Leanne Ussher
Link to her site [1]
Ussher Publications Complementary Currencies and international aid.
Join us for a regional Neighborhood Economics focused on entrepreneurship.
Neighborhoodeconomics.org/Asheville
On Jul 22, 2024, at 11:55 AM, Stacey Druss <27openheart@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Michael, Super interested in everything you've mentioned, but particularly in the farm project in Kingston. I'm only about an hour and fifteen minutes away, in Nyack. I'm really looking forward to hearing more. Warmly, Stacey
On Mon, Jul 22, 2024 at 9:19 AM Michael Marks <mbmsling@gmail.com> wrote: Hi Kevin et al.
Great to be joining this discussion. Leanne, thanks for bringing me in
As Leanne noted, I am heavily into the neighborhood enterprise space, having been involved in starting and supporting four community currencies (CC) since my PHD in 2008, including the Hudson Valley Current (HVC) in Kingston, NY. Leanne and I are working on a paper on HVC to be presented at RAMICS in November at their conference in Rome. It involves studying the combination of a community currency with an embedded social enterprise, a unique feature of CCs to date.
Quick background: I have been working in the child welfare and juvenile justice fields for almost 40 years (still involved) and pivoted to include fostering 'alternative' community and economic development innovations, after witnessing that so much of youth/family involvement in these two fields is poverty related. In addition to HVC, I am advising community leaders on social enterprise development, consulting with a national organization that is bringing together business allies using their social capital to assist people in their community and starting two projects below that I believe will be of interest to all:
1-I am in the early stages of planning for a community investment trust for a local farm project in Kingston. The farm was purchased by the Kingston Land Trust (KLT) as part of its Land in Black Hands Initiative. The farm will be a regenerative farming educational center as well as a historic center chronicling the history of Black people's relationship with the land. The land is fully owned by KLT. We are exploring adapting a model of ab community investment trust that originated in East Portland, Or. (and replicated up the road from us in Albany, NY), to enable unaccredited investors from a poor zip code in Kingston to buy equity shares of the property and also receive dividends on revenue produced by the farm project.
2-I am also working with the local community action program on developing a multi-stakeholder collaboration researching the potential of establishing a Green Energy/Weatherization social enterprise to provide affordable weatherization services for local working poor and middle class landowners and landlords. Our vision is to work with existing providers to train and place refugees and poor young people in jobs in these fields, with some becoming business owners creating their own LLCs. Interestingly, the CEO of the CAP wants diversity funding, ending dependence on mostly shrinking federal dollars and small donations that serve only income- eligible poor, recognizing that there are many more families in need of these services and solid long term careers.
I believe that my work has come full circle, from asset-based work with proven risk young people to community asset identification and maximization using new economic innovations that are maturing to support entire communities.
Hope this is helpful in understanding my interests
Kevin, I wish your wife well. Looking forward to meeting with you to learn more about Neighborhood Economics.
Best,
On Sun, Jul 21, 2024 at 4:37 PM kevin jones <kevindoylejones1@gmail.com> wrote: Hi very interested. My wife is getting out of the hospital tomorrow, gall bladder surgery. Whats next week like?
Join us for a regional Neighborhood Economics focused on entrepreneurship. Neighborhoodeconomics.org/Asheville
On Jul 21, 2024, at 4:10 PM, Leanne Ussher <leanne.ussher@bowraleafarm.com.au> wrote:
oops, I forgot to add Michael's email Michael Marks <mbmsling@gmail.com>
On Sun, Jul 21, 2024 at 10:09 PM Leanne Ussher <leanne.ussher@bowraleafarm.com.au> wrote: Hi Kevin, this is a great book. I was going to critique the video interview which didn't mention the critical piece of a solidarity economy which is the network of mutual aid. But then after reading the first part of the book I see they are all over it. Wonderful! https://www.assetsincommon.org/
The sponsor of this book, One Project, also sponsored the Cofi event that I attended in the beginning of July in Belgium. I believe the Assets in Common book and your own Common Cents Fund, has a lot in common with Dil Green's commons housing project. Dil was also at the CoFi event along with Will Ruddick, and various others. Together we are trying to solve mutual aid issues in sovereign or semi closed communities.
My own intuition is that like the Assets in Common book, which has some simple flow diagrams, the way to design these neighborhood economic systems is to model the flows in a network of indirect reciprocity. Michael Marks and I are doing some research on this for the Hudson Valley Current, over the next couple of months.
I'm cc'ing Michael on this email and I'll ask him to introduce himself to you. Along with being a sociologist and community activist, he works with some African American investment groups in the Hudson Valley I believe tied to land trusts. But I will let him introduce himself. He may even be interested in attending your conference in November. Perhaps even present our work.
Best Leanne
Leanne J. Ussher, Ph.D.
