Sightline Institute Research

Sightline Institute · beyondwords.io

Cascadia’s sustainability think tank brings you a feed of its latest research articles, in text-to-audio recordings. Learn how the region can advance abundant housing for vibrant communities; reform our democratic systems and elections to honor the public’s priorities, including its support for climate solutions; make a just transition away from fossil fuels and into a 21st-century energy economy; and model forestry and agricultural practices that rebuild our soils, ecosystems, and rural economies. View articles in full at sightline.org.

60 episodes

2mo ago latest

weekly cadence

English language

▶ Play latestRSS feed Website Government Education News Politics

https://audio.beyondwords.io/f/15006/46191/read_6c8361cc1e4c518983a26f2d4a775a4a

Episodes 60

Oregon’s New Path to Inclusionary Housing: Fully Funded and Flexible
2mo ago · 7:25
Underfunded inclusionary zoning programs, which likely slowed housing production in the City of Portland from 2017 to 2024, are on track to be illegal in the Portland area. A bill that cleared Oregon's legislature on March 4 requires jurisdictions in the area to regularly self-evaluate these mandatory affordability programs, if they have them, and to keep them fully funded. The legislation gained bipartisan support, passing the House 32–21, following a 21–6 vote in the state Senate in February. The bill's lead champion, Sen. Khanh Pham (D-Portland), wrote: "Senate Bill 1521 is the Oregon legis
11% of Northwest Residents Live in Fire Country; 100% Pay the Price
2mo ago · 2:56
As of 2023, nearly 1.6 million people in the Northwest lived in areas facing high wildfire hazard, a figure that climbed eight percent since 2018. In most Northwest states, population is growing fastest in the places most likely to burn. Yet the cost of continuing to build into fire-prone areas does not stop at the edge of fire country. About 80 percent of north-westerners live outside places subject to high wildfire hazard, but they increasingly subsidize growth into them—via higher taxes to fund escalating fire suppression budgets, steeper utility rates for wildfire mitigation, and rising in
How to Close Montana Primary Elections’ ‘Drop-and-Swap’ Loophole
2mo ago · 4:37
It went down like a game of three-card monte, with Montana voters as the mark. Eight minutes before the June primary filing deadline, Kurt Alme, who until that day was the US Attorney for the District of Montana, put his name in the running for US Senate. Moments later, sitting Senator Steve Daines dropped out and announced his retirement. After that, he and President Trump quickly fired off coordinated endorsements for Alme. The backroom deal played out like clockwork: neither Democrats nor Republicans had time to field other candidates. Voters still technically have other choices on the ball
How Threats to Voting by Mail Could Affect Cascadia
2mo ago · 22:39
How Threats to Voting by Mail Could Affect Cascadia Voting by mail has a long and proven track record. It increases turnout, gives voters more time to consider issues and candidates, and saves election administrators money. It's just as free from fraud as other methods of voting—which is to say, there's virtually none. Neither Democrats nor Republicans get a particular boost from expanding access to mail ballots. Unsurprisingly, it's also popular. Across the five states that make up most of Cascadia (Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington), four in five voters receive their ballots in
Seattle's No-Cost Emissions Cut
6mo ago · 16:39
Through the first decades of this century, the greater Seattle area had a secret weapon for fighting climate change: it let people choose to live closer to each other. Using a study of neighborhood-level carbon emissions, Sightline estimates that new residents to the Seattle area produced about 5 percent less greenhouse gases from 2000 to 2020. That's simply thanks to their metro area being better than any other in the United States at adding homes to existing neighborhoods. The region eliminated about 1 million tons of potential greenhouse gas emissions basically for free: no government spend
Fast, Affordable, Illegal
6mo ago · 12:45
Since NW Tiny Homes opened on Columbia Boulevard in Portland, Oregon, last July, business has been good. By September, the company had already hit its sales goal for the year. It sells stylish park model RVs ranging from $49,900 to $83,000, making them great options for people who are otherwise priced out of the housing market. Unfortunately, owner Jimmy Hickey frequently has to deliver bad news to prospective customers: in their city, it's illegal. Hickey told Sightline: "Pretty much every week or every couple days, we're running into someone that's excited for one of these and then, 'oh sorr
Ranked Choice Voting, the Utah Way
6mo ago · 19:06
January 1, 2026, marked the conclusion of a remarkable experiment in American ranked choice voting. A bipartisan bill passed by the Utah legislature in 2019 led some of the state's reddest cities to adopt a ranked choice voting pilot, a program widely appreciated by their mostly Republican voters. These cities reduced their election costs by 40 percent, had fewer low-plurality winners, improved representation, and saw more positive campaigns. At the program's zenith, 23 Utah cities opted to use ranked choice voting methods in their elections, and voters largely approved. Polling found that a m
Districts Won’t Truly Represent Deschutes County Residents
6mo ago · 15:10
