Many People WOMEN Are Experiencing Escalating Domestic Abuse In The Wake Of COVID

Illustrated By Jackson Joyce, Lauren Krouse  

© Jackson Joyce Many people are experiencing intimate partner violence or abusive relationship behavior in the wake of the pandemic. Here's how to help a loved one safely.

The saying“timing is everything” has particular significance when it comes to getting out of a relationship involving emotional or physical abuse. An abuser’s tactics, a survivor’s complex feelings of shame or guilt, and factors like children or finances, or even pets, can all impact when and why someone feels ready to make their exit.


It’s a process that friends and family and the person in the difficult situation can’t rush—or craft a completely flawless plan—to fix.

Still, when you hear or suspect someone you care about is in an unhealthy or abusive relationship, the knee-jerk reaction is often“Why can’t you just leave?” or“We’re ending this now.” Despite your best intentions, experts caution that what your instincts tell you to do is not always the most effective route in the long run. Especially in uncertain times like the present, when there are even more hurdles complicating the road to safety and healing.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is about one person in the relationship (or a former significant other) trying to take control and power away from the other. And abusers use a slew of strategies to do that, from threats to digital harassment.“A victim is experiencing a lack of control over their own decisions,” says Deborah J. Vagins, president and CEO of the National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV).“The last thing you want to do is take more power away from them by making choices on their behalf.”

In the wake of COVID-19, many are experiencing escalating violence or abuse for the first time for a variety of reasons, including skyrocketing stress, financial struggles, unemployment, and alcohol use, says Nancy Glass, PhD, a community-based intervention researcher at the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing and associate director of the university’s Center for Global Health. While rates of IPV are notoriously difficult to track—those impacted may forgo seeking outside help in order to stay safe, or carefully weigh the pros and cons of asking—calls to help lines and the police have recently gone up in many U.S. cities and around the world, per a study in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine. (Right after states across the country issued shelter-in-place orders last year, however, many hotlines reported an initial downtick in calls, likely because survivors stuck at home had fewer opportunities to seek help.)

But experts say this data is the tip of the iceberg. After all, emotional abuse is the most common form of IPV—and it’s challenging to chart. The initial signs are easy to minimize, like increased isolation, personal jabs (being called names as a“joke”), tests of loyalty (such as insistence that passwords be shared), or gaslighting.

Worse yet, it’s hard to identify and address what’s going on from the outside, even if you suspect something’s amiss. While at home,“if a survivor wants to connect, they aren’t able to do that easily without their abusive partner knowing about it,” says Katie Atkinson, director of survivor services for LGBTQ people of all genders at The Network/La Red in Boston. The people they confide in most often are friends and family, though, so it’s critical to think proactively. (This is especially true for multiracial, Black, Native American, disabled, low-income, bisexual, and trans women, who face higher rates of domestic violence and greater barriers to receiving aid.)

One of the most helpful things you can do is help someone recover a sense of agency over their life. But you have to step up to the plate carefully. This advice from advocates with decades of know-how will guide you to get it right.© Jackson Joyce jackson joyce
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Research on Your Own First

“The more you understand the dynamics of intimate partner violence, the better able you will be to offer support,” says Anna Nicolosi, operations manager at StrongHearts Native Helpline. Expressing concerns about someone’s relationship is super-dicey territory, so learn the red flags and the different forms of offense before starting a conversation. This will help you avoid common mistakes that could jeopardize the situation. (Not what you want.…)

How to do this? Contact a trained advocate via the National Domestic Violence Hotline (NDVH) or live-chat at thehotline.org. Or find contact info for a local organization and give them a rundown of the situation. A common misconception is that hotlines are *only* for the person in the situation—but Glass says family and friends often call in too. Take a few notes about the nature of the relationship and any concerning behaviors you’ve witnessed or heard about so you’re ready to share them when asked why you’re calling. Also, make a list of questions you want to cover, says Atkinson, such as“Is it okay if I say or do X?” and“What local resources are available if they want to leave, find housing, or get legal aid?” And to ensure they’re comfortable potentially calling on their own behalf in the future,“How do you handle confidentiality?” Clarifying what you should (and shouldn’t) do in your role can give you the confidence you need to tackle what comes next.

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A Way to Connect One-on-One

                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

Ask your loved one if you can chat sometime (but don’t mention abuse, and do let them choose how to connect—socially distanced in person, over the phone, via Zoom, or on FaceTime, for example—since their partner could be monitoring communications). Start with not-so-invasive questions such as“Where’s so-and-so today?” or“I want to talk to you about something personal—can we chat privately?” suggests Atkinson.

Then, when you’re sure you’re both in a safe place, simply ask how they feel about the relationship. Let them know you’re concerned about something you’ve witnessed or heard about, and encourage candidness by listening reflectively. For example:“I’m worried when [name] says things like that to you. How does it make you feel?” or“What you’re describing sounds like an example of gaslighting. What do you think?” Prime questions with phrases to emphasize that they’re in control (e.g.,“There’s no pressure to answer any of my questions”) and be truthful about your own uncertainties (“I don’t know exactly what to say, but I want to support you however you need. May I ask you some questions about this?”).

You might feel the urge to disparage their partner, but this can backfire fast. The person is still a key part of their life and someone they may love deeply. They might become defensive, blame themselves, or stop confiding in you entirely. Focus on behaviors and their impact instead, says Nicolosi. At the same time, be firm, emphasizing that it’s never okay to treat someone that way, no excuses. If they don’t want to talk to begin with? Do not push it. Let them know you care about them very much and are concerned, and that you respect their boundaries and are available anytime they want to discuss. Then let them change the subject.

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No-Strings-Attached Support

While it’s important to be honest about your concerns, keep your tone calm and avoid gushing about how worried you’ve been (experts call this centering your own feelings), which could cause unnecessary drama or fear, says Nicolosi. Thank them off the bat for trusting you with this information.“What survivors need most is someone who will believe them and listen to them,” says Linley Beckbridge, communications and outreach director at Doorways, a domestic violence shelter in Arlington, Virginia. Let them know you’re in their corner, and never give ultimatums or unsolicited advice.

Also good to know: Going back to the relationship is a normal part of the process. They might be facing obstacles they can’t tell you about, like feelings of denial or guilt. Pressuring them to“get out” before they’re ready is dangerous. The hope is that *they* know best how to stay safe until they can carefully exit.






Once they’re (possibly) ready to move forward, you can help sort priorities with an open-ended question like“Are there any options you’ve been thinking about?” Assure them, once they’re on board, that there are people who care and programs that can help, says Doreen Nicholas, survivor engagement and systems change specialist at the Arizona Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence (ACESDV).

