Monday, November 10, 2008

Writing Sample #15: November Cheat Sheet (QSR, November 2008)

Oh, how the times have changed.

Last January, QSR took a closer look at the presidential frontrunners and their thoughts on key restaurant industry issues. At the time, Senator Barack Obama was largely seen as a longshot while Senator John McCain’s candidacy appeared in ruin.

But the winds of change swirled and tossed around one of the most anticipated presidential elections in decades. Beginning with the Iowa caucuses, Obama surged and held off a Hillary Clinton charge while McCain resurrected his campaign and locked up the Republican nod in quick time.

With the rookie Senator from Illinois and the veteran legislator from Arizona earning their respective parties’ presidential nominations, a heated contest commands the nation’s attention. As the race for the White House intensifies and voting day nears, we revisit Senator Obama and Senator McCain, taking a closer look at each man’s views on critical industry issues.

American with Disabilities Amendments Act and Notification Act
The ADA Amendments Act, a compromise reached following on the heels of the more drastic Americans with Disabilities Restoration Act, maintains the previous definition of a disability as well as the requirement that an individual must demonstrate that he or she is qualified for the job. After passing the House in June, the ADA Amendments Act now sits in the Senate.

Both Obama and McCain, a co-sponsor of the ADA in 1990, have voiced support for expanding the landmark legislation and strengthening its implementation. While McCain has cited a more thorough, specific definition of “disability,” Obama favors the aforementioned ADA Restoration Act, which seeks to redefine what constitutes a protected impairment under the ADA—a redefinition many employers feel is far too loose as it could apply to employees with neck strains, eyeglasses, or even tennis elbow.

The ADA Notification Act, meanwhile, would provide restaurants up to 90 days to review and repair alleged accessibility issues while helping to protect restaurants from frivolous ADA violation lawsuits. McCain has maintained his support for the cause, which would allow business owners the opportunity to become ADA compliant without the threat of costly legal tussles. While Obama, a former civil rights lawyer, has not spoken exclusively on the ADA Notification Act, he has repeatedly indicated his desire to appoint judges and justices who uphold the “essential message of liberty and inclusion.”

Biofuels
Since his election to the U.S. Senate in 2004, Obama trumpeted his support for biofuels, citing Brazil as a nation that has quickly escaped its complete reliance on crude oil from outside nations. Obama has been consistent in his message to find new energy sources and weaken the dependence on foreign oil. Even prior to the start of the primary season, Obama proposed a $150 billion fund to finance new biorefineries and stated his desire to see all new cars run on E85.

Today, Obama’s campaign site hosts this message: “Advances in biofuels…and other new technologies that produce synthetic petroleum from sustainable feedstocks offer tremendous potential to break our addiction to oil. Barack Obama will work to ensure that these clean alternative fuels are developed and incorporated into our national supply as soon as possible.”

While McCain, once a critic of ethanol, supports wider use of biofuels, he rejects any mention of subsidies or mandates for ethanol production; instead, McCain favors such money traveling to increased research and development of renewable energies. In particular, McCain worried that biofuel mandates would challenge the simple economic rules of supply-and-demand. When the 2007 Senate energy bill called for a five-fold increase in ethanol production by 2022, McCain shot back that ethanol was on its way to divulging one-third of the nation’s corn crop in 2008.
“This subsidized (ethanol) program—paid for by taxpayer dollars—has contributed to pain at the cash register, at the dining room table, and a devastating food crisis throughout the world,” he said.

Food Safety
In February 2008, the U.S. Department of Agriculture led a recall of 143 million pounds of frozen beef, a move that prompted Obama to release this statement: “When I am President, it will not be business as usual when it comes to food safety. I will provide additional resources to hire more federal food inspectors. I will also call on the Department of Agriculture to examine whether federal food safety laws need to be strengthened, in particular to provide greater protections against tainted food being used in the National School Lunch Program.”

Obama soon followed with the introduction of a Senate bill in July aimed at further addressing food safety. While he did not suggest any changes at the procedural level of food processing, he did propose a $25 million grant for state and local food safety agencies to boost capacity in order to improve detection, outbreak communication and coordination, and surveillance.

McCain, who spoke at this year’s NRA convention in May, has not addressed the food safety issue and his campaign office did not offer comment on the issue.