A new proposal to create districts in central Oregon's Deschutes County illustrates all the flaws of the winner-take-all election model that predominates in Cascadia and beyond. It's also a case study of how much better our elections could be. The Deschutes County Board of Commissioners recently proposed switching the county's election method from at-large numbered seats to single-member districts. The board-appointed committee tasked with drafting a possible district map, however, ran into a number of challenges in fulfilling its charge, including outdated data, unequal puzzle pieces, and a l
A Charter Commissioner’s Guide to Election Reform
6mo ago · 10:25
This January, dozens of Cascadians are sitting down for the first meetings of charter review commissions across the region with the same goal in mind: improving local government. They picked a great place to start. Municipal charter reviews—during which a panel of residents suggests amendments to what are basically local constitutions—can be a powerful and collaborative way to kickstart positive change. Healthier elections can ultimately mean better outcomes for voters and communities that achieve their local priorities. So, if election reform is a goal, where's a commissioner to begin? Sightl
Katie Wilson Can Be Seattle’s Climate Mayor for Renters
6mo ago · 11:35
Seattle's new Mayor, Katie Wilson and I share more than a few things in common. We're both parents to toddlers. Scandalously, our children's grandmothers help cover a portion of sky-high Seattle daycare costs (though my daughter's 2026 daycare cost hike just swallowed my in-laws' contribution). We're also among the roughly 50 percent of city residents who rent. Seattle renters contribute less to climate-warming pollution, on average, than homeowners. Renters in the city are nearly twice as likely to heat their homes with clean electricity as homeowners, more than half of whom burn natural gas
How the 2026 Washington Legislature Can Right-Size the Power Grid
8mo ago · 16:43
One month after unprecedented floods surged across Washington, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee their homes, lawmakers will convene in Olympia to discuss climate policy. This latest climate change-fueled disaster, in an ever-extending string of them, is yet another reminder of what is at stake. Washington's climate ambitions hang on poles and wires. Electric transmission lines make it possible to carry cheap, efficient, reliable power from solar fields in California or wind farms in Montana to the people in Washington who rely on it every day. Without more grid capacity, the state r
New Oregon Rules Will Re-Legalize Neighborhood Apartments
8mo ago · 16:39
UPDATE, Dec. 4, 2025: The proposed rules discussed in this article were unanimously approved. This article was edited to reflect minor amendments and describe the rules as approved. Two-and-a-half years after a bipartisan bill promised "transformational" changes to Oregon's housing policy, Gov. Tina Kotek's administration has completed the blueprint of that transformation. As approved by a state commission on Thursday, the new housing production rules make Oregon the first US state or Canadian province to create a model statewide zoning code and then apply that statewide code to cities underpe
Portland’s Inclusionary Zoning Program Is Finally Performing, New Data Suggests
8mo ago · 6:30
For the first seven years of its existence, Portland's inclusionary zoning program seemed to be working like the wrong end of a magnet. Housing projects skidded, twisted, and jumped away from the city's 2017 mandate that a share of homes in most new buildings be sold or rented for less than it had cost to build them. Tens of millions of dollars flowed instead to sites just outside the limits of Oregon's largest city, like the Tigard Triangle and Vancouver waterfront. Multifamily permit filing rates within Portland tumbled 40 percent from their 2016 peak. Portland's new affordable housing manda
The High Cost of Slow Permitting
8mo ago · 12:38
Delays, delays, delays. It takes forever to build the transmission lines that carry power from where it's produced to where people use it. Idaho Power and PacifiCorp can tell you. The two utilities thought they'd be starting construction back in 2018 on the Boardman-to-Hemingway (B2H) transmission line, which spans 290 miles of Idaho and Oregon. The project broke ground this summer, 19 years after the utilities initially proposed the project. Puget Sound Energy (PSE) can tell you. It flipped the switch on its 16-mile Energize Eastside transmission line upgrade project in 2024, a full six years
A Two-Word Fix for Alaska’s Ballot Confusion
9mo ago · 7:29
In 2024 Alaska Democrats were understandably incensed when Eric Hafner, a convict who had never lived in their state, ran for Alaska's US House seat as a Democrat. State and federal law allowed Hafner to seek the office, and state law let him register with the party he preferred. The state Democratic Party, for its part, could do nothing. It had no way to disavow him or indicate on the ballot its endorsement of incumbent Representative Mary Peltola. Come election day, Hafner got more than 3,500 first-choice votes from Alaskans who saw his name and party on the ballot but presumably had no idea
No More 48-Candidate Races
9mo ago · 13:21
A surplus of candidates can ruin any political campaign, and it's happened twice in recent groundbreaking elections in Cascadia. Fortunately, neighboring jurisdictions have demonstrated the solution to this problem: raise filing fees. Alaska and Portland each recently debuted a new, much-anticipated ranked choice voting method. In both places, the trouble was that putting your name on the ballot was so easy (costing less than a tank of gas for a Ford F-150) that the elections were flooded with candidates. The result, in both Alaska and Portland, was an inaugural campaign that tried voters' pat
Will an Electoral Glitch Send a Republican to Patty Murray’s Seat in 2028?
9mo ago · 13:50
