* I spotted an interesting HUD program that covers a topic I’ve never or rarely seen the feds touch: “Increasing the Supply of Affordable Housing through Off-Site Construction and Pro-Housing Reforms Research Grant Program Pre and Full Application.” Four million dollars are available, with grants of $500,000 and five estimated awards. (Five times $500,000 is $2.5 million, not $4 million: feel free to ask HUD about the discrepancy). Still, the “Increasing the Supply of Affordable Housing” offers funding for research to “build the evidence base to accelerate the adoption of effective practices and policies to increase the production and supply of quality, affordable housing.” News that the housing crisis is primarily one of demand may finally be percolating through the federal bureaucracy.
What’s your favorite unusual grant program? Leave a comment with the answer.
* “US could soon approve MDMA therapy — opening an era of psychedelic medicine.” Better late than never. Banning MDMA by making it a Schedule I drug was a mistake when it happened and continues to be a mistake, and one that makes millions of people pay the price of our collective folly. “What MDMA Therapy Did For Me” is a passionate first-person account of using MDMA therapeutically, and it begins: “I did MDMA therapy. It was a deeply profound and life-changing experience.” And then: “I would rank it as one of the top 3 most important things I’ve done in my life, at least in terms of my personal development.” I of course, like you, have never done anything illegal, but “What MDMA Therapy Did For Me” is consistent with my own experiences.
* “I personally named my house and business after Silmarillion references – I would have named my car after one, but I learned my friend had named her car after it first, and that Steven Colbert had also named his car after it, and it would be weird to have all these cars named ‘Vingilótë’ driving around. At this point I backed off.” Would it be weird, or too weird? From “Contra Kriss On Nerds And Hipsters.”
* Rice cookers are great, underrated kitchen gadgets. I use mine (also a Zojirushi, if you’re wondering) all the time. It, combined with an Instant Pot, helps me make a lot of good, interesting food in a relatively short period of time, and without having to constantly check for doneness.
* A supposed breakthrough in stationary storage for hydrogen-nickel batteries. Emphasis on “supposed.” I’m not sure what the “catalyst” is, exactly, as described in the article. We’ve worked on some hydrogen grant projects and are cognizant of the potential benefits (here is us describing the DOE’s Hydrogen Shot grant program), but we’ll see how many breakthroughs materialize that can also be commercialized. Press releases are cheap.
* The great electrician shortage. It’s interesting to see this:
People who graduate from college do earn more, on average, than people who don’t, but the statistics can be misleading. Many young people who start don’t finish, yet still take on tens of thousands in education loans—and those who do graduate often discover that the economic advantage of holding a degree can be negated, for years, by the cost of having acquired it.
Those who skip college frequently do better, and not just at first.
While I’m not sure we’d have seen emphasized in this venue a decade ago, word about the problems of the “college for all” model is spreading. Better late than never. My main essay on this topic is here, from 2017, but it’s still relevant.
* Make parking impossible. We can choose to make the cities we want to live in through effective public policies.
* “How to Stop Environmental Review from Harming the Environment.” The National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) is having the opposite effect of what its creators intended. It often harms, instead of helping, the environment. Maybe we should fix that.
* California strip malls were upzoned last Saturday. The housing crisis is encouraging California politicians to take some relatively modest steps towards improvement, which are welcome, but more can and should be done. Property owners should be able to build whatever they (safely) want to. Don’t believe me? Visit Tokyo and observe the incredibly dense and creative land use planning that allows 36M folks to live in relatively affordable and good housing.
* Related to the link above: Developer could build hundreds, and maybe a thousand, apartments in Beverly Hills. Good. California needs more housing—a topic we’ve covered extensively, particularly because we’ve worked on so many California homelessness services and affordable housing grants—and the sooner California builds more, the sooner it can help get the homeless housed and make life at least somewhat affordable for the middle class. The California dream of inexpensive, sunshine-filled life was alive until NIMBYs brutally murdered it via zoning. Let’s bring it back.
* “Towards an enlightened centrism.” This is often what we aspire to: knowledge, information, understanding, and an avoidance of petty clannishness.