Health Care
Obama has pledged to create a national health care plan, one which includes: guaranteed eligibility; comprehensive benefits; affordable premiums, co-pays, and deductibles; and the creation of a National Health Insurance Exchange to help those individuals who wish to purchase a private insurance plan. He has also discussed expanding Medicaid and creating a Small Business Health Tax Credit to provide, his campaign says, “small businesses with a refundable tax credit of up to 50 percent on premiums paid by small businesses on behalf of their employees.” The new credit, he feels, “will provide a strong incentive to small businesses to offer high quality health care to their workers and help improve the competitiveness of America’s small businesses.” He has said he would demand employers make a meaningful contribution to their employees’ health care needs.

In contrast, McCain has repeatedly insisted that Americans themselves should be in charge of their health care needs, believing that competition would restore control to the patients and allow them to select the plan that best fills their needs. Striking against universal health care plans, McCain charged, “We will replace the inefficiency, irrationality, and uncontrolled costs of the current system with the inefficiency, irrationality, and uncontrolled costs of a government monopoly.”

McCain has also championed portability in health care, plans that would move with the individual from job to job. He has also trumpeted the benefits of Health Savings Accounts, tax-preferred accounts used to pay insurance premiums and other health costs. He believes affordable health care is possible without a federal mandate and has indicated his wish to provide $2,500 refundable tax credits for individuals and $5,000 for families.

Immigration Reform
Few issues evoke as much debate and chatter among industry insiders than immigration, given that immigrants—both legal and illegal—constitute a healthy chunk of the restaurant industry’s workforce. That reality has continually pushed immigration to the front of the 2008 presidential election, leading both McCain and Obama to articulate clear positions on the issue.

McCain, no stranger to the issue as his home state of Arizona borders Mexico, sponsored the bi-partisan Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006, one that promised to increase security along the U.S.-Mexican border, allow long-time, law abiding illegal immigrants a path to citizenship, and increase the number of guest workers. Obama, in fact, voted in favor of that bill.

Today, McCain sings a similar tune, though he insists amnesty has never been a part of the discussion. At a Republican debate in January, McCain outlined his priorities.

“We will secure the borders first when I am president,” he said. “Then we will move onto the other aspects of this issue, as importantly as tamper-proof biometric documents, which then, unless an employer hires someone with those documents, that employer will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

Obama has vowed to “fix the system” in such a way that it eliminates the need to address the immigration problem again in the near future. He has proposed tougher policies on employers who hire illegal immigrants. During a Democratic primary radio debate on NPR, Obama summarized his overall position, noting specifically his belief that immigrants—illegal or not—should have a pathway to citizenship and share in basic American rights.

“I think that if [the immigrants] are illegal, then they should not be able to work in this country. That is part of the principle of comprehensive reform, which we're going to crack down on employers who are hiring them and taking advantage of them,” he said. “But I also want to give them a pathway, so that they can earn citizenship, earn a legal status, start learning English, pay a significant fine, and go to the back of the line. But they can then stay here and they can have the ability to enforce a minimum wage that they're paid, make sure the worker safety laws are available, make sure that they can join a union.”

Minimum Wage Increase
If elected president, Obama has said he will raise the minimum wage, something he often prefers to call a “living wage,” to $9.50 an hour by 2011 and index it to inflation. He has repeatedly championed minimum wage increases.

“We shouldn't raise the minimum wage every 10 years,” Obama told a Wisconsin crowd during the primary season. “We should raise it every year to keep up with inflation. If you work in this country, you should not be poor.”

In his August speech at the Democratic National Convention, vice presidential nominee Joe Biden chided McCain, his longtime Senate colleague, for voting against Democratic-led minimum wage hikes a total of 19 times. In truth, McCain’s Senatorial career is peppered with various positive votes in favor of a minimum wage increase, including one that would lift the figure to $7.25 per hour. As is common on Capitol Hill, some of his votes for or against the minimum wage were tucked inside other bills, such as a 2007 one on war funding.

In general, McCain has supported minimum wage hikes, just at a more modest rate than his colleagues to the left. In 2007, he joined 27 other Republicans in voting—unsuccessfully—to allow individual States the rights and flexibility to determine minimum wage. The Arizona Senator has frequently said his rejection to a more robust minimum wage increase arrives from his concern that it would boost employers’ labor costs and thereby limit the creation of new jobs.

Paid Sick Leave
While up to 46 million American workers do not receive paid sick days, legislators in a dozen states have proposed laws requiring employers to provide them. Current federal legislation, called the Healthy Families Acts, remains on the table that would require businesses to provide seven paid sick days each year to employees who work at least 30 hours a week. Obama has touted his support for such legislation while McCain, true to his form of opposing federal mandates, has said such rules further stifle employers, particularly during challenging economic times.

