Archives: Reg Murphy Pubs

I live in a comfortable suburban Brunswick neighborhood. Our neighbors are nice, and we enjoy the area. When we moved into this house a few years ago, I joined to area Facebook page and Nextdoor page to keep up with lost dog posts, HOA announcements, and the like.

Recently, there was a post on our Facebook page that announced that some rezoning signs had been spotted near our community grocery store. The rezoning signs indicated that a new 72-unit apartment or duplex complex may be coming to the area. This was followed by many comments and assumptions about what this would mean for our community.

Some of the assumptions included concerns that this rezoning almost certainly meant we would be getting “yet another section 8 housing complex.” This was followed by many opinions about such housing: it will lead to increased crime, the people living in this housing are (mostly, but not always, noted the commenter) looking for handouts and don’t want to work, and that this kind of housing will lead to overcrowding in our area. The final comments encouraged residents to come to the public meeting to voice these concerns.

I am, unequivocally, in favor of the last call to action. Yes, every citizen has a right to participate in their democratic process and be heard by their elected officials. But, what struck me was the assumptions that were being made about people who live in section 8 housing specifically. Having only a general notion about exactly what section 8 is, I thought I would do a little research to see if their policy concerns held any weight. Was there data to support their notions?

I started by simply looking into what section 8 housing is. In short, The Brunswick Housing Authority administers this federally-funded rental assistance program to help low income families secure affordable housing through the use of vouchers paid directly to landlords. These vouchers typically do not cover all of the tenant’s rent and do not include utilities. Here are some statistics on the average occupant in Glynn County that I obtained:

·      Turnover rate: 20% annually

·      Average time voucher holder has received these benefits: 6 years, 11 months

·      Average household: 2.8 persons

·      Average household income: $13,113/year

·      Percent using welfare benefits as primary income source: 1%

·      Percent with other income source (disability, Social Security, or Pension): 44%

·      Head of Household: 25-49 (67%), 51 or older (27%)

·      70% of households have children – 68% headed by a woman only, 2% headed by two adults

This indicates to me, that these vouchers are used to support the working poor, those with disabilities, in some cases the elderly, and in many cases women supporting their children. The Brunswick Housing Authority also noted that applicants must be in good standing in terms of criminal history and financial obligations to the Housing Authority.

I then tried to look into this fear of increased crime as a result of such housing. I attempted to use the county GIS maps to help me answer this question, but quite simply did not have a strong enough command of the technology. Instead I had to look to more general data – scholarly articles. In particular, economist Dr. Paul Emrath synthesized data from 16 studies published after 2000 for the National Association of Home Builders. He found the following:

In distressed neighborhoods, the basic findings were that building LIHTC housing increases surrounding property values and reduces crime rates.  In high-opportunity neighborhoods, LIHTC housing has no effect on crime rates, either positive or negative, but a small negative impact on property values—although only within one-tenth of a mile and if the high-opportunity neighborhood also lacks racial diversity. 

Another 2019 study by Elena Derby found that each additional year a child spent in a Housing Credit home “is associated with a 3.5 percent increase in the likelihood of attending a higher education program for four years or more, and a 3.2 percent increase in future earnings.” As someone working in Higher Education, this statistic excited me.

In short, what my cursory research indicated was that, 1) this kind of housing can have a big impact on women and children in particular, 2) it is not likely to negatively affect my property value in a meaningful way, 3) it might just improve diversity in my area, 4) it is not likely to increase crime in my neighborhood, and finally 5) it could, in some small way, improve higher education attainment for Glynn County children. Unfortunately, I think the fears surrounding this rezoning are a typical case of NIMBYism (not in my backyard) rather than an indication of real threats.

Dr. Heather Farley is Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, Public Policy & Management and a professor of Public Management in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia. She is an associate of the College’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.

Each semester in my Public Policy classes, we begin the term by laying out the basics – how policy is developed and the fundamental phases of the policy cycle. Then, we spend much of the semester analyzing and evaluating policy. Through these exercises in analysis, we discuss the drivers and influences on policy. Some of the typical drivers of policy include:
 

·      disequilibrium within a group – some population is unhappy with some issue that the government can address

·      political leadership – a politician has made a promise and they are attempting to “make good” on that promise

·      protests – the population or a specific part of the population are publicly protesting an issue

·      a critical mass of attention – something big happens and it focuses attention toward the issue

Then, when one or more of these drivers have functioned to get an issue on the legislative agenda, there are several typical influences that determine the success of that agenda. These might include media attention, public opinion, major expert reports, interest groups, and good timing.

Interestingly, the same drivers and influences that help get an issue on the agenda also can operate to determine whether a policy is adopted.

This week in the Georgia legislature, the Senate voted (29-20) on the issue of voting rights in our state during crossover day. Crossover day is the deadline that bills must pass out of one chamber to remain alive for the remainder of the legislative session.

The voting rights bill is a clear result of the 2020 elections. The election, which resulted in several key Democratic wins at the national level, prompted controversy over whether our state conducted a secure election. This controversy was spurred on by unfounded claims by the President. These claims were followed by support from various leaders in the GOP, protests that culminated in a riot at the Capitol, and a great deal of media attention. The result is that there are now a slew of political leaders who must react to the critical mass of attention surrounding this issue.

