Bold New Economy

photo greenfield

Creating a Bold New Economy: An Idea Incubator for Franklin County’s Future will explore new business models that will help us all thrive in Franklin County. The forum will be kicked off by Marjorie Kelly, author of Owning Our Future, and former editor of Business Ethics magazine.  Kelly is also co-founder of Tellus Institute’s Corporation 20/20, which explores creating new ways of doing societal good while building thriving businesses. A panel of local leaders from FRCOG, CDC, Greenfield Cooperative Bank, and the Franklin Community Cooperative will comment on the applicability of Kelly’s ideas to Franklin County. In the afternoon working groups will explore Financing the New Economy; Creating a Living Wage Economy; Food as an Economic Engine; Building an Authentic Cultural Identity; and Thinking Like a Region. Organized by Greening Greenfield and co-sponsored by CDC, FC Chamber of Commerce, FRCOG, Franklin Hampshire Regional Employment Board, PVGrows and others. Saturday, Nov 15, 8:30-3:30 at Greenfield Community College. $25 registration fee includes lunch and refreshments. $15 discounted rate for CDC members, students and low income. For more information and to register go to www.GreeningGreenfield.org and look under “Events” or call 413-773-0228.

 

Bold New Economy

photo greenfield

Creating a Bold New Economy: An Idea Incubator for Franklin County’s Future will explore new business models that will help us all thrive in Franklin County.  The forum will be kicked off by Marjorie Kelly, author of Owning Our Future, and former editor of Business Ethics magazine.  Kelly is also co-founder of Tellus Institute’s Corporation 20/20, which explores creating new ways of doing societal good while building thriving businesses. A panel of local leaders from FRCOG, CDC, Greenfield Cooperative Bank, and the Franklin Community Cooperative will comment on the applicability of Kelly’s ideas to Franklin County. In the afternoon working groups will explore Financing the New Economy; Creating a Living Wage Economy; Food as an Economic Engine; Building an Authentic Cultural Identity; and Thinking Like a Region. Organized by Greening Greenfield and co-sponsored by CDC, FC Chamber of Commerce, FRCOG, Franklin Hampshire Regional Employment Board, PVGrows and others. Saturday, Nov 15, 8:30-3:30 at Greenfield Community College. $25 registration fee includes lunch and refreshments. $15 discounted rate for CDC members, students and low income. For more information and to register go to www.GreeningGreenfield.org and look under “Events” or call 413-773-0228.

“Change Makers: Hone Your Skills” Workshop Includes Over 40 Participants

TIMAG2283hank you to everyone who attended pvSustain’s “Change Makers: Hone Your Skills” workshop on Wednesday, January 29th. Over 40 people, including municipal officials, non-profit leaders, and sustainability professionals attended the skills building event. The event included a keynote by Professor Joseph Krupczynski of the UMass Center for Design. As part of PVPC’s development of the Sustainable Knowledge Corridor planning project, Joseph and his students worked with PVPC, the United Way Pioneer Valley, and Hampshire County United Way staff to assure participation of residents who are too often left out of traditional planning processes. The event also included small-group workshops led by Eric Weiss of the Hampshire Council of Governments, Paul Lipke of Health Care Without Harm, Lora Wondolowski of Leadership Pioneer Valley, and Lynn Benander of Co-Op Power.

Guiding Principles

Guiding Principles

pvSustain members share a vision of a future for the Pioneer Valley that will be worth the struggle in the difficult years that we all know lie ahead.  In this future,diversity is cherished and protected within the human community and beyond. The inhabitants of the Valley’s cities, towns and countryside enjoy access to the clean air, the water, the food and the human support fundamental to good physical and mental health.  They possess the information and the skills needed to meet the challenges of their day, and their communities are able to control many of the important decisions that affect their daily lives.  The health, diversity and population levels of plants, animals and other life forms, both domesticated and wild, are treated as a sacred trust.

pvSustain members work to support this broadly shared vision in many different ways.   Some seek to create environmentally sustainable transportation, some to ensure that education from basics through to needed specializations is available, some to support regional food production and distribution and other basic economic activity, some work for clean air and water, some to create and distribute needed  information, some to ensure that relevant basic science is carried out, some work for land and wildlife preservation, and some to ensure the development of effective structures for self-governance and regional collaboration.

pvSustain members believe that to move toward this just, sustainable, healthy and biologically diverse community of all living things, we must be guided by the following principles:

  • Human diversity is a treasure to be preserved;
  • Human communities must learn to support the physical and mental health, education and information resources and degree of self-governance needed to meet the challenges we will face;
  • Biological diversity and robust populations of existing species of animals, plants and other life forms must be preserved;
  • Active collaboration and information-sharing among pvSustain members as well as between members and the broader community can and must play an important role in moving the Valley toward this desired future.

Network Structure

Network Structure

Our purpose is to foster dialogue and collaboration. We make decisions by consensus of the members present at our meetings about how and when to meet, what initiatives to take on, and how to complement them. We have agreed not to become another organization with staff competing for funding, but remain a community of professionals (paid and volunteer) working in sustainability who pay dues to support our collaboration, as a project of the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission. pvSustain now has over 100 member organizations and individuals.  We have one paid part-time staff position, in addition to the two paid part-time researchers who secured the original funding.  A volunteer Chair facilitates meetings, a volunteer steering committee helps set agendas, and ad hoc committees emerge as needed to work on time-limited projects.

