Episode 8 of StreetSmart features an interview with Hana Creger, the Associate Director of Climate Equity with the Greenlining Institute. The interview was conducted on June 3 before the budget deals, and before ICE raids sparked protest in Los Angeles and many other parts of the state.
A brief part of the conversation - about the state budget - may now seem a little dated, but since it was surrounded by the rest of the discussion on how to message to win over a broader segment of the public, SBCA decided to leave it as it is. For those keeping score at home, the legislature's budget restores funding for public transit, but not for the Active Transportation Program (the state grants that fund walk and bike facilities.)
Creger also discusses polling showing that hammering people about climate change and air quality is not winning hearts and minds. While she doesn't suggest abandoning environmental goals, she recommends also discussing how the same fixes that will improve air quality will also improve commuting times and lower costs.
A lightly edited transcript can be found below:
Transcript:
Damien Newton
I'm here with Hana Creger with the Greenlining Institute. And the topic today is, “how do we advance the issues that we care about?” There's a lot of overlap between the issues that the Greenlining Institute writes about and advocates on and that we write about at StreetsBlog. How do we advance those issues in today's political climate, both nationally and locally?
We are recording this podcast on June 3, it'll probably go up the following week, so there's a chance there will be some changes by then. The state budget, which has to be passed by June 15, but we're dealing with the budget as it is right now.
Let's just start with a little chat about where we are in the budgeting process.
Hana Creger
That sounds great. I wish I could sugarcoat it, but folks, it's pretty damn bleak. It's not looking good.
When we're focusing on the issue areas I know a lot of you care about…around clean transportation, around climate…there are some proposed really big cuts. I'm hoping in a couple weeks, maybe it looks a little bit different. I don't think this is a surprise. This is obviously part of a broader trend. But I think what this underscores is we need a lot more money for clean transportation. We need to shift money to the right places. We need to be doing something a bit different, because right now it's just not really cutting it.
Damien
I think if you were to talk to people pre November election, the feeling that a lot of California advocates had was that although we could be doing more, generally the ball is moving in the right direction.
In the face of the state budget deficit, and the state of all the federal changes that are happening, that sort of optimism, cautious optimism, guarded optimism… isn't there anymore. Now it feels very much like we're playing defense again.
Hana 2:37
That's pretty spot on. In these dark times, folks are very much looking towards something to grab onto. One thing that I've found to be really interesting at this moment, in the last few months, is to observe how much energy and excitement there has been around this abundance framework.
I know people have a lot of feelings around Ezra Klein, around abundance, and I think it's starting some really good conversations. And I've been thinking, “What is so compelling around this narrative to folks? Why are folks really grabbing onto this at this moment? In some ways, it's offering a visioning around something bold, around this alternative to scarcity.
In this era where we're feeling like we need to be doing defense work, it is setting up a platform around, “How do we build coalitions that are much broader, beyond our specific issue areas that unite housing, climate, tech, social justice folks?” It has a very like strategic villain at the center, which is bureaucracy and all these outdated processes. It has great communications strategies. There’s an emotional tone to it, really vivid imagery on what the vision is.
And then, to your point, it came at the right political time, right? Everyone is just running around like chickens with their heads cut off. At the same time, there's obviously a lot that's missing from the abundance framework. I think there's a lot of really good discourse happening right now around, “Abundance for who?”
We shouldn't just build anything. We should make sure we're building the right things. And if we're doing this, we need to make sure we're also having a critique around capitalism and this whole manufactured scarcity.
All that to say, “Yes, in general, it's looking dark. It's looking bleak.” And I think it's been interesting that there's trends like this abundance thing..yes, let's explore this. And let's learn from what was really successful around this push. And let's make sure folks are following along with this and are looking for solutions in a way that's inclusive, that still is balancing the need to prioritize communities who have been left behind That's prioritizing the right kinds of projects so that we're not just building more highways, more sprawl, more coal plants, but really doing this in an intentional way.
Damien
When we're talking about budget priorities, this is something that struck me. Streetsblog Chicago has written a lot about what happened in Illinois over the last weekend, which, for you and anyone else who isn't following Illinois politics, they passed their budget. And separately, they were voting on ways to fund the massive transit budget deficit that RTA, which is Chicago's transit system, is facing. They didn't pass anything for it. There were a bunch of different proposals out there, but all the proposals were about where this is where the money could come from: this tax, this fee, this, this, all this, but they were all new taxes.
