Sightline Institute

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Centre

SIGHTLINE INSTITUTE
Type of Company Research Institute & Sustainability Think-Tank
Founded 1993, Seattle, Washington, USA
Headquarters Seattle, Washington, United States of America
Key people Alan Thein Durning
Industry Sustainability
Products Progress Indicators, research, systemic solutions, news aggregator service.
Website www.sightline.org

Sightline Institute (formerly Northwest Environment Watch) is a not-for-profit research and communication center--a think tank--based in Seattle. Founded in 1993 by Alan Durning, Sightline's mission is to bring about sustainability--a healthy, lasting prosperity grounded in place. Nonpartisan and wholly independent, Sightline's only ideology is commitment to the shared values of strong communities, fair markets, and responsible stewardship.


The organization's focus is on Cascadia, or the Pacific Northwest, which it defines as "the watersheds of rivers that flow into the Pacific Ocean through North America's temperate rainforest zone". This region includes all of Washington, most of Oregon, Idaho and British Columbia, and adjoining parts of Alaska, Yukon Territory, Montana, Wyoming, Nevada and California.[1].


Contents

[edit] About Sightline Institute

Sightline carries out its work in three ways:

[edit] I. Tracking Indicators

Monitoring the Northwest's progress toward a healthy, lasting prosperity with the Cascadia Scorecard, an index of eight key trends shaping the future of the Northwest.

Cascadia Scorecard
Launched in 2004, the Cascadia Scorecard is Sightline Institute's index of sustainability for the Northwest. It provides regular progress reports on the region by tracking eight key trends, and how many years the region is from reaching an attainable target for each indicator--Japan for lifespan, Germany for energy, and so on.
  1. Sprawl and Transportation- Sightline's project to track smart growth in the region’s seven largest cities, and the most important solutions for curbing sprawl. Cascadia Scorecard 2006 focuses on how urban design affects health.
  2. Energy and Climate- The 2005 edition of the Cascadia Scorecard focused on one of the most critical issues facing the region: energy security. Sightline's research, maps, and publications on Cascadia's energy system both document its impacts, and explain how the region can become cleaner and more secure.
  3. Pollution and Toxics- For the Cascadia Scorecard pollution indicator, Sightline chose to study pollution in people--toxics such as PBDE and PCBs--and what can be done to reduce exposure to them. Sightline also studied trends such as [ozone pollution on Mount Rainier].
  4. Forests and Wildlife- The Scorecard project includes a forest indicator that measures the health of Northwest forests, by monitoring clearcuts in five key areas; and a wildlife indicator--new in 2005--that tracks the abundance of five important Northwest species, including salmon, orcas, wolves, sage-grouse, and caribou.
  5. Human Health- Northwesterners’ health—as measured by lifespan, the single best measure of a population’s health--continues to improve. Sightline's Solutions for Healthier Communities suggests how individuals and institutions can take simple steps to create compact, complete communities that enable residents to get around without a car and encourage physical activity and connections among neighbors.
  6. Population- To track population growth, Sightline looks at average family size, which is an excellent gauge of women’s--and families’--well-being. Also offered are its best ideas for how the Northwest can better ensure that every child is born wanted.
  7. Economy- To better measure how the economy affects working families, the Cascadia Scorecard includes an economic security index that serves as a better measure of how northwesterners are really faring.
  8. Green Taxes- Sightline feels that taxes are the DNA of the economy: invisible, cryptic, and awesomely powerful. It also believes that unfortunately, the tax system penalizes many of the activities northwesterners want more of--such as work and investment, while encouraging activities that northwesterners want less of--such as sprawl and waste. Sightline's research and resources on Green Taxes take a revolutionary approach to tax reform called tax shifting--or green taxes--which replaces taxes on "goods" with taxes on "bads."
By spotlighting successes inside and outside Cascadia, the Scorecard helps provide a practical vision for a better Northwest. The Scorecard data is updated in a book that's released each spring, and throughout the year in reports on individual indicators, articles and commentary, newsletters, and on our blog--the Daily Score.

[edit] II. Encouraging Solutions

Identifying the most important systemic solutions for the region: high-leverage changes that could redirect business as usual to more sustainable ends, such as compact urban development, tax shifting, and pay-as-you-drive car insurance that rewards consumers for driving less.

[edit] III. Educating Others

Sightline's team works hard to contribute research, books, maps, and commentary widely available to the Northwest's engaged citizens, media, and leaders, so they can better understand and better advance sustainability in their communities.

[edit] Recent Features

Some of Sightline's heavily researched articles, commentary, and reports include:

A maps and graphics center
Including more than 100 maps, charts, and Flash animations on Northwest trends such as gas consumption, how ozone affects Mount Rainier, and sprawl for activists and others to download and use in diffeerent versions
Living Car-lessly
Sightline's executive director, Alan Durning documents his family's challenge to survive for one year without a car.
Washington State's land-use initiative debate
An in-depth analysis of I-933, an initiative modeled after Oregon's Measure 37, its implications, and its relation to a nationwide debate over land use, eminent domain, and property fairness.
Sustainability Revolution
Featured in Sightline's Cascadia Scorecard newsletter.
Smart growth and sprawl
An in-depth study of growth policies and rural land conservation, comparing Portland, OR, with 14 other Northwest cities.


Sightline also publishes a news aggregator, Tidepool, which provides daily updates of the most important Northwest news stories collected from more than forty on-line news sources.

[edit] Accomplishments

In the years since its founding in 1993, the work of Sightline has helped leaders and advocates log many victories: a pilot tax shift in British Columbia in 2001; defeating a ruinous land-use ballot measure in greater Portland in 2002; phase-outs of toxic flame retardants throughout the Northwest in 2004 and 2005; a center-city strategy in Seattle that will make the city’s downtown a vibrant, walkable zone modeled on Vancouver, BC; and clean-car standards in Oregon and Washington in 2005.

Books- From 1993 to early 2006, Sightline has published 16 books and distributed more than 150,000 paper copies of them; they have also given away tens of thousands of additional copies as free downloads. Sightline's 1997 book Stuff alone has sold 40,000 copies.
Other Publications- The Sightline team has also published several dozen shorter reports and newsletters; scores of op-eds, articles, and fact sheets; more than 100 maps, many of them animated; several Flash animations; and innumerable charts and graphs. (Almost all of this material is downloadable from the website.)
Daily News & Commentary- Since early 2004, Sightline staff members have penned more than 1,000 posts on the Daily Score blog, and continue to produce a new edition of Tidepool, its daily news summary, every weekday morning.
Speeches & Consultations- Sightline's executive director, Alan Durning, and fellow staff members have given hundreds of speeches and briefings; met dozens of times with Northwest leaders; and regularly participate on panels, advisory boards, and other collaborative efforts.

Sightline's purpose as an organization is to provide Cascadia’s community problem solvers with practical vision and innovative thinking, inspiring and empowering them to bring about a healthy, lasting prosperity. In recent surveys, some 70 percent of its audience reported that because of Sightline they are “more inspired to work for change,” and 86 percent reported that they’ve used or shared Sightline’s information with others.

[edit] External Links

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