Building Community

Occupy the Million Dollar View

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Now that the current phase of the Occupation movement—one that involved camping out in public places—is drawing to a close, thoughts turn to other, even more effective venues and exploits. Occupying the front lawns of mansions owned by the 1% would certainly send a message, although a very brief one, since trespassing happens to be illegal.

And then it hit me: Occupy flotillas floating up to crash swank exclusive seaside gatherings.

World made by hand

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Old school letterpress printers Hatch Show Print of Nashville, Tennessee have been in continuous business since 1879. They do everything by hand from carving plates to setting type to inking and then hand cranking their print rollers. Their business model offers an excellent example of the kinds of jobs of the future communities need in addition that go beyond food production and farming.

Climate solution: from air to soil

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Tested in lion country in the African bush, Allan Savory is still in the top 11 for the $25 million dollar Virgin Earth Challenge to find a harmless way to remove carbon from the atmosphere. In Vermont, carbon farmer Abe Collins follows that lead. Then we hear how to create a functioning local food system – even in hard times. North Carolina county organizer Aaron Newton was recorded at ASPO 2011 in D.C. All this new agriculture can function in a super-low oil economy – but can we handle change?

Common Ground: Securing a future for all who share our planet’s resources

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We live in a fragmented landscape. This would matter a lot less if human populations were sparse and ecosystems across the globe were in a healthy state. However, the exact converse is the case today: human numbers have exceeded seven billion with the fastest rates of growth in developing and often already environmentally-stressed countries, and the UN’s authoritative Millennium Ecosystem Assessment provides solid evidence that virtually all major habitat types across the planet are substantially degraded with alarming implications for their continued capacity to support human well-being into the long-term future.

Where do we occupy from here?

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They clearly do not want us in the parks. That much is clear after a national crackdown on park occupations throughout the United States. With violent police interventions from Portland to Oakland to Philadelphia to New York (and a lot of other places), this particular tactic may have run its course as the spatial organizing principle, at least for now. We’re also headed into December, and in New York at least, an outside occupation was going to go the way of Valley Forge. So rather than be demoralized, I’d like to see our removal from the parks as an opportunity. Don’t get me wrong, police beating people is never “a good thing,” but it forces us to imagine other ways to channel this energy. Here are some ways people have thought of occupations beyond the park.

Take our children, please!: A modest proposal for Occupy Wall Street

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Inspired in turn by Swift, I want to suggest that we put in motion a similar undertaking: on January 16th, Martin Luther King Day, citizens from around the country should gather at the New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street. Let’s call this macabre gathering — with luck and even worse times, it should be mammoth — “We Surrender” or “Restore Debtor’s Prisons” or “De-Fault Is Ours” or “Collateralize Us.” And plan on a mirthful day of mourning.

the fire stealers – a love story

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The fact is our rulers, gods or government, corporate CEOs, the 1%, however you like to look at it, want to keep the fire for themselves. They like to govern over the people, but they do not like the people. They do not like you. Some part of you doesn’t like you either. That’s the hard part. Psychologists and mystics can chip away at that part for years, and yet the only thing that transforms us is doing the one thing it is terrified of: connecting with the heart.

From Foreclosure to Occupation

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A group of low-income San Franciscans has come up with a positive, long term solution to the housing crisis that is causing millions of Americans to be evicted and some to embrace the “Occupy Homes” movement: buy the buildings. In October 2011, residents of the Columbus United Cooperative (CUC) in San Francisco celebrated final approval of the ownership of their building as a permanently affordable, resident-owned limited-equity housing cooperative. The residents can now purchase “shares” in the co-op for only $10,000 in the heart of San Francisco (where housing starts at $500,000) to become cooperative homeowners, though most earn less than 50 percent of area median income.

Edible Landscapes London

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It’s a brisk Autumnal Monday morning. I’m at Edible Landscapes London, an offshoot of Transition Finsbury Park. This is the cutting edge of no-dig, agroforestry, predominantly perennial and definitely low-maintenance gardening and our practice challenges conventional gardening wisdom. I’m talking about deeply ingrained habits of digging and tidiness. Tell a trad gardener that they’re working too hard, that they don’;t need to dig every year or remove every weed to the compost heap and it’s like whipping the (strictly manicured) lawn from under their feet. They wince and clutch onto the spade handle more tightly.