Money is not wealth.

 This morning I have been thinking about foreclosure  and alternative economies (though the scent of fresh jasmine from the Chinatown community garden, the bamboo wind-chimes and songbirds are distracting deep thought). Last night I was at a campfire discussing what a foreign policy with Iran would look like if it took into consideration our history of imperialism. It reminded me of Lisa Schirch's work to see development and diplomacy as acts of our national defense. It is difficult to watch the way the system works against healing and progress in people's lives.
   On Thursday our writing group wrote about 'the color of hunger.' One guest wrote (in Spanish), "Only you know the color of your hunger."  There are so many struggles in my community-- struggles to re-enter against the stigma of felony, of past-drug use, struggles to maintain homes, to find work, to find a place to sleep at night. Recently there have been more guests (and even volunteers) who are facing foreclosure and the loss of their homes.

"The anti-foreclosure and right-to-housing movements are among the most consistent in our nation’s history of activism—a constant necessity in a country where private property is a right but a family’s basic shelter, security, and safety is a privilege." Occupy Moves to Front Lawns

I can not fully understand what a terrifying place to be in that is for them. And what is happening here is just a tiny sliver of the struggle across the United States- the struggle which I hope is the birth-pangs of awakening to the unsustainable way of American life.  Having just finished my third cup of coffee this morning I can't articulate the urgency, passion, despair, and hope I feel about this... but I am recalling the power of the human microphone at Occupy Wall Street last October and the sense of embodying others words and speaking for and with them to be heard. We must take our power for each other, from each other, together with each other. We must not forget that money is not wealth. And we must challenge the systems that prevent us from being human with each other.

[David Korten]

The devastation created by Wall Street’s failure affirms three truths that are the foundation on which millions of people are at work building a New Economy:

1. Our individual and collective well-being depends on acting with concern for the well-being of others. We all do better when we look out for one another.
2. Money is not wealth. It is just numbers. Sacrificing the health and happiness of billions of people to grow numbers on computer hard drives to improve one’s score on the Forbes Magazine list of the world’s richest people is immoral. Managing a society’s economy to facilitate this immoral competition at the expense of people and nature is an act of collective insanity. 
3. The proper purpose of the economy and the enterprises that comprise it is to provide good jobs and quality goods and services beneficial to the health and happiness of people, community and nature. A modest financial profit is essential to a firm’s viability, but is not its proper purpose. 

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Community Development in the US of A.

There's an exhaustive amount of questions and theory and living to dissect in my head. I miss sitting in Common Grounds and being able to discuss these issues.

Today a member of my community, a favorite of mine-- a 70yr. old man with bright blue eyes and weathered skin who I helped build a shelter for, gave me the first 20 pages of his biography to read. It's actually pretty well-written and fascinating. Moving here has shattered misconceptions I had about "the homeless" (and made me think about how often we use adjectives about people's situations to classify them versus returning to the fact of humanity. They are homeless people. Undocumented people. Migrant-worker people. Drug-using people. etc.). Many of my new friends are kind, smart, & strong-willed but for whatever reason (bad-decisions, bad habits, lack of ability to adapt, or lack of skills in stress/conflict management, social ability, etc.) have fallen out of what is defined as "normal" society. How do I accompany them in the unique struggles of their community and in their individual stories? It's frustrating to see people who are very capable and intelligent but lack the resources or social skills or coping abilities to function. I have been spending a lot of time thinking about "mutually liberating partnerships" and meaningful work. One exciting thing I'm working with is a woman's group, Bill-- a co-worker of mine and an amazing community organizer, has helped them establish a reading room and coffee shop micro-enterprise that is in the beginning stages but its amazing to see the women finding their voice and learning how to organize, communicate, and make their imagined futures a reality. 

[Excerpts from a letter to a friend] I've been thinking about land right's a lot. I think we hear about it as an issue in the third-world more with peasants or whatever but I've been surprised to see how it's an issue in the US too. In the coming weeks the police are planning a sweep of the homeless encampment where lots of my new friends live and we have a weekly community forum where someone asked, "where is there a place I am allowed to sleep?" The PD has said they don't want to criminalize homelessness, but it does in effect become criminalized where it is illegal to camp just about anywhere. I have been thinking about private property and how even "public" places forbid camping (or sleeping)... or with the Occupy Movement-- sleeping bags, lying down, etc. It seems like the system always benefits those who have property to protect and defend. 

Parallels that come to mind as I think of what you're doing and would love to hear your take on-- ownership/agency despite the potential of transitory. Your community faces violence, outbreaks of fighting or threatening. My community also faces violence, I've been to two memorial services in the past two weeks. They face intervention because they don't own their land. Some of my community has little investment in their surroundings besides trying to secure a place to sleep-- they are given disposable objects and get new donations rather than hold unto things (which is also understandable because it's hard to be homeless and have to lug things around but it can become a cycle.) So how have you worked on increasing ownership or desire to participate in your own community there?