The July Market Update sees a massive shift from previous months, according to our friends at the Cromford Report.

Here are the basics:

• Active Listings (excluding UCB & CCBS): 8,788 versus 15,422 last year – down 43.2% – and down 26.5% from 11,917 last month
• Active Listings (including UCB & CCBS): 14,279 versus 20,030 last year – down 28.7% – and down 16.8% compared with 17,171 last month
• Pending Listings: 7,933 versus 6,642 last year – up 19.4% – and up 9.8% from 7,224 last month
• Under Contract Listings (including Pending, CCBS & UCB): 13,424 versus 11,230 last year – up 19.5% – and up 7.6% from 12,478 last month
• Monthly Sales: 9,702 versus 9,476 last year – up 2.4% – and up 37.8% from 7,040 last month
• Monthly Average Sales Price per Sq. Ft.: $182.71 versus $172.17 last year – up 5.8% – and up 1.6% from $179.82 last month
• Monthly Median Sales Price: $305,000 versus $279,000 last year – up 9.3% – and up 4.1% from $293,000 last month

“Supply is crashing – down 26.5% (excluding UCB and CCBS listings) in a single month – and this is the most important factor in the state of the market. Without an improvement in supply, life will become ever more difficult for buyers while sellers will be dealing with many competing offers even if demand were to decline substantially. For sellers this is a nice problem to have, but for buyers the level of competition from other buyers presents a massive obstacle to them achieving their goals. This extends to the iBuyers who have seen their acquisition numbers collapse since the first quarter. Their market share has dropped substantially as a result.

Demand has recovered from the pandemic-induced slump of April and May and is now benefitting from the catch-up effect, replacing the sales that were deferred during the second quarter. At price points below $600,000, the market is constrained by the shortage of homes for sale.

Price measurements took a hit during April and May due to a few panic sales and the small number of high-end homes closed, but they are recovering at a fast pace now. The median sales price is juiced up by the lack of homes selling under $275,000 and the monthly median rose over 4% during the single month of June. We expect this to continue as a strong upward trend while homes under $400,000 remain in very short supply. The average $/SF is a more stable measurement but this rose 1.8% during June, as the top end of the market started to function properly again. Based on the number of luxury homes that are under contract, the average $/SF for July is expected to be substantially higher this time next month. Both list price and under contract price $/SF are now in an upward trend.

The Cromford® Supply Index has dropped from 52.9 to 44.1 over the last month. The normal reading is 100 and 41.3 represents the record low touched in April 2005. It is looking likely that we will crash through that record low during July. The Cromford® Demand Index has recovered from 83.7 to 102.5, a remarkable surge, taking us from well below normal to slightly stronger than normal (100). At the moment both the CSI and CDI numbers are diverging so the Cromford® Market Index can only go higher still. It stood at 232.7 on July 1 and the record high is 313, set in the spring of 2005. This is the first time that record has looked in danger since 2005.”

So, given all of that, what does it mean for you? Well, if you are selling a home, and if you are priced reasonably, expect multiple offers –especially if your home is listed below about $400,000.

Homes that require jumbo loans may see fewer offers as a result of a slump in the jumbo lending market. That slump is caused by new requirements of 20% down for jumbos, and we don’t know how long that will last.

We reported last month that active listings were dropping in number, but I’m not sure even Michael Orr at Cromford predicted this. So, it leaves us to wonder what the rest of the summer will be like.

If you need help thinking through your next move, contact us at 602-456-9388.

Donna Reiner, a local historian and a good friend of Get Your PHX, has written many articles over the years for the Arizona Republic and others about Phoenix history and memorials. This month, she is sharing her article on miniature golf.

Question: While playing miniature golf, if your swing goes wide, should you yell “two!”, rather than “four!”?

We use her services when we list properties of historic significance to help us tell the stories behind the homes.

We are happy that Donna is allowing us to re-publish some of her articles on a monthly basis. If you or your business ever needs a historian, let Donna know at laydeescholar “at” hotmail.com.

Dog legs, sand traps, water hazards, woods, and irons. While golf has a long history, miniature golf seems to have appeared in the early part of the 20^th century. Perusing through lots of old newspaper articles, one will find references to miniature or mini golf especially in the Los Angeles area as early as the 1920s.

What was the attraction of this “sport/game”? It took less time to play, took up far less acreage to build, needed no special equipment for the player since the putter was provided, and cost a lot less than the full sized game would.

