Future Forward

Seyi Fabode (00:01.476)
Hello, hello Reza, how are you?

Reza (00:03.698)
Hey Seyi, I'm good, how are you doing?

Seyi Fabode (00:05.828)
I am good, I am good. We are on episode eight of Future Forward.

Reza (00:12.082)
Unbelievable. We keep rolling.

Seyi Fabode (00:13.924)
We keep rolling and this episode, we're going to touch on the future of environmental regulation. And for our new listeners, this is a podcast, a conversation really that Reza and myself have been having for years. It's called Future Forward. We explore the future of cities and we provide strategic foresight about what will happen in our cities based on the historical events and

activities that we see that have led us to the present.

Reza (00:48.658)
Yeah, I'm excited about this one, Seyi, because we kind of touched on this in the last episode, and we have touched on it almost in every episode, because if you have a city, you need some type of regulatory structure because there's just so much in that system that is happening. And we talked about it in the episode on the future of water, and you'll start that thread over there. But more importantly, it's sort of topical because of this

recent change that came about with the Chevron deference. So let's start at the start, Seyi, talk about environmental regulation and how it got started and why.

Seyi Fabode (01:33.188)
Yeah, yeah. So as you just mentioned, we did talk about it, but we mentioned the Coyahoga River fire, which was a 1969 environmental pollution experience that led to a fire in what is a hundred mile river located in the northeast of Ohio flows through Cleveland, empties into Lake Erie.

And up until the late 1960s, pollution from manufacturing and industrial activities had been essentially damaging this river body, which was also providing water to communities downstream of the river. It culminated in this fire, which most people in the industry

ascribe the eventual regulation, which we all know as the Clean Water Act, which came in 1972. Most people attribute the eventual, the agitation and the groups that started to make a lot of noise as a result of the fire that happened on the Cuyahoga River. And

It, I'd say, is sort of the genesis of what we now know as some of these activist movements that lead to eventual passing of laws and regulations for addressing a lot of the issues we face as communities and people who live in cities. So food regulation, environmental regulation, it all seems to stem from agitation.

I'll quickly reel off a few groups that were involved in the agitation that led to the Clean Water Act. The Sierra Club, this was one of the main groups. They're still around today. And there were a bunch of environmental organizations as well. The National Wildlife Federation, the Isaac Walton League and public officials. The mayor of Cleveland, his name was Carl Stokes.

Seyi Fabode (04:01.828)
back then at that point. And then the media played a big part as well. So all this agitation led to Congress taking up this decision to regulate the desire of the people, which is clean water at all times, not polluted by some of the commercial activities that was going on.

The interesting thing is Nixon vetoed the act, but a bipartisan group of Congress people signed it back into law.

every other regulatory, federal regulatory activity for the few years after that from the 1970s to the early 1980s was all coming through Congress as a result of people agitating.

Reza (05:10.546)
Interesting. So it seems, so my takeaway there is there was an event, there was community involvement that then led to legislation that led to regulation. And that's kind of how...

Seyi Fabode (05:12.964)
Yeah.

Reza (05:35.602)
that started how these regulatory, like things like the Clean Air Act, similar with energy and food and things like that, that was kind of a pattern for driving the activism and the regulation that was needed from it.

Seyi Fabode (05:40.708)
Yep. Yep.

Seyi Fabode (05:53.86)
Yes, absolutely. And this sort of overlaps with, again, we've said this almost every episode where there was some agitation and things start to sort of change and shift. So you are correct in your assessment of what that pattern was. But in 1984, under, I believe, the Reagan administration, it shifted.

Reza (06:05.554)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (06:21.092)
It was a case between Chevron USA, the oil company, and NRDC, National Resources Defense Council, where the NRDC wanted to get regulations or fines enacted against Chevron because of some pollution that was

attributed to a plant, a Chevron plant. The NRDC wanted the plant to be held responsible, but the Chevron deference, which is the name we now know that regulatory change as today, shifted the responsibility for...

fining or punishing Chevron to the agency, which is the EPA, if I remember correctly, which is responsible for implementing the Clean Water Act or the Clean Air Act. So that case shifted how agencies were left to determine

who was responsible, what the amount of accountability was supposed to be, and the consequences of any flouting of those regulations. And that, I think, is the real sort of shift here. The understanding then was the agencies, which are led by non -political individuals, are in charge of enacting

whatever regulations that ensure companies, entities, individuals followed the regulations.

