Philadelphia Inquirer management to employees: Time’s running out

Philadelphia Inquirer newsroom

By Jeff Blumenthal  – Reporter, Philadelphia Business Journal

The Philadelphia Inquirer has fewer than five years to make fundamental changes to its business, products, operations and culture or it risks financial peril, management told employees in a new strategic plan.

“The economic challenges of our industry and the dominance of the major tech platforms pose mortal threats to our long-term sustainability,” Inquirer management said. “At our current trajectory, we know that in five years we will be buried under a debt load that will be next to impossible to overcome.”

Management emailed the eight-page memo, entitled “Unlocking A New Era Of Inquirer Journalism,” to employees late last month while negotiating buyout packages as part of what it deemed necessary cost-cutting. 

The Inquirer, which also operates the Daily News and Inquirer.com (formerly Philly.com), noted that the company was impacted more than some of its peers by “cataclysmic” changes in the news industry over the past 15 years due to its ownership turmoil. But with those issues in the rearview mirror, it has made what it described as meaningful changes such as merging three newsrooms into one, rebranding under the Inquirer name and introducing a digital subscription product. 

But it admitted that it has largely failed to solidify its digital footprint, and the company’s quest for a viable business model remains elusive. So for the past four months, the senior leadership team has held weekly off-site meetings to identify a common vision, cultural changes and a sustainable business model. 

“We need to make some tough but necessary decisions about the future of our print product,” management wrote. “We need to secure resources to invest in digital operations, and we need to attract new audiences with content that they are willing to pay for.”

Before getting into specifics about its plans, management provided its take on the newspaper industry, highlighting deep declines in print circulation and advertising revenue, with digital advertising revenue being insufficient to offset those trends. The response from newspaper companies has been cutting costs, largely through staff reductions such as those endured at The Inquirer in 2015, 2017 and just this month. 

But the Inquirer said there are some bright spots amid the gloom, including digital consumer revenue, which is on the rise across the industry, philanthropic collaborations, and growth of an events business.

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Will NJ Gov. Phil Murphy agree with lawmakers who think the burying or burning of food waste is ‘recycling’?

food waste being scraped from a plate into trash can
Food waste: Process it, bury it or burn it?

Michael Sol Warren reports for NJ.com

America has a major food waste problem, and New Jersey is no exception.

Upwards of 40% of food in America is never eaten and just gets thrown out, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It’s a problem that has plagued the Garden State for years, but legislation has also stalled for years in Trenton as other nearby states like New York and Vermont passed their own laws.

In 2017, Gov. Chris Christie signed a law setting a goal to cut New Jersey’s food waste in half by 2030. One way to do that is to expand composting, and a bill sitting on Gov. Phil Murphy’s desk now tries to do just that.

The bill, S1206/A3726, would require businesses and organizations that generate large amounts of food waste — at least 52 tons per year — to separate it from other garbage and recycle it. That’s big for the growth of “food waste facilities,” where food recycling is done through methods like composting or anaerobic digestion, which produces methane.

But in last-minute amendments, the bill’s definition of “food waste facilities” was expanded to include incinerators for four years and landfills indefinitely — the two least preferred methods of handling food waste, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

That change has angered advocacy groups, who are concerned that the amendments undercut long-sought efforts to boost New Jersey composting.

“We’re saying now that the landfilling of food waste is recycling. And incinerating food waste is recycling,” Marie Kruzan, the executive director of the Association of New Jersey Recyclers, said of the amended bill. “No one else in the country says that, but New Jersey does.”

The inclusion of incinerators, in particular, is stoking outrage. New Jersey is home to four power-generating incinerators, all owned by the company Covanta. Those incinerators are all located in poor communities and frequently raise environmental justice concerns and worries over public health effects.

“This bill would effectively generate more greenhouse gases and contribute to air pollution in overburdened communities through the burning and burying of waste that could be diverted via more sustainable mechanisms like composting,” the Ironbound Community Corporation said in a previous statement opposing the late amendments.

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Connecticut bag ban spurs contentious debate

Cole Rosengren reports for WasteDive

Connecticut’s newly passed bag bill marks an incremental step forward in plastic reduction efforts. It’s also being described as a missed opportunity by many involved in the process.

As finalized in a budget bill recently signed by Gov. Ned Lamont, Connecticut will require retailers to charge a 10-cent fee for any “single-use checkout bag” starting Aug. 1. By July 1, 2021, all such bags will be banned entirely.

The law defines “single-use” as plastic bags less than 4 mils thick – excluding bags for meat, fish, produce, newspapers and dry cleaning. The dozen-plus municipalities that already have their own policies in place will be allowed to keep them, and others can still pass stricter ordinances.

Environmental groups wanted to see paper bags included as well, while companies in the organics world pushed for compostable bags to be exempted entirely. The final version has resulted in a universally palatable stalemate of sorts, but tension remains after a heated legislative process.

Path to the ban

“We’ve been advocating for a ban on plastic checkout bags with a charge on paper bags, with the end goal of obviously producing a policy that promotes reusable bag use,” said Lou Burch, state program director for the Citizens Campaign for the Environment (CCE). “This law does not do that. However, we do think it’s a good step in the right direction.”

CCE, Surfrider Foundation and the Connecticut Food Association originally pushed a bill that went much further than what has now been enacted, or even what preceded it.

The legislature’s favored bag bill, passed out of the General Assembly’s environment committee in April, would have banned single-use bags made of “plastic, paper or other material” by 2020. Paper bags would be allowed if they were deemed 100% recyclable, made from 40% post-consumer recycled content and included the phrase “Please Reuse and Recycle This Bag.”

