POLICY enables growth. For breakthroughs to happen and flourish, it is necessary for the private sector to innovate and for the public sector to get the policy and regulatory environment right. This is a tricky situation.
Get the policy wrong, and the private sector is limited or makes decisions to circumvent regulations. Examples include policy changes that triggered the Great Depression, the recent financial crisis in the U.S. or India’s 1994 financial collapse.
Get it right on the other hand, and you enable public and private organizations to produce great results. That is how the U.S. built the most reliable and affordable electricity and telecommunications systems in the world -- during the time period between 1900-1970.
But time doesn’t stand still and policies must adapt because what was great yesterday, can turn disastrous tomorrow.
Policies I played a lead role in:
Created and co-led the major foreign assistance reform effort of President Obama’s administration, USAID Forward.
As Chief of Staff for WA Senator Maria Cantwell, I was instrumental in getting the clean energy tax credits renewed.
A historic federal law was passed restructuring the electricity industry in the Pacific Northwest. I authored two white papers prioritizing investments in efficiency and renewables as well as creating a publicly accountable policy decision-making authority. Championed by others as well, both ideas became part of the final law.