Fair Plans Research Articles

Exploring role-playing as a tool for involving citizens in air pollution mitigation urban policies

The design of air pollution control policies is a complex decision-making process. Public participation can enhance the legitimacy and effectiveness of environmental urban regulations but does not always occur naturally. This article presents the experience of the use of role-playing in six mid-sized cities in southern Chile to evaluate how residents affected by high concentrations of fine particulate matter perceive the problem and debate possible solutions. For this, the participants were asked to assume the role of advisors. On that premise, they had to prioritize between a series of mitigation measures and reach a consensus with other advisors. The results show the potential of role-playing games, on the one hand, to promote critical thinking and argument skills among the general public and, on the other, to help policymakers in the design of more operative and fair plans of action.

How FAIR plans confronted redlining in America

How FAIR plans confronted redlining in America

Spatial Pattern of a Comprehensive fE Index for Provincial Carbon Emissions in China

China has committed to ambitious targets to reduce its carbon emissions in the next decades, in order to combat climate change and improve the environment. The realization of the targets depends on the fair and effective mitigation plans of all provinces. However, with varying ecological and environmental conditions and social-economic development, it is a critical issue to quantify the provinces’ efforts equally. This paper proposed a comprehensive fE index in coordinating ecology, equity and economy, by accounting for carbon emissions and sinks to characterize provincial carbon emission status in China, from 2000 to 2017, which shows a spatial pattern of “boundary high, central low”. The provinces with higher fE value (>1.5) in boundary areas can be seen as “relative equality” provinces with good ecology circulation, equity and economic efficiency. The provinces with lower fE value (<0.7) in central areas around Bohai Bay are regarded as “severe inequality” provinces, and are identified as the hot-spot provinces, which have emitted more CO2 than their equity share by occupying the carbon emission space of other provinces in recent decades. These results could provide a reference for a provincial guide for carbon reduction and sustainable development of the low-carbon economy.

Watching Neighborhoods Vanish: The Intertwining of Gentrification, Race, Class, and Policy

ABSTRACT Housing policy officials’ interest in alleviating displacement faces scrutiny for the effective implementation of housing programs and diversifying neighborhoods. While officials deliberate diversifying neighborhoods; residents focus on affordable housing, remaining in gentrifying neighborhoods and fair relocation plans. Displacement, as an outcome of gentrification, has long history in the United States. New York developer, Robert Moses, renowned for his contributions to the infrastructure of New York was coined the “Great Builder.” When recognizing Robert Moses’s legacy of revitalization, literature dually records the disparaging impact that his revitalization plan had on low-income minorities, displacing 250,000 people over four decades.

Survival of the Fairest: Examining HUD Reviews of Assessments of Fair Housing

ABSTRACTIn 2015, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) Rule, arguably the most significant federal effort in a generation to address place-based disparities in access to opportunity and to advance fair housing. In 2018, HUD suspended the rule, it said in part because of the resources it was expending to implement it and in part because of the large share of municipal plans that HUD determined had failed to meet the rule’s requirements. In this article, we present the first analysis of the fair housing plans that HUD did not accept, examining how municipalities failed to meet the rule's requirements, what those failures imply about advancing fair housing, and the extent to which HUD’s enforcement strategy was working before the suspension. Our analysis shows that HUD engaged in detailed reviews of municipalities’ Assessments of Fair Housing and provided constructive feedback. The most common issue with which municipalities struggled was setting realistic goals that would actually advance fair housing and creating measurable metrics and milestones to gauge progress. Several municipalities neglected to conduct thorough regional analyses or analyses of all relevant disparities in access to opportunity. Both shortcomings reflect broader challenges municipalities face in advancing fair housing, particularly in identifying strategies that address interconnected causes of disparities in access to opportunity and in building regional support to address those causes.

