Capitalism with a Human Face

Capitalism's Human Face
From BusinessWeek Online

Social Entrepreneurs tackle the world's problems in the face of a global downturn.

PHILANTHROPY November 25, 2008, 5:00PM EST
Social Entrepreneurs Turn Business Sense to Good
As charitable giving dries up, new kinds of leaders are taking on the world's problems, using the for-profit world as a model

By Steve Hamm

As chief executive of Mercy Corps since 1994, Neal Keny-Guyer helped turn the Portland (Ore.) relief organization into a global powerhouse with 3,500 employees and a budget of nearly $300 million. But he was taken aback last year when one of his lieutenants proposed the radical step of buying a bank in Indonesia. Why would a not-for-profit disaster relief agency go the capitalist route and buy a bank?

Gradually, though, he warmed to the idea. He saw that, if Mercy Corps operated a wholesale bank that could offer capital to some 2,000 local microcredit organizations and had an ATM network, it could help turn microfinance into a powerful force in Indonesia. Keny-Guyer was in uncharted territory, however. In the last days before the acquisition closed in May, he feared the risky gambit would end in disaster. "I imagined a newspaper headline saying, `Mercy Corps' Bank in Bali Fails,' " he recalls. "I thought of the reaction of our donors to that bit of news."

Now, as the renamed Bank Andara cranks up operations, Keny-Guyer is hopeful. If the strategy works in Indonesia, he says, Mercy Corps may try it in the Philippines next.

This departure from business as usual in the nonprofit realm is part of a major shift in the way people are taking on the world's social problems. In developing nations and parts of the U.S., governments have failed to make substantial progress against poverty, disease, and illiteracy. Traditional charities and social service agencies often provide Band-Aids for problems instead of long-term solutions. Now a new breed of do-gooder—the social entrepreneur—is trying fresh approaches. While the term is used in many different ways, there's a narrow definition that gets to the heart of what makes these people stand out: Rather than depending solely on handouts from philanthropists, social entrepreneurs generate some of their own revenues and use business techniques to address social goals. "Traditional ways of doing things haven't produced the kind of progress we all hoped for, so we're trying to come up with new approaches that are truly transformational," says Keny-Guyer.

The idea of the social entrepreneur has been percolating for decades, but it has become a mass movement in the past couple of years. Thousands of people are launching ventures and trying out new business models, both for-profit and nonprofit. Now that the global financial crisis is squeezing charitable giving, socially oriented organizations are pushing even harder to reduce their dependence on donors and generate their own funds. Lehman Brothers, for instance, was a generous backer of both nonprofits and social entrepreneurs. No more. In this climate, only the most efficient and effective organizations will thrive.

Social entrepreneurs are being backed in part by a new generation of super-aggressive philanthropists and social investors, including Microsoft (MSFT) co-founder Bill Gates and former eBay (EBAY) executives Pierre M. Omidyar and Jeffrey Skoll. These guys expect results from their social investments and grants. Says Gates in an interview with BusinessWeek: "Nonprofits are applying what we've typically thought of as business strategies for better outcomes, and businesses are beginning to apply what I call creative capitalism strategies to increase the positive social impact of their work. That's a powerful combination." He believes the most effective way to make social progress is through partnerships among nonprofits, businesses, government, and philanthropists.

WHICH MODEL WORKS?
In this emerging social sphere, there's a danger of confusing enthusiasm with effectiveness. Many social enterprises, from microfinance organizations to those aimed at purifying water or improving agriculture, aren't being built to grow large or to last. They're poorly managed, undercapitalized, or overly dependent on philanthropic handouts. In India, for example, there are an estimated 1.2 million organizations aimed at addressing social problems. "Many are just too small to be effective," says Manoj Kumar, chief executive of Naandi Foundation, a large Indian social service organization.

In a sense, the social enterprise phenomenon is like an industry just starting to take shape. Think of the early days of autos or computers, when startups tried a variety of approaches to see what worked best. For this movement to have a major impact, it needs the same kind of dynamic business climate as Detroit in the 1920s or Silicon Valley a decade ago. What's necessary—once the global financial crisis eases—is free-flowing capital, a willingness by entrepreneurs to aim high and take risks, and a level of transparency that quickly makes obvious what's working and what isn't. "You have to get beyond the gee-whiz factor of social entrepreneurship," says Michael E. Porter, a professor at Harvard Business School. "Which of these models really works? How do you create a high social value per dollar invested?"

