No Longer the Fuzzy, Feel Good Values - Benefit Valuation in State Land Conservation with Jim Seif

Jim Seif, former Secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection in Pennsylvania, joins the EcoMetrics Podcast to discuss economic value of land use, sharing stories of how considering the true and full value of land and nature can impact other economic priorities for the positive. Jim talks about how this value used to be the "fuzzy, feel good values" during his previous tenure, but now we have "the numbers" to help share the importance of benefits valuation in land conservation. 

Jim mentions a recent article by The Nature Conservancy, check out the article HERE. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Welcome to the Etometrics Podcast. Join us as we cultivate a dilemma around valuing the co-benefits of nature-based solutions. We'll host guests from all around the world in different industries and different roles to discuss the importance of benefits evaluation. We know this is only the start. We hope each conversation will create more opportunities for knowledge sharing and collaboration. Welcome everyone. Thank you for joining us for the Ecometrics podcast. Today we have Jim Seif with us. He is a friend of Ecometrics and also a longtime acquaintance of our president at Panero. I am going to allow Jim to give an introduction to himself based on his experience and kind of his background and why he's here today. And then we'll kind of dive into some questions. Jim, how are you?

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Good, Lizzie. Thanks for having me on. There's not a lot more introduction. I got to know Ed Panero when I was Secretary of Environmental Protection in Pennsylvania. I'm a lifelong Pennsylvanian and was a deputy secretary. He has since gone on to a uh a great consulting uh career and has uh some projects that have interested me in the last few months as I've thought more and more. I'm long retired, but I'm still quite uh concerned about all of the issues that engage a large state environmental secretary. And some of what uh Ecometrics is doing is of great interest to me. And so I've looked at it and uh would be happy to talk about it right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

That's awesome. I there's so many different ways and angles that we could go. Um, let's start off and just kind of maybe look at the different economic aspects of environmental protection. So during your time when you were at DEP and kind of really evaluating what the agency's role was in the context of watersheds. So let's talk about watersheds, how they compare to county borders, how you looked at that um from your role at DEP and why you were such a pioneer for the way that you did it.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

Well, others can call me a pioneer, but at least I made I made I made noise sooner than a lot of people did. Uh back when, and I was uh uh secretary in the Palm Ridge administration, 1994 to 2001, uh I uh brought with me a great deal of respect for the birds and bunnies and trees and forests and so on. I had that conventional view uh imparted to me by family and others, uh, and uh often spoke about them. I uh confronted the reality, however, that there were 2,600 local governments in Pennsylvania, uh and that they made decisions about the birds and bunnies and trees and so on. And they made them sometimes without regard to things like the watersheds and where the water goes, and uh what the scenery was and what the habitat was. And uh they uh had to hear, I think, from policymakers and neighbors to projects or tracts of land that were under consideration, that there were other considerations between uh besides the dollar value of what they were doing. Uh people live in watersheds, not just not just municipalities and boroughs and so on. Uh and some people recognize they live in a watershed, some just think there's a river nearby. Uh, but that's important. Uh when I urged particular land use or let's take down a dam that was uh uh uh screwing up fish migration, or let's try to protect a certain wetland. Uh I could speak of the value of doing that, but only in general terms. Uh they were the fuzzy values, they were the feel-good values. Oh, yes, it's nice to build a home that has a nice view of a mountain that has economic value, uh, and people could see that. Uh to just have a view of a mountain for hikers uh and passers by is not deemed as valuable or as valuable as uh as uh building a home that you could sell based upon a view. Uh some interesting things have happened since those days long ago. I call it the Jurassic era, but uh uh uh uh when I was uh urging these kinds of considerations in land use decisions. The main thing that's happened is that the uh the the the cyber era and the machines and all that that we work with every day have brought us vast amounts of data that back up the notion that there is value other than monetary in land. We can prove it. We can even say that a certain kind of land use has an economic value that matches what the owner thinks it's worth in dollars and cents. Uh it might be a value to someone else and not the owner. But if everybody is involved in the deciding of what to do with the land, then those dollar values can be hashed out, equalized, and used to make a deal that works for the environment and everybody. That's what uh ought to be brought into consideration. Recently the uh the Nature Conservancy uh put out a uh its uh periodic newsletter, and it was a wonderful article about the economic value of nature. It's measured in trillions, the water we have, the clean air, uh the pollination, uh, the uh uh carbon sequestration, the flood control. It's an enormous amount of money. Uh, our entire economy rests upon nature and its bounty. And our economy is hindered when we don't protect it. We lose billions in lack of resiliency in cities with uh hurricanes and so on, and we uh have to uh uh build flood control structures instead of using nature uh which was free, quote unquote, but it actually had great value when we figure out how much the cement and the pipes are gonna cost. Interesting story. When I started that environmental protection, Tom Ridge became governor. Uh a man named George Pataki became governor of New York at the same time. One of his first problems in 1995 was a demand by EPA that New York's water system be protected, this the drinking water be protected, with about a billion dollars worth of infrastructure and purification and the like. What did Governor Pataki do? He bought hundreds of thousands of acres in the Adirondacks. They purify New York's water now, and they also bring enormous other value to New York and to New Yorkers who live there and everywhere who visited the Adirondacks. Uh, that was a real twofer showing, in a specific case, the actual value of that acreage.

