I am of mixed mind about Andrew Garber’s (2012) Seattle Times “expose” on state purchases of hybrid SUVs. On the one hand, we need more reporting that shines a spotlight on state government. That can be a catalyst for useful reforms.
On the other hand, the story has an overhyped quality. Garber goes after Washington state for — gasp! — investing in compact hybrid SUVs.
To Garber’s credit, he notes that the state cannot give more than a ballpark estimate of how many vehicles it owns. Perhaps his article will lead to a more centralized tracking system.
However, his story literally creates a problem out of thin air. State government does not, in fact, have an “expensive love affair with 4-wheel drive hybrid SUVs,” as the headline screams. It had an increase in purchases between 2006 and 2010, but policy loopholes were closed in 2011 that made it possible. Indeed, one could argue that, in knee-jerk fashion, the state may be going too far in the other direction.
The Seattle Times appears to have decided to write a “look how state government wastes your tax dollars” story. I suppose that sells newspapers . . . and fits with the political ideology of the Times’ publisher. But despite the article’s unusual level of depth, it’s flawed journalism. I hope the Columbia Journalism Review weighs in on this one.
What’s particularly distressing is that Garber could have written a valuable story if he had adopted a more objective framing. For all of his frothing about hybrid SUV purchases, he never directly answers a key question: What have been the impacts of recent state vehicle purchasing policies designed to reduce gas consumption and greenhouse emissions?
Overcharged rhetoric abounds
I don’t know how much control Garber had over the editing of his story, but someone at the Times clearly wanted to “sex up” the rhetoric. The headline and subhead set the tone for the piece by using charged words such as “expensive love affair” and “SUV buying binge.” Then the first two paragraphs say that a 2005 executive order freezing the purchase of SUVs has led to a dramatic increase in their usage.
Did you hear that, Martha? Those gas-guzzling, mansions of overkill?
Tucked away in the last sentence of the second paragraph is a key caveat — that “most” of the SUVs purchased after 2005 were hybrids. Compact Ford Escapes. However, these were “more expensive four-wheel drive hybrids.”
More expensive than what, you ask? The front-wheel drive Toyota Prius. I’d argue that this is an apples-to-oranges comparison. Both may be considered compact in terms of their exterior dimensions, but an Escape is more comparable to a larger family sedan. Indeed, Garber reports that the Escape’s extra passenger and cargo space is one reason that state agencies have preferred it over a Prius.
What’s wrong with that — particularly if an agency is replacing a larger sedan? The story’s photo caption implies that bad judgment was displayed by exempting the Escape from the SUV buying freeze “because it barely made the 30 mph requirement.” But what if that Escape was replacing one of the state’s venerable Ford Tauruses? The 2000 model gets only 20 miles per gallon. If the additional space is really needed, that strikes me as a reasonable improvement in gas mileage.
Garber fixates on the extra cost of four-wheel drive. But what he doesn’t tell the reader until almost the end of his lengthy story is that in 2011 the state closed the loophole in rules that allowed the purchase of four-wheel drive vehicles if they were hybrids.
Data presented in the most negative way
The story’s second paragraph breathlessly exclaims that SUV purchases soared from 26 percent of vehicle purchases in 2004 to 77 percent in 2010. It’s silly for Garber to compare traditional SUVs and compact hybrids, but equally questionable is that he chose to highlight a statistical anomaly.
In 2010 vehicle purchases were much lower than previous years, so percentage comparisons aren’t meaningful. He sort of acknowledges this later in the story, but he still shouldn’t have highlighted the 77 percent to begin with. A more accurate figure would have been the percentage of SUVs purchased between the years 2006 and 2011. Garber never tells readers that figure in the text, but you can calculate it with data included in an accompanying info graphic (link no longer available).
Drum roll please: Over a six-year period less than 50 percent of total vehicle purchases were hybrid SUVs. That doesn’t strike me as an outrageously high figure given the popularity of four-wheel drive with the general public, which has been drawn to it as a safety feature.
The story’s text also does not tell readers another key fact shown in the info graphic: Hybrid sedans were the second most-popular type of vehicle purchased since 2006.
Perhaps most importantly, Garber doesn’t tell you that the “buying binge” of hybrid SUVs amounts to only 4 percent of the state’s total vehicle pool, which is estimated to be around 14,600 vehicles. Let’s step back and admire the Times’ righteous indignation. Somehow 4 percent represents a “love affair?”
Coverage may be causing a knee-jerk reaction
The Times’s ongoing coverage of this issue has clearly gotten the attention of the executive and legislative branches of state government. For example, Garber reports that in the summer of 2011 the state’s motor pool issued a new rule that Ford Escapes “were no longer exempt from the restrictions that applied to other four-wheel drives, and that driving in bad weather or mountain passes was not justification for buying one.”
Instead, Garber reports that four-wheel drives could only be purchased “when the primary assignment of the vehicle is to operate on unimproved roads… , operate off-road in mountainous terrain, or for immediate response in severe weather conditions for the safety of citizens or the environment.”
That strikes me as overkill. Ford Escapes aren’t real SUVs. In the auto industry they are referred to as crossover utility vehicles, or CUVs. These are essentially tall station wagons with four-wheel drive and beefy looks. They weren’t designed for heavy off-road use like a Jeep Wrangler.
Great. Let’s limit purchasing of four-wheel drive CUVs to conditions they weren’t designed to handle. I wonder how long that rule lasts before somebody gets hurt in the line of duty.
Garber implicitly marginalizes the impact of the 2011 rule change by noting that 145 hybrid SUVs were ordered by the state in 2012 because the motor pool is now purchasing for natural resource agencies. What he doesn’t tell you is how much this new round of consolidation has expanded the motor pool’s holdings. Thus, the reader lacks a sense of proportion.
What he does helpfully tell you is that this order — which was subsequently reduced — was “more than the previous two years combined.” So what? In 2011 a grand total of only 12 vehicles of all types were purchased.
If Andrew Garber’s goal was to produce in-depth, policy-savvy and objective journalism, this story is an epic fail.
NOTES:
This article was originally published on April 29, 2012 in a local political blog called Olympia Views.
RE:SOURCES
- Garber, Andrew; 2012. “State’s expensive love affair with 4-wheel drive hybrid SUVs.” Seattle Times. Posted April 28; accessed April 28.
Be the first to comment