why am I posting this in a blog where the focus is Social Media? Because at its core the subprime mortgage problem is no longer merely financial nor is it confined to a few people. It is now becoming a social problem - it is largely now about isolation, abandonment and and soon it will be about betrayal.

People who are affected directly find it exceptionally difficult to find help that they can trust. People who are directly affected are often in shock too and hence are shut down and will not trust official help - after all it was the system that told them that borrowing was going to be OK. People who are directly affected feel shame and feel shamed. Many must feel like many returning vets from Vietnam. The are being told that the subprime crisis is all their fault. The commercial media are telling them that we do not care about them.

Many others are smug. I am OK. This is not about about me. My nice middle class or upper class area is safe. But of course it's not and nor will it be as the ripple spreads

Others see the business opportunity. Facebook and the web are full of people now lining up to exploit the crisis. Houses can be bought at auction for hundreds of dollars. The same forces that put millions in jeopardy are now fighting over the scraps.

Here is the overview by region.

Here is an overview by house price change.

All our research tells us is that this is not the end but the beginning.

As I see it, the issue is larger than a person losing their home. The real risk is that too many people in a city will give up on being a citizen. They will give up not simply because they lost their home but because they think that they have been betrayed. They went for the Dream and they were taken for a ride.

So what can we do? Can we save every home? Should we save every home? Can we save every home?

I think the answer is no to all of those questions. But I think we can do this:

• If we can find real help that can be trusted - we can help those that can be helped to save their house
• If we can connect people in trouble to each other, they can maybe help others save their homes and ALSO get the emotional support that they need
• If we can show to the larger community that we are all involved, then we can end the blame and the shame and we can mobilize the entire community - as we are seeing in the Iowa Floods - for this is a collective disaster.
• If we can show that people are no longer helpless then hope will return
• At worst, if we can show that you can lose your home and still be OK, then we will really achieved something for what we will have done is shown that there is a community and that it does care about you. That the Dream is not dead.

A public TV station that has no ax to grind may have the essential trust to take up this work. A Public TV station that does its best to learn how to use Social Media might have a chance.

KETC, Channel 9, in St Louis has been chosen by CPB to develop a template and a set of tools for Public TV that will have a real shot at ensuring that that we might be able to do this. We have until the end of August to make a difference.

We are going to need your help.

I will do my best to tell you what we are doing - as we try stuff. Please let me know what you think.

As a start I need to find some well connected bloggers in St Louis. If you are one or know one please let me know in the comments.

(Cross Posted at Fast Forward)

No excuse now for you not to come to PEI in the Summer

New Delta Flight!

Beginning June 13th and continuing to September 17th Delta Air Lines regional partner Comair will add new weekend flights for direct non-stop service between New York City and Charlottetown.

Getting here has never been easier!

Public TV and Disasters - IPTV and KETC

How does a small public TV station provide its state with complete coverage of a statewide series of disasters?

Iowa is truly a disaster state right now - not only has it record floods but also tornadoes.

IPTV, Iowa Public TV, has asked the public for help and it is getting it. Here is its video page where you can see not only a selection of Videos from the public and the station but also its process of attracting them into the station. This is a thumbnail so click to see more.

Here is is Flickr Feed. Click to see more.

Ironically, the minimal resources that Public TV has is making its adoption of social media more widespread and the result is of course that the stations that have gone down this route are getting more attached to their members.

With the fire in San Diego, the Bridge collapse in Minneapolis and now the Floods in Iowa, we are seeing Public TV starting to find a new definition for the term "Public Broadcaster".

At KETC in St Louis we begin a new chapter in covering disasters and in engaging the public. For normally when we think "Disaster" we think of a flood or a fire. But what about the great and complex social problems that we all face. What about education? What about health care? Are these not "Disasters".

Unlike a flood, they are persistent and they are pervasive. They also seem insoluble - maybe until now? For their causes are surely systemic and we are very poor at even seeing systemic issues, let alone coping with them. We tend to line up along special interest lines. There is not enough trust in play to break through.

There has also been no Trusted Place for the real conversation to be held.

Next week we will start to see if we can help the people of St Louis cope with the mortgage crisis. What could be more complex than that? What could be more dangerous that large segments of any city losing hope that they can be part of society? Our hope is that Public TV can offer the Trust that can connect the unconnected and hence mobilize the Trust that is surely the essential element of how a community can come together and confront these dangerous systemic social "disasters" that are eroding our society.

I will be posting the story of how we do this as it unfolds. I hope to share with you in real time our thoughts and our struggles to take this next step in media.

Cross Posted To Fast Forward