Reza (08:22.386)
Yeah, yeah, interesting. So I like the way that you're framing that this was like a shift in power. And I think that's what we're going to explore in this episode is these shifts in power. So Seyi, bring us to today because I have some comments about agencies and I'm curious about the most recent episode, like we had this change with the Chevron deference. So bring us up to speed on that.

Seyi Fabode (08:28.548)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (08:32.996)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (08:38.819)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (08:46.564)
Yep. Yes. So a few days before this recording, the Supreme Court ruled that the enforcement and the creation of regulations will shift again is really what's going on here. It is especially in situations where there's some ambiguity.

Reza (09:15.026)
Mm -hmm.

Seyi Fabode (09:15.268)
that requires what would have previously required expert opinion to determine or clarify the ambiguity. So in the Chevron case against NRDC, the NRDC case against Chevron, the core ambiguity was should the plant or the chemical that is

coming from the plant be held responsible for the damage. And so it was this, the NIRDC wanted this broad definition, which was the plant, but Chevron's defense made it such that, or the Chevron's defense was that, no, it is the chemical, not the whole plant. And what the Chevron deference to Supreme Court have changed,

Reza (09:50.61)
Mmm.

Reza (09:57.938)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (10:13.604)
recently, a few days ago, is who determines the and clarifies that ambiguity that exists. And the case for those who followed is Loper Bright Enterprises versus Raymundo. And Raymundo is one of the secretaries under Biden's administration and Loper Bright Enterprises. It's a fish, I believe a fish company.

Anyway, the point, without over -complicating this, is that who has the power to interpret, clarify ambiguities, and determine the consequences as shifted from...

the individual agencies to Congress. And the general reaction to that is because of how partisan our current environment is. And I say Congress, but some of these will also go to some of the lower courts and the lower government, sorry, not agencies, the political.

Reza (11:07.858)
Hmm.

Reza (11:18.642)
Mm -hmm.

Reza (11:30.514)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (11:31.812)
judicial arm of cities, states, and the federal government. What we're reacting to, Reza, I believe, because the general reaction to this has been, this is horrible. And it is horrible because of our current political climate, not, in my opinion, not in the change in who has the power.

Reza (12:00.37)
Yeah. Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (12:01.38)
It's what we think of those who have the power now.

Reza (12:05.682)
Yeah, and I think that's the crux of it because I remember us exchanging texts and I had this visceral reaction against what the judgment was. And I just felt like this is more of the same with this current Supreme Court just stripping away power from where it should be and going in a more direction that's worse for our environment. But I think...

Seyi Fabode (12:15.716)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (12:30.98)
Yeah, yeah.

Reza (12:32.882)
like we have formed a more nuanced opinion since then, and that's what we're going to try to explore. Because there's a trade -off, I think that's what we're going to talk about, is we have these four entities. You have the legislative branch, you have the judicial branch, you have these agencies, and then you have the public and the communities. And what we're trying to explore over here is what is the right balance

Seyi Fabode (12:37.764)
Yes. Yes.

Seyi Fabode (12:57.124)
Yes. Yes.

Reza (13:02.45)
for forming environmental regulation between these groups, between these sources of power. And this judgment has shifted the power and the initial reaction could be, this is not good, but I want to explore with you like, what is good and not good ultimately, which is what I always come back to is like, what is good and not good for our communities based on what

Seyi Fabode (13:09.988)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (13:25.988)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (13:30.564)
That is a, it's a fantastic sort of framing of, of why we're even taking this on as a topic today, because we, we got clear once it came out, it became immediately clear that it is now the courts that will exercise their own judgment in the interpretation of some of the statutes and the regulations.

Reza (13:31.474)
What has occurred here?

Seyi Fabode (13:59.268)
Another thing that is clear is that it is now limiting the power of the agencies involved up until now in determining those statutes and the interpretation of those statutes and clarifying the ambiguities. What I think hasn't been clear in most of the conversation about this is the elevation of

the ability and the input of communities, advocacy groups, entities that are saddled with and have chosen to do the work of ensuring cities work for all. This actually gives them more room to, I believe, advocate for the things they care the most about.