The work of pvSustain is informed by a number of leading thinkers and practitioners in the field of sustainability. Among these are William McDonough and the Natural Step Framework.

pvSustain is a work in progress.  Here are some resources we have used as we articluate who we are and how we function as a network of sustainability professionals in the Pioneer Valley region of western Massachusetts.

A Handbook for Network Builders Seeking Social Change”:
by Peter Plastrik and Madeleine Taylor
Net Gains Handbook

PVSN seminar with Roberto Cremonini BARR Foundation
PVSN Workshop PDF
PVSN Workshop PowerPoint

Book Reviews

Endorsements for Good Morning, Beautiful Business

“Judy Wicks’ brilliance redefines what a business can be. The White Dog Café modeled what commerce will become if we are to create a livable future. This is business as spiritual practice, business as kindness, business as community, business as justice, joy, transformation, leadership, and generosity. There is nothing here you will learn in business school because the White Dog Café is not in the business of selling life; it’s in the business of creating life. How blessed is Philadelphia and the world for her presence and prescience.”

Paul Hawken, author Blessed Unrest

“Judy Wicks is one of our great leaders and visionaries, and this books makes clear why. She thinks about traditional subjects (“business,” “economics”) in fresh, practical, real, and powerful ways. Read it and then live it yourself!”

Bill McKibben, author of Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future

“Guided by her own powerful activist sensibility, Judy Wicks beautifully conveys the important influences that a restaurant, or any business, can have within a community—politically, economically, and socially.”

Alice Waters, owner of Chez Panisse and author of The Art of Simple Food

“Judy Wicks set out to create a business that expressed her values, served her community, and fed her family. She ended up leading a national movement to build local economies that are inclusive and resilient, provide green job opportunities, and conduct business sustainably and responsibly. Good Morning, Beautiful Business is an inspiration—a living, breathing tale of the new American dream in action.”

Van Jones, author of Rebuild the Dream

“Wow. What a woman, what a book. In it, you enter the life of someone who, even as a child, learned that she could create—that she could make things and make things happen. We need Wicks’s confidence and courage now more than ever. So read it and you’ll get some. Her spunk is contagious.”

Frances Moore Lappé, author of EcoMind: Changing the Way We Think, to Create the World We Want

“Beware. This is a business book like no other. It will change how you see the world, America, business and the economy and should be required reading in every school of business and department of economics. Judy Wicks teaches us how to succeed at business while managing from the heart, having an outrageously good time, and measuring success as contribution to healthy communities and a world that works for all. Those who take Judy and the White Dog as their model change the world one beautiful business at a time.”

David Korten, co-founder and board chair, YES! Magazine.
Author Agenda for a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth, and
The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community

“Fun and funny, kind and savvy, Good Morning, Beautiful Business is a rollicking good tale about a rollicking good life. From working as waitress at a restaurant she helps save from demolition at age 23, to becoming a world leader in the socially responsible business movement, activist-entrepreneur Judy Wicks shows how one woman can help build a compassionate, locally sourced economy–and have a blast doing so. These pages are as full of friendships, food, and dancing as they are of great ideas that could apply to businesses in any town. Judy Wicks is an inspiration. By the end of this wonderful book, she seems like an old friend whose example can change your life.”

Sy Montgomery, author of The Good Good Pig

“Judy Wicks is one of the most amazing women I have ever met.  She ran the legendary White Dog Café with passion, heart, common sense, and financial success. And she continues to blaze new paths on the road to a truly sustainable people-centered economy. This is a must-read book.”

Ben Cohen, cofounder, Ben & Jerry’s

“Judy Wicks’s journey is potent medicine for a culture that falsely separates personal life and work,  self and community,  business and environment, and entrepreneurship and activism. Anyone who wants to engage their full entrepreneurial vision, and find their own unique path that may combine seemingly disparate goals, can take heart: this remarkable story is a visionary beacon and joyful read.”

Nina Simons, Co-founder, Bioneers

“If there ever is a Nobel Prize in Planet-Saving, Judy Wicks deserves to be the first recipient.  Besides creating one of Philadelphia’s most popular restaurants (the White Dog Café), her legacy includes Pennsylvania’s local food movement, America’s fastest growing network of independent businesses, and entrepreneurs worldwide –especially women – whom she has inspired to make business the leading edge of social change.  In this riveting, funny, and moving autobiography, Judy also reveals herself as a superb storyteller and a sharp policy critic.  Her life story, which unfolds from the Arctic to Chiapas, shows how one passionate person really can bend the arc of history toward justice.”

-Michael H. Shuman, author, Local Dollars, Local Sense:  How to Shift Your Money
from Wall Street to Main Street and Achieve Real Prosperity

“Judy Wicks is something rare, invaluable, and essential in our time: a visionary artisan of cultural renaissance. Read this book. Learn what she’s done and, even more important, how she became who she is. Let her story inspire you more fully into your own cultural artistry.”

Bill Plotkin, author of Soulcraft, Wild Mind, and Nature and the Human Soul

“Judy Wicks followed her passion and trusted her heart; she uncovered and was guided by what makes healthy local businesses thrive; and then she led a movement to share her discoveries and help transform other local economies.  Now, thanks to her vision and leadership, there are hundreds of communities unlocking the power of local commerce for good.  What a gift from a true pioneer who shows us how to unite an avocation with a vocation!”

Will Raap, founder, Gardener’s Supply and Intervale Center