Passion, Protest, or Just Plain Incivility?: Responding to Bad Behaviors in Public Meetings

Bad behavior is not new, but the prevalence of incivility seems a rising tide in the public arena. Passionate outbursts at a public input meeting and planned protest to disrupt meetings are captured with increasing frequency on today’s omnipresent electronic media. The negative invective allowed/encouraged during political campaigns seems to carry over to public input meetings and other places intended for the measured, deliberative processes of governance. In the public forum, sometimes it is easy to discern the planned protest from the passionate outburst; sometimes it is not. When a theater group pretending to be audience members broke into song to object to the demise of the public option in the Health Care Bill at an American Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) Annual State Issues Conference, the protest was obvious, planned, and refined (Singing Flashmob, 2009). When a Congressman yells “You Lie” at the President during a joint session (Remarks, 2009) or an individual in attendance at a public meeting screams invectives at a County Commissioner, it is more difficult to discern if the vocalization was a passionate utterance of the moment or a planned strategy. Likewise, it is difficult to tell from afar if the behavior is a behavioral trait of an individual or a behavior emboldened by what has been seen on news channels, reality shows, or from others who advocate one’s position. Regardless of its cause, many agree with Innes & Booher’s (2000) conclusions that the legally required ritual of public input meetings isn’t working: The traditional methods of public participation in government decision making simply do not work. They do not achieve genuine participation in planning or decisions; they do not provide significant information to public officials that makes a difference to their actions; they do not satisfy members of the public that they are being heard; they do not improve the decisions that agencies and public officials make; and they don’t represent a broad spectrum of the public. Worse yet, they often antagonize the members of the public who do try to work through these methods. (p. 2) This paper examines why those who manage public meetings and public input processes should be concerned about the apparent growth of citizen incivility. Wang (2001) defines traditional public participation processes as including “public hearings, citizen forums, community or neighborhood meetings, community outreaches, citizen advisory groups, and individual citizen representation. Citizen surveys and focus groups, the Internet, and e-mail are also used” (p. 322). Concerns arise about whether incivility is a passing fancy or a threat to democratic processes and government attempts to foster communication/ accountability. After discussing some concerns about rising incivility, the essay will discuss what might be done during public meetings to moderate uncivil behaviors

Natural Ice-Nucleating Bacteria Increase the Freezing Tolerance of the Intertidal Bivalve Geukensia demissa

Instead of avoiding freezing, freeze tolerant invertebrates actively initiate controlled ice nucleation at relatively high sub-zero temperatures in extracellular compartments. Most produce proteinaceous ice-nucleators in their hemolymph, however the intertidal bivalve mollusc Geukensia demissa lacks this ability. Instead it utilizes at least one strain of ice-nucleation active (INA) bacteria, Pseudomonas fulva, present in seawater, to induce crystallization in the pallial fluid that fills its mantle cavity. In this study, two additional INA bacteria strains were isolated from the palial fluid of Geukensia demissa: Psychrobacter sp. and Shewanella sp. The ice-nucleation activity of both strains was characterized and Psychrobacter was found to consistently induce nucleation at temperatures 1-3°C higher than Shewanella. Based on 16S rRNA sequencing, neither of these bacteria have yet been identified. The effects of Psychrobacter on the freeze tolerance of summer-acclimatized Geukensia were assessed and compared to the freeze tolerance of winter-acclimatized specimens. This assessment was accomplished through whole-organism death experiments involving 12-hour periods of exposure to sub-zero temperatures and cell viability tests using a LIVE/DEAD sperm viability kit (Molecular Probes, Inc, Eugene, OR). Adding INA bacteria to summer-acclimatized Geukensia reduced their LT50 from -12.5°C to -15.0°C. The LT50 of winter-acclimatized specimens was determined to be -16.5°C. This result may be explained by the presence of cryoprotectants and multiple strains of bacteria in the winter-acclimatized specimens. Gill cell viability tests resulted in an average of 12% greater damage in summer-acclimatized Geukensia without added bacteria at -13.5°C, but no significant differences at -10°C and -15°C. This study is, to our knowledge, the first time that a bacterium has been shown to increase the survival of a freeze tolerant animal

Quantifying the legacy of snowmelt timing on soil greenhouse gas emissions in a seasonally dry montane forest.

The release of water during snowmelt orchestrates a variety of important belowground biogeochemical processes in seasonally snow-covered ecosystems, including the production and consumption of greenhouse gases (GHGs) by soil microorganisms. Snowmelt timing is advancing rapidly in these ecosystems, but there is still a need to isolate the effects of earlier snowmelt on soil GHG fluxes. For an improved mechanistic understanding of the biogeochemical effects of snowmelt timing during the snow-free period, we manipulated a high-elevation forest that typically receives over two meters of snowfall but little summer precipitation to influence legacy effects of snowmelt timing. We altered snowmelt rates for two years using black sand to accelerate snowmelt and white fabric to postpone snowmelt, thus creating a two- to three-week disparity in snowmelt timing. Soil microclimate and fluxes of carbon dioxide (CO2 ), methane (CH4 ), and nitrous oxide (N2 O) were monitored weekly to monthly during the snow-free period. Microbial abundances were estimated by potential assays near the end of each snow-free period. Although earlier snowmelt caused soil drying, we found no statistically significant effects (p < 0.05) of altered snowmelt timing on fluxes of CO2 or N2 O, or soil microbial abundances. Soil CH4 fluxes, however, did respond to snowmelt timing, with 18% lower rates of CH4 uptake in the earlier snowmelt treatment, but only after a dry winter. Cumulative CO2 emission and CH4 uptake were 43% and 88% greater, respectively, after the dry winter. We conclude that soil GHG fluxes can be surprisingly resistant to hydrological changes associated with earlier snowmelt, likely because of persistent moisture and microbial activities in deeper mineral soils. As a result, a drier California in the future may cause seasonally snow-covered soils in the Sierra Nevada to emit more GHGs, not less