Save the Whales and School Choice Week
Here's the latest dispatch.
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An Inconvenient Truth for Environmentalists: Offshore Wind Endangers Whales
Democracy, for once, isn’t dying in darkness.
The Washington Post, an outlet all-in for net-zero energy, conceded recent whale deaths off the Atlantic Coast spell doom for the Biden administration’s offshore wind prospects.
“The humpback was one of nine large whales to get stranded over six weeks on or near beaches in the Northeast, not far from where developers of hundreds of offshore wind turbines are engaged in a flurry of preconstruction activity,” the publication noted.
The article added, “It's the latest in a string of threats to a fledgling offshore wind industry that climate advocates say is central to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Surging costs from inflation and labor shortages have developers saying their projects may not be profitable. A raft of lawsuits and pending federal restrictions to protect sensitive wildlife could further add to costs.”
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A fact largely going unreported: As offshore wind leases expanded between 2015-2016, Incidental Take Authorizations (ITAs) were increasingly requested by renewable energy companies to offset their impact on marine mammals. For instance, 46 one-year ITAs have been authorized for wind sites. And more are expected to be approved. Talk about a coincidence.
David Wojick with the Committee for the Constructive Tomorrow attributes whale deaths to sonar blasting, writing, “There are lots of ways this sonar blasting might cause whales to die. Simply fleeing the incredible noise could cause ship strikes or fish gear entanglements, the two leading causes of whale deaths. Of the whales could be deafened, increasing their chances of being struck by a ship later on. Direct bleeding injury, like getting their ears damaged, is another known risk, possibly leading to death from infection. So there can be a big time difference between blasting and death.”
But NOAA Fisheries insists these projects have no impact, even dedicating a FAQ sheet to claiming there’s no link “between recent large whale mortalities and currently ongoing surveys for offshore wind development.”
13th Annual National School Choice Week
This week marks 13 years since National School Choice Week was first established. And this week alone saw some monumental gains for school choice.
In summer 2011, I was fortunate to participate in the initial cohort of the National School Choice Week Student Writers' Program in San Francisco, CA. That’s where my interest in the issue first developed.
Hailing from Southern Orange County - where school choice was scarce at the time - I unofficially benefitted from the policy ahead of my entry into elementary school in the mid-1990s. My parents wanted to send me to my eventual K-5 school instead of our assigned school. Due to few options available, school districts - save for some exceptions - restricted parental choice. My folks, however, were able to trade spots with a family we knew and the rest is history. Unheard of at the time. (Win-win.)
I spent K-12 in public schools, graduating from one of the top public high schools in Orange County, CA (Tesoro HS). Eventually I would go on to graduate from UC-San Diego in three years. While not a direct recipient of school choice, my parents were able to place me and my sister in high-performing schools in spite of our zip code and using some unique loopholes. Heh!
Back to the present day: This week, Utah and Iowa passed universal school choice bills pertaining to education savings accounts that match dollars with students. Therefore, funding students and not systems. Why? There’s a movement building to allow tax dollars follow students instead of putting teachers unions’ interests first ahead of students.
The COVID pandemic shed a light on this pervasive network and students trapped in failing schools. This made parents more heightened to what’s happening in schools.
I dedicated a Townhall VIP column to ESAs earlier this week, which you can read here. And for those of you also in Northern Virginia, join Independent Women’s Forum and EdReform Virginia tomorrow evening for an event at Rocklands BBQ in Arlington, VA. I’ll be there and hope you join us.
And speaking of IWF and school choice, Ginny Gentles—who heads up our Center for Education Freedom — just launched a new podcast called Students Over Systems.
Listen to the first episode below:
ICYMI
Articles/ commentary/media appearances from the past week.
MEDIA MENTIONS
The Federalist: My CFACT colleague Craig Rucker plugged my report on Lava Ridge in his latest column.
ARTICLES/BLOGS
Podcasts You May Have Missed
Catch up on District of Conservation episodes below.
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—Gabriella