Know of a service for their needs? Offer to set it up for them. For example, if they are interested in connecting with an affordable or free therapist, support group, or other mental health service in the area so they can talk through coping methods or have an objective person help unpack an upsetting interaction, search for professionals who are trained in trauma-informed care and regularly work with survivors of sexual and domestic violence, says Nicholas. In that case, you would search their state or city and“Coalition Against Domestic Violence” to find the local coalition. (Call or email; a rep should be able to direct you to mental health resources.)

If they’re not there yet, don’t jump into problem-solving mode; continue to lend an ear and unconditional support, says Nicolosi. Money troubles are one of the most common reasons victims stay or return to partners. (The majority experience financial abuse—e.g., their person controls all finances or prevents them from working.) What you can do is spot them on childcare, necessities, or an Airbnb.

Pro tip: Advocacy centers sometimes help cover immediate needs or can point them toward other opportunities.

 

© Jackson Joyce jackson joyce

Abusers of any kind use isolation to deepen their control, dominating a person’s time to keep them from spending it with loved ones. So continue to reach out, offering a space to talk, to feel validated, or to just know they’re not alone. Ask how they prefer to stay in touch and check in often-—as long as it’s safe for you both, says Nicolosi. Connect over phone calls, texts, video calls, virtual games—even grocery deliveries or socially distanced meetups.

Just be sure to find ways to maintain your comforting presence and encouragement, even if you have to get creative. It may be lifesaving.

D.C.’s Lack Of Statehood Is An Issue Of White Supremacy. Here’s How It Could Change.

Natalie Gontcharova  

4/22/2021

For Ty Hobson-Powell, his hometown of D.C. means go-go music, basketball culture, and mumbo sauce. The city is not the monuments or what you see on CNN for natives like him; it’s the Black-owned businesses on U Street, from Ben’s Chili Bowl to Lee’s Flower Shop, it’s Moechella, the go-go festival, recently held in front of the historic Howard Theatre, it’s the distinct way some natives talk. But ever since Hobson-Powell was old enough to be aware of it, D.C. has also been a place where he and his family and friends are disenfranchised because of a centuries-long practice, rooted in white supremacy, through which 700,000 residents — who, until recent waves of gentrification, were predominantly Black — pay taxes every year but don’t have representation in Congress.

“At first, it was seeing the reminders that we don’t have statehood, one just being the tags on the cars here that say ‘Taxation Without Representation,’” Hobson-Powell tells Refinery29. “You get online, you go shopping for something, you’re placing an order, and you notice that D.C. doesn’t come up in the state section. It was that kind of elementary exploration that I experienced in my younger days around D.C. statehood.”

Hobson-Powell became involved in the statehood movement shortly after graduating college at 15 years old, hoping to advance the rights of the residents of the place where he grew up. He is now an outreach strategist and issue advocate at 51 for 51, an organization that advocates for making D.C. the 51st state, and the founder of Concerned Citizens D.C.

Statehood has more momentum now than at any other point in recent history. Today, the Democratic-led House is expected to pass H.R. 51, the Washington, D.C. Admission Act, which has 220 House and 44 Senate cosponsors. President Joe Biden’s administration this week officially supported statehood by issuing a policy position, which is the strongest backing the issue has ever gotten from the White House. And 54% of voters nationwide agree with making D.C. a state, according to a new national poll. This is the highest level of documented support to date.

In contrast with the ‘90s during the Clinton presidency, when more than 100 Democrats joined Republicans in opposing a D.C. statehood bill, almost every Democratic member of the House has co-sponsored D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton’s H.R. 51, which passed the chamber for the first time last year on a party-line vote. The legislation, however, does not have enough votes to clear the narrowly Democratic-led Senate, where the archaic filibuster rule means it needs 60 votes to pass. But many prominent senators are behind statehood, including Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten Gillibrand, and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has promised to bring the issue to the floor.

“Congress can no longer exclude D.C. residents from the democratic process, forcing residents to watch from the sidelines as Congress votes on laws that affect the nation or votes even on the laws of the duly elected D.C. government,” Norton, who is allowed to propose legislation but not vote on it, said last week, when the House Oversight and Reform Committee voted to advance the bill. “Democracy requires much more.”

While some lawmakers — particularly Republicans — in the Capitol treat statehood as a removed, theoretical issue, the city’s disenfranchisement has affected residents in very real and tangible ways. After violent white supremacists stormed the Capitol on January 6, Mayor Muriel Bowser didn’t have full power to protect residents. And during protests for racial justice last summer, Trump commanded national forces to tear gas protestors on D.C.’s streets. “We saw the deployment of the National Guard against peaceful protestors back in June, just for a photo op by President Trump at the time, against the will of local leadership,” says Hobson-Powell. “We saw January 6 and how D.C.’s lack of statehood left Washingtonians held hostage to white supremacy as requests were being made from the Mayor’s office to activate the National Guard because she needed permission to do the things she was already empowered to do when elected.” Hobson-Powell himself was on the forefront of the Black Lives Matter protests in D.C., and was arrested in August with over 60 other protestors who were seeking justice for Breonna Taylor.

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Demi Stratmon, also an organizer for 51 for 51, says, “This system in place has always made D.C. residents and our communities not secure. We were always in a position where if something like [January 6] happened, we were at risk. Trump is an example of [how politicians] can make D.C. a photo op and place the residents here at risk for political gain.”

Stratmon says she first became involved in this issue while attending Dartmouth College, where she started traveling around the country with political campaigns and seeing how voters in states like Iowa and New Hampshire were treated versus people in her home city of D.C. in terms of the value of their vote. While at college, she also noticed that when students were encouraged to contact their representatives on issues, she was left out.

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Aside from security, there are countless other ways in which residents have been affected by the lack of statehood. “Coronavirus recovery and how D.C.’s lack of statehood led to us being shorted hundreds of millions of dollars in relief funds from the CARES Act” is a major issue, says Hobson-Powell. “And as a result, we were left in a position that was less than adequate to provide services for a pandemic that we’ve seen has claimed a lot lives here that have been majority Black and brown.”

Jamal Holtz, another organizer at 51 for 51 and a commissioner on the D.C. Mayor’s Commission on Juvenile Justice Reform, says for him, it was about healthcare.

“It was 2014 when there was a huge discussion around the Affordable Care Act,” Holtz tells Refinery29. “That was something that was groundbreaking for me and my family, for my mom who didn’t have access to health insurance or preventative care. [It] shaped my family’s medical stability. So I started to advocate for it, and there was a lot of conversation about ‘call your senator and tell them to vote for the Affordable Care Act’ because it was a close vote. At that point I realized my advocacy ended at the mayor’s office, that I wasn’t able to go to the Hill and talk to my shadow senators, who didn’t have a vote on these issues.”

