As Local As Possible Meeting Recap

Bruce and Cathy Odom hosted a wonderful potluck and planning meeting for the refresh of As Local As Possible (ALAP).  Around a dozen of us discussed a new, community investing orientation for the ALAP group and shared a variety of ideas on how we can structure future meetings.  We agreed to keep things simple at this stage with a discussion and networking format that can be launched right away.  Many in the room seemed quite interested in eventually evolving into a true investment club (which involves a degree of legal and structural work), but for now our efforts will revolve around building a forum where local entrepreneurs and those interested in making local investments can meet and discuss local business projects.

So far, we agreed to stick with our general intro statement as follows: 

We are an informal group of Northern Michigan citizens seeking to have more local impact and connectedness with our money.  We gather once a month for a potluck and to meet local entrepreneurs and learn about their projects.  During our meetings, we also share ideas for how we might keep more of our money locally and invested for triple-bottom-line returns (financial, social, and environmental). This is an experiment of sorts with exciting offshoot possibilities, including the spawning of a more formal local investing club.  For now, though, those interested in pursuing local investments with other group members or presenting entrepreneurs may do so independently of this ALAP group.  Our meetings are open to any individual, although we request that you RSVP so that we can assure sufficient meeting space.

We also agreed to try a once a month meeting frequency, with our next three hour session slated for Thursday, December 8.  The structure for this meeting will be along the lines of:

6:00-7:00 Potluck and Social Time

7:00-7:30 Invited Entrepreneur #1 Discussion Time (Short presentation plus Q&A period)

7:30-8:00 Invited Entrepreneur #2 Discussion Time (Short presentation plus Q&A period)

8:00-9:00 Group Business (Selection of next meetings speakers, format changes, feedback for presenting entrepreneurs, etc)

To-Do’s

Cathy is checking out possible venues for the Dec 8 meeting.  Possibilities mentioned include The Good Work Collective, MLUI HQ, and the GT Commons meeting room. 

Zach and Bruce will create a short “Investing Opportunity” submission form that group members can use with prospective entrepreneurs who would like to speak to our group. 

All are encouraged to introduce the group to friends who have an interest in community investing and to also help find sustainability-focused entrepreneurs seeking alternative, community funding sources.  Interests among group members tonight were broad including areas such as local sustainable farming/food, alternative energy, healthcare, eco-tourism, clean transportation, green building, and education.

For those seeking more information about community investing in general and a group like ours that has formed in Washington, see the following links:

http://www.l2020.org/index.php?page=investing-opportunities

http://www.slowmoney.org/

http://www.livingeconomies.org/node/616

This promises to be an exciting new adventure!  Thanks to all who attended and especially to Bruce and Cathy for welcoming us into their home!

ALAP Meets Tomorrow (11/17)!

Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow 11/17 for the restart of As Local As Possible

Time:  Potluck from 6pm, Meeting 7-8:30 pm

Place: The Odom Residence (Bruce and Cathy), 3838 Manchester (English Woods Sub-division)

Directions from Downtown Traverse City :

East on US 31 to Holiday Hills Rd. (East Bay township)
right on Holiday 1/2 mile to Five Mile Rd.
right on Five Mile Rd., approx. 2.5 miles to Prouty Rd.(hanging
street light over intersection)
left on Prouty 1 mile to English Woods
left on English Woods 1 block to Manchester
left on Manchester 5th house, on the left.

Questions:  Bruce Odom @ 231-922-9952, Zach Liggett @ 231-649-4511

Meeting Agenda:

6-7:00 Chow time/social time

7-7:10 Quick around the room intros

7:10-7:30  Intro to the general concept of the ALAP money group

Draft Intro Statement:  We are an informal group of Northern Michigan citizens seeking to have more local impact and connectedness with our money.  We gather once a month for a potluck and to meet local entrepreneurs and learn about their projects.  During our meetings, we also share ideas for how we might keep more of our money locally and invested for triple-bottom-line returns (financial, social, and environmental). This is an experiment of sorts with exciting offshoot possibilities, including the spawning of a more formal local investing club.  For now, though, those interested in pursuing local investments with other group members or presenting entrepreneurs may do so independently of this ALAP group.  Our meetings are open to any individual, although we request that you RSVP so that we can assure sufficient meeting space.

