Alien Registration- Stephens, Jennie L. (Houlton, Aroostook County)

https://digitalmaine.com/alien_docs/34857/thumbnail.jp

Referral Pathways and Service Connections Among Heirs’ Property Owners in South Carolina

Researchers, practitioners, and policymakers interested in alleviating heirs’ property ownership precarity have long sought to connect these owners to titling and land management resources, but there is limited scholarly evidence on successful interventions. Using administrative data from the Center for Heirs’ Property Preservation®(CHPP®), this article explores the demographic characteristics, types of direct legal services received, and referral pathways of landowners seeking legal assistance from CHPP® between 2017 and 2021. We find that applicants are primarily elderly, Black women, referred through four main pathways: (1) owners’ personal networks, (2) CHPP® outreach efforts, (3) CHPP® partner organizations—including public, private, and nonprofit agencies, and (4) word of mouth (other individuals/entities not formally connected with CHPP®, including outside legal and forestry professionals). Lastly, we identify a strong desire for estate planning amongst applicants, despite documented legal distrust amongst heirs’ property owners. This analysis has important implications for designing targeted interventions to assist heirs’ property owners beyond the South Carolina context

Socio-political dimensions of CCS deployment through the lens of social network analysis

AbstractThe Socio-Political Evaluation of Energy Deployment (SPEED) framework was proposed to improve understanding of energy technology deployment. It was intended to help energy policy-makers develop and implement more effective strategies to accelerate the deployment of emerging energy technologies. The theoretical underpinnings lie in the fields of sustainability science, political science, and risk perception. Part of the objectives of the SPEED framework are to identify the dominant socio-political influences on energy technology decisions and examine how policy can facilitate a societal response to climate change by contributing insights to stakeholders. The focus is at the state level because it is at the state level that emergent energy technologies are sited, permitted, and built. The purpose of this study was to examine the structure of communication about carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology from the perspective of individuals actively involved in decisions that affect deployment and diffusion. We use density of function-system networks to examine differences between states and categories stakeholders. The information is used to inform the discussion of the current structure of communication and how it might present either barriers or opportunities for CCS innovation. Five function systems are used, each divided into benefits (positive) or risks (negative) associated with CCS: Economic benefit (ECP), economic risk (ECN), environmental benefit (ENP), environmental risk (ENN), health and safety benefit (HLP), health and safety risk (HLN), political benefit (POP), political risk (PON), technical benefit (TEP), and technical risk (TEN). An additional category of CCS statements that could not be definitively assigned to one of these categories was included as an ‘other’ category (OTP and OTN). Networks were constructed for all stakeholders, each state, and each stakeholder type based on ties of shared intensity of communication about the particular frame. From these networks, density measurements were calculated and reported. In the case studies presented here, technical risk dominates communication about CCS at the state level. The economic, technical, and political system functions appear to present the greatest barrier due to largely negative communication. This study focuses on how the development of shared meaning creates ties between individuals in a CCS policy network

The relationship of femoral neck shaft angle and adiposity To greater trochanteric pain syndrome in women. A case control morphology and anthropometric study

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate if pelvic or hip width predisposed women to developing greater trochanteric pain syndrome (GTPS). DESIGN: Prospective case control study. PARTICIPANTS: Four groups were included in the study: those gluteal tendon reconstructions (n=31, GTR), those with conservatively managed GTPS (n=29), those with hip osteoarthritis (n=20, OA) and 22 asymptomatic participants (ASC). METHODS: Anterior-posterior pelvic x-rays were evaluated for femoral neck shaft angle; acetabular index, and width at the lateral acetabulum, and the superior and lateral aspects of the greater trochanter. Body mass index, and waist, hip and greater trochanter girth were measured. Data were analysed using a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA; posthoc Scheffe analysis), then multivariate analysis. RESULTS: The GTR group had a lower femoral neck shaft angle than the other groups (p=0.007). The OR (95% CI) of having a neck shaft angle of less than 134°, relative to the ASC group: GTR=3.33 (1.26 to 8.85); GTPS=1.4 (0.52 to 3.75); OA=0.85 (0.28 to 2.61). The OR of GTR relative to GTPS was 2.4 (1.01 to 5.6). No group difference was found for acetabular or greater trochanter width. Greater trochanter girth produced the only anthropometric group difference (mean (95% CI) in cm) GTR=103.8 (100.3 to 107.3), GTPS=105.9 (100.2 to 111.6), OA=100.3 (97.7 to 103.9), ASC=99.1 (94.7 to 103.5), (ANOVA: p=0.036). Multivariate analysis confirmed adiposity is associated with GTPS. CONCLUSION: A lower neck shaft angle is a risk factor for, and adiposity is associated with, GTPS in women