The issue is tragically reflected in gun violence, too. “D.C. is, as far as laws on the books are concerned, one of the most progressive locales in America, but because of a lack of representation and inability to vote on issues like red-flag laws and background checks, there are still guns from other states with laxer regulations that are coming into our streets, wreaking havoc on our young men and young women, causing violent deaths, oftentimes in young people under the age of 25 and Black and brown youth,” Hobson-Powell says. Too often, the guns discovered at homicide scenes in D.C. are found to have been illegally brought in from neighboring states like Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas. D.C. police recovered 1,000 illegal guns in the city in 2019, the year 11-year-old Karon Brown was gunned down.

Washington, D.C., was created at the beginning of the 19th century as a concession to Southern, slave-holding states, whose representatives wanted to move the capital, which was then in Philadelphia, further south. At first, its residents were able to vote for their own local government, and during Reconstruction it became the first place in the U.S. to grant suffrage to Black residents.

Soon after, however, formerly enslaved people coming from the South began to populate the city, and pushback from conservatives took away residents’ rights to choose their own local government by the end of the 1800s. It wasn’t until 1973 that Home Rule, or the right to elect the mayor and City Council members, was restored. In 1980, 60% of D.C. voters supported a referendum to establish a state constitution, which was a big step for statehood. But the statehood movement stalled in the next decades, and presidents including Clinton and Obama voiced support for the issue, but never did much outright to make statehood viable. In 2016, Mayor Bowser called for a new referendum on statehood, and this time it was backed by 86% of voters, in part thanks to the advocacy of organizations like 51 for 51.

But statehood still faces fierce opposition from Republicans, who argue it is unconstitutional because the Constitution called for the creation of a federal district. Sen. Mitch McConnell, not a D.C. native, called the prospect of D.C. statehood “full-bore socialism.” Democrats, however, say that Norton’s bill would not eliminate this district but only change its borders. Additionally, advocates believe Republicans oppose D.C. statehood so vehemently because it is such a heavily Democratic area, with 92% of voters backing Biden over Trump last year; if D.C. becomes a state, it would certainly give Democrats two more Senate seats. The fact that D.C. would be the first plurality Black state if it became the 51st state is no coincidence here, either.

“I remember hearing commentary from Republicans throughout the course of this that said D.C. doesn’t have ‘real people,’” says Hobson-Powell. “It feels a lot like dog-whistling to me, because I feel pretty real myself, and the over 700,000 majority Black and brown residents here feel pretty real as well.”

With Republicans unlikely to come around, Stasha Rhodes, the campaign manager at 51 for 51, says the only way to make statehood a reality is to eliminate the filibuster (that said, there are plenty of other good reasons to get rid of the filibuster).

“The filibuster is an arcane Jim Crow relic that makes the Senate more undemocratic,” Rhodes tells Refinery29. “It has a long history of blocking civil rights bills, including over 200 anti-lynching laws. We must abolish the filibuster if we plan to enact structural change and uplift the voices of Black and brown folks. The Senate is unequal and undemocratic in that it over-represents smaller, white states.” She adds, “And, there’s only been 11 Black senators — [Raphael] Warnock’s the 11th.”

Despite the renewed energy around D.C. statehood, it seems unlikely that it can become a reality absent major filibuster reform. However, advocates are optimistic that the tide has turned, and the time has finally come to recognize D.C. as a state.

“Yes, I absolutely think it will happen,” says Stratmon. “Right now, Democrats are in control of Congress, the Senate, and we have, in the White House, two leaders who supported 51 for 51, who supported D.C. becoming the 51st state with 51 votes or less in the Senate. So I think the time is now — it’s inevitable. And we have to make sure we don’t waste any more time.”

The fight for DC statehood gets its best chance yet

Jerusalem Demsas 

4/22/2021

It’s difficult to walk around Washington, DC, without spotting at least one car with a license plate reading “taxation without representation.” The callback to the American Revolution’s rallying cry is also a reference to the reality that the roughly 700,000 people who reside in the nation’s capital have no representation in Congress despite paying federal taxes

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© Alex Wong/Getty Images A Washington, DC, “Taxation Without Representation” license plate is seen in 2013 on the limousine of then-Vice President Joe Biden in Washington, DC.

Now, in a party-line vote, Democrats have approved DC statehood, sending the bill to the Democratically controlled Senate — where even a party-line vote would still not be sufficient to send the legislation to President Joe Biden’s desk. And that itself isn’t guaranteed; according to reporting by POLITICO, not even all 50 Democratic Senators have signaled their support for the bill (the five outstanding are Sens. Angus King (I-VT), Joe Manchin (D-WV), Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), Mark Kelly (D-AZ), and Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH)).

The vote came just days after the White House put out an official statement of support for the bill, arguing “for far too long, the more than 700,000 people of Washington, D.C. have been deprived of full representation in the U.S. Congress.”

This is not the first time statehood has made it to the House floor. Just last year, House Democrats voted 232-180 in favor of statehood, making it “the first time in the nation’s history that either house of Congress approved legislation granting full statehood and congressional representation” to the District, Vox’s Ian Millhiser reported at the time.

But, the best chance yet still isn’t much of one: The bill — like last time — is likely to join countless others languishing under the might of the Senate filibuster.


While the debate over statehood has centered largely on how it would affect the political composition of Congress (92 percent of DC voters selected Biden in 2020), the district’s lack of statehood and limited control of local affairs has led to tangible policy harms for its residents — from being unable to enact locally popular health care policies to losing out on over $700 million in CARES Act relief funding last year.

“Most people, when they find out that their own nation’s capital [doesn’t] have the same rights they have — they’re ashamed,” the district’s non-voting delegate, Eleanor Norton Holmes, told Vox. “Ashamed to live in the only country which does not give the residents of their nation’s capital the same rights that everyone else in the country has. No American wants to have that distinction.”

That’s not exactly right. A Data for Progress poll conducted in February found that while a majority (54 percent) of voters agree with making DC a state, 35 percent of voters oppose it, including 56 percent of Republicans. In a March Rasmussen poll, only 29 percent of adults favored statehood with 55 percent against. FiveThirtyEight looked at both polls and noted that Data for Progress’s question primed voters to support statehood, and in the Rasmussen poll, the wording primed them to oppose it. That could indicate the majority of Americans don’t have a strong opinion on DC statehood one way or the other, so how pollsters frame the question matters a great deal.
What is DC losing out on without statehood?

