Zach Patton

Recent Articles

• New Species of Cockroach in NYC: The Jokes Write Themselves
• Jan 11, 2010
• New York City has shed its pop-culture image as a dingy, dirty burg where all the streets have rats and all the apartments are full ...
• 4 Comments

• Blagojevich and Trump: Can Your TV Handle the Hair?
• Jan 5, 2010
• As you most likely have already read, disgraced former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich is finally getting his day in the reality-show sun. A federal judge ...

• Illinois Inmates Getting Too Much Soy?
• Dec 30, 2009
• Prison inmates at the Danville Correctional Center in Illinois are being fed too much soy, according to a new lawsuit from the Weston A. Price ...

• NYC's Newer, Grosser Obesity Ads
• Dec 17, 2009
• Both my colleague Penelope Lemov and I have both written about New York City's recent ad campaign aimed at curbing obesity. The poster ads, ...
• 4 Comments

• Pot Restaurant Testing the Boundaries of Medical Marijuana
• Dec 16, 2009
• Colorado voters approved a medical-marijuana law in 2000. But since then, THC-users have had to make do getting their drugs from medical dispensaries. The facilities were ...

• Would Online Gay Marriage Be a 'Game-Changer' for States?
• Dec 15, 2009
• What if gay couples could get married in a state without ever setting foot there? Two University of Michigan professors say that should be an ...

• Phoenix Drivers Confused by Light Rail
• Dec 11, 2009
• The light-rail line in Phoenix has been running for a year now. But automobile drivers are still having trouble getting used to dealing with the ...

• States Conspiring to Get You Drunker
• Dec 7, 2009
• If you're finding lately that your local tavern's quaffs are packing more of a wallop, it could be because an increasing number of ...

• Is a Stoplight with a Progress Bar a Good Idea?
• Dec 4, 2009
• This stoplight has won a design award for incorporating a progress bar that shows drivers exactly how long they can expect to wait at an ...
• 8 Comments

• What Do Google Searches Say About Your City?
• Dec 3, 2009
• Google has released its annual "zeitgeist" numbers, tallying the top Internet searches for the past year. (Congrats, "michael jackson" and "...

• Brad Pitt's Katrina Cottages: Energizing or Too Extreme?
• Dec 1, 2009
• The travel section of this Sunday's New York Times had a cool little piece about the houses that Brad Pitt's Make It Right ...
• 9 Comments

• Autonomy, Access and Accountability
• Nov 30, 2009
• As a wave of younger employees, including those from Generation Y, enters the workplace, governments are working to position themselves as employers of choice. Aaron...

• Next-Generation Government and Today's Needs
• Nov 30, 2009
• Today's leaders are wrestling with a big question: How can they shape next-generation government to fit the changing needs of their communities? At Governing's Managing...
• 1 Comments

• Colorado State Senator Sets New Bar in Calling-Obama-a-Terrorist Contest
• Nov 13, 2009
• President Obama's critics have accused him of being a Socialist, a Communist, a Fascist and, yes, a terrorist. But in a recent Twitter post, ...
• 2 Comments

• Could Roads Be the Next Source of Renewable Power?
• Oct 31, 2009
• There are more than 4 million miles of paved roadways in the United States. Increasingly, renewable energy advocates are looking at all that asphalt and seeing...