SPEAKER_02 7:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:44

Now it wasn't the value of the acreage to people who owned it, which was in many cases a uh New York state owned a lot of it. Um, but it was the value to the economy and to the state and to the other stakeholders, people who drink water downstream in this case. Uh that was uh uh an early monetary uh example of what the Nature Conservancy article was talking about. Here's the problem, though. A good example like that could give you dollar values, but for the most part, land transactions are on a micro basis, not the macro basis, like like billions of dollars or trillions in terms of the natural value of nature, the economic value of nature. They're $100,000, or they're two acres, or they're a small amount. How do you bring that kind of thinking that uh of natural value into those transactions? Well, it's hard work. You figure it out by looking at the research or successful projects of a similar nature, uh uh agricultural research, what's 40 acres of alfalfa do in terms of holding back water? Uh what's this wetland value uh uh at this point? What is the uh pollination value of a meadow versus uh uh turf or asphalt? Uh what uh what's the carbon sequestration potential of a particular forest? Uh we now know a lot about that, either because projects have been done or broader research brings those numbers to us. Uh and if you can find that kind of information and apply it according to what people would like for your particular 20 acres or a thousand acres or whatever it is, uh, then you have valuable information for people to play with. Well, I shouldn't say play with. This is serious stuff. Uh this has this has to do with our future and also the economic viability of some landowner or some neighbor or a community and so on. Uh uh I know of a particular tract of land in the middle of Pennsylvania. Uh it's state-owned property, which had a particular use uh right now, namely, it was a penitentiary for many, many decades. Uh it doesn't have to be a penitentiary anymore for a lot of reasons. What do you do with all that acreage? It already has some very fine farmland on it. Uh, it is upstream of people that need flood protection, it is near uh uh Penn State University, uh, the major asset in Pennsylvania, a magnet for people of all kinds. It is uh uh has natural vistas, uh mountains and meadows and so on. Uh maybe you could build uh a suburban housing development on it, and you could probably put an economic value on doing that. But there is existing economic value that would be upset and overturned if that particular land use were chosen. The state has an opportunity to take that acreage and talking with stakeholders, neighbors, downstream people, Penn State, uh people uh who understand the value of recreation, economic value, health value, and so on of recreation, uh, people who understand what that farmland is worth, uh as farmland, as productive farmland with jobs on it, and as farmland that has uh that pollinates neighboring areas that uh uh uh can be home to wildlife. Uh it's uh uh if you parse out those values, then people who who have an economic benefit in that value, like downstream flood protection, can be in on the deal, can help. If the landowner wants to sell it uh for a suburban development or Walmarts or tattoo parlors or whatever, uh then uh he he has an economic value in mind. But if uh other stakeholders can join in a broader transaction and contribute to the landowner the value that they get out of his land, then you have a deal. Uh and the environment is uh uh greatly aided and protected, uh, and the economic value is not lost. It's not people versus trees, it's uh a community. Yeah, it's a community that has trees and people in it, both have a place, an economic place, and if you can value that economic place that trees have, trees meaning fields or whatever, then you have decision makers at the state or the tiny borough level who can make a deal uh and and see more broadly than the borders of their township or or or their property line. Um it's wonderful to see that uh as as confusing as cyberspace has been to me at my age, uh uh it has been so very valuable in uh creating and allowing us to aggregate and collect the information and apply it to real decisions like that.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