The Valley of the Sun became a mecca for golf courses and golfers, but it also became home to a number of themed miniature golf courses.

Reed E. Price and Nephi Allen, partners in a construction firm, became intrigued with the concept and eventually built three such courses in Phoenix. Price had seen several courses in Los Angeles and decided to copy the idea (with permission). Working with Robert Gosnell, Price proposed a course next to the new Green Gables restaurant on 24^th Street and Thomas Road. Gosnell insisted that the course’s theme match the restaurant’s.

When the course opened in November 1951, young and old entered through a gothic castle entrance to play miniature golf. One of the most challenging holes was approached by hitting the ball over a drawbridge. Not an easy feat when you consider that the drawbridge when up and down on a regular schedule and you had to plan carefully when you putted in order for your ball to make it across.

In December of the following year, Price and Allen opened Westwood Acres at 2410 W. Thomas. This 18-hole course had a western theme. However, the theme later changed to a Hawaiian theme and was called Hono Lea.

Alpine Valley at 27^th Avenue and Northern opened in February 1960. Yes, you could see the Alps, a Swiss Chalet, a castle, and even a Swiss Church while playing this course.

Like a full-sized course, players had a score card. There was also a par score which thousands of kids and adults across the valley tried to achieve. Unlike those full-sized courses though, players might discover prizes for a hole-in-one such as a free game. Naturally there were always some mischievous players who tried to circumvent rules in order to cash in on the “prizes.”

Price and Allen did install the course at Legend City, but as everyone knows, that site did not last. And the other themed parks Price and Allen built eventually could not compete with newer places and closed. Times and interests change, but for those who played these courses, the fond memories remain.

Recent events have me thinking about how Americans are now facing our past in ways that we have not before.

As realtors we are strictly forbidden from treating people differently based on their race. We can lose our licenses, be fined, etc.

For us, this is an issue that is important enough to talk about, even on our real estate pages. After all, there is a huge disparity in inter-generational wealth and home ownership, which is a direct result of racists laws from our past.

We cannot, as realtors, ignore that. We have to educate ourselves and do better.

And as reasonable human beings, Michelle and I support the Black Lives Matter movement.

For us, the movement is asking Americans to reject simply having laws on the books that only pretend to protect all people, while still allowing a pervasive disparity in how different races are treated in the United States.

While I will leave it to you to decide how you want to address this in your own lives, I want to share a podcast that I think will help explain why America has never dealt with its past adequately.

It is worth 51 minutes and 31 seconds of your day to listen to this. Please, trust me. Listen while you’re taking a walk or puttering around in the garden.

This is not a podcast that covers the basics that you see in the news, or the list of needed police reforms. Although that is good to know.

No, this podcast from WNYC Studios asks what happened in the last 150 years that prevented us as a nation from truly facing our history, opting instead for an idealized telling of it.

The podcast covers how Germany dealt with its past, but we never did.

Having lived in Germany during high school, I know that Germans did confront their historic crimes in a way that the US never has.

This reporting gives me hope for the future. There is a proven way that America can confront and heal by acknowledging its past.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on this.

For the 2020 June Market Update, we are seeing some price dropping, about $7/sqft from last month. But that’s not the big news.

Michael Orr of the Cromford Report says in his latest update that this market is changing very quickly and we are starting to see some gathering storm clouds on the horizon:

“Active listings dropped only 3.9% from last month, but active listings without a contract fell over 15%. This tells us that a large chunk of the available supply went under contract during May and very little was replaced by new inventory. It is therefore getting much harder for buyers to find the home they want and when they find it, they are likely to find many other buyers trying to buy the same house. Multiple offers are piling up. The huge recovery in demand is confirmed by the under contract count which surged over 31% over the month of May and now stands 4.5% higher than this time last year.”

Anecdotally, we are seeing strong sales under $400,000. Our listings under that price went very quickly.

Regardless, if you look at the Cromford Report and the Supply & Demand charts, we still have a way to go from this point going into the June Market before the conditions are right for serious price drops.

It is particularly notable that the Cromford Index turning upward again. For those of you who are new to this blog, the Cromford Index is a measure of whether it is a seller’s market (above 100) or a buyer’s market (below 100), and by how much.

The Index is a really good predictor of where things are going to go. Expect prices to stay stable, or go up as we recover from this calamity.

I think this demonstrates what we said last month: that the reduced demand matched the reduced supply and prices stayed the same in the June market. Now that we are opening up a bit, people are buying. Until more properties come on the market, watch for prices to stay high.