The legislators, after the budget was passed, didn't want to be talking about new taxes or anything like that. And so they were never able to cobble together a majority.
Here, we're not talking about new taxes. We're talking about reallocating money that exists in other places in the budget to get to funding transit operations., S
Some cap and trade money that's going to be going to CAL FIRE if the governor's budget stays could have an operating subsidy for at least a couple years, until the Bay Area can vote on a ballot measure.
So it's a very different strategy and conversation. But again, as of June 3, at least on the budget front, it doesn't seem to be happening. But if you turn the page to the policy front, it does seem like there is fun, wrong word, good progressive stuff going forward on housing and even possibly on transportation.
(NOTE: A lot has changed since June 3, see our previous coverage of the budget at Streetsblog California.)
Hana
At the end of the day, California will need both. We need to grow the revenue sources that may result in, you know, more taxes, et cetera. Obviously, those need to be done in progressive ways so that they're not harmful to low income folks.
We'll also need to be shifting funds from the bad projects to the good projects. We're in a time where we need to get creative. We don't really have another option. And so I'm curious to see over the next few years how we can grow and explore new revenue sources that are progressive…that aren't going to just harm the pocketbooks of low income folks most.
As we move forward in exploring that, and as we're pushing all of our transportation policies more broadly, we need to get so much better at telling a compelling story.
And again, I think that's what abundance did really well. It captured people's imaginations. And to be frank, like, I think our transportation vision largely kind of sucks. We talk about vehicle miles traveled and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
I am so guilty of that too. I'm in like, no position to be pointing fingers at anyone, but that's just not doing it for folks. One of the things I've been thinking about a lot is how Greenlining is part of the Clean Rides Network…and I can just give a super high level overview? It's uniting over 100 national and grassroots organizations spanning climate, transit, electrification, housing, public health, business and labor. We are focused on scaling up state level change around shifting funds from polluting highways to walking, biking, public transit and electric vehicles. We're working in seven states. We're developing specific state campaign plans, we're doing all this data driven work to really help create a blueprint for how sustainable transportation can cut costs for families, can curb air pollution, and ultimately shorten commutes and just make people's lives better. So that's the background.
So much of it went into this understanding of what is important to people at the end of the day. And so we did some polling, and some message testing across the seven states. And the seven states are California, of course, Minnesota, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New York and Maryland. We did polling across that…7000 participants…each state had slightly different results. But there were some trends.
The number one message on why we should create a sustainable transportation system was reducing traffic. The number two message was saving people money. Climate Change and health were the least convincing reasons across all states.
This was both a total knife to the heart as a climate advocate for my career, and a wake up call of, “Okay, cool. No one actually cares about this climate messaging that we've been pulling over for the last few years.”
I think this is a bit of a light bulb moment around showing we need to completely reframe all of our policies in a way that isn’t telling people we’re not completely changing things all together, but we need to be helping make the connection to people…to legislators… on how this policy is fundamentally going to, lower costs for them, or help them get home faster to their families.
As we develop our policy agenda for the future, I really think it's imperative that advocates spend a lot of time crafting compelling messages that resonate with people, kitchen table issues, etc. Of course, we can still be pushing climate safety and other agendas, because they're all connected. At the end of the day, it's not like we're changing our approach altogether. It's just changing the way we connect with people.
Damien
In 2007, I went to a candidate forum for Democratic nominee for president being held at the VA here in Los Angeles. Hillary Clinton told the 1200 people in the room and got booed when she said, “Talking about global warming is a dud. When I go to Iowa, when I go to New Hampshire, when people talk I talk about this, or any of the other people on the stage talk about it, people's eyes glaze over. It's not working.”
We boo’d her as any good group of environmentalists would at the time, but it stuck in my head, especially after she didn't win the nomination. That message doesn't work broadly, even if it's one that we hammer all the time at Streetsblog. There's a little bit of choir preaching, though, when you're you know Streetsblog California. A) you've got Californians and B) you've got people that are reading Streetsblog.
One of the things that we wanted to talk about is what's happening with congestion pricing in New York. If anyone doesn't know, it's a project where they change the amount of money collected on the tolls for the city based on the congestion. They're raising a lot of money that way, and investing the money back into their transit system.
But there's also been a lot of side benefits. There's a lot less traffic during rush hour going into the Manhattan Borough and the air has been cleaner. The cost of riding the subway has been reduced. For people that live in New York, the reverse commute is actually, I believe, a little cheaper on the tolls if they happen to be going into New Jersey. So there's a money saving issue for New Yorkers.
