Dillon\u27s Rule Versus Home Rule: A Comprehensive, Comparative Review of the Impacts

There are two primary configurations of the American state-local relationship. The status quo configuration, pure Dillon\u27s Rule, is a top-down organizational structure in which the state, primarily through its legislature, exercises close-to-complete oversight over decision-making at the local level — in municipalities, counties, towns, etc. An alternative configuration may be brought about by the institution of home rule, a constitutionally or legislatively conferred devolution of powers to substate governments that allows, at least nominally, for greater autonomy at the local level. This study utilizes institutional theory and a systematic review of the current body of literature concerning the tangible impacts of differences in state-local power dynamics to comparatively assess pure Dillon\u27s Rule systems and home rule systems of state-local interaction. Through the utilization of OneSearch, an aggregate search engine, 518 independent search results relevant to the substantive impacts of these systems were gathered from the contemporary body of literature. After subjecting these 518 search results to screening based on predetermined selection criteria and an even more in-depth critical appraisal process, 60 sources were ultimately chosen to constitute the study\u27s literature sample. Eight themes were extracted from this literature sample, four of which point to differences between the systems in terms of their on-the- ground impacts. Home rule does appear to make governing institutions better equipped to respond to local voices and local problems: home rule localities\u27 budgets are more sensitive to emergent community needs, autonomy at the local level corresponds to more dramatic shifts in budgetary allocations based on electorally expressed wants, and local governments\u27 legal capacities under home rule do allow for a wider range of innovation on social policymaking at the local level. However, efficiency gains through home rule are suspect at best; home rule tends to engender more bureaucratic sprawl in service delivery, not less, and any local economic gains are more or less contingent on that locality being part of a metropolitan area. Thus, this systematic review\u27s results alter the conversation fundamentally, asserting that the question of home rule is not properly understood as one of efficiency, but as one of effectiveness in local representation

Dillon's Rule Versus Home Rule: A Comprehensive, Comparative Review of the Impacts

There are two primary configurations of the American state-local relationship. The status quo configuration, pure Dillon’s Rule, is a top-down organizational structure in which the state, primarily through its legislature, exercises close-to-complete oversight over decision-making at the local level – in municipalities, counties, towns, etc. An alternative configuration may be brought about by the institution of home rule, a constitutionally or legislatively conferred devolution of powers to substate governments that allows, at least nominally, for greater autonomy at the local level. This study utilizes institutional theory and a systematic review of the current body of literature concerning the tangible impacts of differences in state-local power dynamics to comparatively assess pure Dillon’s Rule systems and home rule systems of state-local interaction. Through the utilization of OneSearch, an aggregate search engine, 518 independent search results relevant to the substantive impacts of these systems were gathered from the contemporary body of literature. After subjecting these 518 search results to screening based on predetermined selection criteria and an even more in-depth critical appraisal process, 60 sources were ultimately chosen to constitute the study’s literature sample. Eight themes were extracted from this literature sample, four of which point to differences between the systems in terms of their on-the- ground impacts. Home rule does appear to make governing institutions better equipped to respond to local voices and local problems: home rule localities’ budgets are more sensitive to emergent community needs, autonomy at the local level corresponds to more dramatic shifts in budgetary allocations based on electorally expressed wants, and local governments’ legal capacities under home rule do allow for a wider range of innovation on social policymaking at the local level. However, efficiency gains through home rule are suspect at best; home rule tends to engender more bureaucratic sprawl in service delivery, not less, and any local economic gains are more or less contingent on that locality being part of a metropolitan area. Thus, this systematic review’s results alter the conversation fundamentally, asserting that the question of home rule is not properly understood as one of efficiency, but as one of effectiveness in local representation

The Interannual variability of hurricane activity in the Atlantic and east pacific regions

The investigation of the interannual and interdecadal variations in hurricane activity has been an important topic of study lately, especially with regard to their implications for climate change issues. On the interannual time-scale, the El Niño and Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phase has been correlated with hurricane activity in the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific Ocean Basins. For example, various atmospheric and oceanic parameters that influence hurricane development become significantly altered during an El Niño event, leading to suppressed easterly wave development and growth in the Atlantic, but more activity in the Eastern Pacific Ocean Basin. This study examined the interannual variability of hurricane intensity (measured as wind speed and interpreted through the Saffir-Simpson Scale) from 1938 through 2007 in the Atlantic and 1970 through 2007 in the Pacific basins, respectively. These data were then compared with the occurrence of El Niño/La Niña events as defined using the Japan Meteorological Association (JMA) index. El Niño/La Niña variability superimposed on variability associated with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) was also examined here. Not surprisingly, during an El Niño year the intensity of Atlantic hurricanes was found to be weaker than during a neutral year or a La Niña year, but these conclusions were opposite in the Eastern Pacific Ocean Basin. There were also significant differences found in hurricane intensity between El Niño and La Niña years when the PDO was in phase 1 (warm phase), rather than when the PDO was in phase 2 (cool phase). This study also examined the interannual variation in hurricane intensity by genesis region (i.e. Atlantic: the eastern and western Atlantic Ocean Basins, the Caribbean, and the Gulf of Mexico; Eastern Pacific: divided into quadrants using 20o N and 125o W as the quadrant intersection point). Finally, the utility of this information in a long-range forecast application is demonstrated

Discovery and Validation of Kepler-452b: A 1.6-Re Super Earth Exoplanet in the Habitable Zone of a G2 Star