Reza (14:48.658)
Mm -hmm.

Reza (14:58.162)
Interesting.

Seyi Fabode (14:59.556)
working with the experts in those fields. And the reaction was to the first two of those points. The reality is if we reframe it and as advocacy groups, entities that work in these spaces in water advocacy, energy, poverty, advocacy, we actually now have a lot more

input and a little bit more power, I would dare say, to advocate for the things we care about instead of what was traditional approach where it was the experts in those agencies that determined what got taken up as rules and regulations.

Reza (15:36.53)
Yeah.

Reza (15:49.586)
Interesting, I love that Seyi, you know, your optimism. I love your optimism, bringing that, like, there is something good that can come from this even though it looks bad off the bat. And so I wanna sort of pull on that thread. So it almost seems like you would think that agencies would be advocates for these communities, but they don't seem to be. And I wondered, like, agencies sometimes,

Seyi Fabode (15:53.22)
Hahaha!

Seyi Fabode (15:57.956)
Absolutely. Absolutely.

Reza (16:17.554)
you know, have political appointees, that even though they have experts working at those agencies, they're led by political appointees that might not be aligned with what a community would want to do. And so you go through these swings in agencies of like, you know, a democratic government with a democratic appointee and a Republican government with a Republican appointee. And so you have these swings where, you know, maybe you don't have

Seyi Fabode (16:26.404)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (16:40.676)
Yep.

Yep.

Reza (16:46.258)
a way for communities to engage consistently. And so what you're saying is maybe through legislation and judicial bodies, there might be more of an avenue for a community to agitate at a level that can address the challenges that they face at their community level. Is that?

Seyi Fabode (16:49.636)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (17:05.316)
and act change.

Seyi Fabode (17:10.084)
I truly believe so. That is exactly what I'm suggesting. And we can actually dive into some examples here, which I think is what you're offering that I should take on. So I'll use the San Joaquin Valley region, California. It is the heartland of most of the fruits and food that comes from the...

California, the state of California. The wild and crazy thing that's been going on, and this came about through some work we were doing when I was running Varuna, and we were working with Imagine H2O, which is this fantastic incubator out of California that focuses on water. And Kelly, the lady who was in charge of this, she made it known and

introduced us to some individuals who lived and worked in the San Joaquin Valley region. In a region where you have companies moving tens of millions of gallons of water daily across the state with through pipes, the farmers who are working on those farms did not have water coming out of the taps in their homes.

Reza (18:39.506)
Cheers.

Seyi Fabode (18:40.612)
And so they were suffering from what we, I believe, call water poverty in this case. And I'm not even going to touch water quality because that's a whole other slew of issues there. But this was water poverty as a result of the actions of some companies. And the only people who were pushing to rectify this were

Reza (18:50.834)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (19:09.444)
advocacy groups who were trying to work with us at Varuna to get data about the state of water in the state, the situation of water in the state, to take this as part of the information they would take to legislative groups, entities in charge, the EPA, to try and address this. But they were getting nowhere. They were getting nowhere.

Reza (19:19.57)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (19:38.948)
With this change, their advocacy, their agitation will have to be taken up at the local level, at the local judicial level. It will have to be taken up before it could just be brushed off. And I'm hopeful and positive that this shift leaves room for a lot more people to

stand in front of the people who make the regulations and say, this isn't right. Here's the data to say, this is how the community is suffering from this injustice or environmental issue. How can we enact laws to address that? That, I think, is a shift that we should take advantage of as we do the work here.

Reza (20:31.154)
So this allows some decentralization of power down to a local level to address an issue that maybe would not be sort of get any voice at a federal level. So, yeah.

Seyi Fabode (20:35.556)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (20:44.004)
Yes, yes. It does raise one thing, because where we will now see most of the struggle is localized interpretation that removes the standardized approach to enacting regulations. So a few episodes ago, you talked about

Reza (20:58.258)
Mm.

Reza (21:08.818)
Yeah, that's a trade -off.

Seyi Fabode (21:11.972)
Yeah, you talked about just the value of standards and how it allows us to move things forward. Well, when the local advocacy group in West Texas figures out a way to enact some laws that do no good for the communities in East St. Louis, and they have to do the work themselves.