The project has been out longer and longer, it's been getting more and more popular, even as the Trump administration tries to revoke permits for it. Are you looking at what's happened in New York with congestion pricing and A) thinking,”well, maybe that's possible here” or B), “what else can we learn from it that's useful for Californians?”
Hana
Yeah, absolutely. I have been applauding this effort from the sidelines. And know that there's been just years and years of work that went into this. Definitely talk about message testing and communication strategy. It was brilliant, what those folks were able to accomplish.
I've definitely thought about this a lot in the context of California. A few years ago, pre-pandemic, it seemed like San Francisco was heading in this direction. Los Angeles has also done some kind of study on it. Greenlining was advising the San Francisco congestion pricing study. There's a few key things that are different around like what congestion pricing would look like in New York compared to California.
In New York, there's obviously a robust enough transit system in place. It's dense enough where if you are low income, you travel by walking, biking or public transit. So if you are driving into the city, you're probably more well off.
California is just built different, right?
So many low income people have no other option but to drive. It is true that, like the folks who do walk by, take public transit, like disproportionately, still are low income, but there's a big percentage of low income folks that have no other option but to drive.
So for the San Francisco study, and I believe, for the LA study, it landed on whether there needs to be discounts available for low income drivers, for drivers with disabilities, for other groups who have a different financial picture, and might need a different situation.
There still is a congestion pricing website that San Francisco has up that has examples of the different price points for different demographics. Last time I talked with those folks…I mean, the pandemic just really put a damper on things, right? Traffic levels were not at the same as they were before, and they were really just trying to revitalize the downtown.
Maybe in the near future there is a possibility: traffic is now absolutely horrendous in the Bay Area. Obviously the same in LA. Assuming that New York congestion pricing continues to be effective and successful, I can absolutely see there being momentum for other regions in California to do the same…to follow in their footsteps, but again, to do it in a way that makes sense for California, which realistically would look like having some kind of scaled approach based on income and other factors.
Damien
We were working on congestion pricing when I worked for the Tri-State Transportation Campaign in 2005-2007. So it was a long time coming. Even though I was out here, I was really excited to see it start, and really excited to see it working as well.
I know out here on the LA one was mostly jobs related. I remember the study they did was looking at cars moving west, basically towards the beach cities, towards Santa Monica. I was just reading an article today about Santa Monica adding four or five jobs for every new dwelling. in Santa Monica.
There's a light rail line that goes into Santa Monica, and a bunch of freeways and a few rapid buses, but they're all sitting in congestion because the bus-only lanes don't extend all the way into the city. So, the transit system just isn't there yet.
But…you end up in the chicken and the egg, because it doesn't look like there's a plan to, you know, super develop the transit system that would get there, either.
So anyway, that's just one issue on the ground… that doesn't have as much to do with the messaging when it comes to raising funds.
Speaking of messaging, that’s one way they got killed in Illinois on transit funding. One of the things that was voted down, but I think the one that got closest to passing, was a package delivery fee that they were calling the “pizza tax.”
When we talk about revenue generation for transportation, we really don't look at all of the trips that are generated by people dropping stuff off at other people's houses. That didn't happen at this scale a decade to decade and a half ago.
Is that something that you think is interesting at all? Adding an extra fee onto delivery services.
Hana
I definitely think it's worth exploring for sure.
Man, coming back to messaging: Ooof, that is going to be a tough one, right?
People have become, myself included, so attached to the convenience of being able to get dinner delivered to your door, get your Amazon Prime the next day. Politically, that's definitely a tough one. I think it's an important one.
Specifically in California, that might be considered an additional tax that might require a two thirds vote of the legislator. So I've been mulling that one around my brain for a while. That's a side project I would love for, like, someone to do a legal analysis on: what actually would be required for that.
At the end of the day when we're in a tough spot. I think we need to be really open and innovative. We could have some fees on private jet or yacht usage. We were just so far talking about transportation specific versions, but we could get really creative outside of the transportation specific space: a fee on luxury vehicles or something…a road user charge.
Back to transportation, stuff has definitely been capturing a lot, a lot of hearts and minds in the transportation nerd community…which I know probably all the listeners, including myself, are a part of…is inevitably going to be the future. The gas tax is declining significantly. The state of California is already heavily researching what it will mean to replace the gas tax with these road user fees based on how many miles you drive on the state highway system.
