Earlier this month, about 15 people got together to share examples of how cooperative governance structures can change the way work works. We focused on different organizations – including Equal Exchange, Semco Brazil, and Alcoholics Anonymous – and answered the questions:

- How are different types of decisions made?

- What are the roles and the relationships between roles?

- How is the strategic direction determined?

There was a lot of interest in continuing the conversation, so stay tuned and feel free to throw out ideas!

You can view and add to the notes here.

The spring issue of YES! Magazine is about how cooperatives are driving a new economy. From the discussion by the editors of the magazine, “Co-ops aren’t new. What’s new are the opportunities we now have to expand the reach of the cooperative economy:

• Unions are joining forces with Spain’s successful Mondragon Cooperatives to bring the model to the United States.
• Communities looking for alternatives to expensive, for-profit health insurance are forming health care cooperatives.
• Thousands who “moved their money” from Wall Street banks to credit unions now have a say in how that money is loaned and invested.
• Consumers looking for ways to increase prosperity for small-scale producers are turning to cooperatives like Equal Exchange.

Instead of making more money for those who are already wealthy, cooperatives offer everyone ownership of an economy that benefits all life.”

By Reverend Dele

Phase two of the Sunflower Field School orientation took place on Saturday, March 9, 2013 at Plymouth Congregational UCC with four of our participating organizations in attendance– the Glenncrest Community/Make A Difference House Youth Ambassadors; Sasha Bruce House and Beet Street Gardens’ Youth Garden Stewards/Yolo Pies; and the Fairfax Village Community Garden. These groups represent 11,500 square feet of urban land which can be restored to regenerating ecosystems. Presentations from Gail Taylor, Zachari Curtis, and Xavier Brown during the first session modeled our ethic of open sharing for the youth.

The excitement generated during the first session carried over to this week’s session as the groups shared scaled drawings of their growing spaces, were guided in their presentation of break even analysis homework assignments, as well as in sunflower yield calculations. After just two hours of working together, many of the participants, for whom the concepts were new and who initially shied away from some very different calculations, demonstrated a better grasp of the material and confidence in carrying out the calculations.

The session also included an exploration into the practice of co-ops as Allison shared with the teens and sponsors the philosophy, principles, types and the overall co-op landscape in DC. Sponsors had the opportunity to meet separately to discuss program outcomes and logistics.

Although this was the last of the two part orientation, everyone left energized knowing that the seeds of working together were just being planted and the future was ripe for a bountiful harvest of many kinds — a model teen co-op enterprise, emerging youth leaders, urban growers and environmental stewards, employment opportunities, job skills, organization partnerships, a bumper crop of sunflowers, newly established markets and more!

Organizations agreed to identify time for monthly planning and work share sessions and Nature’s Friends will make site visits to growing sites in April; finalize the workbook and will distribute sunflower seeds for planting in May. Nature’s Friends may facilitate other relevant trainings as funding becomes available. Thus, the focus over the next couple of months will be fundraising and organizational capacity. We’re looking forward to the evolution of the teen farming co-op and the best practices we will be able to share with the local and national community.

Take a look at our Co-op Directory. Let us know if we’re missing cooperatives from the greater DC area by posting a comment. We’ll also be updating the co-op map soon!

On Jan 13th, a small group of us met to discuss the potential to try to pass a local version of the National Cooperative Development Act. This act provides funding for loans and seed capital to cooperatives, and grants to organizations that provide technical assistance to cooperatives.

Because UDC’s Kirkman Center for Cooperatives is primarily a research resource right now and we don’t have strong (or any?) technical assistance providers in DC, we felt like this particular legislative battle isn’t the first step in building a more vibrant cooperative ecosystem in DC. We discussed the Cooperation Texas model, which provides affordable training and technical assistance to worker cooperatives. Some people on the Coop DC list serve have been forming Coop Incubator DC, though no one at the meeting has been able to get in touch with the group members recently for an update. We hope when it’s up and running it can help to fill this gap in the city. In the meantime, there are several groups looking for information on starting a cooperative. Eva is hoping to be able to provide legal support to cooperatives full time after graduating, which is great.

One of the groups is Nature’s Friends, run by Dele. She’s organizing a sunflower seed cooperative for DC youth gardeners. The sunflower seed gardening trainings will take place on March 2 and 9. People at the meeting offered both direct support and to make connections to others who can support the project.

What’s next? We keep making connections and organizing trainings and learning opportunities until DC has a cooperative technical assistance provider that fills some of this gap. As always, ideas are welcome.

Attendees: Josephine, Kara, Dele, Amanda, Greg, Eva, Allison
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Other updates we learned after the meeting:

American and Georgetown University professor John Whitman and UDC law professor and clinic director Louise Howells are working to pass a worker coop friendly statute in DC. UDC law students will be working on this during the Spring 2013 semester.

John Whitman is also hoping to engage the DC Office of Employment Services in providing worker coop training, probably through their existing Workforce Training contractors. Here they especially want to engage those re-entering the community from prison.

He also hopes to promote teaching about coops in business and law schools, but this largely depends on student demand, so students should let their deans know. You can check out cooperative curricula here: http://cooperative-curriculum.wikispaces.com/

Cooperation Texas is the only worker cooperative development center in Texas:

Founded in October 2009 in response to growing economic inequality, Cooperation Texas is an Austin-based non-profit committed to the creation of sustainable jobs through the development, support and promotion of worker-owned cooperatives. We believe everyone deserves equal access to dignified employment, which is why we place those most directly affected by social and economic inequality at the center of our work. We provide education, training and technical assistance to existing and start-up worker cooperatives in all sectors of the economy, helping launch and strengthen Texas businesses that put people and the planet first.

There is discussion of a similar program here in the District, the DC Coop Incubator…