7:30-7:45  Discuss types of investment projects interested in (for example, organic ag/food, alt energy, education, generally anything local, health care,etc)

7:45-  Discuss frequency/meeting space/communication/ground rules/etc

Some questions to consider for the meeting:

1)      What types of projects are you interested in investing in or learning more about?

2)       Do you know of a venue that could accommodate a group of this sort going forward (preferably food and drink-friendly)?

3)      What type of ground rules do you believe would be important to a group like this?

4)       Here is a possible structure for future meetings.  What do you think?

Future Meeting Structure:

6-6:30 Potluck/social time

6:30-6:45 Quick introductions of new faces

6:45-7:15 Group sharing time of various ALAP topics (events, possible guest speakers, etc)

7:15-8:00 Invited entrepreneur presentation/Q&A time

Legalizing Local Investment

Picked up this post from Michael Shuman @ energybulletin.net where he points out another 99% that could use some attention:  the 99% of Americans essentially prohibited from investing locally. Shuman points out that the House recently passed HR 2930 which promises to liberalize things a bit for the crowd-funding set and shares some links for those interested in showing support for the pending legislation.  From Shuman:

If we could overhaul securities laws that we enacted during the early Jurassic Period, local businesses could be fabulous investments. They are the most important job producers in the economy. They account for more than half of private sector jobs. They are increasingly competitive—so much so that their their share of the national workforce actually growing. Stunningly, sole proprietorships are three times as profitable as C-corporations. 

For the first time in decades, reform is finally possible. A remarkable coalition has emerged bringing together leaders of the Tea Party and the Obama Administration. They agree that investment apartheid should be abolished. Republican Representative Patrick McHenry of North Carolina is leading the charge in the House to legalize small businesses raising money through large numbers of small investments (aka “crowdfunding”), with minimal paperwork, for companies raising less than $1 million. Recent changes in his bill (HR 2930, The Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act) actually make it very similar to reforms President Obama proposed in his jobs package in September. 

On November 3, HR 2930 passed the House with overwhelming support (407-17). But passage of crowdfunding legislation is still uncertain. Senate Republicans may be afraid to support anything that Obama has proposed as part of his jobs package. And many Democrats are defending the status quo, because they are understandably afraid of deregulating the financial industry. What Dems don’t appreciate, however, is that the key to Wall Street reform is to ratchet up regulation at the top and loosen things a bit for the 99% at the bottom. 

The Occupy Wall Street protestors could make a critical difference here. They – and we – should occupy Congress until they legalize local investment. Once that occurs, we’ll see thousands of small companies owned by their customers. We’ll see the emergence of local stock exchanges that will provide investors with liquidity. We’ll see mutual funds with local securities (none exist today), and local pension funds.

Check Out The 3/50 Project

Recently came across this project: http://www.the350project.net/home.html

They also have their own LookLocal app:
http://www.the350project.net/iphone_look_local_home.html

Reminded me of MLUI's Spend 10. From the 3/50 project site:

3: What three independently owned business world you miss if they
disappeared? Stop in. Say hello. Pick up something that brings a smile. Your
purchases are what keeps those businesses around.

50: If half the employed population spent $50 each month in locally owned
independent businesses, it would generate more than $42.6 billion in revenue.
Imagine the positive impact if 3/4 the employed population did that.

68: For every $100 spent in locally owned independent stores, $68 returns to
the community through taxes, payroll, and other expenditures. If you spend that
in a national chain, only $43 stays here. Spend it online and nothing comes home.

1: The number of people it takes to start the trend... you.
Pick 3. Spend 50. Save your local economy.