It's difficult to prove success in such an immature field. Nobody has come up with numbers quantifying the overall impact of social entrepreneurship. Some organizations make impressive claims. Grameen Bank, the pioneer of microfinance, says it has brought 65% of its 7.5 million clients out of "extreme poverty." Yet while Grameen's home base of Bangladesh is crawling with microfinance outfits, it remains one of the poorest countries in the world, with 40% of its people under the poverty line.

At the same time, there's much disagreement over which business models are best. Grameen founder Muhammad Yunus, who won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for his work, argues that social businesses should not make a profit off of poor people. In other cases, people who call themselves social entrepreneurs seem to be in it mainly for the money. Banco Compartamos in Mexico, for example, charges interest rates topping 100% per year, claiming that such rates are justified because it's expensive to operate a microfinance business (BW—Dec. 13, 2007). Yunus berates for-profit outfits for charging exorbitant interest. "When you charge high rates, you're no longer microcredit. You're a loan shark," he says (see a video interview with Yunus).

To others, the profit motive is crucial for addressing the needs of poor people. C.K. Prahalad, a University of Michigan Ross School of Business professor and author of the influential book The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits, argues that the poor should be seen as consumers, not charity cases. Their basic needs can best be addressed by businesses that are attuned to dealing with them. "If we get entrepreneurship right, social entrepreneurship won't matter as much," he says.

Vikram Akula, a social entrepreneur based in Hyderabad, wants it both ways. He's out to prove you can make a healthy profit while serving—and not gouging—the poor. Akula grew up in Schenectady, N.Y., but returned to his native India in the mid-1990s after he got a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago and worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Co. He first worked for a government-run microfinance organization. But with limited funds, it couldn't expand fast. He says his conversion to the for-profit, faster-growth model came after an encounter with a poor woman he had to turn down for a loan because he couldn't operate in her village. "She said: 'Don't I deserve to get out of poverty, too?' " he recalls. "I decided to come up with a model that works so you don't have to say no to anybody."

Today, Akula is chief executive of SKS Microfinance, which has 9,500 employees and 3.3 million customers throughout India and is adding 300,000 new clients per month. SKS charges an average of 26% annualized interest. Given the cost of granting and servicing microloans, that's considered a reasonable rate by many industry observers. SKS had revenues of $48 million in the half-year ended in September, up 153%, and net income of $6.16 million.

A journey with Akula into the villages of India's state of Andhra Pradesh shows just how aggressive he is about applying business methods to economic development. In a schoolyard in Narayanraopet, a village of 3,500, three dozen women dressed in brightly colored saris sit in a circle in the shade of a spreading rain tree. K. Sandhya Rani, a self-assured 18-year-old SKS field assistant, takes attendance, collects weekly loan payments, and hands out new loans with all of the efficiency of an employee at McDonald's (MCD), which, in fact, Akula uses as a model of business-process excellence. (When he set up the company, he even tracked the time it took to do things with a stopwatch.) The whole meeting lasts just 25 minutes.

Afterward the women hustle back to their shops and farms. There, money from SKS pays for more goods and for the purchase of chickens and buffalo. A woman named Sarojamma carries in her hands a six-inch pile of currency with which she plans to buy rice, lentils, and other food to replenish the shelves in her four-year-old kirana, or mini general store. In the coming days, she explains, her husband will call on his mobile phone to suppliers in neighboring cities to find the best prices for the items they stock, then take a bus and a taxi to fetch the goods back to Narayanraopet. Sarojamma has a simple dream: "I want to make my shop bigger."

Sarojamma and people like her represent a new market opportunity for companies that hope to reach India's vast population of villagers. SKS's Akula is using his network of field agents and customers as a distribution channel for moving a wide variety of products and services on behalf of business partners such as Nokia (NOK). SKS helps sell mobile phones, insurance, and foodstuffs for shopkeepers. "The potential here is huge," says Devinder Kishore, Nokia's marketing director in India.

"BUSINESS IS BUSINESS"
While Grameen Bank's Yunus doesn't believe in profiting off the poor, he, too, sees his microlending network as a strategic jumping-off point for all sorts of economic activity. The bank's parent company, Grameen Family of Enterprises, is forming joint ventures with large multinationals in an effort to develop vast new markets and improve the health and livelihoods of poor people. The first of the ventures, Grameen Danone Foods (GDNNY), sells nutrition-enhanced yogurt to poor people in affordable, single-serving packages, with a portion of the deliveries handled by Grameen Bank customers.

