All posts by: Dinah Winnick

In advance of last Saturday’s announcement that Tokyo will host the 2020 Summer Olympic Games, public policy professor John Rennie Short offered a fresh take on how to make the games more sustainable: keep them in the same place.

Short suggested to writer Nate Berg, in an article for The Atlantic Cities, that instead of asking cities to invest billions of dollars in new Olympic venues the OIC should create a single site that would function more or less as an international city-state, overseen by the United Nations, to host the Olympics and its training in perpetuity.

“There would be maybe big infrastructure costs, but there’s huge infrastructure costs being borne every year. How much did the Chinese pay? We’ll never know,” said Short, who’s written extensively on globalization and urban affairs. “We know the real costs are always underestimated. It’s billions upon billions.”

Having a stationary summer Olympics host site could also provide opportunities for more accurately measuring athletic performance over time, enable ongoing experimentation in sustainable development and architecture, and help to avoid the regular displacement of poor populations that often happens with new Olympics construction. Short shared, “Up to half a million people were displaced for the Beijing Olympics. Why do we keep doing that when we could find a place that doesn’t require any displacement?”

Read the full article at The Atlantic Cities and preview Short’s recent book, Stress Testing the USA, in this video:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcUEyXn28hI&w=560&h=315]

The Baltimore Sun reports that support is building among lawmakers to raise Maryland’s minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to at least $10 an hour. Why now? Donald F. Norris, professor and chair of public policy at UMBC, says, “People are running in a primary election for governor, that’s what’s different.”

In addition to citing the support some candidates hope to get from labor, Norris says he also senses a legitimate concern among politicians about the growing number of workers who have been struggling, since the recession, to survive on $7.25 an hour. Whether or not this support translates into the legislation that will pass may also depend on legislators from the more conservative districts who are facing re-election, Norris notes.

Norris also commented in the recent Baltimore Sun story “O’Malley kicks off ‘Better Choices’ tour.” He suggests this series of policy forums will serve three purposes: promoting the governor’s record in advance of a possible presidential bid, supporting Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown in his gubernatorial bid, and preparing for the governor’s final legislative session.

“Maryland Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler came under fire Tuesday for comments that his top rival in the Democratic primary for governor is running on little besides his African-American heritage,” write Erin Cox and Michael Dresser in The Baltimore Sun.

What impact could Gansler’s statement have? Donald F. Norris, professor and chair of public policy at UMBC, tells the Sun that Gansler “has just offended a whole lot of voters he cannot afford to offend.” Read the full Baltimore Sun article here. Norris commented further about the situation in an August 13 interview on WTOP radio.