We report on the discovery and validation of Kepler-452b, a transiting planet identified by a search through the 4 years of data collected by NASA's Kepler Mission. This possibly rocky 1.63$^{+0.23}_{-0.20}$ R$_\oplus$ planet orbits its G2 host star every 384.843$^{+0.007}_{0.012}$ days, the longest orbital period for a small (R$_p$ < 2 R$_\oplus$) transiting exoplanet to date. The likelihood that this planet has a rocky composition lies between 49% and 62%. The star has an effective temperature of 5757$\pm$85 K and a log g of 4.32$\pm$0.09. At a mean orbital separation of 1.046$^{+0.019}_{-0.015}$ AU, this small planet is well within the optimistic habitable zone of its star (recent Venus/early Mars), experiencing only 10% more flux than Earth receives from the Sun today, and slightly outside the conservative habitable zone (runaway greenhouse/maximum greenhouse). The star is slightly larger and older than the Sun, with a present radius of 1.11$^{+0.15}_{-0.09}$ R$_\odot$ and an estimated age of 6 Gyr. Thus, Kepler-452b has likely always been in the habitable zone and should remain there for another 3 Gyr.Comment: 19 pages, 16 figure

Planetary Candidates Observed by Kepler. VII. The First Fully Uniform Catalog Based on The Entire 48 Month Dataset (Q1-Q17 DR24)

We present the seventh Kepler planet candidate catalog, which is the first to be based on the entire, uniformly processed, 48 month Kepler dataset. This is the first fully automated catalog, employing robotic vetting procedures to uniformly evaluate every periodic signal detected by the Q1-Q17 Data Release 24 (DR24) Kepler pipeline. While we prioritize uniform vetting over the absolute correctness of individual objects, we find that our robotic vetting is overall comparable to, and in most cases is superior to, the human vetting procedures employed by past catalogs. This catalog is the first to utilize artificial transit injection to evaluate the performance of our vetting procedures and quantify potential biases, which are essential for accurate computation of planetary occurrence rates. With respect to the cumulative Kepler Object of Interest (KOI) catalog, we designate 1,478 new KOIs, of which 402 are dispositioned as planet candidates (PCs). Also, 237 KOIs dispositioned as false positives (FPs) in previous Kepler catalogs have their disposition changed to PC and 118 PCs have their disposition changed to FP. This brings the total number of known KOIs to 8,826 and PCs to 4,696. We compare the Q1-Q17 DR24 KOI catalog to previous KOI catalogs, as well as ancillary Kepler catalogs, finding good agreement between them. We highlight new PCs that are both potentially rocky and potentially in the habitable zone of their host stars, many of which orbit solar-type stars. This work represents significant progress in accurately determining the fraction of Earth-size planets in the habitable zone of Sun-like stars. The full catalog is publicly available at the NASA Exoplanet Archive.Comment: Accepted to the Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. 30 pages, 9 figures, 7 tables. We make the DR24 robovetter decision code publicly available at http://github.com/JeffLCoughlin/robovetter, with input and output examples provided using the same data as contained in the full paper's table

Planetary Candidates Observed by Kepler. VIII. A Fully Automated Catalog with Measured Completeness and Reliability Based on Data Release 25

We present the Kepler Object of Interest (KOI) catalog of transiting exoplanets based on searching 4 yr of Kepler time series photometry (Data Release 25, Q1–Q17). The catalog contains 8054 KOIs, of which 4034 are planet candidates with periods between 0.25 and 632 days. Of these candidates, 219 are new, including two in multiplanet systems (KOI-82.06 and KOI-2926.05) and 10 high-reliability, terrestrial-size, habitable zone candidates. This catalog was created using a tool called the Robovetter, which automatically vets the DR25 threshold crossing events (TCEs). The Robovetter also vetted simulated data sets and measured how well it was able to separate TCEs caused by noise from those caused by low signal-to-noise transits. We discuss the Robovetter and the metrics it uses to sort TCEs. For orbital periods less than 100 days the Robovetter completeness (the fraction of simulated transits that are determined to be planet candidates) across all observed stars is greater than 85%. For the same period range, the catalog reliability (the fraction of candidates that are not due to instrumental or stellar noise) is greater than 98%. However, for low signal-to-noise candidates between 200 and 500 days around FGK-dwarf stars, the Robovetter is 76.7% complete and the catalog is 50.5% reliable. The KOI catalog, the transit fits, and all of the simulated data used to characterize this catalog are available at the NASA Exoplanet Archive

Planetary Candidates Observed by Kepler V: Planet Sample from Q1-Q12 (36 Months)

The Kepler mission discovered 2842 exoplanet candidates with 2 years of data. We provide updates to the Kepler planet candidate sample based upon 3 years (Q1-Q12) of data. Through a series of tests to exclude false-positives, primarily caused by eclipsing binary stars and instrumental systematics, 855 additional planetary candidates have been discovered, bringing the total number known to 3697. We provide revised transit parameters and accompanying posterior distributions based on a Markov Chain Monte Carlo algorithm for the cumulative catalogue of Kepler Objects of Interest. There are now 130 candidates in the cumulative catalogue that receive less than twice the flux the Earth receives and more than 1100 have a radius less than 1.5 Rearth. There are now a dozen candidates meeting both criteria, roughly doubling the number of candidate Earth analogs. A majority of planetary candidates have a high probability of being bonafide planets, however, there are populations of likely false-positives. We discuss and suggest additional cuts that can be easily applied to the catalogue to produce a set of planetary candidates with good fidelity. The full catalogue is publicly available at the NASA Exoplanet Archive.Comment: Accepted for publication, ApJ