Orr also expresses concerns about the continued impact of COVID-19:

“So the Greater Phoenix housing market proved its resilience over the last 3 months and short term trends strongly favor sellers. However what about those ominous dark clouds? There are several. First, COVID-19 has not gone away, in fact the global infection rate is currently hitting new peaks. The USA as a whole is seeing a slow fall in new cases, but Arizona is not. The weekly new case count for Arizona on June 2 was 4,467, the highest yet reported and more than doubled from a week ago. This is not a second wave. The first wave has not peaked yet and is currently growing at the fastest rate since April 4.”

An even bigger cloud for the housing market and a medium-term threat to its stability is the fact that so many people have stopped paying their mortgage or their rent. This would not be a problem if they started paying them again soon. But what if they have lost their job and have little saved to fall back on? With unemployment around 20%, the threat that many tenants will be evicted is very high. It is a less immediate problem, but some home-owners will receive Notices of Trustee Sale over the next 12 months because of damage to their income and thus their ability to pay their mortgage. This will probably include landlords who cannot pay their mortgage because their tenants cannot pay their rent.

What’s the long and short of it? If you are thinking of selling, you are in a strong position and may be for a while (unless unemployment persists and people cannot purchase homes).

If you are thinking of buying, don’t expect prices to drop any time soon.

In light of the pandemic, and the lack of group activities or events, here are some links that we hope will be helpful to you as we fight this pandemic in June.

If you missed our list from May, see here.

Stay safe. Stay healthy!

1) Our Commitment to Community. Both Michelle and I were shocked and saddened by yet another death of a black man at the hands of police. We are not just talking about George Floyd, but also Dion Johnson. The data showing how law enforcement and the judicial system treats people of color differently has been known for a long time, but not by enough people. There are many studies. Here is one to get you started, if you have not already been aware. Here’s a great story about how a Republican Senator experienced it. The Department of Justice under several presidents has been collecting data on this, year after year. Michelle and I are standing up for fairness and equality. We are attending protests, contacting our elected officials and shopping at locally-owned, black-owned businesses. We hope you will join us.

2) Energy Savings in the Summer. As we go in to the summer, and as many people have less money at their disposal than they did a few months ago, there are things that you can do to save on your utility bills. Some things require spending a little, but you will see a return on investment soon. Other things will save you money with just smart planning.

Look at the APS, TEP and SRP websites for tools on saving energy.

Getting utilities to offer tips and rebates on products in support of energy efficiency is like pulling teeth. They want to sell more power, not less. But we need them to generate less if we want to protect our lungs and our planet. The effort to require utilities to help you save money is called “demand side management.”

The more you know…

3) Downtown Phoenix Farmer’s Market Goes Online. The downtown market, for which we raise money at the Phoestivus Market, is adapting to COVID-19 in June with a new on-line on-line market.

I know. It’s not the same as perusing the stalls and smelling the fresh bread. But that’s shopping in the time of COVID. Well, you can still go to the market on Saturdays, but they are spread out to protect you. Still, as it gets hotter out, it gets harder for vendors to stay out in the heat waiting for you.

This way you can order ahead and pick up what you need, while still supporting the many vendors and local farmers.

4) Innovative Ways to Re-open. Local First Arizona, which has been standing strong with small, local businesses since the pandemic began, published this handy article on innovative ways to attract business as you re-open safely in June.

It includes things like creating a virtual tip jar for employees, which raised $40,000 at one local business. Local business support app, Hownd, is helping businesses sell vouchers, which can be used later, but which help businesses pay current bills.

Don’t miss their Small Business Re-opening Resources, as well. Please share this with your friends and family who are looking to re-open safely.

5) The Return of the Drive-In. Are you old enough to remember the drive-in? What nostalgia! Well, COVID has helped bring them back, at least temporarily.

The City of Phoenix has compiled a nice list of places you can go to see movies from your car, but still maintain physical distance.

I love the innovation! This will be handy when I’m going stir crazy, but don’t feel like getting on the I-17
“parking lot” to the north country.

Donna Reiner, a local historian and a good friend of Get Your PHX, has written many articles over the years for the Arizona Republic and others about Phoenix history and memorials. This month, she is sharing her article on turn-of-the (20th) century doctor, Nello Greenlee.

We use her services when we list properties of historic significance to help us tell the stories behind the homes.

We are happy that Donna is allowing us to re-publish some of her articles on a monthly basis. If you or your business ever needs a historian, let Donna know at laydeescholar “at” hotmail.com.

