NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) protests are often criticized as parochial and short-lived, generating no lasting influence on broader processes related to environmental politics. This volume offers a different perspective. Drawing on cases from around the globe, it demonstrates that NIMBY protests, although always arising from a local concern in a particular community, often result in broader political, social, and technological change. Chapters include cases from Europe, North America, and Asia, engaging with the full political spectrum from established democracies to non-democratic countries. Regardless of political setting, NIMBY movements can have a positive and proactive role in generating innovative solutions to local as well as transnational environmental issues. Furthermore, those solutions are now serving as models for communities and countries around the world.

Policymakers who wish to deconcentrate assisted housing for low-income and special-needs households into areas where these households are underrepresented are at odds with citizens who wish to keep such housing out of their neighborhoods. One side sees the expanded opportunities and quality of life for residents. The other side sees an invasion of undesirable neighbors who will undermine their quality of life, security, and property values. In Baltimore County and Denver, jurisdictions that differ in many respects, innovative efforts during the tail end of the twentieth century to spatially deconcentrate assisted households of various types met with vocal, well-organized community opposition in both locales. In Denver, scattered-site public housing and the supportive housing for special needs populations programs were targeted. In Baltimore County, the Section 8 Moving to Opportunity rental assistance program proved a lightning rod for protest. The authors seize the analytical opportunity provided by these programs in Denver and Baltimore County to explore fundamental issues concerning the deconcentration of assisted housing. Does assisted housing of various types cause negative neighborhood impacts? Do impacts vary across different sorts of neighborhoods? How does the spatial concentration of assisted housing or the scale of the facility affect impacts? What are the mechanisms through which these impacts transpire? How can deconcentration policies be revised to minimize any negative impacts? This book provides answers to these questions by bringing to bear a variety of qualitative and quantitative research methods.

An introduction to the roughly 4000 different bee species found in the United States and Canada, dispelling common myths about bees while offering essential tips for telling them apart in the field

Rajiv Surendra was filming Mean Girls, playing the beloved rapping mathlete Kevin Gnapoor, when a cameraman insisted he read Yann Martel's Life of Pi. So begins his "lovely and human" (Jenny Lawson, author of Furiously Happy) tale of obsessively pursuing a dream, overcoming failure, and finding meaning in life. “This was a once-in-a-lifetime chance. I found myself standing dangerously close to the edge of a cliff. Far below me was an incredible abyss with no end in sight. I could turn back and safely return to where I had come from, or I could throw caution to the wind, lift my arms up into the air . . . and jump.” —From The Elephants in My Backyard What happens when you spend ten years obsessively pursuing a dream, and then, in the blink of an eye, you learn that you have failed, that the dream will not come true? In 2003, Rajiv Surendra was filming Mean Girls, playing the beloved rapping mathlete Kevin Gnapoor, when a cameraman insisted he read Yann Martel’s Life of Pi. Mesmerized by all the similarities between Pi and himself—both are five-foot-five with coffee-colored complexions, both share a South Indian culture, both lived by a zoo—when Rajiv learns that Life of Pi will be made into a major motion picture he is convinced that playing the title role is his destiny. In a great leap of faith Rajiv embarks on a quest to embody the sixteen-year-old Tamil schoolboy. He quits university and buys a one-way ticket from Toronto to South India. He visits the sacred stone temples of Pondicherry, he travels to the frigid waters off the coast of rural Maine, and explores the cobbled streets of Munich. He befriends Yann Martel, a priest, a castaway, an eccentric old woman, and a pack of Tamil schoolboys. He learns how to swim, to spin wool, to keep bees, and to look a tiger in the eye. All the while he is really learning how to dream big, to fail, to survive, to love, and to become who he truly is. Rajiv Surendra captures the uncertainty, heartache, and joy of finding ones place in the world with sly humor and refreshing honesty. The Elephants in My Backyard is not a journey of goals and victories, but a story of process and determination. It is a spellbinding and profound book for anyone who has ever failed at something and had to find a new path through life.

A new way forward for sustainable quality of life in cities of all sizes Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Build American Prosperity is a book of forward-thinking ideas that breaks with modern wisdom to present a new vision of urban development in the United States. Presenting the foundational ideas of the Strong Towns movement he co-founded, Charles Marohn explains why cities of all sizes continue to struggle to meet their basic needs, and reveals the new paradigm that can solve this longstanding problem. Inside, you’ll learn why inducing growth and development has been the conventional response to urban financial struggles—and why it just doesn’t work. New development and high-risk investing don’t generate enough wealth to support itself, and cities continue to struggle. Read this book to find out how cities large and small can focus on bottom-up investments to minimize risk and maximize their ability to strengthen the community financially and improve citizens’ quality of life. Develop in-depth knowledge of the underlying logic behind the “traditional” search for never-ending urban growth Learn practical solutions for ameliorating financial struggles through low-risk investment and a grassroots focus Gain insights and tools that can stop the vicious cycle of budget shortfalls and unexpected downturns Become a part of the Strong Towns revolution by shifting the focus away from top-down growth toward rebuilding American prosperity Strong Towns acknowledges that there is a problem with the American approach to growth and shows community leaders a new way forward. The Strong Towns response is a revolution in how we assemble the places we live.

"EVEN A BRIGHT, SUNNY DAY FEELS MENACING IN THE HANDS OF THIS PRO." —Margaret Maron NEIGHBORHOOD BLIGHT Romance writer, suburban mom, and sometime sleuth E.J. Pugh is certainly not thrilled to have Michael Whitby for a neighbor. A convicted criminal, Whitby served his time in prison and now has moved to the quiet Texas community of Black Cat Ridge, the Pughs' hometown. Despite her fears, E.J. feels the townsfolk's campaign on harassment—which is affecting the ex-con's innocent family—is unnecessarily cruel and blatantly unfair. The local citizenry has decided that Whitby must go! And no method is too extreme if it removes him from the vicinity. But a line is crossed on Halloween night when a dead body is discovered on the Whitbys' front lawn. And now a morally outraged E.J. is on the trail of a killer, digging for dangerous secrets that might best be left interred—secrets that might possibly be buried in her own backyard. "A GIFTED AND PERCEPTIVE WRITER WHOSE CHARACTERS ARE SECOND TO NONE."—Sharyn McCrumb

How a woman-led citizens' group beat a Southern political machine by enlisting federal bureaucrats and judges to protect their neighborhood from unchecked economic development This social history of local political activism tells the story of the decades-long fight to save Green Springs, Virginia, illuminating the economic tradeoffs of protecting the environment, the origins of NIMBYism, the changing nature of local control, and the surprising power of history to advance public policy. Rae Ely faced long odds when she launched a campaign in 1970 to stop a prison, then a strip mine, in Green Springs. The local political machine supported both projects, promising jobs for impoverished Louisa County, Virginia. But Ely and her allies prevailed by repurposing the same tactics used by the Civil Rights movement--the appeal to federal agencies and courts to circumvent local control--and by using new historical interpretations to create the first rural National Historic Landmark District. The Green Springs protesters fought to preserve the historic character of their neighborhood and the surrounding environment in a quest that epitomized the conflict in late twentieth-century America between unbridled economic development for all and protecting the quality of life for an economically privileged few. Ely's tactics are now used by neighborhood groups across the nation, even if they have been applied in ways she never intended: to resist any form of development.