All of the typical drivers and influences are present in this case: disequilibrium, political leadership, protests, and a critical mass of attention accompanied by media attention, strong public opinion, and appropriate timing. So, the agenda has been set by the Republican-led legislature and it seems to have a good chance of success. Therefore, the analysis of the Bill’s merits will ultimately be left to the Governor.

When I ask students to analyze policy, the big question they must ask is “who gets what and what are the alternatives?” In the case of SB 241, the question really needs to be reframed as “who doesn’t get what?” because it is a restriction of current laws. The bill ends no-excuse absentee voting and limits it to only people 65 years of age and older, those with a physical disability, and those who will be out of town during the voting period. The House voted in favor last week on a similarly restrictive bill (HB 531) that would limit Sunday voting, restrict the use of ballot boxes, and require an ID for absentee voting among other provisions.

At first blush, this may sound like it will increase the security of our elections. Georgia’s Republican Governor, however, along with the Republican Secretary of State, both repeatedly affirmed that there was no widespread voter fraud in 2020. Therein lies the first problem – if these bills are meant to address an issue, where is the issue? It seems that there is a perception of an issue within parts of the population, but it is not clear that an issue actually exists in the first place. Even within the committee meetings for these bills, GOP law makers have made statements indicating that while there is no evidence of fraud, they must address the perception of fraud.

Next, by keeping people 65 and older in the mix of eligible absentee voters but excluding all others, limiting Sunday voting, and requiring ID for absentee voting, a clear message is being sent that the GOP hopes to keep this kind of voting flexibility for their older majority exclusively. In fact, a March 6^th report from the Brennan Center for Justice indicated that it is clear that the provisions in these bills will directly impact Black voters in the state disproportionately. Simply put, younger Black voters increased their use of mail-in voting in 2020, utilized Sunday voting to a greater degree, and are less likely to have ID compared to white voters.

The final concern the Governor will need to consider is the fact that in 2020, 5 million Georgians voted and 1.3 million of them voted absentee. This was record-breaking turnout. And while it resulted in some national gains for Democrats, it also resulted in a Republican-led Assembly. While it is clear Georgia is now purple, it is not clear that we are a blue state. Given that the Governor will be running for his seat next year, he will need to carefully consider if signing these restrictive bills will have the political effect of alienating more moderate voters in this state-wide seat.

There are certainly voting security alternatives that can be considered, and at the College we will continue to ponder these alternatives in our classrooms. But, as these bills make their way through the legislative process, it seems clear that the onus of such analysis will be left to our Governor in short order.

Dr. Heather Farley is Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, Public Policy & Management and a professor of Public Management in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia. She is an associate of the College’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.

Hidden beneath a second Presidential impeachment, calls for the censure of a GA Congresswoman, and ongoing Capitol riot aftermath, lies a simmering debate waiting to happen: the removal of the Senate filibuster.

The U.S. Senate filibuster is an institutional rule that has been around long enough that it effectively feels like part of our Nation’s founding. It is not in fact; the filibuster emerged in 1806 and has no Constitutional origins.  Some scholars argue that the U.S. Constitution lays out an “implicit premise of majoritarianism” (Chafetz 2011) and, therefore, the filibuster with its ability to increase minority power, is unconstitutional.

The filibuster is the ability to block legislative action through lengthy debate. Until 1806, debate in the Senate could be ended with a simple majority vote. Once the filibuster was in place, a 2/3 majority (later changed in 1975 to 3/5 or 60 votes) was required to end debate on legislation and nominations (this is called cloture) thereby creating a larger role for the minority party in blocking or assisting in decision-making.

By and large, the filibuster has historically been used sparingly. The notable instances of its use have included large displays of long, or even silly, speeches to draw out and ultimately block a vote. Notably, it is the filibuster that was a favorite tool of southern Senators from the 1920s to 1960s as they aimed to block legislation to protect civil rights. This included anti-lynching bills, bills prohibiting poll taxes, and anti-discrimination bills. As such, the filibuster holds a certain historical reputation. Former President Obama has referred to it as a “Jim Crow relic.”

For much of this rule’s history, it has either been used sparingly or, the mere mention of filibuster was enough to block a debate. During the Obama administration, however, it became a heavily relied-upon tool by the Republicans in the Senate to obstruct everything from court nominations to legislative proposals. At the time, Democrats had 55 votes in Senate – just short of the 60 needed to invoke cloture. In 2013, Democratic Senators changed the filibuster rule to allow a simple majority vote (51) on nominees to courts and other federal offices. The rule was not changed for Supreme Court nominations nor for legislation.

Today, there are calls to eliminate the filibuster rule entirely while others warn that the filibuster serves to balance majoritarian power. For instance, former Senator and Vice-Presidential candidate Joe Liberman cautions that the 60-vote filibuster serves as an incentive for both parties to work in a bipartisan fashion toward common goals. Several Democratic Senators meanwhile, criticize the rule as a mechanism for gridlock that prevents the work of the people from getting done.