Proponents of statehood point to several ways DC residents have lost out under the current paradigm — most recently, while trying to weather the pandemic.

“In the first Covid relief package we were shortchanged millions of dollars,” Stasha Rhodes, campaign manager of 51 for 51, an organization fighting for statehood, told Vox.

The $2 trillion CARES Act, which provided relief last March as Covid-19 began to ravage the nation, classified DC as a territory rather than a state. As such, instead of being granted the minimum of $1.25 billion guaranteed to each state, it would receive only $500 million, the Washington Post reported. DC has a larger population than both Vermont and Wyoming, which received $1.25 billion in aid, each.

“Arbitrary and out of the norm,” is how DC Vote’s Executive Director Bo Shuff described this classification. “It is typical in spending bills that we’re categorized as a state.”

It wasn’t until Congress passed the American Rescue Plan Act under President Joe Biden and a Democrat-controlled Senate that DC received the money it would have if it had been classified as a state originally.

Timothy Noah recently argued in the Atlantic that because DC isn’t a state, it is losing out on tens of thousands of vaccine doses that go to federal agencies within DC’s borders: “The upshot is that DC’s population-based vaccine allotment — 44,440 this week [week of March 29], the third-smallest allocation in the country, after Wyoming and Vermont — likely falls short by one-third to one-half,” Noah writes.

Covid-19 is only the tip of the iceberg, Shuff tells Vox. As Vox’s German Lopez has explained, DC has only had a sitting local government since 1973, when Congress passed the Home Rule Act. And even that amount of local control is somewhat constrained:


Prior to the Home Rule Act, Congress set DC’s laws. The Home Rule Act made it so the local government could approve its own laws, although only after 30 or 60 days of congressional review depending on the type of policy. Congress can also block DC’s laws through budgetary requirements.

Shuff said that congressional oversight has led to DC’s inability to legalize, tax, and regulate marijuana; the congressional prohibition against using local funds for abortion care for low-income women is also a sore subject.

“But the biggest one that stands out in my head goes all the way back to the ’80s and early ’90s when we were banned and prevented from implementing a needle exchange program to reduce HIV and AIDS transmission amongst intravenous drug users,” Shuff explained.

The ban was lifted, and Vox’s German Lopez reports the city “adopted a needle exchange program to combat its HIV epidemic [and] needle-caused HIV cases dropped by 80 percent, from 149 in 2007 to 30 in 2011, according [to] a report from the DC Department of Health.”

“So now we’re dealing with two instances where lack of statehood has killed Washingtonians,” Shuff said.
How DC statehood would work, briefly explained

HR 51, the Washington, DC, Admission Act, would create the state of Washington, DC, but instead of DC referring to “District of Columbia,” it would come to be known as Douglass Commonwealth, in honor of Frederick Douglass.

The bill states that the commonwealth wouldn’t encompass federal buildings and monuments including the White House, the Capitol, and the Supreme Court.

© New Columbia Vision, 2016 The red boundaries demarcate the boundaries of “Douglass Commonwealth,” and the white boundaries contain the federal buildings and monuments that would remain under federal jurisdiction. The blue is the Potomac River.

As a state, DC would then have two US senators, and a number of representatives in the US House commensurate to its population. And, like every other state, it would be able to pass laws in accordance with its legislative and executive bodies without undue interference from the federal government.

As Vox’s Ian Millhiser has reported, there are constitutional questions that Congress will need to address on the path to statehood: “The 23rd Amendment effectively grants three Electoral College votes to ‘the District constituting the seat of Government of the United States.’ Under this amendment, which was ratified in 1961, DC has as much say in presidential elections as the ‘least populous State.’”

While some conservatives have argued this means that DC cannot be admitted without a new constitutional amendment, Millhiser points out that since the district is still an entity (albeit a much smaller one), Congress can simply pass a law giving the district’s electoral votes to “whichever presidential candidate would otherwise win the Electoral College — or, even better, Congress could award these three votes to the national popular vote winner.”

But answering these technical questions is putting the cart before the horse. For now, the biggest obstacle to DC statehood is the US Senate.

It’s a hard road ahead for proponents of DC statehood

Democrats’ narrow majority was able to pass statehood legislation when it came to the House floor but now it goes to the Senate — where bills go to die via filibuster.

Despite the myriad ways statehood would benefit DC residents, the political debate has been defined by the reality that two more Democratic senators would likely be added to the Senate if DC were to become the 51st state. According to the Brookings Institution, since 2000, the Democratic presidential nominee has captured, on average, over 89 percent of the vote in Washington, DC.

The political stakes of this were laid bare in 2009 when the Senate struck a deal to add a DC House seat in exchange for another House seat in a Republican part of Utah. The proposal died in the House.

As Alan Greenblatt has reported for Vox: “Republicans weren’t too happy [with this deal] either.” Jason Chaffetz, then a representative from Utah, complained, “This whole thing strikes me as political bribery. If Washington, DC, is due representation, make that case. ... Don’t try and dangle a carrot out there.”

Rep. James Comer (R-OK) who sits on the House Oversight Committee, argued this point at a hearing last week: “Let’s be very clear what HR 51 is all about. It’s all about creating two new Democrat US Senate seats.”

Rhodes, of 51 for 51, pushes back on this point: “I think most importantly, this fight is about democracy and the fact that all American citizens deserve participation in democracy. Our country takes a step back to talk about racism mostly in the context of policing and criminal justice, but we really want to ensure that we’re talking about racism that’s rooted in our democracy.”

51 for 51 is beginning an ad campaign targeting Democratic members of the Senate Rules Committee. The ads frame the issue as a racial justice and civil rights issue and ask viewers to call their senators to “prioritize DC statehood.”

That the fight is both a civil rights fight and a partisan fight would align with US history, whether lawmakers from either party want to acknowledge it or not. As Greenblatt notes, “political bribery is what the creation of states has all been about ... states have historically entered the union in pairs, with lawmakers using new states to maintain the balance of partisan power — or at least try to.”

With the filibuster in place, it’s not just all 50 Democrats who have to get on board; advocates will have to convince 10 Republican senators that the case for statehood trumps their current partisan incentives.

While progressive hopes for filibuster reform spiked with the victories of Georgia Democratic Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, Sen. Joe Manchin’s (D-WV) recent op-ed in the Washington Post threw cold water over these talks, stating baldly: “I will not vote to eliminate or weaken the filibuster.”