Political Fairness in Redistricting: What Wisconsin's Experience Teaches

In this paper, to be presented at an election law forum sponsored by the University of Memphis Law Review and published in a forthcoming issue of the University of Memphis Law Review, I argue that the law and practice of redistricting should address the question of political fairness. I base my argument on the history of redistricting in Wisconsin which I discuss at some length. Although under the Wisconsin Constitution redistricting is a legislative responsibility, in every Wisconsin redistricting since the 1950s lawsuits were started and courts became involved. Moreover, all of the maps drawn by courts, one by the Wisconsin Supreme Court and three by three-judge federal courts, were politically unfair. This was true whether or not the courts that drew the maps chose to ignore or consider political factors. The fact is, from a political standpoint, none of the courts knew what they were doing. I contend that state legislatures should establish a standard of political fairness with which redistricting plans must comply. In the absence of such legislation, entities that engage in redistricting, such as courts or commissions, should on their own initiative endeavor to create politically fair plans and utilize all available tools including modern computer technology to assist them. A politically fair plan is one that reflects the political complexion of the state. In other words, the composition of legislative districts should be based on the preference of the state’s voters. Thus, if a state is 53 percent Republican, then 53 percent of its legislative districts should at least lean Republican, and if a state is 51 percent Democratic, then 51 percent of the state’s legislative districts should at least lean Democratic. In order to determine the political make up of a state, it is essential to rely on a sufficient number of elections held over a sufficient period of time and to avoid elections that are overly determined by candidate specific factors. Thus, a redistricting entity should calculate the percentage of votes received by candidates of both major parties in the five preceding presidential or gubernational elections and average them. This will create an accurate political profile of the state. This process will enable the redistricting entity to establish a standard of political fairness that will govern drawing the map. Under the standard, each party is entitled to a percentage of legislative districts equal to the average percentage of votes it received in the five elections.

Development and performance of self-sealed MRPC

The MRPC has been widely applied in the high-energy physics experiments in recent decades for its excellent timing performance and good efficiency. The Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment at FAIR plans to build its TOF system based on the MRPCs, aiming at a good hadron identification. The CBM-TOF will work at a very high particle flux rate (∼ 30 kHz/cm2) condition, and the long-time exposure to such high-rate ionizing radiation will lead to severe gas aging problem on the MRPC. In order to improve the gas interchange inside the MRPC, we designed a new structure of self-sealed MRPC. It has a much smaller gas volume, which may accelerate the exchange process between the fresh and the polluted gas. The preparation time before the MRPC could work is also largely shortened. A prototype of self-sealed MRPC was produced in Tsinghua University, and it was tested in the CERN SPS Nov 2015 beam test organized by the CBM-TOF group. It showed around 98% efficiency and 60 ps time resolution. Due to the rate limit of 10 kHz/cm2 in this beam test, we cannot make judgement on its performance under extremely high rate. Therefore further studies have to be performed under higher rate in order to study the capability of improving the gas exchange speed of this more flexible and operable sealed MRPC. This will allow that MRPC to be better suited for the high rate environment of TOF system while operating in the experiment.

The Evolution of Local and Regional Housing Studies

Abstract Housing studies have evolved over eighty years from a set of disparate techniques into comprehensive fair share housing allocation plans. During this evolution the individual studies also have served a variety of political purposes, although housers and planners have not always admitted to them. In the latest development, a few states have sought to implement these plans by explicitly bringing them squarely into the political arena. They have done so by using analysis and plan as an agenda for improved vertical and horizontal intergovernmental sharing of control over land use decisions. This article provides a historical review of the evolution of these studies and their political uses. It concludes with some possible next steps in the evolution of housing studies.

Fair vs Optimal Salesmen's Compensation Plans

Fair vs Optimal Salesmen's Compensation Plans

FAIR Plan Insureds: Occupancy and Location Characteristics and Experience

FAIR Plans were established primarily to make insurance available to persons, with property in urban core areas with riot potential, who could not secure insurance directly from individual insurers. In practice, the plans have been extended to cover locations other than urban core areas. Under these plans the insureds cannot be denied insurance because of environmental hazards. FAIR Plan insureds pay either the same rates charged standard property owners or higher substandard rates, depending upon the results of a property inspection. Properties with high internal hazards may be rejected or may have to be upgraded before they are insurable.' FAIR Plans insure properties representing various occupancies and locations. No accurate information is available, however, on (1) the extent to which the plans service the various occupancies and locations and (2) the loss experience of different occupancy and location groups.2 Consequently insurers and the public do not know whether the plans serve primarily the insureds in urban core areas or the owners of high risk occupancies such as bars and restaurants outside the urban core areas. They also do not know what types of properties have developed the more adverse experience. This paper sheds some light on the occupancy and location characteristics of Minneapolis and St. Paul properties insured under the Minnesota FAIR Plan. It also comments on the inadequacies of present FAIR Plan data and provides a model for further analysis.3