Reza (21:18.002)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (21:40.228)
the localized interpretations will leave room for a lot of inefficiencies.

Reza (21:40.498)
Hmm.

Reza (21:46.258)
Yeah, yeah, so it's like the trade off. Like it will create inefficiencies, will it improve the quality of life at the level of those communities? Like will they actually make them thrive better or will the inefficiencies make it even harder? It reminds me of one thing, Shai, that you brought up on the last episode.

where we were talking about stagnation in regulation in water. And there is value in standards, but we also had stagnation. So I want to kind of counter with that because that was like, that's a failure of centralized standards.

Seyi Fabode (22:17.412)
Yes. Yes. Yes.

Seyi Fabode (22:27.108)
we did.

Seyi Fabode (22:30.756)
Yeah, it is. It is, it is. And so the less optimistic side of me will say that lack of standardization and the confusion that this change in the law in the Chevron deference causes is the point.

Seyi Fabode (23:02.948)
just the dissipation of the energy of advocacy groups and the localization and the confusion that this causes is really sadly the point. So where we've failed on the water side to address

a lot of the evolving situations due to environmental and climate change and some of the water scarcity issues and the water quality problems we've been having.

Even though there were not a lot of laws being passed, the ones that were there sort of held things together for the most part. So we weren't seeing enough innovation in the U .S. especially, but even just having those standards held things together for as much as it could here in the U .S. and we see that breaking now. But as we mentioned on that same

podcast episode in Israel, knowing what the base expectations were for water quality standards and the spur of just innovation that happened to meet those standards at the national level is a model for what can happen when there's federal standardized regulations and laws and you don't lose the innovation.

Reza (24:49.01)
Yeah. Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (24:49.22)
It's possible, but the less optimistic side of me says in the US, we haven't innovated as much as we should. The regulations in place aren't as strict and consequential as they should be. And now we're going into a legal era where we will be dissipating.

the power of the experts and the agencies into these judicial arms that in some cases will choose to consult with experts, in some cases will choose not to. And further, and I hope this is not the case, but it might further erode our ability to protect the most vulnerable through regulations and environmental regulations.

Reza (25:45.106)
Yeah. So Seyi, if we try to project forward, if we revisit this episode in a year, what are some things that you'd be watching for to see, are we moving in that positive, optimistic, Seyi direction or a bit of this doom and gloom of will we not be able to protect our communities in the ways that we have done?

Seyi Fabode (26:05.412)
Hahaha

Reza (26:14.994)
relatively well so far.

Seyi Fabode (26:15.044)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yes, I'll keep I'll definitely keep it very optimistic because I do believe in the midst of chaos is a ton of opportunity as well. The first one, there are a few things I'd love for us to look back on and see that have happened. Experimentation is one policy experimentation, especially a can can we borrow if a place on the

Reza (26:28.018)
Yeah. Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (26:45.124)
South Side of Chicago figures out some regulatory frameworks that ensures clean, available water for the communities. Can we experiment with those policies in other parts of the country? I think that would be a positive benefit of this. We will need, the second thing is we will need Congress to draft clearer legislation, working with

Reza (27:12.178)
Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (27:14.052)
agency experts so that it's more of a collaborative approach instead of what has been contentious up until this point. That would be the second one. And that same collaborative approach that Congress needs to have applies to the third element of my optimistic view on what this Chevron deference will bring. It's the courts.

having a more balanced interpretive role in crafting these policies with agency expertise. I will always go back to that because expertise will never stop being required in these core critical areas. And the agencies, because they have experts and

Reza (27:46.546)
Mmm.

Reza (27:55.474)
Yes.

Seyi Fabode (28:10.148)
For the most part, the people who work in the agencies are experts, not political appointees. The fourth point here is that I trust they will stay resilient despite these changes and continue to do the good work. And I actually think this might lead to innovation at the agencies as well, because they will need to get creative. The thing is,

Reza (28:34.002)
Interesting.

Seyi Fabode (28:39.748)
Once power or resources are removed,

Most businesses do this a lot. Once we're starting to not have as much power, market power, or resource availability as we think we have, we get creative to stay ahead. And I believe that creativity will show up in the innovative ways the experts at the agencies will approach their work. And I'd say, again,

Reza (29:00.082)
Yeah. Yeah.

