Episode Details

Your Heard Tell for Friday, July the 29th, 2022 is turning down the noise of the news cycle and getting to the information we need to discern the time we live in by parsing out the uproar over the Pact Act procedural vote in the US Senate that stopped VA funding and burn pit legislation from going forward. We'll talk about the funding and financial bloat added to the bill, whether or not that was the right time to fight that battle, and what it means in real world, practical terms beyond just the politics and outrage on social media on an issue that has been decades trying to get recognition. Vladimir Putin is once again using refugees as weapons, and the millions flowing from Ukraine into Europe are not just a byproduct of war but a centerpiece to Putin's plans. We work through a piece by Ivana Stradner and Iulia Sabina-Joja that breaks down the history and intention of people being used to destabilize governments and the world order opposed to Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine. Our guest today is Nolan Gray, author of the book Arbitrary Lines: How Zoning Broke the American City and How to Fix It joins to explain beyond just the internet arguments how zoning and planning affect not just our cities and communities, but also the cultural and political debates we have about everything from property rights, to taxes, to quality of life. Nolan breaks down the nomenclature of what zoning is and isn't, compares cities like Houston who has little zoning to other cities like Minneapolis, Fayetteville, and Hartford who have varied and different zoning issues. Nolan also explains that while zoning is often citied as need to improve cities, it is usually the chief obstacle to building more affordable, vibrant, equitable, and sustainable cities. Also, Nolan breaks down a real world example of the how zoning laws and political ideology clash using the umbiquitous American zoning product - the stripmall. Meanwhile, Chris Cuomo is back, sort of, as the disgraced and fired former CNN host has a new TV gig, and one of the UK largest grocery stores collects over a million free meals from customers for those in need. All that and more on this Friday edition of Heard Tell.

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