The fight for statehood has been ongoing since the capital’s creation. In 1801, a prominent judge wrote in favor of representation, proposing that DC “be entitled to one Senator ... and to a number of members in the House of Representatives proportionate to its population.” Still, last year was the first time the measure passed in the House, showcasing the slow progress statehood advocates have made over the centuries.

“The most important thing is to see the progress we’ve made.” Holmes said. “It would make a real difference [for DC residents] to have two senators.”

Opinion: Saskatchewan can be a STEM destination with the right direction

Patrick Thera 

4/21/2021

The Avro Arrow was one of the most innovative aircraft of its time, establishing Canada as a global leader in aerospace research and development. In what has been deemed the closest thing Canadian industry has to both a love story and a murder mystery, the program was cancelled by the Diefenbaker government in 1959. The shuttering of the Arrow program resulted in the loss of at least 25,000 jobs.

© Provided by Leader Post SED Systems' satellite dish in Argentina. SED Systems, now Calian, constructed three 35-metre wide satellite dishes in Australia, Spain and Argentina.

It was the ultimate brain drain. More than 33 senior Canadian engineers left for NASA and made an indelible mark on the manned space program and lunar landing 10 years later. Among them was Canada’s Owen Maynard, who oversaw NASA’s Lunar Module Program and played a key role in the design of the module.

The first successful moon landing was nothing short of momentous. Roughly 650 million viewers watched those first few steps on their television screens, cementing the United States as the winner of the global space race. However, underpinning the moon landing is a lesser-known Canadian contribution.

The move south by Maynard and others, while an immense gesture to Canadian ingenuity, was a significant exodus of Canada’s brightest minds. This has since become an unfavourable trend, not just for the aerospace industry, but from our country’s science and engineering ranks more broadly. A recent study found that one-in-four STEM graduates from three leading Canadian universities opted to work outside Canada. Eight-in-10 chose the United States.

Meanwhile, technology for space exploration has gained momentum and public attention in recent years, providing Canadian companies with the opportunity to re-assert themselves as global leaders. As NASA signals its intention to return to the moon and sends new vehicles to Mars, companies on our home soil are thriving, innovating and delivering key technologies for space exploration, sensing and communication.

There is great potential to make Saskatchewan the Canadian destination for STEM talent. Our goal is to create and maintain highly skilled jobs in the province and across the country, especially in the area of science, technology and engineering.

Yet sustaining local and national competitiveness relies on innovation and bringing the right solutions to market. Government support can help accelerate innovation and commercialization of space and satellite communications, bolstering Saskatchewan’s position domestically and abroad. Canada’s space companies, including Calian, are already providing solutions here on Canadian soil and are generating export sales from foreign clients.

In Saskatchewan, there are opportunities to invest in a future where talent thrives over the long-term, enticing highly-trained professionals and thus enhancing the long-term sustainability and diversity of the economy. Telesat LightSpeed is developing Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites that will provide high-speed broadband internet to many remote, rural and First Nations communities. These satellites will improve internet connectivity speeds, giving Saskatchewanians greater prospects of job advancement and better access to healthcare and education.

The barriers to good rural connectivity were recently identified by the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan. Its task force report offered a series of recommendations to remove the barriers. These include ensuring government funding to regain Canadian excellence, taking a leadership role to build long-term sustainability, and achieving universal connectivity to realize the societal and economic benefits.

Saskatchewan has a chance to secure its future as a leader in a highly competitive global market. The province can deliver an all-Canadian solution for the Telesat LEO program, increasing accessibility for these underserved communities all while creating and sustaining local jobs.

Government must support the domestic space supply chain and help engineer Saskatchewan’s social, cultural and economic fabric.

-based Patrick Thera is president of Calian, Advanced Technologies, formerly known as SED Systems, which provides infrastructure for satellite ground systems across the aerospace and defence, satellite and nuclear industri

Fort Saskatchewan Correctional Centre workers seek third-party review of 'toxic' workplace

Jonny Wakefield 

4/21/2021

© Provided by Edmonton Journal Exterior of the Fort Saskatchewan Correctional Centre.

Staff at Fort Saskatchewan Correctional Centre are demanding an independent review after a survey found most employees feel their workplace is “toxic.”

Seventy per cent of respondents to a recent survey reported feeling bullied at work, according to results released Wednesday by the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE).

Eighty-five per cent said the work environment has taken a toll on their mental health, while around 75 per cent reported negative consequences to their physical health. More than half believed managers would retaliate if they raised concerns.

Ninety-five per cent of employees want the provincial government to order a third-party review of the workplace, AUPE said in a news release, saying relations between managers and staff have broken down.

“It’s a very hard job,” said Susan Slade, AUPE vice-president. “And it’s a very trying job, dealing with, you know, criminals. But at the end of the day, you should still be able to have a healthy work environment.”

FSCC was built in 1988 . It can house 546 prisoners , including pretrial inmates and those serving sentences. It has averaged fewer than 300 inmates during the COVID-19 pandemic.

AUPE represents the majority of workers at the facility, including correctional officers, licensed practical nurses and administrative staff. Around 80 per cent filled out the AUPE survey.

Slade said the current issues go back at least five years. In October, staff presented managers with a list of issues, but were “brushed off.”

“(Staff) feel that management just doesn’t want to listen,” said Slade.

The pandemic has increased tensions. In December, correctional peace officer Roger Maxwell died of COVID-19. Slade said his passing is now considered a workplace death. Forty-seven per cent of respondents said the centre’s COVID response was among their biggest concerns, “second only to the issue of bullying, harassment, and intimidation,” AUPE spokesman Jon Milton said.
Other jails flagged after ‘toxic’ workplace complaints

FSCC is the latest Edmonton-area correctional facility to report toxic workplace concerns.

In 2019, the province released the results of an independent workplace review of the Edmonton Remand Centre (ERC), which compared the workplace culture to a “high school” riven with cliques, bullying and immature behaviour.

In response to the report, then-Justice Minister Doug Schweitzer announced unspecified “staffing changes” at the management level.

The federal, maximum-security Edmonton Institution, meanwhile, has long been plagued by complaints about the workplace culture.

In 2019, Postmedia obtained a workplace review which found numerous allegations of sexual assault and harassment involving co-workers at Edmonton Institution. Canada’s correctional investigator has repeatedly highlighted bullying, harassment and intimidation issues at Edmonton Institution, which fired, suspended or forced out 11 staffers in 2018.

Slade said the ERC review resulted in positive changes, but stressed that the workplace is still “not a perfect scenario or anything like that.” She hopes to see similar action at Fort Saskatchewan.