Critical Evaluation of Fair Plans

Widespread problems of availability of basic property insurance became a matter of public concern over the last decade, culminating in the emergence of a Congressional interest following riots in inner-city areas. The Congress, in 1968, authorized a Federal program following generally the recommendations of the President's Advisory Panel on Insurance in Riot-Affected Areas, encompassing Federal reinsurance against riot and civil disorder losses and State-wide FAIR Plans to assure access to insurance markets. FAIR Plans, in operation for over a year, appear generally to have succeeded in accomplishing the basic purposes for which they were organized, although the profitability or loss potential of these Plans is as yet undemonstrated. New or more comprehensive Federal regulations governing the operation of approved FAIR Plans were issued in September 1970. A comprehensive report on the availability of crime insurance in urban areas was transmitted to Congress by the Federal Insurance Administration in July 1970 recommending a sequential approach to a solution of the availability problem with maximum reliance upon the capabilities of private industry and the existing structure of State regulation. The viewpoint aid position of the Federal Government rely upon the insurance industry and the States to continue to carry out their responsibilities under the free enterprise system. To the extent the industry and the States fails to do so, the Federal Government recognizes its responsibility to meet the essential insurance needs of the public. In evaluating the role of the FAIR Plans in meeting urban insurance needs, it is necessary both to understand the background and purpose of the legislation that authorized the Federal riot reinsurance program, and to appreciate the growing public need and demand for insurance

Environmental Hazards and Rating Urban Core Properties

This paper defines hazard and describes how costs inherent in environmental hazards, particularly those producing the recent urban core riots, are assessed and distributed by current and alternative insurance pricing systems. The concept of socializing risks beyond the control of the insured is explored and the characteristics of a completely effective socialization mechanism are enumerated. Rating recognition of environmental hazards under current class, schedule, and schedule excess rating plans, substandard filings, and surplus lines rating are reviewed, with particular attention addressed to pricing under FAIR Plans and the civil disorder premium loading. The loading is described as a current example of risk socialization with some private equity features that have posed several unanswered questions. The riots and civil disorders that have plagued our cities since 1965 have led to Andrew F. Whitman, Ph.D., J.D., C.L.U., C.P.C.U., is Associate Professor of Insurance in the University of Minnesota and a member of the Minnesota Bar. Dr. Whitman has contributed articles of this Journal and the C.P.C.U. Annals. C. Arthur Williams, Jr., Ph.D., is Professor of Economics and Insurance in the University of Minnesota. Dr. Williams, a past President of A.R.I.A., is the author or co-author of several books and articles. This paper, which was presented at the 1969 Annual Meeting of A.R.I.A., was made possible by the generous cooperation of many persons, including the following who supplied important information in response to the authors' inquiries: W. C. Freitag, Manager, Fire Underwriters Inspection Bureau, Berton Heaton, Assistant Manager, Rating Division, Minnesota State Insurance Department, C. R. Hall, Assistant Secretary, National Association of Independent Insurers, K. H. Parker, General Manager Fire Insurance Research and Actuarial Association, W. H. Rodda, Manager, Transportation Insurance Rating Bureau, LeRoy Simon, General Manager, National Insurance Actuarial and Statistical Association, Kenneth 0. Smith, Manager, New York Fire Insurance Rating Organization, J. T. Sorensen, Manager, Fire Insurance Research and Actuarial Association, and William S. Gibson, Assistant Director, State of Illinois Department of Insurance. This project was funded through a special legislative appropriation to the Bureau of Business Research, Graduate School of Business Administration, University of Minnesota. some significant changes in property insurance rating philosophies and practices. Because they have sustained increased property losses due to these riots and because they fear that this higher level of riot activity will continue, insurers have sought more premium dollars to prevent underwriting losses in the future. However, public pressures and practical limitations have prohibited them from collecting t-he premiums they consider adequate to insure property owners in riot-affected areas. Consequently insurers have re-examined their rating philosophies, which were based primarily on private equity concepts, and have given new emphasis to the socialization of risk associated with environmental hazards. This paper (1) examines the socialization of risk and how this might be achieved, (2) describes how current fire and extended coverage insurance pricing methods allocate the cost of environmental hazards among insureds and company owners, and (3) analyzes the special riot and civil disorder charges that insurers have added to cover these newly discovered sources of loss. In another article the authors will present more specific in-

Brussels Fair Plans Cut

Brussels Fair Plans Cut

Fair and Equitable Plans of Corporate Reorganization

Fair and Equitable Plans of Corporate Reorganization