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Paradoxically, polls show that concern about the environment is much higher now than a year ago. But the defeats contain some valuable lessons for environmentalists. Among them: 1) proposals should be simple and well focused, 2) plans that shift power from localities to state capitals are a hard sell, and 3) a recession is a bad time to ask for money. The very strategy of favoring ballot proposals over the horse trading of legislation may also bear re-examining. "I don't predict the beginning of some trend that makes environmental initiatives more difficult to achieve," insists Jim Maddy, executive director of the League of Conservation Voters in Washington. Yet last week's results hardly suggested that the task was becoming easier.