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A special Holiday Think Tank Round-Up today. Green housing, state budgets, and Gitmo await:
- Green House. CAP's David Abromowitz examines the possibility of retrofitting 6 million HUD-subsidized rental units with energy efficient technology. An initiative focusing on energy conservation ccould be accomplished with a variety of policy changes that would make it easier to invest in projects like solar panels. A GAO report Abromowitz cites suggests that inexpensive improvements -- in the $2,500 to $5,000 range -- could lower $5 billion in current energy costs by 25 to 40 percent. Abromowitz also notes the potential for creating jobs with this iniative and stimulating the moribund economy. Housing advocates would love to see any kind of rehabilitation funding come their way in January's stimulus plan, and linking their issue with other priorities is the best way to do it.
- Bad news bears. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities reports that 30 state governments are responding to declining revenues during the recession by cutting important services to taxpayers. Cuts in healthcare funding for children in 19 states, services for seniors and the disabled, cuts to both K-12 and Higher Ed, and workforce reductions are all in the offing. CBPP suggests that states take measures to raise revenue with new taxes or by closing tax loopholes for corporations and the wealth. Federal assistance will also be necessary, the report argues, to prevent increasing unemployment and further stress on the economic safety net. Most states don't have the resources to respond to the economic troubles themselves, especially with credit still difficult to obtain, and it falls to national authorities to provide aid.
- Gitmo guest list. Less a policy proposal than a chilling artifact of our times, the Brookings institution offers a regularly updated report of who exactly is being held by the United States government in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. While some detainees are well-known, for many others details about their identity (and the reasons for their detainment) are sketchy at best. Alleged members of Al Qaeda only make up a bare majority of the 248 current detainees; very few of those are high-level operatives. Only 64 detainees were captured in situations -- such as combat -- that "strongly suggest belligerency." The report "shows little evidence of a concentration of the most dangerous detainees resulting from the dwindling of the Guantánamo population," which flies in the face of the arguments that the prison should remain open.
--Tim Fernholz
Past Round-Ups:
12/16/2008
12/9/2008
