Reflecting on ILSR’s DC origins 50 years later, when the seat of federal power inspired three pioneers to build local power. … Read More

Born and raised in DC, Kehmari Norman established her flower shop to bridge culture and floristry. The visionary behind Black Flower Market drew from her background as a stage designer at Temple University,  transforming her skills into landscape design, and intertwining environmentalism with entrepreneurship. Throughout the episode, Kehmari highlights the significance of authenticity and cultivating connections … Read More

A grassroots group in Detroit reimagines democracy and economic empowerment. … Read More

Avalon Village is a testament to the resilience of communities and the transformative power of collective action.… Read More

A Detroit entrepreneur explains how her pilot projects are building community, local self-reliance, and resilience. … Read More

The Detroit People's Food Cooperative represents a vital step towards fostering food sovereignty in a neighborhood historically affected by food apartheid. … Read More

A Detroit-based bookseller shares the purpose behind her store and its profound impact on the community over the past three decades.… Read More

In our new season of Building Local Power, The City Series, we take a tour of cities and towns across the U.S. and talk to guests who are working to make their communities more locally self-reliant.… Read More

Local initiatives are resisting profit-driven mergers by mobilizing their communities and building robust local economies. … Read More

Communities nationwide proactively address food security by opening grocery stores that adopt innovative ownership, access, and governance approaches. … Read More

Sparklight monopolization of East Carroll Parrish prompts leaders to build a fiber-to-the-home network for fast, affordable Internet. … Read More

From the Capitol to K Street, a Wisconsin native finds a home at Consumer Reports advocating for broadband access and affordability. … Read More

A community advocacy organization fought to transfer power from a fossil fuel-backed investment firm to community-driven clean energy. … Read More

A determined coalition fights to block a private takeover of the state’s largest utility. … Read More

A NYC composter fights to fend off Wall Street and invest in the land and her community. … Read More

An environmental lawyer and activist calls bigness the most pressing issue in the waste industry. … Read More

A brewer details the importance of creativity, community, and empowerment in the male-dominated brewing industry and highlights the struggles faced by smaller breweries. … Read More

Our new season shatters the deceptive facade often employed by merging companies that claim their consolidation will benefit consumers.… Read More

Chris Noble, Director of Organizing at Health Access, and Allison Hardt, Community Development Director at T1 International, share their personal experiences accessing life-saving medication in America. Stacy Mitchell delves into the hidden world of pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) — their role in the pharmaceutical industry and how their practices hinder people like Chris and Allison from obtaining essential medicines at reasonable prices.… Read More

Kay Eady and Ry Marcattilio dive into the lack of broadband access in the rural South, shedding light on the consequences it holds for individuals seeking telehealth services.… Read More

Rose Thelen shares her story of working with the Sierra Club’s “Beyond Coal” campaign and successfully mobilizing hundreds of concerned residents in an effort to shut down the Minnesota Sherco coal-fired power plant. Tyson Slocum joins the second half of the episode to discuss how private equity firms across the country have been acquiring and sustaining coal plants like the ones Rose is fighting against.… Read More

Dr. Perryman, a life-long Toledo resident, tells his story of leading a religious, social, and political movement to empower his community and fight against dollar store proliferation. Kennedy Smith weaves Dr. Perryman's story into the national fight against dollar stores. She notes the harms that dollar stores inflict as well as the strategies communities can use to battle them. … Read More

For our final Building Local Power episode of 2022, we invited Co-Founder, David Morris, to offer a history lesson on the self-reliance framework that underpins ILSR’s work. He discusses how that framework has evolved over four-plus decades, the organization’s inherent aversion to bigness, and the successes and hardships of ILSR’s early years. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, Christopher Mitchell and Sean Gonsalves talk about the work that immediately lies ahead for the broad array of communities seeking to free themselves from the unbridled power of monopolistic Internet providers.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, three members of ILSR’s Independent Business team, Lauren Gellatly, Katy Milani, and Kennedy Smith, answer: What challenges are small, independent businesses facing? And what legislative solutions are on the way? … Read More

The three members from ILSR's energy team engage in a riveting conversation on the biggest energy stories from 2022, including the Inflation Reduction Act’s big funding for solar, the antimonopoly focus in the Biden administration, how utility companies are continuing to use their financial power to lobby against energy, and a new tool designed to bring distributed solar to more communities.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, members of the Composting for Community team, Brenda Platt and Clarissa Libertelli, explain how their accomplishments in 2022 have impacted communities across the U.S. and forged a more sustainable future. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, Josh Ewing, Director of the Rural Climate Partnership, explains how we must put rural America at the forefront of the clean energy transition. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power Alejandro Roark, the Chief of Consumer and Governmental Affairs at the FCC tells a captivating journey of his career from working at the Hispanic Technology and Telecommunications Partnership all the way to his current career at the Federal Communications Commission. He speaks about his LGBTQ inclusion work, racial and economic justice in the telecommunications sector, collective action, and how the ACP is filling an immediate and vital need. ILSR's Sean Gonsalves weighs in on how to strategize for longer term Internet solutions that will make our broadband economy more fair and equitable.… Read More