In a statement, justice ministry spokeswoman Katherine Thompson said the government “takes concerns about workplace culture very seriously, and that is why plans continue to be developed to enhance collaboration and the workplace culture among the staff and leadership at Fort Saskatchewan Correctional Centre.”

“Management or staff who don’t support a professional and respectful work environment are not meeting expectations, whether those of their colleagues, this department, or Albertans at large,” she added.

Slade said correctional facilities should not be inherently toxic workplaces.

“We need to stop that kind of culture, and we need to stop that kind of (belief), that it’s OK to not feel mentally healthy because you work in corrections,” she said.

jwakefield@postmedia.com

twitter.com/jonnywakefield

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Who To Call Instead Of The Police During An Emergency

Lydia Wang 

4/21/2021


On April 20, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was found guilty of murdering George Floyd in 2020. But Chauvin is only one part of the problem, and America’s broken police system isn’t changed by his conviction: While Chauvin’s trial was underway, 20-year-old Daunte Wright was shot and killed during a traffic stop. And moments before Chauvin was announced guilty, 16-year-old Ma’Khia Bryant was shot and killed by a Columbus, OH officer whom she had reportedly called for help.

 

© Provided by Refinery29

Last year, 1,127 people — disproportionately Black men — were killed by the U.S. police, according to data from the Police Violence Report. It’s clear that our current system is racist, harmful, and violent. But there’s still disagreement on what America would look like with no police at all.


Part of the problem is that we’re conditioned to call the cops during tense situations. Even those who support abolition may not know what other resources are available. But very often, there are other solutions that could better de-escalate a situation. The website Don’t Call The Police is a great place to start. This comprehensive directory, sorted by city and emergency, offers numbers for local hotlines and crisis centers.

For example, DCTP includes resources for local and national domestic violence hotlines. This information can be incredibly useful, as many people dealing with domestic violence report feeling reluctant to call the police, and one in three people who did call the police felt less safe after doing so, a 2015 survey by the National Domestic Violence Hotline found.

DCTP also has resources and hotline numbers for dealing with mental health crises. Evidence indicates that mental health professionals and nurses are more effective at helping in these kinds of situations: Eugene, OR has a system in place that sends both a medic and a crisis worker to homes upon receiving a report of erratic behavior. In one year, the team responded to around 24,000 calls, and backup was only required around 150 times. The police, however, are less adept and trained at handling such incidents: In 2020, 97 people were killed by the cops in response to reports of erratic behavior or mental health-related crises, the Police Violence Report states.

If you’re in New York, formerly incarcerated software engineers also created an alternative to 911, aptly titled Not911. According to the app’s website, Not911 is designed to direct people in crisis to “New York City-based organizations that offer counseling, mediation and intervention services” that don’t involve police intervention.

Numbers show that in many cities, police primarily receive calls about nonviolent or life-threatening offenses. It might seem harmless to call a cop for help breaking up a neighbor’s party, but the majority of police killings begin with traffic stops, reports of mental health checks, and low-level offenses, according to Mapping Police Violence. Alternatives to the police don’t just solve problems; they potentially save lives.

The options listed here aren’t perfect solutions. Not911 only operates in New York City and DCTP currently displays resources for a limited list of locations. If your city isn’t included, it may be worth doing some prep work to find similar hotlines and resources that are local to you, so you have them on hand if you were ever to need them.

“In this long transition process [to a world without police], we may need a small, specialized class of public servants whose job it is to respond to violent crimes. But part of what we’re talking about here is what role police play in our society,” writes Minneapolis-based collective MPD150. “Right now, cops don’t just respond to violent crimes; they make needless traffic stops, arrest petty drug users, harass Black and Brown people, and engage in a wide range of ‘broken windows policing’ behaviors that only serve to keep more people under the thumb of the criminal justice system.” Changing this will take widespread, intentional action — and that can start with you.

Credit Suisse had more than $20 billion exposure to Archegos investments - WSJ


(Reuters) - Credit Suisse Group had more than $20 billion of exposure to investments related to Archegos Capital Management and struggled to monitor them before the fund had to liquidate many large positions, the Wall Street Journal reported.

© Reuters/ARND WIEGMANN FILE PHOTO: The logo of Swiss bank Credit Suisse is seen at a branch office in Zurich

Parts of the bank had not fully implemented systems to keep pace with Archegos' fast growth when Archegos bets on a collection of stocks swelled leading up to its March collapse, the report said, citing unidentified people familiar with the matter.


Chief Executive Thomas Gottstein and Lara Warner, the bank's recently departed chief risk officer, became aware of the Archegos exposure in the days leading up to the forced liquidation of the fund, the report said. Neither Gottstein nor Warner had been aware of the fund as a major client before, it said.

Credit Suisse declined to comment on the WSJ report.

Switzerland's second-biggest bank has been reeling from its exposure to the collapse first of British fund Greensill Capital and then U.S. investment fund Archegos within the course of one month.

Huge losses at Archegos last month prompted Credit Suisse to replace its heads of investment banking and of compliance and risk after it said it would book a $4.7 billion first-quarter charge from exposure to the stricken firm.

(Reporting by Sabahatjahan Contractor and Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)

SNC-Lavalin chief executive gets $8.02M in compensation in first full year at helm

MONTREAL — SNC-Lavalin's chief executive received a big pay raise in his first full year at the helm of the engineering firm as his total compensation surpassed $8 million, according to a regulatory filing.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Ian Edwards's total compensation rose to $8.02 million from $3.74 million in 2019 largely due to a big boost in share-based awards and a doubling of his annual bonus, which he converted to stock.

Edwards's salary increased 8.3 per cent to $1.03 million and rose again in 2021 to $1.4 million. Share-based awards last year were valued at $5.6 million, up from nearly $2 million a year earlier.

SNC said $1.8 million of the stock awards came from a one-time grant in March that was deferred from 2019 because of restrictions in its insider-trading policy. It will vest over three years.

He also received a $1.07-million bonus, $216,462 pension value and $90,179 in other compensation, according to the proxy circular filed ahead of its annual meeting on May 14.

Edwards became CEO on Oct. 31, 2019, several months after he was appointed interim head upon the departure of Neil Bruce. He joined the company in 2014 as vice-president of infrastructure construction.

Chief financial officer Jeff Bell's total compensation was $3.17 million while his predecessor, Sylvain Girard, saw his total compensation nearly double to $4.86 million.

Most of the increase for Girard, who left the company on Aug. 31, was the result of $2.4 million in other compensation.

This report by Th e Canadian Press was first published April 21, 2021.