It's uh I mean it sounds like you have been following along with like this development of the importance of ecosystem services and benefits valuation. And I know now that you're not in the government um role and in that space, you're still active in Pennsylvania. And I know you have some relationships with conservancies and land trusts. And is this kind of this development that you've been describing what led you to be interested in that angle, the conservancy land trust angle? How do you see that um kind of boosting the community?

SPEAKER_00 14:15

The uh the interest group, if you will, that has, I think, the most interest in bringing to light the economic value of environmental assets are probably uh the conservancies, the rails to trails people, uh, agricultural interests, uh, people that own land that is particularly uh uh valuable as flood control property, people that have in mind uh uh putting up projects uh uh and preserving the natural area around it because of its value to the project and to the environment more broadly. Uh they are the ones who I think could most use this kind of insight about making the dollar value a broader value and then equating the two, that is figuring out what the actual dollar value is of a uh of an environmental protection that a project might give or land might produce, or economic value like tourism uh trails and all of that. Uh they have a value, they they have a stake as they look at land that they want to uh work with or that might be threatened by uh uh a wasteful land use. Uh and so I'd like to spread the word uh to those people. And uh uh I know that Ed and I have been to a couple of conferences uh to do that. One of them was the uh gathering of state environmental secretaries in Savannah uh some months ago. Uh they were my colleagues. I don't know any present ones because, as I said, I'm the from the Jurassic era, but the uh I I do have uh uh uh an insight about what they're up against when they when they see a project uh and they're thinking about permits or state grants or other state actions that will affect that project. They ought to be able to understand also with real data, real numbers, uh, and and real backup in terms of footnotes and citations and similar projects and so on, they ought to be able to understand the broad impact and not just the dollar value of what they're doing. And uh when you explain it that way, you get that that head nod from uh someone who says, Yeah, I I get it, I see what you mean. And to the extent we can get more of that in both macro policy making about land and any individual project, one one to two thousand one acre to two thousand acres, then we get some real smart decision making.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

Sure. Yeah, you alluded a little bit to some of the barriers I'm thinking about, like for decision makers and policymakers. Um, what would be the most common barriers today that are popping up for them to kind of more widely adopt this perspective? And what would you say to those barriers?

SPEAKER_00 17:23

Oh, uh probably shouldn't say this sounds like a sounds like a complaint, uh, but uh the natural conservatism of people, you know, we've always done dollar values. We have you know tax rolls that say how much it's worth, we have real estate appraisals, insurance judgments, and so on. Uh, when you introduce other kinds of values and other players, uh it's something new. And if you're a if you're a government official, there's so much else on your desk. Uh and uh well, if you're anybody for that matter, you just have other things to do, and it's it's a new way of of looking at things. So so there's that. Uh uh secondly, I guess there's an effort to finding out all the things that I think you should find out about a particular land use or project. Costs money. Someone uh has to go uh through vast amounts of data, uh uh piles of data that heretofore were impenetrable, but you now we can we can find stuff in it. And uh that that takes a few bucks. You also have to thoughtfully convene, and this may take time, stakeholders. Everybody who's involved who has a good idea about or a bad idea for that matter. I that I don't you you don't want to make a judgment, you want to find out what their value is too. Uh and you uh have to talk to them, you have to be patient, you have to put aside whatever you thought was the best idea and value them all uh and make accommodations. That takes time, and and in a private sector time is money. Uh, you have you have a promise of a loan for X amount of time, and if you spend all your time talking to stakeholders, a time runs out. So you have to be thoughtful and you have to pay for the data, uh, and you have to uh uh be willing to accept data that doesn't accept your particular notion of the best thing to do. Uh an honest job by a consultant in this area will report data that someone doesn't like, uh, and uh so be it. Uh I I uh I know Ed, and uh he he wouldn't tolerate fudging a result based upon a consulting uh uh preference uh or preference by a someone who hired the consultant. Uh uh in a in a democracy, the facts are gold, and you everybody has access to the gold and you decide based on the facts. Uh there's some some breaches in that principle these days, but uh certainly with local land use decisions, we ought to be able to look each other in the eye and say, yes, that has value. I will help you figure out how to harness that value uh for the broader community here.