When six-term US Senator Patty Murray is up for reelection in 2028, the Washington state leader will be 78 years old. If she does not retire on her own, she may well find herself challenged by younger Democrats, as is now happening to 79-year-old Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts. Gerontocracy is out of vogue among Democrats; many blame their party's loss of the presidency on 81-year-old Joe Biden's delay in stepping aside. If Murray forgoes the race, expect a stampede of eager Democrats hoping to succeed her. Her seat has not been vacant since 1992, so every ambitious politician in the Everg
Yukoners to Weigh in on Ranked Voting
9mo ago · 6:30
If you had a chance to overhaul your government, where would you begin? Last year, 38 Yukoners from every corner of the territory stepped up to answer that question in a citizens' assembly on electoral reform. Their recommendation? Upgrade the Yukon Legislative Assembly's first-past-the-post elections to ranked voting, much like Alaskans did in 2020. Voting is already underway for a statewide plebiscite on the assembly's reform of choice. Though the vote is advisory, two of the Yukon's three major parties have committed to respecting the will of the voters if they win control of the assembly t
To Build Fast, Think Small
9mo ago · 6:09
Speed matters. And to people looking for a home today, it matters a great deal whether that home is built next year, or in ten. If Cascadia's leaders really believed in speed, then they would focus more on re-legalizing small, neighborhood-size buildings with 6 to 12 homes each. But despite recent reforms, small apartment buildings remain illegal almost everywhere in Cascadian cities and across North America. Meanwhile, advocates and leaders in the region have legalized medium-sized and large apartment buildings via transit-oriented development, which smartly co-locates new apartment homes alo
Time to Tune Up Washington's Primaries
9mo ago · 9:46
On September 4, 2024, Democrats across Washington State let out a collective sigh of relief. A recount of the primary election finally confirmed that one of their own, then-King County Councilor Dave Upthegrove, would appear on the November ballot. Even though Democrats had won 270,000 more votes than Republicans in the primary for Commissioner of Public Lands, Upthegrove squeaked into second place by just 49 votes. This math story problem gone awry is a hiccup of Washington's top-two primaries, in which the two candidates with the most votes, regardless of party, square off in the general ele
For Oregonians, Better Elections Are Hidden in Plain Sight
11mo ago · 11:17
In 2024, Democrat-endorsed candidates swept all seven seats on the Bend Oregon, city council - even though city elections are technically nonpartisan. Democrats certainly outnumber Republicans in Bend, but 20 percent of city voters are registered with the G.O.P., and many more are not affiliated or are registered with smaller parties. Those voters don't get their views represented in their city government. In southern Oregon's Jackson County, the representation failure is reversed. Democratic or Independent candidates have won more than 40 percent of the vote for every county commissioner cont
Homes on Wheels Are Filling a Big Gap in Portland
11mo ago · 13:57
The Maine family needed a cheaper place for one of them to live. And quickly. It was 2024. Synia Maine, 56, had just developed a back injury so severe that she had to retire from her career as a hairstylist a decade earlier than planned. Suddenly, she had increased medical bills and no income. Her daughter-in-law, Ember DeVaul, recounted that they'd explored multiple options to try to keep Synia in Arizona, where she lived. Even the lowest-cost housing option, manufactured homes, required a permanent foundation and tens of thousands of dollars in permitting costs. Ember and her husband, who li
How Cascadia Can Maintain Its Heat Pump Momentum
11mo ago · 18:10
Meeting Cascadia's climate goals will require millions of households to stop burning fossil fuels for warmth. In Oregon and Washington, buildings emit more pollution than any other sector besides transportation. (The building sector is the third highest emitting in British Columbia and Idaho, and fifth in Montana.) Heat pumps powered by renewable electricity are what the International Energy Agency calls the "proven technology of choice to decarbonize heating," and several Cascadian jurisdictions are working hard to expand access to the technology. Oregon, for example, set itself a goal of hea
Who Owns a Utility Matters Less for Climate Than the Rules They Play By
1y ago · 17:10
Cascadia's transition to safe, healthy, gas-free homes and businesses is not moving quickly enough, and the region's gas utilities bear much of the blame. Consider a few recent examples: In 2022 Oregon's gas utilities sued the state over its landmark Climate Protection Program, setting back implementation by at least a year. In 2023 NW Natural funded a campaign in Eugene, Oregon, to repeal the city's ban on gas hookups in new residential buildings. In 2024 Cascade Natural Gas and NW Natural supported ballot initiative 2066 to keep Washington state hooked on gas, including by restricting the st
Seattleites Keep Their Model Campaign Finance Reform Program
1y ago · 4:18
With 57 percent in favor of Proposition 1 (and 150,000 ballots in; last updated August 7, 2025), Seattle voters have reaffirmed their commitment to advancing a more democratic city government. Seattle's iconic Democracy Voucher Program will have funding for another ten years. This renewal means the city can continue to lead the way in the share of its population who contribute to city campaigns. Candidates will keep having more reasons to knock on doors rather than spend hours a day calling up the wealthiest people they know to fund their campaigns. And Seattle residents will get more choices