But the strains between social goals and business imperatives are showing. Wahidun Nabi, the executive director of the venture, who came from Danone in mid-2007, says he's being forced by economics to sell larger packages and market to those with more money, which means he's doing less than he might have for poorer people. "For the success of the project, we must improve the bottom line," he says. "This is a social business, but business is business."

Such strains are even more intense in fledgling social enterprises. Belgian Bart Weetjens was focused purely on altruism when he started an organization called Apopo a decade ago. It trains African giant pouch rats to sniff out land mines on former battlefields. The mines, if they remain undetected, occasionally blow up and hurt people and animals. The program was a modest success, with mine-clearing operations in Mozambique and a contract to expand into Africa's Great Lakes Region. But Apopo ran into problems when Weetjens tried to secure a more dependable source of funding. An adopt-a-rat program launched on the Internet, HeroRATS.org, failed to attract many supporters. "We're living in uncertainty," says Apopo Chief Executive Christophe Cox. "If some of the main donors drop off, then we're finished."

So Weetjens and Cox decided to run Apopo more like a business and generate their own money from operations. Earlier this year they hired Virtue Ventures, a consulting group specializing in social enterprises, to help them write a business plan. And in the summer they brought four interns from the MBA program at Oxford University to their headquarters in Tanzania to help size up their money-earning potential. Options include expanding mine-clearing operations to the Middle East, getting into the cargo-inspection business, and forging aggressively into disease detection. It turns out the rats can sniff out the presence of tuberculosis, and perhaps other diseases, at costs dramatically cheaper than traditional laboratory tests.

The pressure of switching to a for-profit model is evident during a meeting of the two founders and their student advisers in Morogoro, Tanzania. The six gather for their weekly progress discussion in the war room, where interns work in stifling heat under two fast-spinning ceiling fans. It's not clear how big the long-term cost differential will be for their rats compared with other outfits that use European-trained dogs for mine-clearing. Cox cautions against exaggerating their advantages: "We don't want to compare the worst dogs with the best rats."

Weetjens, the organization's front man, says it now looks like Apopo may continue the mine-clearing operations on a not-for-profit basis but try to turn disease detection into a profit-maker. Their tests with Tanzanian health-care clinics are producing strong results in cost and quality.

For all the challenges that Apopo faces, there is anecdotal evidence that social enterprises can grow large and balance their social and economic imperatives. But it requires a lot of time and effort.

That was the case with Sekem Group, an Egyptian conglomerate with businesses in organic farming, garment manufacturing, herbal medicines, and food processing and distribution. The family-controlled company got off to a fragile start in 1977 in the desert 50 kilometers northeast of Cairo. Egyptian-born founder Ibrahim Abouleish had been managing a pharmaceutical-research facility in Austria but returned to his homeland after he realized that two decades of socialism had ruined the economy. His goal was to convert the country to organic farming and enrich Egyptian culture with a renaissance of art and education. Abouleish chose a place in the desert far from urban influences so he could create a self-defining community. It all started in a mud hut built for him by Bedouin.

The original hut remains as part of a guest house on a campus that now includes 20 sparkling-white buildings for offices, farm operations, and factory work. Sekem has 2,500 employees, 500 acres of nearby farmland, and a vast composting operation. The company, which has been growing at 25% per year, brought in $40 million in revenues and $3 million in net income in 2007—after spending much of its operating profits on schooling and health care for employees' families. Sekem just bought 4,000 acres of arid land on the Sinai Peninsula and in the Western Desert that it plans on converting to farming.

THE NEED FOR CAPITAL
For Abouleish and his son, Helmy, who now runs day-to-day operations, more important than the financial accomplishments is the impact of Sekem on Egyptian agriculture. When done right, organic farming uses a lot less water, and farmers don't spend money on expensive and polluting herbicides and pesticides. When Sekem started operations, there was no organic farming in Egypt. Today there are several other major organic growers, and Sekem has developed a network of 800 independent farmers on 50,000 acres whose produce it exports to major grocery chains in Europe. The company's nonprofit Sekem Development Foundation runs a school, a medical center, and economic development programs in the seven villages around the campus. But Ibrahim Abouleish is not satisfied. "What we have achieved is a great model. Now we have to change the whole country," he says. He figures it could take more than 100 years to reform Egypt from the bottom up.

