Richmond Co-op Program Holds Potential for Jobs
Dan Clore
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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/08/19/BAT61KP5GQ.DTL
Richmond co-op program holds potential for jobs
by Chip Johnson, Chronicle Columnist
Friday, August 19, 2011
Richmond -- House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Barbara Lee
rallied the crowd at Oakland's Acts Full Gospel Church earlier this week
around a call for new job creation.
The town-hall-style event drew strong contrasts between Republican and
Democratic approaches to the issue, but offered no solutions.
"It is a sad time. ... There is no magic formula," Pelosi told the
crowd. "But we know there are things we can do differently."
In nearby Richmond, a city of 120,000 residents with a 17 percent
unemployment rate that is nearly twice the national average, city
officials are trying different things.
The city has embarked on a program to help promote the growth of co-op
businesses to create job opportunities and provide avenues to create
stable incomes for unskilled and hard-core unemployed residents.
The program started last year after Green Mayor Gayle McLaughlin visited
the Mondragon Corp., a federation of worker cooperatives in the Basque
region of Spain. She was part of a national delegation.
More than 50 years old, the Mondragon Corp. operates more than 120
businesses that employ more than 89,000 workers in banks, manufacturing
and industrial facilities. Mondragon ranks as one of the 10 wealthiest
companies in the country. McLaughlin wants to launch a smaller version
in her own city.
"Even in good times, Richmond has high unemployment," McLaughlin says.
"In hard times, cities like Richmond suffer even more."
The city's efforts have resulted in standing-room-only meetings at the
city's main library. City officials are discussing a plan to award extra
points to local co-ops in city contract bids.
McLaughlin said the city could act as a conduit by hiring co-op
businesses to provide services to the city.
City officials are now re-working a vendor ordinance that would allow a
health-food truck co-op onto city-owned property.
The city Chamber of Commerce and its traditionally conservative Council
of Industry have also expressed interest in the co-op project.
"Everybody is looking for alternatives and new ideas to stimulate
business, and this is one of them," McLaughlin said. "We can't continue
with the same strategies, and these co-ops offer the chance to create
new jobs and build personal wealth."
The program is still in its infancy, but there are already more than a
half-dozen co-op efforts under way.
"There are many different kinds of co-ops, and we're focusing on worker
co-ops where people own their own jobs and manage themselves," said
Terry Baird, who was hired by Richmond as a consultant. Baird, a
Richmond resident, is a co-founder of Arizmendi Cooperative Inc., and a
co-op owner of the Arizmendi Bakery on Lakeshore Avenue in Oakland.
And so far, Richmond is not lacking for ideas, Baird said.
Miguel Espino, who established the East Bay Agricultural Project, wants
to establish aquaponics farms in Richmond that grow fish and vegetables.
Baird has consulted with a budding North Richmond health food co-op, an
electric bicycle builder and a group that wants to sell hydroponically
grown organic foods.
Most recently, Baird advised the Latina Center, a women's group of
Central and South American immigrants who dream of one day running a
bakery similar to Arizmendi.
Baird, a 30-year veteran in co-op enterprises, has advised the group to
start small and think big. The costs of starting up most of these
ventures are low. Instead of a bakery operation, Baird recommended
creating a "pop-up" restaurant, in which an existing, often struggling,
restaurant allows other chefs to use existing facilities to launch a new
business.
The model has been used in San Francisco and Berkeley, a leader in the
co-op businesses and home to some of the most well-established
co-op-owned businesses in the nation.
"It's a good way to test the market, and it doesn't cost a lot of money
to start up," Baird said. "I think there would be great interest in
trying Bolivian food and Venezuelan food and dishes from a variety of
countries," he said. He is also trying to negotiate a deal to provide
sweat equity in exchange for a lease on a building to provide a
brick-and-mortar site to house a handyman's cooperative - a local
version of the online clearinghouses like Angieslist.com, which provides
information about skilled tradesmen with local referrals.
At a time when the nation's leaders are providing more political
rhetoric and party criticisms than actual solutions to the nation's
employment issues, it's encouraging to see a city making an effort to
fend for itself.
Richmond co-op meeting
The next informational meeting of the Richmond Co-op Project will be at
7 p.m. Thursday at the main branch of the Richmond Public Library at 325
Civic Center Plaza, just off Macdonald Avenue.
Chip Johnson's column appears in the Chronicle on Tuesday and Friday.
E-mail him at chjo...@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/08/19/BAT61KP5GQ.DTL
This article appeared on page C - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
--
Dan Clore
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"From the point of view of the defense of our society,
there only exists one danger -- that workers succeed in
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aspirations _without intermediaries_."
--Censor (Gianfranco Sanguinetti), _The Real Report on
the Last Chance to Save Capitalism in Italy_