Growing, growing, gone!

Here’s an issue I suspect the green growth, zero growth, and downsizing folks should spend some time considering. Is the entire local governance structure in the USA and other countries established to promote development rather than protect agriculture and natural resources [public policy claims to the contrary]? Reading much of the relevant Minnesota legislation, one might conclude so. There rarely, if ever, seems to be any consideration of the question of how much is enough?

We’re posting on this theme because this year, at the Lent Township annual meeting, sort of out of the blue, the question of a merger with a city with which there’s an existing Joint Powers agreement, was raised. The concern expressed was loss of control of the township’s future 20 or 30 years in the future because that city and another declined to enter into a “No Annexation” agreement.

There’s been a fairly recent, and very contentious, annexation/merger involving another nearby township and city. Here’s a link to an Office of Administrative Hearings “Finding of Fact etc.” All 43 pages of it.

In the Matter of the Petition of Chisago
City for Annexation of Unincorporated
Property in Wyoming Township (A-6996)

On a directly related matter, here’s a link to a 2012 Legislative Auditor’s report on the Consolidation of Local Governments. One of the key findings was:

In lieu of consolidation, collaboration and cooperative service arrangements and incremental boundary adjustments are preferred methods to reconfigure local government services. (pp. 31-34, 62, 64) 

developments are often named after what they’ve replaced

Photo by J. Harrington

In light of the way the current township government has provided no real background information on the pros and cons of a merger compared to other alternatives, we have substantial concerns about how well residents will be served by the committee that was authorized and appointed at the annual meeting to “explore” the proposed merger.

Minnesota’s legislation leaves too much discretion to local officials and does not require, in our opinion, sufficiently rigorous analysis and local referenda to provide informed consent by current residents on any reconfiguration of local government.

 If we still lived on a planet where being hell bent for growth and development at all costs was the appropriate strategy, our perspective might be different. We are now facing climate weirding, a sixth extinction, multiple wars, significant food system issues and related problems. More of the same isn’t likely to solve these problems, is it?

It Is Enough to Enter

By Todd Boss

the templar 

halls of museums, for

example, or 

the chambers of churches, 

and admire 

no more than the beauty 

there, or 

remember the graveness

of stone, or 

whatever. You don’t 

have to do any

better. You don’t have to

understand 

the liturgy or know history 

to feel holy

in a gallery or presbytery. 

It is enough

to have come just so far. 

You need 

not be opened any more 

than does 

a door, standing ajar. 

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

Spring, impending!

 Perhaps we’ve acted prematurely, overly optimistically, but the winter parkas and heaviest coats have been returned to the closet. It’s not that we think we won’t see snow or cold again until late this year, it’s that a week’s worth of consistent thawing and melting has made us willing to take a chance that spring may actually arrivve close to on time and last for more than a week or so this year.

Tomorrow, as all of us in the Northern Hemisphere know, is the Vernal Equinox. Locally, it happens at 10:33 am CDT. But we also know that each  season is a series of progressions that precede and follow specific moments in time. Can you see much difference between the two photos below? They’re of the pond a little north of our property. The one on the left (top) was taken last Thursday. The one on the right (bottom), this morning. Thursday was partly cloudy. Today was sunny. Other than that, is the difference in open water between the two noticeable?

March 17, 2022

Photo by J. Harrington

March 19, 2022

Photo by J. Harrington

There looks to me to be slightly more open water today, but not an overwhelming amount, unlike the ice and snow disappearing from our driveway. Sometimes natures transitions can be abrupt. More often, they’re gradual and slow. Humans list sunsets and sunrises as specific times, but light grows and fades during dawns and dusk. Remember, the universe, and the earth, function organically. It’s for our convenience that we impose mechanistic frameworks on days, weeks, months and seasons. The Celts observe two seasons, winter and summer.

The Celtic year was divided into two halves, the dark and the light. Samhain was the beginning of the dark half, with its counterpart, Beltane beginning the light half. Between these two 'doors' or portals fell Imbolc, on February 1, and Lughnasadh or Lammas, celebrated on August 1, quartering the Celtic year. These quarters were again divided by the solstices and equinoxes, which were known as the four Albans.

Minnesotans jokingly refer to our two annual seasons as winter and road construction. To reinforce our assessment of how basically arbitrary much of our time and date frameworks are, remember that this week past the US Senate approved, by unanimous consent, legislation that would make daylight savings time permanent. Those with their wits about them, particularly in the medical profession, believe the Senate got it bass-ackwards. Shocking, I know. At least we weren’t around to cope with  the confusion when the annual calendar was changed from Julian to Gregorian.

Even-Keeled and At-Eased

By Alberto Ríos

But the truth is, I am Thursday on a Monday. I

Am the walking calendar alive of mixed-up days and dim hours. I have

A week inside of me, a week or a year, time out of order. I have contracted

With the world to behave, to try, hard, to be Monday on a Monday. I

Look like I am happiness, don’t you think? On Monday, to you I have

The right laugh, and seem always to be even-keeled and at-eased.

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.