This open-ended language raised the alarm for two companies with Connecticut interests — Novamont, an Italian bioplastics company and Quantum Biopower, owner of the state’s first anaerobic digester.

The two have been ongoing partners in an effort to expand organics processing in Connecticut. Quantum is actively looking for ways to attract residential tonnage, and Novamont saw an opportunity to expand market share for bags to line those hypothetical curbside carts.

In fact, Novamont told Waste Dive it was actively pursuing plans to build a new manufacturing facility in the state.

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Thinking small could be a big boost to the grid

TOM JOHNSON reports for NJ Spotlight | JULY 11, 2019

Distributed Energy Resources Systems - solar, sind and energy storage
Distributed Energy Resources Systems

Distributed energy resources like solar arrays and CHP can help customers save while giving utilities a way to trim spending on local, long-distance infrastructure


If New Jersey is to achieve its ambitious clean-energy goals, it needs to integrate small-scale power systems, like solar systems and energy storage, into the electricity grid, according to a new study by groups working to promote renewable energy.

The study embraced much of the Murphy administration’s clean-energy agenda, particularly electrifying the transportation and building sectors, but also recommended a moratorium on new natural-gas pipelines, an issue pushed by large segments of the environmental community so far ignored by the governor’s office.

The report largely focuses on what is termed distributed energy resources (DER) — solar arrays, small wind systems, fuel cells, and combined heat and power (CHP) — typically connected to local utility distribution wires instead of more centralized transmission wires.

Savings for customers, utilities

Those systems offer the opportunity for customers to trim energy bills, as well as reducing the need for large-scale transmission investments by utilities. They also cut expenditures on utility distribution systems by eliminating the need for new substations and other infrastructure, the report said.

“If New Jersey is smart about how it integrates distributed generation, it can save ratepayers money and provide resilience,’’ said Jeanne Fox, part of the leadership team of the Center for Renewables Integration, a contributor to the study, and former president of the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities. “Use of Distributed Energy Resources, like solar, wind, battery storage, and smart inverters can make a big difference if New Jersey gets hit by another Sandy.’’

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Kushner, Sessions to be subpoenaed in House probe of obstruction of justice

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) arrives for a Democratic caucus meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday. (Andrew Harnik/AP)By John Wagner July 11 at 12:50 PM
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) arrives for a Democratic caucus meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday. (Andrew Harnik/AP)By John WagnerJuly 11 at 12:50 PM

John Wagner reports for the Washington Post

A House panel voted Thursday to subpoena 12 people with connections to President Trump, including his son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner and former attorney general Jeff Sessions, as part of an ongoing investigation into whether Trump obstructed justice or otherwise abused his office.

The vote along party lines by the House Judiciary Committee was the latest escalation in a battle between the Democratic-led chamber and the White House over multiple probes of Trump and his administration, including whether the president sought to obstruct the investigation of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III.

“We will not rest until we obtain their testimony and documents so this committee and Congress can do the work the Constitution and the American people expect of us,” Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said at the outset of Thursday’s hearing.

Trump lashed out at Democrats ahead of the planned vote, suggesting that they should focus on immigration issues instead.

“Now the Democrats have asked to see 12 more people who have already spent hours with Robert Mueller, and spent a fortune on lawyers in so doing,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “How many bites at the apple do they get before working on Border Loopholes and Asylum.”

Trump also chided Democrats for plans to hear testimony from Mueller next week about his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible obstruction of the probe by Trump.

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Georgia homeowners hustling to get solar installed before tax credit drops

Josephine Bennett reports for Georgia Public Radio

Homeowner Eric Byas and Chaia Lews with Creative Solar talk to one of Byas’ neighbors about residential solar power. Josephine Bennett photo

When the Public Service Commission wraps up its once-every-three-year energy plan later this month, it expects to announce a massive increase in solar farms. But when it comes to residential solar, Georgia gets an “F.” 

Despite that failing grade from the nonprofit Solar CrowdSource, installers here are swamped. That’s because at the end of the year the federal government will begin phasing out a 30% federal tax credit for residential solar.

That’s why homeowner Eric Byas just spent $22,000 to put 24 solar panels on the roof of his home in Jones County.

“You know that rebate’s going away this year,” Byas told his neighbor Jeff Fordham.

“That’s why we’re jumping,” Fordham said.

Byas said he installed the panels now to qualify for the maximum 30% federal tax credit. In 2020 it drops to 25% and 22% in 2021.

“I mean, I’ve known about solar for about six or seven years,” Byas said. “We’ve been checking in on it.”

That keeping people like Chaia Lewis with installer Creative Solar working nonstop.

“This is going to be the busiest year in the U.S. to date for solar,” Lewis said. “That’s because of that tax credit phasing out.”

And in Middle Georgia people are also motivated by an additional 25% off thanks to Solarize Middle Georgia. It’s one of many solar initiatives across the state through the nonprofit Solar Crowd Source. If enough people in your area sign up, you all get a discount.

“It’s like a bulk purchasing program and they bring several non-profits in the area into it,” Lewis said. “The city helps us out, and Solarize Middle Georgia is our 8th campaign.”

But that campaign ends at the end of July.

Programs like this are necessary because right now the state of Georgia offers no incentives for residential solar. Vice Chairman of the Georgia Public Service Commission Tim Echols said that’s because their focus is on utility scale projects for Georgia Power.

“Most of our solar growth is going to be in those large arrays in middle and South Georgia where we can essentially put solar on the grid below the cost of coal,” Echols said.

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