Why can't we get anything done?

[TreeBeard]

5 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

There's a style of management in IT that big tech has successfully used.  It eschews over planning in favour of failing fast and often.  It sounds counter intuitive but exactly what government needs.

This is what Musk and Trump did and we could do it too.  The time it takes to find the right solution through failure is less than the time to plan a solution that will take years to fail.

Nobody in government has the vision to try it though.

Are you willing to risk the environment to “get things done” quickly?   I’d rather they take the time to get it right and mitigate potential risk.  

[Michael Hardner]

1 hour ago, I am Groot said:

The mentality of government and bureaucracy is that the highest priority of all they do is to never be held responsible for something going wrong. If that means spending a million dollars to ensure that you don't lose fifty thousand - and get blamed for losing it - then that's considered a good trade.

Amen.

And almost nobody knows the names of the most powerful people in the bureaucracy, the deputy ministers.

[Michael Hardner]

55 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

Are you willing to risk the environment to “get things done” quickly?   I’d rather they take the time to get it right and mitigate potential risk.  

It's a false choice.  Sometimes people automatically think taking more time will come up with a better solution.  But it's not always so.

[Nefarious Banana]

First Immigrants will get the final say on anything that needs doing in this country.  Country will grind to a halt from its snail pace now.

[Moonlight Graham]

Our leaders are giant d-bags and losers, and Canadians are far too patient and polite to put up with it.  Then again, I know they don't like it but the alternatives are also d-bags and losers.

[TreeBeard]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

It's a false choice.  Sometimes people automatically think taking more time will come up with a better solution.  But it's not always so.

Not a false choice at all.  When projects are fast-tracked, the environmental assessments and mitigation are short-cut.  
 

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2021/07/05/provinces-special-orders-fast-tracking-development-swamp-toronto-area-conservation-authorities.html?rf

 

“The conservation authorities say that given the expedited nature of minister’s zoning orders, or MZOs, the province is approving developments without a complete picture of their environmental impacts.”

[Michael Hardner]

18 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

Not a false choice at all.  When projects are fast-tracked, the environmental assessments and mitigation are short-cut.  
 

I maintain that longer doesn't automatically mean better.  A bad process can take longer AND not consult the right people.

[Michael Hardner]

Another example... longer can mean NIMBY cancellation of projects...

[TreeBeard]

2 minutes ago, Michael Hardner said:

I maintain that longer doesn't automatically mean better.  A bad process can take longer AND not consult the right people.

So you say….  But I am the only one to show a clear example of fast tracking being detrimental to the environment and not doing the proper assessments.  
 

3 minutes ago, Michael Hardner said:

Another example... longer can mean NIMBY cancellation of projects...

That’s not an example;  that’s an assertion.  

[Michael Hardner]

14 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

1. So you say….  But I am the only one to show a clear example of fast tracking being detrimental to the environment and not doing the proper assessments.  
 

2. That’s not an example;  that’s an assertion.  

1. Did you?  Or did you just assert that it happens?  I'm not disputing it.

2.  Haha love it... I just put that on YOU 😜

 

The St.Clair Streetcar upgrade lengthened the consultation process because business people got a judge to delay the start of construction.  It made no difference other than to delay the construction, cause disruption, and add expense.

[TreeBeard]

16 minutes ago, Michael Hardner said:

Or did you just assert that it happens?  I'm not disputing it.

I linked to an article that you clearly didn’t bother looking at.  

[Michael Hardner]

21 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

I linked to an article that you clearly didn’t bother looking at.  

Sorry I would have if I saw it.

[Michael Hardner]

Ok I read it. No surprise.

[TreeBeard]

2 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Ok I read it. No surprise.

You’re right.  It’s not a surprise that fast tracking projects is  detrimental to the environment.  That’s what I said earlier.  Glad we agree.  

[myata]

And again, we want to believe that the system, that is devoid of incentive and responsibility, just one question: why bother? made two centuries ago for a quiet and remote peasant, timber and beaver far corner of the world is perfect as it was at the time of inception (with nothing like a functional democracy of the 21 century in the plans) and the problem is in the "methods" and "style". That is, leave the same system, same bored to half death or gone a bit funny (of inability to use their creative potential in any constructive way) folk, change their "style" and "methods" (via extensive development exercise, at least a decade, XYZ millions to the taxpayer) et voila, a shiny new dawn of a new Canadian era in public management. Good luck (you will need it very, very much down this path).

