MossForDistrict10.com
"District 10 residents love their neighborhoods. They want a supervisor who is going to listen to their concerns, and fight for what they need."
—Steve Moss
On behalf of the U.S. Treasury Department, between '07 and '08 Steve traveled to Niger, one of the world's poorest countries, eight times, to consult with Ministry of Finance officials, hold workshops with governmental staff, and collaborate with other international financing agencies on policy reform efforts.
Viewpoints
+Full List of Publisher's View
Publisher’s View: CareApril Issue, 2009, Potrero View
Californians spend upwards of a billion dollars each year to subsidize electricity and natural gas customers. Under the California Alternative Rates for Energy, or CARE, program, low-income households are gifted a 20 percent reduction on their energy bills.
CARE provides needed relief to millions of Californians, who, even with the discount, are hard-pressed to pay for food, rent, and utilities. But in an era in which we desperately need to reduce our energy use – to lower associated costs and polluting air and greenhouse gas emissions – subsidizing energy use has the odd effect of encouraging environmentally damaging demand. In our neighborhood that demand is chiefly met by the aging Potrero Power Plant, whose emissions may contribute to Bayview-Hunters Point’s higher than average asthma rates.
Low-income families tend to rely on older, less efficient appliances, including energy hogging refrigerators. In some cases heating systems are so bad – and insulation nonexistent – that ancient stoves are used to warm homes. As a result, much of the CARE subsidy is eaten-up by inefficient appliances that better off Californians would simply replace as a way to reduce their utility bills.
No doubt we should help our poorer neighbors pay for steadily rising energy costs. But there’s a better way to do that than rate subsidies. We should take the billion we spend each year and invest it directly in low-income homes. Energy efficient appliances, lighting, and weatherization would lower these households’ bills while making them more comfortable. And, if we look to these same families to conduct energy audits, and deliver or install energy efficiency appliances and lighting, thousands of green collar jobs would be created.
We need to squeeze more productivity out of our resources. A good way to start would be to create more productive public policies. If we really cared, we’d do more than just give low-income families a hand-out to help them solve their problem. We’d give them an opportunity to help us solve the problems all of us face.
Publisher’s View: Conflict August Issue, 2009
More open space would help solve conflicts over how best to use our parks
Publisher’s View: Dead Plant Walking May Issue, 2009
It's not needed, we don't want it: close the Potrero Power Plant now.
Publisher’s View: Yes We CanDecember Issue, 2008
Obama has made community organizing cool. What are you going to do about it?
Publisher’s View: Focused EnergyAugust Issue, 2008
Let's create a new, community-based energy system: organic energy.