Companies in this story: (TSX:SNC)

The Canadian Press

Some Amazon delivery drivers say new surveillance cameras in their trucks can offer protection, despite concerns over constant monitoring

ahartmans@businessinsider.com (Avery Hartmans,Kate Taylor)  

4/22/2021

© Provided by Business Insider Amazon drivers say the new cameras bring new challenges, along with protection. Keith Srakocic/AP

Amazon delivery drivers say new cameras inside their vans can encourage safer driving.
One driver who initially bristled at the cameras told Insider that he now sees them as an "insurance policy."

AI surveillance cameras are becoming more common across the delivery industr

Some Amazon delivery drivers are chafing at a new camera system that watches them inside their vans. But the driver-facing cameras are becoming more common across the industry - and drivers also say there are some key advantages to the new monitoring system.

Insider spoke with five drivers who described what it's like working under the watchful eye of the cameras. They said they felt "micromanaged" and slowed down by the cameras, which ding them for infractions like speeding or distracted driving.

But workers also highlighted several benefits, saying the cameras encourage safer driving and could protect them - as well as protect Amazon and the companies it hires to make package deliveries - in cases of traffic accidents or other dangerous situations. Many of the drivers asked that their names be withheld for fear that their jobs would be affected, but Insider verified their identities.

A representative for Amazon told Insider that the cameras are used to keep "drivers and the communities where we deliver safe."

"Don't believe the self-interested critics who claim these cameras are intended for anything other than safety," a representative said in a statement.
Drivers say that the cameras can improve safety and provide a record of traffic accidents

The camera system, called Driveri, was created by a transportation company called Netradyne, which uses artificial intelligence to monitor drivers.

Amazon told Insider that it saw improvements in driver safety during a pilot test of the Netradyne cameras from April to October 2020: Accidents decreased 48%, stop-sign violations decreased 20%, incidents of workers driving without a seatbelt decreased 60%, and distracted driving decreased 45%.

Some drivers who spoke with Insider said they agreed that the cameras could improve safety on the road. Bronwyn Brigham, a driver based in Houston, told Insider that the cameras could provide critical evidence in dangerous situations.

"If someone has an accident or somebody comes up to the van, that's the only upsides I can see - if somebody tries to rob the van," she said.

A California driver told Insider that the cameras encourage workers to focus more on safe driving.

"They do force the drivers to think more about safety and traffic laws because they will be called out for violations," the driver said. "No more 'secret sin' so to speak."

Drivers also said the cameras could be helpful in the case of traffic accidents. A driver who delivers near the Twin Cities told Insider that he could see how the cameras could prove beneficial in cases where another vehicle hits his van, because he would have the camera footage to prove that the collision wasn't his fault.

An Oklahoma-based driver echoed that the cameras offer a level of protection for drivers if there's an accident.

"You can prove to them, 'Yes, I was paying attention and I just got hit.' And, conversely, if you're screwing around, it's going to prove that too," he said.
Drivers have also criticized the cameras

© AP Cameras rolled out across the US for Amazon drivers in March. AP

The camera system is mounted on the inside of the delivery vehicle windshield and contains four cameras: a road-facing camera, two side-facing cameras, and one camera that faces inward toward the driver.

The cameras record 100% of the time when the ignition is turned on, but only upload footage when they detect one of 16 issues, such as hard braking or a seatbelt lapse, Karolina Haraldsdottir, a senior manager for last-mile safety at Amazon, said in a training video about the cameras.

The system began rolling out to drivers nationwide last month, and initially sparked a backlash among some drivers. A driver named Vic told the Thomson Reuters Foundation that the cameras were the final straw, leading him to quit his job.

A driver named Angel Rajal told Insider last month that he thought the new cameras were "annoying" and made him feel as if he were always being watched.

In interviews with Insider, five drivers whose vans have the cameras installed highlighted a slew of concerns over the devices, including a lack of privacy, an obstructed view due to the system's placement on the windshield, "rage-inducing" verbal alerts when drivers make a misstep, and a negative impact on their efficiency.
Companies are increasingly using cameras to monitor drivers

Provided by Business Insider Amazon drivers are not the only ones on camera on the job. Jim Young/Reuters

Matt Camden, a senior research associate at the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, recently told Insider that in-vehicle alerts like the ones the Driveri system provides help address risky driving behavior. But he also noted that Amazon may have to make a trade-off when it comes to efficiency.

"If a fleet wants to reduce risky driving behaviors, it's critical to look at why the drivers are doing that in the first place, and usually, it's because there's other consequences that are driving that behavior," which could include "unrealistic delivery times," Camden said.

The most effective approach, he said, is for delivery fleets to build a strong "safety culture" that doesn't pressure employees to keep going if they feel tired or have to use the bathroom.

While the cameras are new for Amazon delivery drivers, they're becoming more common across the industry. Last fall, UPS installed a similar AI surveillance system called Lytx Drivecam inside vans in Texas and Oklahoma. FedEx and Walmart have also started installing Lytx driver-facing cameras in recent years. (Lytx confirmed to Insider that Walmart is a client and the brand is a vendor for FedEx VEDR, saying in a statement that the "service is used by fleets to improve everything from driver safety to vehicle location, compliance, and fuel management.")

One truck driver who hauls Amazon trailers told Insider that - after initial resistance - he now feels that driver-facing cameras are in drivers' and employers' best interest.

"I told myself I would never work for anyone with a camera in my truck," he said. "But … people drive with such disregard, it's almost like an insurance policy."

When he first started working for an Amazon contractor, the driver said he would wave at the camera, saying "Hey, Jeff Bezos, here you go," in a reference to Amazon's chief executive. Now, he said he has become oblivious to the camera.

If more companies are going to require driver-facing cameras throughout the supply chain, the driver said, he is willing to tolerate the surveillance. According to the driver, high-tech tracking has become an inescapable part of the job.

"It's a sign of the times," the driver said.
Read the original article on Business Insider

Province unveils new wild pig strategy


WATERLOO REGION — The province is rooting out the wild pig problem before they get a hoof-hold in the province.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry is asking for public input into a new strategy to deal with wild pigs, and accompanying updates to the Invasive Species Act.

Ontario’s strategy to address the threat of invasive wild pigs is meant to proactively address the threat before wild pigs establish stable populations in the province.

“Based on experiences from other jurisdictions, it is clear that the least costly and most effective approach for managing wild pigs is to act early,” the province writes in the strategy.

The United States Department of Agriculture estimates more than $1.5 billion is lost each year to wild pigs either through damage or lost farming produce. Pigs love to eat agricultural crops and trample the plants and dig up the ground in the process. They also cause significant environmental and water quality damage by rooting up landscapes. They also prey on and compete with native species.