While Sekem shows that such enterprises can grow up and make progress, there are many economic and social hurdles that need to be cleared for this phenomenon to become powerful. Money is a major issue. While philanthropies and investors are plowing hundreds of millions of dollars into social enterprises, that's still minuscule compared with the $35 billion in venture capital invested worldwide last year.

To attract more capital, social enterprises have started trying to better quantify their results. A group spearheaded by Acumen Fund, a nonprofit supporter of social enterprises, has begun gathering an ocean of information into one massive, easily accessible database. That way, results can be monitored by the funders and investors, and social entrepreneurs can see how they stack up with their peers.

Still, it's hard to justify most social enterprises on strictly financial grounds. In many cases, investors have to accept lower returns than they would expect from traditional investments. That trade-off has tormented investors in Freeplay Energy, a social business that sells hand-crank radios and lights for people in developing countries and Western nations. The company went public in Britain in 2005, but its revenues have been disappointing, and its stock price plummeted until it was taken private again this year. "It's hard to have a social mission in a capitalistic system," says Rory Stear, Freeplay's co-founder and co-chairman.

When Ramalinga Raju, chairman of India's Satyam Computer Services (SAY), set out to improve India's woeful health-care system, he decided to bring in government as his partner. His idea was that, by combining Satyam's technology and business-operations expertise with government resources, innovative new health-care initiatives could spread rapidly. Emergency Management and Research Institute, a free ambulance service he launched in 2005 in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, has branched out to two other states. The government pays 95% of operating expenses. "I have no doubt that this will be a model for the rest of the world," Raju says.

Maybe. Raju's ambulance service is catching flack from rivals. Sweta Mangal, co-founder of Dial 1298 for Ambulance, which operates in Mumbai, says EMRI relies too much on government support, which might be fleeting. She also doesn't think it's affordable for governments in emerging nations to offer free ambulance service for everybody. Her company charges wealthy and middle-class patients, which subsidizes free service for poor people.

This is just one of the debates that show how unsettled the world of social enterprise is—and may remain. Until today's entrepreneurs discover which business models really work, there will be uncertainty and wasted effort. The movement is growing and taking on more ambitious projects. But from Mercy Corps' Keny-Guyer to Satyam's Raju, these entrepreneurs know most of their work still lies ahead of them.

A Social Entrepreneurship Schism
In Philanthrocapitalism: How the Rich Can Save the World, Matthew Bishop and Michael Green argue that the wealthy can save the world by giving money to social entrepreneurs. But Michael Edwards wrote a sharp critique called Just Another Emperor? The Myths and Realities of Philanthrocapitalism. His concern: The hype will divert attention from the deeper changes he believes are required to transform societies.

To read Edwards' summary of his book, go to BusinessWeek Business Exchange; http://bx.businessweek.com/social-entrepreneurship/reference/


Hamm is a senior writer for BusinessWeek in New York and author of the Globespotting blog.

Green Future; A Synergistic Approach to the Triple Bottom Line (*TBL)

A project to build community and more participatory political and economic systems and a green consumer base using a synergy of people, commerce and social objectives by building a business with social justice and green metrics as bottom line.

The keys to our success will include the following;

* Accountable

* Focus from Ground Up

* Green & Sustainable

* Income for All Participants

* Market-Based

* Open to all, Inclusive

* Profits to Higher Purposes

* Transparent

* Triple Bottom Line (TBL) Metrics (Planet, People & Profit)

* Voluntary


(*For more on the TBL see, Triple Bottom Line and Sustainable Business Strategies)

Briefly, we have four options for sources of capital to meet the difficult challenges we face;

* Business
* Wealthy Individuals, Philanthropists
* Government, taxes, regulation and law.
* Non Governmental Sector; non-profits, religious and educational institutions, foundations, etc.


There is often an interplay between these systems but at foundation is private business. They all bring advantages and disadvantages to efforts at Human advancement. If we are to break free from the limitations and inertia of the status quo we need a new way to synthesize these various components to give maximum influence to citizens and community members in rebuilding their communities and being co-creators of a vibrant participatory democracy. The idea that I propose combines the best aspects of the for-profit and non-profit worlds into a more effective and more sustainable hybrid organization; the purpose driven mission of non-profits with the capital aggregation of for-profit businesses. With this idea we can provide popular access to capital by creating a Social Venture Capital Fund (SVCF)


Below is an introductory outline, some quotes that address my assumptions and a narrative laying out the context that we find ourselves. The idea itself can be found on my blog here, (http://imaginegreenfuture.blogspot.com/2008/09/vehicle-method-and-bridge-to-green.html), and below. I look forward to answering any questions that you may have.




