Governance

In the past four-plus months, many cities have been confronted with renewed outcries to remove offensive or ‘problem’ monuments that commemorate values of a bygone era. In some cases, these statues have been forcibly removed. In the latest essay in his ongoing series of stories about cities and why they are great, Bill Fulton revisits how Ventura, California, handled the controversy surrounding a statue of Father Junipero Serra.

By design, Houston is car-dependent. Yet, Kinder Surveys have shown that half of Houstonians want to live where they can walk more and drive less. Recently approved ordinances that promote walkability in neighborhoods should help. Importantly, in certain areas, the new regulations will eliminate and reduce minimum parking requirements, which are considered costly, unfair and inefficient by many experts.

NIMBY opposition alone isn’t enough to counter the harmful effects of air pollutants emitted by concrete batch plants located in underserved and over-polluted communities in Harris County, which is home to more of these facilities than any county in Texas. Too often, much of the pollution and many of the polluters largely go unchecked by the state.