The province’s strategy has four main objectives:

prevent the introduction of pigs into the natural environment

address the risk posed by Eurasian wild boar in Ontario

use a co-ordinated approach to remove wild pigs from the natural environment

leverage expertise and resources by collaborating across ministries, with federal agencies, other jurisdictions, and industry stakeholders, and partners

Much of the strategy is focused on the first objective: preventing the introduction of pigs into the natural environment.

A key centrepiece is to add wild pigs to the Invasive Species Act. This will make intentionally introducing pigs to the environment illegal and give owners clear actions if a pig is accidentally released. It will also give enforcement officers the authority to address any issues of illegal pig releases.

Other activities include developing and distributing guidelines for the best management practices for keeping pigs outdoors. The province says keeping pigs outdoors poses a much higher risk of pigs escaping.

The strategy also proposes outreach about the dangers of keeping pigs as pets, and also letting pig keepers and producers know their legal responsibilities if a pig escapes.

The province says that in other jurisdictions, there is evidence that humans have intentionally released pigs into the wild. For example, in the United States, “wild pig populations increased in 2008 and 2009 when the hog market crashed.”

According to the strategy, hunting wild pigs will become illegal, and the province will phase out possession of Eurasian wild boar species.

The full draft strategy can be seen on the Environmental Registry of Ontario listing #019-3468 and comments will be accepted until June 7 2021.

Leah Gerber’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative. The funding allows her to report on stories about the Grand River Watershed. Email lgerber@therecord.com

Leah Gerber, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Waterloo Region Record

A farmer to chefs reveals his deep vegetable knowledge

NEW YORK — Despite thousands of years of humans working the soil, there are still things to learn. Just ask Farmer Lee Jones about the beet leaves.

The Ohio-based farmer had planted too many beets and the surplus was dumped in a pile in a cooler. He returned later to find that when he dug below the first layer, to where the beets got no light exposure, beautiful leaves were growing out of the vegetable in the dark.

“It’s a yellow leaf with red veins. And it’s one of the sexiest things that you can imagine,” he says. “We’re like, ‘Holy smokes, this is nicer than anything we grew on purpose!'”

You might not find plants particularly sexy until you speak to Jones and catch his infectious enthusiasm for farming. He's a relentless experimenter, willing to try new techniques, new ideas and new flavours.

“There are literally thousands of plants and vegetables to be explored,” he says. “We have a saying that we try and work in harmony with Mother Nature rather than trying to outsmart her.”

Jones' deep knowledge about vegetables and growing them is soon available via “The Chef’s Garden: A Modern Guide to Common and Unusual Vegetables — with Recipes.” The 640-page handsome book is equal parts vegetable reference bible, family memoir and recipe collection. It comes out April 27.

“We try in the book to really look for different ways to be able to utilize plants in America. We kind of think one-dimensionally,” he says. "We do bone marrow. Why can’t we do vegetable marrow?”

Jones is the face of The Chef’s Garden, a sustainable, 350-acre family farm in Huron that provides chefs worldwide with seasonal specialty vegetables, microgreens, herbs and edible flowers.

Name a starry chef and there's a good chance they've done business with The Chef’s Garden: José Andrés, Alain Ducasse, Daniel Boulud, Thomas Keller and Ferran Adrià, among them. With his welcoming air and signature denim bib overalls and red bow tie, Jones has become something of a celebrity, too.

The Chef’s Garden grows 700 kinds of vegetables, with 150 to 200 more in trials. There's a lab where scientists analyze the soil and seeds, and there's also the Culinary Vegetable Institute, which attracts 600 visiting chefs a year to share their knowledge and cook together.

Readers of the book will find new ways to prepare vegetables, from celery root to cauliflower, and learn about more unusual ingredients like carrot seeds, knotweed and radish seed pods.

“For several thousand years, we always ate only the top of the carrot plant. It’s only been in the last few hundred years that we started eating the bottom of the carrot. Now nobody eats the top,” Jones says.

Jones' farm is surrounded by 5,000-acre commercial farms, and he does things differently: Instead of chemicals, he uses 15 species of cover crop to replenish the soil. He argues that American farmers have lost their way regarding food and health.

“I don’t knock the other farmers. They’re following the model that exists and that’s to keep the costs as low as possible and the tons per acre as high as possible. It’s not about the integrity of the plant. It’s about the tons per acre,” he says. “We’re a bunch of odd ducks out here, for sure.”

Above all, Jones emphasizes taste and minimizing waste. He looks to Europeans, who learned over centuries of struggle with food insecurity to use every part of their animals.

Take oxtail, a peasant food for years. “They figured out great ways to make good dishes with the flavour of the oxtail. And then Thomas Keller comes over here and puts an oxtail on a plate and it’s 90 bucks.”

Jones wants to showcase vegetables, and the book offers attractive and tasty options, from Butter-Poached Squash with Hemp Seed and Coriander to Potato Pierogi with Caramelized Onion Chips.

The book has a forward written by Andres and is co-written with Kristin Donnelly, with recipes by Jamie Simpson. Lucia Watson, the book's editor for Avery, says it is timely.

“Vegetables are the centre of our plate more and more. And it is kind of where all of the exciting cooking is coming from — experimenting with vegetables," she says.

"This gives home cooks an incredible window into that and an incredible resource. It introduces them to vegetables that they may not have heard of before, but they see at their farmer’s market and think, 'What if I brought that home? What would I do with it?' And it also makes them look at vegetables that they’ve taken for granted.”

Jones got his love of farming from his dad and keeps a foot in the past — he admires what farmers before him accomplished and reveres old farm machinery — as well as embracing modern technology for things like crop analysis and distribution.

“My dad had a saying that the only thing we’re trying to do is get as good as the growers were 100 years ago. It was pre-chemical, pre-synthetic fertilizer, rotating the land, rebuilding the soil,” he says.

COVID-19 was a wake-up call for Jones to diversify since The Chef's Kitchen found its links to chefs and cruise lines severed when those business shuttered. The farm has since pivoted to nationwide home delivery and opened a farmer's market while it waits for restaurants to rebound.

But Jones, ever the optimist, sees a silver lining even in a pandemic: There has been a surge of people interested in growing their own food and planting vegetables.

“Kids emulate parents behaviour. And guess what? Parents planted gardens and kids wanted to go help. And when a kid grows a carrot and they pull it out, even if they didn’t like it before, they’re more interested in trying a carrot," he says. "So I think out of the ashes of this we have to find those good things.”

___

Online: https://www.farmerjonesfarm.com/pages/book

___

Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

Mark Kennedy, The Associated Press

4/21/2021