Seyi Fabode (29:14.148)
The thing we all reacted to was the political state of judicial bodies. I do optimistically hope that the negative effects will take longer to manifest, given the positive effects, more time to get ahead.

Reza (29:20.402)
Yes.

Reza (29:37.458)
Mm -hmm.

Seyi Fabode (29:43.396)
the final point here. But yeah, those are the things I'm hoping we see in a few years.

Reza (29:43.57)
I love that. I love that.

Reza (29:49.234)
Yeah, I love that. Those are very, you know, I love that we have taken this what seems to be dark and we've explored what could be light and good in the future. And it's something that we can revisit and we can sort of take these five points and evaluate, like are we headed in the right direction?

Seyi Fabode (30:01.732)
Yes, yes.

Seyi Fabode (30:15.044)
Yes.

Reza (30:15.698)
or not. So thanks for sharing that, Seyi That's a really good way to kind of bring us to a point of hope and a clear way of evaluating where we could be in the future. Because we don't know how this is going to play out, but this is a way for us to evaluate what could be.

Seyi Fabode (30:30.852)
in the future. Good luck.

Seyi Fabode (30:35.588)
Yes, yes. And I thank you for always making sure we don't just focus on the obvious. It's the nuances and the fact that for you, you were like, how does this impact communities? Tell me that. That is what I want to know. And as much as we can respond with a clear -eyed view of what's going on.

and share that with our audience. I think we will continue to do that because of your spurring. So I'm pretty excited about when we look back on this and say, where did we get it wrong? Where are we missing the boat? Or, wow, this worked out as positively as we expected.

Reza (31:27.73)
Yeah, I can't wait. I'm looking forward to that.

Seyi Fabode (31:29.54)
Yeah. Fantastic. Fantastic.

Reza (31:34.226)
Well, cool, Seyi, this brings us to the last section of our podcast, which is Mailbag. And both of us have mailbags for this week. One was a comment that a friend in the product community, Glenn, posted to the episode six, Autonomous Cities, I'd posted that on LinkedIn. And he,

Seyi Fabode (31:44.324)
Mailbag.

Reza (32:03.986)
you know, he responded that cities are non -deterministic, which I think is a very short statement, but there's a lot in it. And I know that we're going to do an episode that talks about it because I think what he was trying to say is that, you know, AI is non -deterministic and cities are non -deterministic. They're systems that are not rules -based. They have these nuances. They have these sort of

Seyi Fabode (32:08.74)
Yes.

Reza (32:30.93)
knock on effects, they have unintended consequences, they have ways of, things are magnified and diminished. And just like...

AI, which, you know, that's my day job. AI is non -deterministic and not rules -based, so you have to have a different approach to sort of building an AI product. And something that I want to explore, thanks, Glenn, for sending that along, because it spurred an idea for a future episode where, you know, we've tried to apply technology to cities, but we probably have tried in deterministic ways to do so. So is there...

Seyi Fabode (33:09.476)
Yes.

Reza (33:11.154)
Do we have better approaches to making cities thrive through AI? And we tried to touch on that in the Autonomous Cities episode, but maybe there's more there that we can explore.

Seyi Fabode (33:25.444)
Absolutely. Yeah, I think we should. I think we, we, and thanks again for the comment, Glenn. We have to explore from that lens. So we'll have to do a subsequent episode diving into that. And we'll probably start to have some guests on too, who are experts in some of these areas and can help us to move that conversation.

a little bit deeper because as you all know, our listeners, these topics are so expansive. We're trying to distill it into conversations that make sense and give us something that we can all wrap our arms around, really. But thank you, Glenn, for the great mailbag. Simple statement, but vast in its implications.

Reza (34:01.746)
Yeah.

Reza (35:09.234)
Yes, yes, yep. Take a minute to share it with a friend who you think will enjoy it. Make that connection and keep the mailbags coming. We want your input, your feedback, your great ideas. We're not the experts. We're trying to learn with you and we hope we all learn together. Thanks everyone. Thanks Shai. All right, bye.

Seyi Fabode (35:32.003)
Thank you. Thanks Reza. Bye.

Seyi Fabode (35:56.456)
Yes.