Triple Bottom-Line; the DNA of a Green Business starts with People

* Problem --
Declining consumer confidence, decreasing discretionary incomes, growing environmental challenges, deteriorating neighborhoods, tightening economy. Government that seems ineffective, business that seem heartless and waning trust in societal institutions; government, business and between people and communities.

* Solution --
A community-wide project combining voluntary effort, the desire of people to help others and participate in something larger than themselves and the revenue generating capacity of Network Marketing to create a synergy that will excite and inspire us all to greater achievement and community spirit.

* Result --
Increased social capital, stronger communities, lower expenditures on crime, stronger consumer base, increased tax base, and a vibrant civic thrust toward a green future.

* Business Model --
A hybrid organization composed of business leaders, representatives of local government, community stakeholders and non-profits utilizing Network Marketing motivated by social outcomes and green metrics.

* Underlying Magic --
People hunger for more meaning and purpose in their lives, businesses seek connection to consumers and employees and the means to join the growing movement to a green future without compromising profit. Network Marketing offers low start-up costs and a short learning curve.

Under Further Development;
* Marketing and sales
* Team
* Projections and milestones
* Status and timeline
* Summary and call to action


In a nutshell the idea takes Network Marketing and uses the revenue generated to endow a Social Venture Capital Fund (SVCF). The SVCF will be managed by a board composed of community stakeholders with the purpose of funding essential community and capacity building efforts and supporting the SVCF itself (salaries, marketing, admin, etc.).

The SVCF will have the mission of greening our community using Triple Bottom Line (TBL) metrics developed by our group. As we green our community using TBL metrics (aka People, Planet and Profits or P3), we can increase the discretionary income of our most vulnerable citizens, increase the ability of community members to become self-reliant, contributing, productive citizens, augment our education budgets, support the arts, etc. Amazingly, the more people that we can help, the more support we can draw from beyond our community in partnership with our efforts.
http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/09/10/triple-bottom-line-the-dna-of-a-green-business-starts-with-people/

A community wide effort has the potential in full blossom to generate millions of dollars to address critical community challenges even as we lower our Carbon footprint, house by house, block by block, community by community. The idea can be utilized in less grandiose contexts as well. It can be mounted as a pilot program in a small business, a day care center, or a non-profit.



The Triple Bottom Line and our fundamental assumptions; P3 = Progress

"Individual and collective economic vitality is an important element of any sustainable community. In order to advance economic security extant economic opportunities must be preserved and new development encouraged. Generally, economic vitality is founded in "a healthy...economy that diversifies and co-develops sufficiently to create meaningful jobs, reduce poverty, and provide the opportunity for a high quality of life for all in an increasingly competitive world"
~(President's Council on Sustainable Development PCSD, 1996:15).

Simple & Integrated Perspective on Sustainability
Warren Flint, Ph.D

Advancement toward social equity requires particular attention to the progress made by those who are most disadvantaged in the community, usually women, youth and children, indigenous people, and/or racial/ethnic minorities.

In essence, we are practicing sustainable development when we find the means to equally and simultaneously address economic development with environmental protection, while also insuring that the most disadvantaged people in our society are provided the ability to improve their quality of life. If disproportionately impacted community members aren't able to improve their well-being, the best designed plans will not meet with success and future generations will not enjoy a high quality of life. This is the nexus of sustainable development and equity -- without equity and justice considerations sustainability objectives cannot be achieved.

In this context therefore, we are affirming that sustainable development not only embraces wisdom and stewardship in the management of natural resources, but also considers fulfillment of basic human needs such as food, shelter, clothing, and the provision of economic means through which to achieve these needs for all peoples in present generations, without compromising the ability of other species sharing our world or future generations to meet their own needs."
http://www.eeeee.net/

“When the fundamental principles of fairness and equal justice through the rule of law are shaken, the cornerstones of our democratic society are threatened. Respect for justice and laws is diminished when large segments of our society do not have equal access to civil justice because they cannot obtain legal assistance to resolve disputes that touch on the very basics of life (e.g., health care, food, and shelter) or to seek legal redress of their grievances.”
~Yale Law & Policy Review, Vol. 17, No. 1, 1998
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=192616

"Because legal services are increasingly necessary in a complex society, prepaid legal service plans analogous to health insurance have become an important means of assuring basic rights to millions of citizens."
~Ralph Nader

"NOTICE: This person is a member of the Legal Shield program and has 24-hour telephone access to legal representation by a law firm provided by Pre-Paid Legal Services, ® Inc. and subsidiaries. To any law enforcement officer or security personnel: If it is your intention to question, detain or arrest me, or if you intend to remove my children from my custody, or serve me with a warrant, please allow me to call my attorney immediately."
~The Legal Shield card offered by Pre-Paid Legal Services, Inc.