Advantages of the no-scalpel vasectomy technique

The no-scalpel vasectomy (NSV) technique should be used instead of the standard incisional method. (Strength of Recommendation: A, based on systematic reviews, mixed-quality randomized controlled trials [RCTs], cohort studies, and case-control series.) The NSV technique is associated with fewer complications, produces less perioperative and postoperative pain, results in quicker recovery, takes less time to perform, and is as effective as standard incisional vasectomy

Transitions in climate and energy discourse between Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy

Although climate change and energy are intricately linked, their explicit connection is not always prominent in public discourse and the media. Disruptive extreme weather events, including hurricanes, focus public attention in new and different ways offering a unique window of opportunity to analyze how a focusing event influences public discourse. Media coverage of extreme weather events simultaneously shapes and reflects public discourse on climate issues. Here, we analyze climate and energy newspaper coverage of Hurricanes Katrina (2005) and Sandy (2012) using topic models, mathematical techniques used to discover abstract topics within a set of documents. Our results demonstrate that post-Katrina media coverage does not contain a climate change topic, and the energy topic is limited to discussion of energy prices, markets, and the economy with almost no explicit linkages made between energy and climate change. In contrast, post-Sandy media coverage does contain a prominent climate change topic, a distinct energy topic, as well as integrated representation of climate change and energy, indicating a shift in climate and energy reporting between Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Sandy

Promises of climate engineering after neoliberalism

The apparent, if uncertain, rejection of neoliberalism manifested by the election of Donald Trump in the US (alongside the slim, but clear majority for Brexit in the UK, and a growing racist and protectionist nationalism across Europe) necessitates renewed analysis of the future of both promises of technical fixes to climate change, such as carbon capture and storage (CCS), carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar radiation management (SRM) (in this chapter collectively referred to as climate engineering), and the potential future hegemonic political regimes that may replace neoliberalism. Drawing on a cultural political economy analysis of the co-evolution of political regimes and promises of technical fixes to climate change (Markusson et al. 2017), we here discuss what the current moment of radical destabilisation might augur. The election of Trump indicates a potential unsettling of an established dynamic whereby promises of technical fixes to climate change co-evolved with, and imperfectly supported, the neoliberal power regime and its preferred market-based solutions to the climate change problem. We identify two key and interacting dialectics, between neoliberalism and illiberalism, and between continued neoliberal (but illiberally challenged) US hegemony and budding China-centred liberalism 2.0. Both these dialectics appear conducive to prolonged attention to the promise of climate engineering, as talk and research, or even as limited deployment

The political economy of technical fixes:the (mis)alignment of clean fossil and political regimes

This paper argues that existing critiques of technical fixes are unable to explain our simultaneous enamourment and distrust with technical fixes, and that to do so, we need a political economy analysis. We develop a critical, theoretically grounded conceptualisation of technical fixes as imagined defensive spatio-temporal fixes of specific political economic regimes, and apply it to the case of geoengineering, or ‘clean fossil’, as an attempted technical fix of the climate change problem. We map the promises of clean fossil as proposed solutions to the problem of climate change in discrete episodes since the 1960s. The paper shows that clean fossil promises have been surprisingly poorly aligned with the neoliberal regime, and explains how they have been moderately stable due to those misalignments. We also show that different liberal capitalisms could be supported by different clean fossil technologies, but also that illiberal or more egalitarian regimes remain possible alongside particular, perhaps radically re-envisioned, versions of clean fossil. Ambivalence towards clean fossil technical fix promises is intelligible, given the inherent instability of their co-evolution with neoliberalism and future political regimes

Operationalizing Energy Democracy: Challenges and Opportunities in Vermont's Renewable Energy Transformation

As the social movement promoting “energy democracy” expands, analysis of how the principles of energy democracy are being operationalized is increasingly valuable. The state of Vermont provides a unique case of a United States jurisdiction intentionally promoting multiple ideals of energy democracy as the state commits to transitioning toward renewable energy. This research explores how energy democracy principles are being operationalized in the state of Vermont. Collaboration among stakeholders state-wide has resulted in a variety of social innovations that advance energy democracy goals, yet there are limited examples of community ownership and strong community opposition to some renewable projects. A diverse set of stakeholders in this small state has developed and promoted the adoption of a comprehensive energy plan with a goal of achieving 90% renewables in all sectors (electricity, heating, and transportation) by 2050. These stakeholders are aligned toward achieving this goal, and a socially innovative, networked effort seeks to establish a creative and inclusive environment for individuals, communities and organizations to benefit in the renewable energy transformation. A collaborative culture has created a protected environment where social innovation and experimentation are supported and encouraged, yet tension and community opposition surrounds some wind and solar projects. Reviewing social innovations in Vermont highlights challenges and opportunities of operationalizing energy democracy and emphasizes the importance of local community and public ownership to distribute the economic and political power associated with renewable energy