Green jobs' promise
The Pacific Northwest is poised to make immense strides in creating green-collar jobs, says a Seattle think tank's new report, but the region will need to offer better training.
Putting people to work in projects that save energy, invest in renewables, or reduce pollution is a better way to support livelihoods than drilling for oil, for example, says the report by the Sightline Institute (www.sightline.org). One million dollars spent to modernize aging buildings for greater fuel economy creates 3.4 times as many jobs as the same amount of money spent on oil and gas. And the clean-energy sector creates many more jobs for those with no more than a 12th-grade education.
But the promise of green jobs won't be realized, write the report's authors, unless unskilled workers can avoid "a gauntlet of dead-end jobs, high school completion programs, disjointed job training programs, and community and technical college course offerings" as they reach for the first rung on a promising career ladder.
Down the ballot
The countywide vote-by-mail election is less than a month away, and ballots are landing in voters' mailboxes next week. And while civil rights supporters are hoping to get out the vote in favor of the statewide Referendum 71, which gives domestic partners the same rights as legally married couples, local housing advocates want the same voters to take the trouble to fill in the "yes" bubble for Proposition No. 1, the Seattle Housing Levy.
A poll last month commissioned by housing levy supporters found that less frequent voters -- who are typically under age 40 -- are "basically unfamiliar" with the seven-year, $145 million measure, says Anna Markee of the countywide Housing Development Consortium. That doesn't mean they're hostile to Prop. 1, which the Office of Housing says will build or preserve an estimated 1,850 homes and assist 3,420 households; it just means they don't know about it.
"As more people turn out for R-71, they need to go all the way down the ballot and vote yes on Seattle Prop. 1," says Markee.
Levy supp orters send out a first mailing targeted to this voting bloc on Oct. 14; and they need all the volunteers they can get. Go to YesforHomes.org to sign up.
--Adam Hyla