SPEAKER_01 20:15

These are this is great thoughts. And I just I love how you're able to kind of like describe your experience and like kind of the evolution of it. I know that you I know that you have seen things change within your space and in your time um in the role with your role in the government. And then I'm curious now, as we kind of close our time together, do you think we're making progress now uh in this space? And maybe what would be some words of encouragement for people to keep progressing um if we need to keep going? Because we do.

SPEAKER_00 20:50

Well, the noise you get from the blogosphere and television and all that uh makes you think there is not progress. You know, somebody is dismantling the EPA, and someone isn't doing this or is doing that, and so on. Uh let me put it this way. I I grew up in Pittsburgh uh in the 50s. Uh at night, uh you could watch from our home east of the city, look west, and the whole sky was flickering. It looked like uh the northern lights. That was when a steel mill was pouring an ingot outside in McKeastport or the south side of Pittsburgh, uh, and it flickered into the clouds. Uh in the daytime, my dad would go to the office if he was going to go out for lunch or for uh uh a walk or something. He'd take another white shirt with him because he would come back with coal dust on the collar and the sleeves.

SPEAKER_02 21:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 21:48

Uh that was Pittsburgh. Uh uh it went at a tremendous renaissance, one important element of which was they called it smoke control, but it was the control of air pollution, as we know it. And uh when I grew up there, and and as I left in the uh early 70s, Pittsburgh was a mess. Economically, the steel mills had fled, a lot of the pollution had stayed, especially in the water. Look at Pittsburgh now. There's a bass tournament and an art uh show uh at the point in Pittsburgh every year. Uh there are beautiful scenic rides uh all over the place, in terms of boat rides, incline rides, you name it. Uh there is clean air, not as clean as it should be. The work uh will continue. But the fact is that the doing of that is what restored Pittsburgh as a community. You don't want to live in a place where you have to take two shirts to the office.

SPEAKER_01 22:49

Right.

SPEAKER_00 22:50

You don't want to live in a place where a duck jumps in the water and dies.

SPEAKER_01 22:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:55

Uh the fact is, uh people want to live in Pittsburgh now. Besides the friendly people and the scenery and so on, it's a clean place. Uh it didn't used to be, and it's certainly cleaner than a lot of cities in the world. Uh, that's how America is going to stay what it has been, a land of resources and uh uh a healthy place to be. Uh Pittsburgh did it, uh, and uh the town fathers, the politicians, the people that own the land and so on, figure it out. It isn't just the dollar value of this stuff. That hillside has a value if we clear cut it, but it has more value if we if we make it a trail.

SPEAKER_02 23:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:38

Uh and it'll and and people will want to live here and it will eat it, it will take up carbon. All those people uh instinctively knew that. What we've added now with the cyber age is the ability to figure out just how much that value is worth, or some other competing value. Farmland versus forest, for example, wetland versus uh alfalfa field. Uh, but once you know that stuff, you have facts and you don't have to argue about which makes you feel better. No, you know, you know the value. That's what I find exciting. And even at uh even as I've been out of uh active public life for 20 years, uh I really, I really hope that uh these kinds of concepts uh will will start to inform transactions, big ones, little ones, uh, and and be part of the public, the way the public thinks about what are we going to do with that two acres.

SPEAKER_01 24:41

This is great. Jim, thank you so much for your time. Thank you for your experience. We will um share this uh podcast episode in our show notes. We'll include some of the um the articles that he mentioned from the Nature Conservancy and other show notes, and you can always find us on your website. Um but for now, thanks so much for joining us and listening. Jim, thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_00 25:04

Thanks so much, Liz. Talk to you later.

SPEAKER_01 25:08

Thanks for joining us for the Ecometrics podcast. Any resources mentioned in this episode will be in the show notes or on the Ecometrics website. We hope you'll help us keep the conversation going. See you next time.