A lot is going to change in the funding and revenue landscape in the coming years. A lot is fairly certain, like the road user charge, and then there's a lot of uncertainty. I'm excited to work with other partners and advocates to figure out what can be, what is the next frontier of revenue in this era.
Damien
When we're getting such, let's say, uneven messaging out of DC, administration to administration on things, it becomes extra hard for as you try to picture like funding into the future.
I'm not necessarily the hugest fan of large EV subsidies. But when the federal government's actually talking about charging people more to buy EV than they do a regular gas car, does it make sense for the state to try and balance that? If we have electrification goals and milestones and all of that set up for our state, how do we plan for the future when every four years we get a totally new set of priorities out of DC when it comes to transportation?
Makes it really hard to do consistent revenue planning at the state level, when you're trying to plan for more than just getting people from A to B. We're talking about efficiency. We're talking about road maintenance. We’re talking about transit, bike mode, share, all this other stuff.
There's an extra layer of complication that's been added. When we started doing Streetsblog LA in 2008, there were obviously different priorities between George Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama. But now the pendulum is just, you know, way back and forth.
You can't see it everybody, but she's agreeing with me, just for the record. There’s a vigorous head nod.
Hana
Yeah, vigorous.
As California tries to keep up with, what did you say? “The uneven communications from the feds?” That is a very generous terminology, by the way, very politically correct.
Damien
501, c3, right? Yeah, I gotta stay on everyone's good side.
Hana
At the end of the day, we still have to figure out what California's vision, despite these federal swings.
The state of California absolutely should continue to support helping folks get into electric vehicles. We've had billions of dollars in financial incentives and in programs to do so, and it's worked. We have the largest electric vehicle ownership rates in the country.
As we figure out our next phase, Greenlining has long been pushing that we should be prioritizing making sure low income people can access electric vehicles. There are very specific programs that help do that, and they're very successful. They are consistently underfunded, compared to, you know, the programs that have been open to anyone and have essentially subsidized wealthy people buying Teslas. So in this new phase of California, figuring out who she wants to be when she grows up, I would love for the priority to be low income people getting into electric vehicles. We have limited funds. We can't be subsidizing everyone. We're in this budget crisis, right?
Damien
Former Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, the subway mayor, running right for governor, trying to break away from the pack by talking about gas prices. Knowing his transportation policies as mayor, and knowing that his son is an urban planner, or at least has a degree in it. I was surprised to see that. But it makes total sense when you talk about the messaging that you guys saw from the polling.
Affordability of transportation is the number one issue. He's staying away from specifics, because I don't know how you lower gas prices without moving off the climate stuff. And he's certainly not going to try to run a Democratic primary being the oil candidate. But it does make sense, I think, especially in this early game, for him to be using this messaging.
How do we get people from place to place without bankrupting them?
I always like to give our guests the last word. Is there anything you would like to add, anything in particular, or any questions I should have asked but didn't that you just want to answer before we go into the wrap up?
Hana
This conversation just solidifies for me that we need to build power to win. We are losing. There's a lot of conditions in place that are making it that way. At the same time, advocates and our broader campaigns need to do things differently. We need to frame things differently, and we need to build stronger alliances across sectors.
Coming back to the piece about how economics issues are at the top of mind for people, I always like to quote this Harvard study that found that a person's commute time is the single greatest factor in their chances of escaping poverty, more than crime rates or school test scores.
This helps to solidify when people say, “I'm so mad I'm stuck in traffic,” or “It takes me so long to get home.” This is a bigger issue than, “Oh, I don't get to watch like, four episodes of Netflix when I get home.” This factor is completely inhibiting people's ability to move up the social socio-economic ladder.
I would just love to work with partners to figure out how we can talk about the importance of building a functional, accessible transportation system in a way that actually improves people's lives on a day to day basis…that they can actually see the tangible benefits in their lives.
Because the connection is there. Transportation is connected to literally everything, and it's not that hard to make that narrative gel. I think we need to be a bit more creative about it, myself included. I definitely have not figured all this out. I'm like, very much on the learning edge of being, “Oh, I guess I shouldn't talk about climate like, we need to frame it in different ways.” So I'm excited for that. I think it's a good challenge.
Damien
Well, thank you so much for your time today. I'm sure we'll have plenty of chances to check back in as time goes on.
Hana
This was fun. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.