[Michael Hardner]

6 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

You’re right.  It’s not a surprise that fast tracking projects is  detrimental to the environment.  That’s what I said earlier.  Glad we agree.  

Not 100% though... There's a concept called rightsizing.

Also, those with money and resources are better positioned to take part in longer and more expensive processes.  Not smaller players.

But again, I'm talking about an approach that doesn't fit all problems.

[I am Groot]

14 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

Not a false choice at all.  When projects are fast-tracked, the environmental assessments and mitigation are short-cut.  

So you don't think you can do an environmental assessment in under ten years?

[I am Groot]

14 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

So you say….  But I am the only one to show a clear example of fast tracking being detrimental to the environment and not doing the proper assessments.  

No you didn't. You cited a Toronto government agency whining about having to spend thousands of hours doing them.

Let's consider that a moment. Thousands? How many thousands? At least two, I guess. How long should an environmental assessment take in hours? 800 hours would be someone working for a hundred days straight on it. You'd think they'd know what they needed to know in a hundred days. But they spent over 2,000 hours so that's more like eight months of steady, non-stop, day in and day out work, all day, every day. And that's not enough to figure out what environmental damage a Walmart distribution centre might cause?

[TreeBeard]

5 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

But again, I'm talking about an approach that doesn't fit all problems.

How do you determine which problems will get the “act fast and fail often” approach?

[Michael Hardner]

16 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

How do you determine which problems will get the “act fast and fail often” approach?

Here's the thing: you think about these things and analyze them.  And you do it publicly.

I know it sounds counter-intuitive and such, but many people fall into the trap that more analysis, more bureaucracy and more time are good for all problems.  I have seen safety issues that have very much suffered from extended bureaucracy for example.

The best organization to engage with for these things is the organization we engage with the least - the public.  We do engage with nimbys, and lobbying groups but not the same thing.

I was in touch with this author Don Lenihan for awhile:
https://middlegroundengagement.ca/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/2008-Its-more-than-Talk-2.pdf

If you read about "publics" (Neil Postman, Habermas, Michael Warner http://facpub.stjohns.edu/~ganterg/sjureview/vol1-1/publics.html) you start to realize the importance of smart public engagement design in a variety of arenas.

[CdnFox]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

I maintain that longer doesn't automatically mean better.  A bad process can take longer AND not consult the right people.

This is true.  For example bc's site C dam went through extensive review and consultation across both federal AND provincai gov'ts and still wound up having unintended consequence.

https://environment.geog.ubc.ca/dam-it-the-site-c-dam-on-the-peace-river/

Often when you have long convoluted processes you miss important data. So much is collected that it gets muddled and confused and it's brutally inefficient.  From the report:

It appears that BC hydro has underestimated the social and environmental costs of the Project and the panel to conclude that the Crown corporation has not performed enough research on these topics which has resulted in erroneous conclusions (Ministry of Environment, 2014).

That despite MASSIVE and EXTENSIVE discusions and research.

So longer doesnt' make things better at all, and there are a huge number of projects which had long processes which led to problems in the end.

Efficient and practical is more important than short and long.  If you have an inefficient long process - you are every bit as likely to screw up as a short process.

so what we need to be demanding is efficient and fast protocols that are still a comprehensive as necessary to get the job done. ANd accept that no matter what you do there will always be some unintentional consequences and plan for that.

Dragging things out DEFINITELY does not make the process better.

[TreeBeard]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

I know it sounds counter-intuitive and such, but many people fall into the trap that more analysis, more bureaucracy and more time are good for all problems. 

I never said it was.   But, when things are fast tracked, the environmental assessments are skipped over.  That is clear.  

 

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

The best organization to engage with for these things is the organization we engage with the least - the public.  We do engage with nimbys, and lobbying groups but not the same thing.

How would your engagement of the public look different, and take less time, than how it is currently done?

[Michael Hardner]

7 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

1.  But, when things are fast tracked, the environmental assessments are skipped over.  That is clear.  

2. How would your engagement of the public look different, and take less time, than how it is currently done?

1. It can be a concern.  But it also can prevent Nimbyism.
2. Quick, small projects with high degrees of online collaboration. It's covered in one of the studies I posted to you above.

[TreeBeard]

34 minutes ago, Michael Hardner said:

Quick, small projects with high degrees of online collaboration. It's covered in one of the studies I posted to you above.

So do you have an example of a quick, small project by government that took too long?

[Michael Hardner]

2 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

So do you have an example of a quick, small project by government that took too long?

No, they don't do those today.