Sixteen years ago, the Phoenix Historic Preservation Office initiated several surveys of the cultural history of Phoenix. One group of researchers worked on compiling as comprehensive a history of the African-American community as possible. But some people were “missed.”

Nello Birthpath Greenlee was born in Asheville, North Carolina in 1886. Nothing is known about his childhood, but he did attend the University of West Tennessee College of Medicine and Surgery in Memphis where he received his medical degree in 1914.

Another blank period of Greenlee’s history followed that graduation with mentions of him in the New York City area unearthed in newspaper articles. By 1917, he was commissioned a 2^nd Lt. in the Army Officer Reserve Corps. He served in Company B367 Infantry which was a segregated unit in the 92^nd Division. Shipped overseas to France in 1918, Greenlee’s group fought in the Battle of Meuse-Argonne where he probably was exposed to the toxic gases used in the battle which his unit oversaw.

Following his discharge in 1919, Dr. Greenlee moved to the Chicago area where he eventually worked for several years as a house surgeon at the Ft. Dearborn Hospital in Chicago and also spent some time in the U. S. Government service as a physician in charge of narcotic cases.

Dr. N. B. Greenlee then moved to Los Angeles, California where he may have heard about Dr. W.C. Hackett’s newly founded Booker T. Washington Memorial Hospital. Greenlee and his wife, Dixie, arrived in Phoenix in probably 1924. He applied and received his Arizona medical license in January 1925, joining Dr. Hackett on staff at Booker T. Washington Hospital and also forming a private practice.

The Hacketts sold the Greenlees the lot in the Collins Addition where the Greenlees would reside. The Phoenix Tribune, a prominent newspaper in the Phoenix African-American community described the new home in glowing terms: a $10,000 palatial nine-room two-story home which was eventually painted white. The home would also have steam heat, a roof garden, and other modern conveniences found in rather expensive homes.

According to the newspapers of the time, Greenlee was quite the prominent person in the community. As a veteran, he joined the William F. Blake American Legion Post No. 40 and quickly became the post commander. He also invested in a lot of property and drove a stunning Pierce Arrow.

Tragically Greenlee’s health apparently suffered from that WWI gas exposure and he spent extended periods of time at the National Soldier’s Home in Sawtelle, California. During one of his confinements in California in 1933, his wife Dixie committed suicide citing despondency over financial losses. A year later, Greenlee committed suicide in Phoenix. The story of Dr. Nello B Greenlee ended then and he was eventually forgotten. Amazingly his “palatial” house remains.

I’ve been reading about a concept called “just transition” and I thought it would make a great policy blog post.

Just transition refers to investing in the people and infrastructure that used to be deployed around coal fired power plants and mines, and helping them to transition to new jobs, industries and infrastructure in a way that is just and respects the generations-worth of sacrifices that they made so we could have reliable power.

We see it a lot around “coal country”, back east. In Arizona, this is particularly important in Navajo and Hopi land.

But, let’s first dig in to a few things that are important to know.

First, coal is more expensive than natural gas, hydroelectric and nuclear power. That is not going to change.

Solar PV and wind is also competitive with natural gas for big power plants (as opposed to on your home). See page three of the last link for a great table. See this article for a good summary.

It is now competitive, often cheaper and will definitely be cheaper than almost all other options in the next few year –that is even when you add the cost of batteries to store power when the wind is now blowing and the sun is not shining.

Good ol’ market pricing: it’s is why coal plants have been closing and another 13 will close in 2020.

So, let’s retire the old debates about whether renewable energy is a good investment or not. It’s settled. Let’s save money and clean the air.

But, we are left with a fairness issue: what do we do with all of those communities that worked so hard to mine the coal and run the plants that gave us all convenient power for the last century?

This is particularly acute when you consider that utilities are closing down coal plants almost over night (by power plant standards), as they look at the cost of coal fuel vs the cost of no fuel (sun and wind).

In other words, coal-centric communities thought they had decades to find new industries, jobs and re-build infrastructure. But they don’t.

While it’s a good and necessary thing that we leave fossil fuels as quickly as possible, we need to be responsible for those communities.

Here is an inspiring video from Eastern Kentucky about how groups there fostered non-partisan conversations about how to approach just transition, and how to pay for it.

But, let’s turn our attention to Arizona, where Navajo Generating Station was recently closed down with little warning. Here’s a great blog post from a man who has been working on energy issues for decades. It gives you a great perspective on how we got to this situation.

