Roundup: A blockbuster week for SCOTUS, young climate activists notch second win, food as medicine and Boston transit's 'googly' eyes

It’s Saturday, June 29, and we’d like to welcome you to the weekly State and Local Roundup. We start with—what else?—the Supreme Court, which handed down several decisions during this blockbuster week that will affect state and local governments.

ICYMI: Route Fifty has covered some of the high-profile cases. Friday, the court upheld camping bans that cities use to move homeless people off of public land. Another ruling significantly scaled back the scope of an anti-corruption law for state and local officials. And a third decision threw out a lawsuit by conservative state attorneys general alleging that federal agencies trying to stop the spread of disinformation online were violating the First Amendment’s protections for free speech.

But while the high court on Friday handed a win to several cities and states, which had issued friend-of-the-court briefs in support of anti-camping laws, the federal government didn’t fare as well.?

Federal regulations overturned: The six-member conservative majority sharply limited the regulatory power of federal agencies, upending a system that’s been in place for 40 years in which courts were supposed to defer to the expertise of agency officials in interpreting ambiguous laws.

“Agencies have no special competence in resolving statutory ambiguities. Courts do,” wrote Chief Justice John Roberts, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.

The decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo could affect regulations governing the environment, health care, financial markets, consumer rights and workplace safety.

Continue reading here.

News to Use

Trends, Common Challenges, Cool Ideas, FYIs and Notable Events

• LGBTQ+ RIGHTS: Supreme Court will take up state bans on gender-affirming care. The high court on Monday jumped into the fight over transgender rights, agreeing to hear an appeal from the Biden administration seeking to block state bans on gender-affirming care. The justices’ action comes as Republican-led states have enacted a variety of restrictions on health care for transgender people, school sports participation, bathroom usage and drag shows. The case before the high court involves a law in Tennessee that restrict puberty blockers and hormone therapy for transgender minors. The federal appeals court in Cincinnati allowed laws in Tennessee and Kentucky to take effect after they had been blocked by lower courts.
• CLIMATE CHANGE: Hawaii reaches first settlement in youth climate case. A deal with young climate activists has been reached in a first-of-its kind legal settlement, giving youth a role in curbing planet-warming emissions while avoiding a major trial. The agreement announced late last week requires the Hawaii Department of Transportation to develop a plan to fully decarbonize ground, sea and interisland air travel by 2045. It also creates a youth council to provide feedback to the state agency. The settlement marks a major victory for the 13 young plaintiffs in the case, which had been scheduled to go to trial—the second proceeding of its kind in the U.S.— in Honolulu this past Monday. In the first U.S. youth climate trial, which took place last year in Montana, a court ruling said the state had violated young people’s rights by preventing analysis of climate effects in environmental reviews of energy projects.
• PUBLIC HEALTH: “Food as medicine” gains acceptance in state legislatures. With America facing an obesity epidemic, it’s no wonder some are embracing the concept that food—simple, healthy, nutritious food—is medicine in and of itself, a philosophy that’s growing in popularity among health care providers. Studies have found that tailoring meals for patients battling obesity or diabetes can have a tremendous, positive impact on their health. State legislators across the country are beginning to embrace the idea, introducing legislation to make food covered by state-run health plans or establish pilot programs to explore the idea. So far, eight states have considered bills that would pave the way for coverage of “food as medicine,” and only Colorado has enacted such a bill.
• DROUGHT: A crucial drought-monitoring tool can’t keep up with drying West. Policymakers and elected leaders in Western states use the U.S. Drought Monitor to make critical decisions about water use, campfire bans, declarations of emergency and more. And multiple federal agencies use the map to determine how much financial aid is filtered to ranchers and farmers in times of drought. But what was once considered an exceptional, rare drought is no longer so rare, according to a study published this spring in AGU Advances, a scientific journal. An “exceptional drought”—the most severe category of drought, depicted in dark red—should occur in a region only 2% of the time, according to the monitor’s guidelines. But some areas of the Western U.S. have been in exceptional drought 18% of the time.

Continue reading here.

Picture of the Week

The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, or MBTA, has added “googly” eyes to five vehicles. The transit agency says after receiving public suggestions, its team found a safe way to install the googly eyes on a limited number of Green Line and Commuter Rail vehicles. The MBTA says it hopes the small gesture can "bring moments of joy to our riders daily commutes."

Government in Numbers

110 million

The number of people, or about one-third of the U.S. population, that were affected by pollution from the East Palestine, Ohio, train derailment. Federal investigators confirmed Tuesday that a hot railcar wheel bearing sparked a fire and caused the massive derailment of a Norfolk Southern train carrying tank cars with hazardous materials in 2023. A thick, tall plume of black smoke billowed from the accident site for days and forced the evacuation of thousands of residents. Now, scientists say that traces of this pollution was found across 16 states, spanning 540,000 square miles from Wisconsin to Maine to South Carolina. The scientists tracked the pollution from the fire by testing rain and snow samples from approximately 260 sites across the country in the two weeks following the derailment. The analysis, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, estimates that the fire impacted about 14% of U.S. land area.

ICYMI

Building emergency housing to meet the unique needs of older adults

A silver tsunami of older adults experiencing homelessness is starting to crash across the U.S. Here’s how one state is trying to soften the blow.

BY KAITLYN LEVINSON

How AI can help and hurt the environment

Artificial intelligence could put a greater strain on electricity, water and other resources already under pressure from data centers. But the technology also presents opportunities to address environmental challenges.

BY CHRIS TEALE

Lessons learned from the Medicaid unwinding period

A new report highlights how states have conducted post-pandemic eligibility renewals with the help of federal waivers and data.

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