Not surprisingly, one’s view of the filibuster seems to change depending on their party affiliation and the party that holds a Senate majority at any given time. Those in the minority consistently support the filibuster while those in the majority (particularly when it’s a very slim majority) decry it as obstructionist.

This politically-motivated position may lead to short-sighted thinking. While eliminating the filibuster now would allow Democrats to pass a wide range of progressive bills, they won’t hold the majority forever. In fact, in just two years Senator Warnock (D-GA) will be up for re-election along with 13 other Democratic senators and 20 Republican senators. The balance of power can shift very quickly. The result of course is that we could experience a dramatic pendulum swing when it comes to legislative direction in the country. Much like President Biden essentially reversed all of Donald Trump’s Executive orders in his first weeks, thereby swinging those policies to the other end of the pendulum, without the filibuster Senate Republicans will undoubtedly push through extremely conservative legislation once they regain Senate control in 2, 4, 6…years. The result would be policy fluctuation but not any meaningful progress. Democrats, therefore, should think very carefully before making such a bold procedural move and perhaps consider if rules such as the special Reconciliation rule that was just used for the COVID relief package might be a viable alternative for getting things done. Or, perhaps more radically, Senators from across the aisle might just have to figure out how to work together again.

Dr. Heather Farley is Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, Public Policy & Management and a professor of Public Management in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia. She is an associate of the College’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.

As I am writing this in mid-December, the first 100,000 or so doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine have arrived in Georgia and have begun their deployment to hospitals and long-term care facilities around the state. Just because it’s here, however, does not mean it’s being administered as readily as public health officials might have liked. For instance, I heard from one local physician who indicated that even within the healthcare community in Glynn County, there is some skepticism over the safety of a vaccine that is being released so quickly. Not all healthcare workers who are eligible to receive the vaccine are ready to do so. Likewise, in a  recent McKinsey and Company consumer survey (2466 respondents) more than half the respondents in the United States report they are likely to delay or decline vaccination despite regulatory approval, with safety concerns being the main driver of vaccine hesitancy.

The skepticism, as I understand it, largely revolves around the time that it took for the vaccine to be tested and then released. For a typical vaccine, according to Pfizer’s website, Phase 1 of a clinical trial includes about 100 participants and takes 1 week to several months to complete. Phase 2 includes several hundred participants and takes up to 2 years, Phase 3 can include up to a few thousand participants and takes 1 to 4 years. And the final Phase 4 includes several thousand participants and takes over a year to conclude. In total, at best a typical trial period would take about 3 years. The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine trial took under a year but did include a similarly large participant pool of 42,000 people.

The big public health and public perception question is, “were corners cut in this modified timeline?” When reviewing the Food and Drug Administration panel’s comments on the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, I saw a lot of discussion about cost benefit and risk analysis. According to a National Public Radio report, one committee member, Dr. Paul Offit director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, framed it this way: “The question that’s being asked [of] us is do we have enough evidence in hand to say that the benefits of this vaccine outweigh what, at the moment as far as severe safety issues, are theoretical risks. I think the answer to that question is clearly yes…The question is never when do you know everything, it’s when do you know enough.”

This kind of risk assessment and reasoning sounded very familiar. My field of study is environmental policy, and in this field risk assessment is an important part of the regulatory and law-making process. Human activities almost always carry an environmental or human health risk; developing policy around human activities, therefore, requires risk assessment. The challenge is to determine what constitutes “acceptable risk.” Carcinogens, for instance, are generally regarded as having no acceptable threshold of exposure, and yet even The Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) of 1996 simply requires “reasonable certainty that no harm will result from aggregate exposure,” not zero tolerance. The reason for this is twofold: uncertainty is inherent in modeling future events, and “sufficient information will rarely be available to permit an accurate assessment of environmental health risks…uncertainties arise at all stages of risk assessment” (James E. Anderson, 1984).

These same ideas surround the vaccines. When the vaccines were released in the UK, there were some adverse immuno-responses that were not observed in the trials. Why then did UK health officials release the vaccine? Because uncertainty is inevitable in risk assessment and they (along with the FDA) found the potential risks are outweighed by the benefits – namely high efficacy rate, increased population immunity, and decreased death rates.

Finally, it’s worth mentioning that two terms – efficacy and effectiveness – are often used interchangeably to talk about the vaccine performance, but they have different meaning. Efficacy is the percent reduction of the disease in the optimal clinical conditions. Effectiveness is how the vaccine operates “in the real world” (different primary care settings, broader population) after it is released to the consumer population. In one’s own assessment of risk, these are important to understand.

Whether you feel comfortable taking this early vaccine or not is ultimately a personal choice. While public health policy is based as much on politics as it is on science, we have not yet heard anything on a federal level that indicates that our country will have compulsory participation. Instead, it will be up to us as individuals within the community to read the science, review the assessments, and determine if we are ready to take on the inherent risk in order to reap the anticipated benefits.

Dr. Heather Farley is Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, Public Policy & Management and a professor of Public Management in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia. She is an associate of the College’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.