In short, utilities since the 1940s built dirty, polluting power plants on tribal land for the purpose of powering mostly Phoenix and pumping water up-hill so that we could have more golf courses and grow high-water use cotton in the desert.

They made promises back then to the Navajo and Hopi people of economic development if they would allow these power plants and mining on their land.

But little was delivered.

All the while, the coal plants were pumping dirty coal dust in the air, strip-mining sacred land and sucking millions of gallons out of the aquifer to cool the plants, all with insufficient protection against pollution.

So, what do we owe the people of this area? They lack basic infrastructure because the investment that was promised never came. In fact, we have seen recently how the lack of infrastructure on Navajo and Hopi land have made them a hot spot for COVID-19.

You think that’s just because Navajo and Hopi governments are inefficient? Well, nobody is perfect, but if you think that, contact me and I’ll go in to great detail how Arizona state tax code seriously undermines tribal ability to invest in infrastructure, like roads, schools, water and power.

Did you know that thousands homes in the Navajo Nation sit within view of massive utility power lines, yet have no power? It is a third-world-level problem in our own state.

Whew.

Okay. That’s a lot to take in.

Lemme take a breath.

Then I want to tell you how great the Navajo and Hopi future can be, if we plan responsibly right now.

Here’s a great column from one of the owners of a new, Navajo-owned renewable energy development company called Navajo Power.

The columnist is very specific about what needs to be done. We need to support tribal development and ownership of the power plants which send us electricity. Rather than building dirty plants and sending profits to Phoenix or out of state, we need to help tribes build plants from which they can profit and build the infrastructure that they were promised 70 years ago.

Have a look at this column from GreenBiz.com about the details of a plan to sell solar energy to Los Angeles Power and Light.

We can do that through just transition.

The utilities can build two things in to their future plans: the purchase of power from tribe-owned renewable energy power companies and funds to help with transition. These funds will help remediate the open sores left from strip mining coal, build water and power infrastructure and get energy projects off the ground.

Look, we all have a strong sense of fairness, regardless of where we are on the political spectrum.

When you understand what Hope and Navajo people have been through, I’m convinced that you will agree that we can to a lot tomorrow with just a little investment today to right the wrongs of yesterday.

In light of the pandemic, and the lack of group activities or events, here are some links that we hope will be helpful to you as we fight this pandemic.

If you missed our list from April, see here.

Stay safe. Stay healthy!

1) Helping Those Less Fortunate. We know undocumented immigrants pay more than their fair share of taxes*, yet these working families are not eligible for any of the funding meant to support people in this time of need.

Regardless of where you stand on the immigration debate, I hope you can agree that it is good policy to encourage people to stay home. For that to happen, people need help paying their bills –regardless of where they are from.

The Arizona Community Foundation is collecting a relief fund to help. I just donated and I hope you will, too. We contributed!

*IRS estimates that 6M undocumented immigrants file a tax return and pay taxes. New American Economy estimates that they pay $20B in federal taxes and Inst. on Taxation and Economic Policy estimates about $11.64B in state and local taxes

2) Governor’s Executive Order. You’ve been hearing a bunch about the Governor’s Executive Order about sheltering in place and keeping a safe distance.

But, have you read it?

Well, I would not blame you if you have not. It’s long. But this update is shorter. And, if you want to see the changes that are going in to affect this week, from the horses mouth, here is the place to look.

I think the thing to remember in all of this is that the virus does not follow our laws. If we all start congregating and organizing group hugs, more people will die. As they say, “follow Fauci” when it comes to the science and public health.

I have confidence that we can adapt to our new (and temporary) normal. We are a bunch of smarties. So, let’s do that!

3) Local First Continues Support for Local Businesses. When the pandemic started, Local First jumped in to high gear. They have stayed there and will probably do so through the pandemic.

When you are thinking of what restaurants to support and local businesses to shop from, please add locals to your list.

Also, if you need support for your business, have a look at their website for all kinds of tools.

4) Local Closure News and Tours. The City of Phoenix has a web page dedicated to giving you updates on local closures and emergency regulations that the City has in place to help us all.

It was also a nice surprise to see that they are flexing their ingenuity muscles with virtual tours of certain landmarks around the city. They have lists of activities to do at home with your kids, and all kinds of goodies.

They even have recipes from your favorite restaurants. Get that?

For all the talk of a bad market, all of the properties that we brought on since the economy began to shut down in mid-March have either sold and closed or are in escrow.