Research and Strategic Planning
Bowralea Dairy Farm
Tel: +61 435 775 468
On Sun, Jun 30, 2024 at 3:49 PM Kevindoylejones1 <kevindoylejones1@gmail.com> wrote:
We will, with the Common Cents Fund, in Jackson, MS, Asheville and in other places be creating surprising grass roots level abundance through philanthropic investing. I am wondering if, when an undifferentiated group of donors morphs into a collectively intelligent giving circle that can rely on the money, post tax deduction, they might be willing to become something like a community where mutual obligation vouchers is a natural next step in the interdependence we will need for local bioregional climate response coupled with making sure all share in the assets, held in common in this sort of form, perhaps. https://www.assetsincommon.org/
The next phase of philanthropic investing here: https://app.catacap.org/invest/32
Our entrepreneurship focused regional NeighborhoodEconomics.org/Asheville conference, is in Asheville, NC, November 12-13
On Jun 30, 2024 at 8:17 AM, <Philip Browning> wrote:
Kevin, I will allow you to run with this conversation with Leanne, but I am wondering whether there is a need to clarify further what you are seeking to achieve and what is meant by a "mutual obligation voucher" eg is it a currency design/economics issue vs a particular social-finance agreement issue between specific parties? Just a question. Leanne might say a currency can be both, but am curious to understand your needs and the broader pattern, as I am sure it can be applied more generally. best p.
On Saturday 29 June 2024 at 09:37:41 pm AEST, Isavary Khabuqwi <isavarykhabuqwi@gmail.com> wrote:
That sounds like great news. Congratulations!
On Fri, 28 Jun 2024 at 02:22, Philip Browning <browning_philip@yahoo.com.au> wrote: cool. the bottom up investment/giving circle is where there is so much opportunity and done well so much potential. p. Leanne, have a new deeply democratic philanthropic investment fund. It costs 1/20th of the standard cost to set up an account at this daf platform, on the impact assets platform. It’s for the mass market; people with under $100k u.s. in assets. We are using it to open up our fund that solves the friends and family gap for the 90% plus of African Americans that are sole proprietors; the very small businesses that usually don’t get to the fourth employee. Those resilient sole proprietors trending toward $100k in revenue have become the lowest cost job creators in the county. So we have been in the last two county budgets. Now we can open that evergreen philanthropic investment fund to individuals who could either contribute their winnings to the fund, or reinvest them in the ecosystem around those entrepreneurs. Or give it to something else entirely. We will also have two deals with climate impact. One unlocking biden’s climate money. My imagination is this. You turn a group of undifferentiated donors, through their common need to manage their incoming loan repayments, could become an intelligent giving circle with an evergreen, growing philanthropic fund that can afford to think long term because the cycle of return (we have a loss reserve) is reliable.
I am wondering in those moments of abundance when they are thinking collectively about what to do next, might be a place to institute mutual obligation vouchers, once there is some community established. Looping in Stacey, Jose and isavary, my friends researching currencies and the relationships around them. Isavary has built on the Serafu model and lives in Nairobi.
Thanks so much for the introduction, Phillip. The perspective of an economist on this would be really helpful to me to put this in context.
Our entrepreneurship focused regional NeighborhoodEconomics.org/Asheville conference, is in Asheville, NC, November 12-13
On Jun 27, 2024 at 4:39 AM, <Leanne Ussher> wrote:
Hi Kevin,
I was previously an economics professor at Bard College, and there one of my students started up a group, in Kingston Thrive On We worked a lot together on community economics and local currencies. I think he would love to attend your NC conference and I'll let him know about the dates.
I am likely not in the US in November, although I plan to be there between July and September.
I'm currently in Europe, attending some monetary rethink conferences. I've spent time in Kenya with Will Ruddick studying his voucher system. I know Will is coming much more around to 'pre-monetary' thinking which is much more about all of us being inside something bigger than our own existence. This is spiritual, and it's interesting for me that your organization appears to have religion and culture as central to your neighborhood economics - although I'm only extrapolating from what I see on your website.
Currently I am looking to a new phase of my life on my dairy farm, and hope to bring about a broader awareness among my community and its economics system tied to its watershed, utilizing the commons - our our river - as a central motivating force for environmental and economic governance and practice. Hoping to do more learning and teaching about bioregional community/local economics in my coming years - with Philip in Australia.
Pleasure to meet you Best Leanne
Leanne J. Ussher, Ph.D. Independent Monetary Theorist Director, Research and Strategic Planning, Bowralea Dairy Farm Tel: +61 435 775 468 leanne.ussher@bowraleafarm.com.au Website: https://www.leanneussher.com
On Thu, Jun 27, 2024 at 3:50 AM Kevindoylejones1 <kevindoylejones1@gmail.com> wrote:
Very interested to learn more.
Our entrepreneurship focused regional NeighborhoodEconomics.org/Asheville conference, is in Asheville, NC, November 12-13
On Jun 26, 2024 at 6:13 PM, <Philip Browning> wrote:
Kevin and Leanne,
I thought I should introduce you to each other.
Leanne, I recently met Kevin via an impact investment workshop- he is quite the visionary doer and has interactions with will rudduck re the application of what has been done re committment pooling into the USA setting. By. way of background see https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevindoylejones/ and also https://neighborhoodeconomics.org/ . Kevin is also involved the Swannanoa Watershed Action Network,
Kevin, Leanne Ussher is the Australian economist/monetary theorist and currency designer who works with Will Rudduck re kilifi etc. As mentioned before she has moved back to Australia to her family dairy farm a half days drive from me in northern NSW. She is about to meet with Will in Europe to plan activities. And thus I thought it might be useful to directly make the link. There would also be potential shared interests regarding both your farm properties activities re bio-regional restoration
Best philip.
Virus-free.www.avg.com
An email explaining her journey to Kevin