Restaurant Depreciation
While depreciation schedules for restaurants have remained rather consistent over recent years, the NRA continues to work for a depreciation schedule that would fall to 15 years from the current 39 ½ year threshold. In April, Maryland restaurant owner and NRA member Fred Rosenthal told a Congressional hearing that “shortening the write-off of restaurant buildings and improvements to 15 years would create immediate economic activity within the industry, which in turn would reverberate throughout the economy.”

Neither McCain nor Obama have clarified their positions on restaurant depreciation. Yet, McCain has said he would allow businesses to immediately expense the full cost of three- and five-year business equipment purchased between 2009 and 2013. After 2013, businesses would again have to depreciate equipment over time. His campaign, however, offered no further comment on the matter. Obama’s camp did not respond to QSR’s request for the Democratic nominee’s stance on the issue.

Writing Sample #14: Hopes on hold one year after I-355 extended (Southtown Star and Sun Times News Group, Nov 10, 2008)

Last Nov. 11 was seen as a day that would forever alter the Southland landscape, one celebrated with parades, community events, civic speeches, and a horde of bikers and runners commanding a roadway then-untouched by commuters.

Optimism ruled the day. However, that optimism quickly acquiesced to reality and a focus on patience.

When the I-355 extension opened last year, many thought it would jumpstart a then-sagging real estate market. Towns long limited by few major access routes and blanketed by two-lane roads, particularly the four communities with exits - Lemont, Lockport, Homer Glen, and New Lenox - welcomed the roadway with open arms, championing its future prospects.


The immediate thought was that the 12.5-mile toll road, which runs south from Interstate 55 to Interstate 80, would help the four towns emerge from Chicagoland's shadows and offer a hearty boost to the local housing market. Well, the unveiling has been anticlimactic to say the least.

"Sometimes the anticipation gets ahead of itself," said Lockport Mayor Tim Murphy, himself a former real estate broker. "Realistically, the development is probably where it should be, but those grander thoughts will come with time, population and as land becomes scarce."


When work began on the extension in 2004, the Southland market saw an upswing in interest that persisted for years. Land prices increased, business entered, and a wider ranging tax base established roots.

In Lockport, for instance, a $100 million commercial development project anchored by Home Depot and Target and two medical facilities offered widespread hope. Conventional thought held that the momentum would continue and that the new roadway would help the four communities - as well as their immediate neighbors - avoid the sluggish real estate numbers that handcuffed other towns.

"The common thinking was that when the roadway was completed it would 'superspark' the area, but much of the massive growth has slowed," said veteran real estate agent Dan Hardy of Re/Max All Properties in New Lenox.

While the Veterans Memorial Tollway's presence has earned high marks for its ease of travel and its ability to connect the Southland to the greater Chicagoland region, it has failed to deliver the housing boom many anticipated. There's been an impact, both real estate agents and builders insist, just not the one many had foreseen, though some contend that the roadway has helped insulate the area from even greater depths.

"It hasn't been the big immediate boom so many thought it would be, but it's coming in dribs and drabs," said Lockport-based real estate agent Sue Dufault of Coldwell Banker Honig-Bell. "But we would certainly be worse off if we didn't have this connection; [the presence of I-355 has] helped absorb some of the hit."

To be fair, I-355's immediate inability to lure a strong number of homebuyers to the Southland is just that: an immediate struggle and one significantly impacted by a greater housing market in turmoil and financial fear. Long-term prospects are far more positive.


"The impact will come and the market will turn itself around," Hardy said."People are spreading the word about these communities and whenever you have easier access to a community, it's going to spur the growth rate."

In fact, Lemont, Lockport, Homer Glen, and New Lenox boast many of the same features that make for an attractive housing destination: homes giving more bang-for-the-buck value than in other Chicagoland towns, highly rated schools, and increased shopping, dining and recreational amenities.


In spite of the rapid growth that characterized the tail end of the 1990s and the opening years of the millennium, many prospective homebuyers rejected the idea of settling in one of the communities, often citing transportation access as one of their chief concerns. With the extension of I-355, however, that lingering objection has wilted.

The issue now, one year after I-355's celebrated opening, is when will the roadway deliver on its potential as it relates to a recovering real estate market? One year ago the talk was "Once I-355 is here ..." Today, the talk is "Once this market gets going again ..." After all, it's always something; it's never nothing. Some industry folks see a rebound coming within a year; others suggest the housing crunch could continue for another three to five years.


Whenever the real estate renaissance begins, local agents all agree that Lemont, Lockport, Homer Glen and New Lenox will inherit a unique ability to capitalize on better economic times and witness the roadway deliver on its still-mounting potential.

"We'll see a major influx of people when they're not afraid to move and believe they can sell their home," Dufault said.