As you will see in our June Market Update, there is still a shortage of listings in the market, as there was before the start of the pandemic. There are still people who need homes!

Have a look at our listings page here to see what we have –both already sold and active.

If you have been thinking of selling, I think that we can confidently predict that you will do fine now if you list.

If you are thinking of buying, don’t be surprised if prices start moving back up again.

The first one we listed is a one-bedroom condo at the mid-century Nonpareil condo complex at 11th Ave and Osborn. This is shady, well maintained, updated and so convenient to the Sprouts, Safeway and restaurants about 500 meters away.

The second one is a 3br/3ba, 1,852sf property on a 9,135sf lot with a pool, custom play area, lots of updates, a workshop and tons of storage. That had multiple offers in just two days!

Our premium property is a unique 6br/4ba, 3,036sf property with a garage on a 9,304sf lot in the Medlock Historic neighborhood. The owner made extensive renovations to open up the floor plan, to the kitchen, bathrooms and flooring. This home should close in early July.

I gotta say, we really expected this one to sit on the market for longer, but it

Stay tuned, as we expect to see more properties come on the market in the next month or so!

It is tough to talk about possible silver linings to a pandemic, especially while so many people are suffering. The reality is that this is tough for so many people.

Yet there is much discussion out there right now about whether this terrible situation might lead to changed behavior on the societal scale.

In this context, the things that are causing us to work differently might not only clean our air, but also lead to advances in efforts to prevent climate change.

Let’s start by looking at Phoenix air quality, over-all. That National Lung Association just presented their annual State of the Air report last month, in which they listed Phoenix as one of the worst places for air quality.

Ozone and particulate pollution comes from a mix of gases from cars, burning chemicals and wood and dust. When it mixes in the heat of the sun, it creates cancer-causing effects, asthma and possibly even dementia.

Phoenix has historically been terrible in this regard. The long-term political resistance to discouraging driving, to supporting mass transit, to urban planning, to planting more trees and to discouraging the use of wood burning at homes have all fed this problem.

This is our base-line. Any possible affects from changed behavior resulting from the pandemic won’t be recorded for a while. Sure, we see ozone levels lower over the last month. But, this is a problem caused by decades of behavior and will require long-term changes.

What we want to watch for is whether people will feel and remember the benefits they had when they stayed home to work and noticed the cleaner air. That is where the ozone silver lining comes in.

Right, you did not want to stay home for as long as you did. You did not want kids yelling in your ear while you are trying to maintain professionalism on a Zoom conference call.

But also, what have you been doing with that time that you don’t spend in your car and in traffic? I’ve heard so many inspiring stories from people about how they’ve re-connected with their personal time.

But, what would the city look like if 50% of office workers asked to work from home just two days more than they do now? We know we can do it and we can feel the benefits

The silver linings for climate change comes in a different way. It comes in directing federal stimulus money to investments in clean energy.

I think people would rather see stimulus money go to clean energy choices, which can save them money on energy, than to the deep pockets of CEOs of oil companies.

On one hand, the issue of the environment may drop on people’s minds as they worry about pandemic responses. Further, according to this article, “On Capitol Hill, the pandemic could threaten the fragile politics of environmental regulation and the Republican Party’s rapidly changing climate beliefs.”

Further, the pandemic could also undermine our ability to get out and prevent wildfires this summer.

But, as the previous article points out, there may be hope in all of this. According to Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Florida), “And if one silver linings can be seen through all of this, it’s the fact that we can work together and mobilize to confront a threat to our way of life in America and all across the globe.”

Articles I’ve seen point to an increasing trust of science and scientists. That trust may increase, as it should, when it comes to climate change and its solutions.

Further, I know from my conversations with people that they like the idea that Americans are coming together to solve a common problem. After COVID-19, our clean air and climate change problems will still be there, ready for us to unite around.

This article from Wired Magazine points to some of the unexpected consequences of how our fuel choices have changed over the last two months. Auto fuel usage has dropped and electricity usage has gone down as economic activity has dropped. Yet, with cheap prices for petrol comes less of an incentive to recycle plastic.

Yet, all of this leads to a unique opportunity to re-think our cities. Some cities have taken this opportunity to close more downtown streets to cars in favor of more bike and pedestrian traffic.

Just like with ozone levels, when we come out the other end of this crisis, the more people remember and feel the benefits of less drive time, the more we can all imagine a world in which we permanently have cleaner air and a reduced threat of climate change.

And those are some nice silver livings.