The project that I am working on is unconventional and at first glance, complicated. It utilizes some components that are not held in the highest regard. It is a bridge, a pump primer and catalyst, not an ends unto itself. It, no doubt, will have detractors. It is not a perfect idea because no idea can satisfy all interests, but it is practical, doable and uses market forces, volunteer energy and the human desire to help, to achieve it's aims. It is a low risk idea with a potential large upside. I believe that in full blossom it can green lower-income neighborhoods, provide liquidity in areas of most need and assist our efforts at forestalling economic collapse. Bold assertions true but I believe that I can make the case for this outcome if given the opportunity.

The idea can be found here, A Vehicle, a Method and a Bridge to a Green Future, (http://imaginegreenfuture.blogspot.com/2008/09/vehicle-method-and-bridge-to-green.html) along with supporting info. With this idea, we can create a new business model that will endow a social venture capital fund for many underfunded needs such as;

Funding small business start-ups, community cooperatives, support for early childhood education, tutors for students, additional income for teachers, support for the arts, hurricane mitigation, solar and energy conservation upgrades, neighborhood gardens, additional tree canopy, etc., all done using green metrics, local labor and the latest in green tech. We could make our neighborhoods LEED certified block by block, neighborhood by neighborhood.

You are probably aware of the condiments company, Newman's Own. Newman's Own (http://www.newmansown.com/) is a company started by Paul Newman that donates all profits and royalties after taxes to educational and charitable purposes. I believe that this concept --using private enterprise for public good-- can be utilized in many other applications.

Wall St. wobbles waiting for Main St. to find it's footing and Main St. is scared. Noted conservative journalist and commentator David Brooks put it this way;

"If there’s a thread running through the gravest current concerns, it is that people lack a secure environment in which they can lead their lives. Wild swings in global capital and energy markets buffet family budgets. Nobody is sure the health care system will be there when they need it. National productivity gains don’t seem to alleviate economic anxiety. Inequality strains national cohesion. In many communities, social norms do not encourage academic achievement, decent values or family stability. These problems straining the social fabric aren’t directly addressed by maximizing individual freedom."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/12/opinion/12brooks.html?hp

It seems that everyone is treading water until manna falls from heaven. Meanwhile, firms are laying off, businesses are failing, families frayed, communities are stressed, and people are suffering.

Free markets are constantly weeding out marginal players, this is par for the course. Economic dislocation always involve some pain. Yet, we may be in uncharted territory as we face severe challenges domestically and from abroad. Because of war commitments, huge entitlement programs and a citizenry hammered by a low tax mantra, policy makers have extremely difficult choices to make. Education budgets are being cut even when studies show that investments early on save expenditures down the road. Public safety costs are escalating and recidivism as well. We are increasingly paying more and getting less.

Essentially this is a method to use the power of the free market, volunteerism and self-help to build beauty, self-sufficiency and sustainability from the ground up in areas of society that are now a drain on public resources and often resistant to current remediation methods. The impulse to do good works, the need for social justice and the quickening wave of excitement about green energy creates an elegant community project generating a synergy greater than it's parts.

This project will not raise our taxes. This project will not force government regulation on overburdened business or people. This project will facilitate our working together to create green communities, bringing capital and income to areas of historic deficits. Please keep an open mind and have a look. As presented, it functions in a municipal context. I can show how the framework can be utilized in for-profit and non-profit organizations as well. Using this method, business owners may enhance recruitment, retention and job satisfaction for their valued team members and support Social Ventures through an innovative funding mechanism.

Thank you,

Bill Milner
Delray Beach, FL




http://imaginegreenfuture.blogspot.com/2008/09/vehicle-method-and-bridge-to-green.html


“I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.”
~Thomas A. Edison


http://www.myspace.com/zaragozabill
http://www.thebigwordproject.com/search?word=ablaze