This week on Building Local Power, we are joined by Brandi Collins-Dexter, author of Black Skinhead: Reflections on Blackness and our Political Future and Stacy Mitchell, Co-Director of ILSR. We engage in a riveting conversation on how political parties have monopolistic tendencies, how Big Tech has dominated mainstream media, and the future of Black-owned and led businesses in America. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, Bloomberg reporter Linda Poon joins us to talk about how cities are [mis]managing rat infestations. We dive into the decline and spike in rat populations during and after the pandemic, cities' solutions to mitigating rat infestations, and how to shift the public focus from a problem with rats to a more proactive and thoughtful approach to how we discard food.… Read More

In the 17th century, humans weren’t the only ones voyaging to the U.S. — the Norway rat decided to join the expedition. And ever since, the human and the rat have been inseparable, much to the rat’s delight and the human’s dismay. Today, rats lurk in underground subways, flourish in commercial centers, burrow in city parks, and scurry across sidewalks. They thrive in any place humans have mismanaged our food disposal systems — hence in cities across the U.S. On this episode of Building Local Power, Bloomberg reporter Linda Poon joins us to talk about how cities are [mis]managing rat infestations. We dive into the decline and spike in rat populations during and after the pandemic, cities’ solutions to mitigating rat infestations, and how to shift the public focus from a problem with rats to a more proactive and thoughtful approach to how we discard food. “There is this one statistic called the one in ten rule. It only takes one house to have very sloppy practices to invite a rat infestation into the neighborhood. It really has to be a community effort, which is why it’s such a big deal that cities are engaging [the] public [on a] large scale.” – Linda Poon Related Resources I Got a Crash Course in Rodent Control at D.C.’s Rat Academy by Linda Poon Linda Poon’s Bloomberg Article Catalog Oh Rats! How to Avoid Rodents at Community Composting Sites The Rodent Academy with Bobby Corrigan Find the Accidental Ecosystem by Peter S. Alagona at your local bookstore! Transcript Linda Poon: The community part is a big deal. There is this one statistic, in our course, that we kept learning, he called it the one in 10 rule. It only takes one house to have very sloppy practices to invite a rat infestation into the neighborhood. It only takes one house to infest 10. It really has to be a community effort, which is why it’s such a big deal that cities are engaging public at a large scale. Reggie Rucker: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance dedicated to challenging corporate monopolies and expanding the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Reggie Rucker, and today we are talking about rats. Now you might be thinking, why are we talking about rats? I have to say, I cannot wait for this conversation. I’ve lived in DC for a little over a year at this point and I am stunned to the degree that rats are everywhere. When I say everywhere, not so much everywhere I go, although a little bit of that, but it’s in my social media feed. People are just constantly talking about rats in this city. And so recently, Luke is going to tell you about some work at our composting team about how you can compost and avoid rats. And so, it just made total sense. We have to have a rat conversation. But before we get into all that, I will pass it over to my cohost, Luke. Luke Gannon: Thank you, Reggie. I haven’t lived in a city long enough to experience the rat infestations. As I’ve been preparing for this show, I’ve read a bunch of rat articles and I’m just so surprised how big of an issue they are. So, I’m really looking forward to this conversation. But my name is Luke Gannon, and today on the show, we are speaking with a reporter at Bloomberg City Lab, Linda Poon. In her work, Linda covers how to be an activist and an advocate of Asian American communities, the complexities of urban life, how cities are responding to climate disasters and recently, she wrote about a rodent control crash course and the relationship between humans and rats. ILSR released a new guide called Oh, Rats! which looks at how you can safely compost while avoiding rodents completely. So we felt like this was a perfect occasion to have Linda on the show to talk about all things urban, climate change and rats. We are so excited to have you on the show today, Linda. Welcome. Linda Poon: Thank you. I never thought my rat knowledge would take me to places. Luke Gannon: All right, so we’ll get started here. So,

On this episode of Building Local Power, Rakeen Mabud the Chief Economist at Groundwork Collaborative and Ron Knox, Senior Researcher and Writer at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, take us on a riveting journey exposing the story of inflation that most economists don't want to tell.… Read More

The pandemic exacerbated the deeply rooted issues in cities around the nation — but the youth of Worcester, Massachusetts, decided that they wanted to enact change to create a better now. Their action lead to the formation of the Worcester Youth Cooperatives. On this episode of Building Local Power, we are joined by two youth collaborators Mario Harper and Samuel Posner and an adult ally Addison Turner.… Read More

This episode previews a new six-part series from the Local Energy Rules podcast. John Farrell highlights the importance of local accountability, failures and successes of cities' trajectories towards controlling their own power, and why exactly you should tune in. … Read More

What can you win if you fail? Minneapolis has a unique story of its path towards clean energy. Although Minneapolis failed to get a public utility on their first significant push, they ultimately made a deal requiring utilities to engage the local government and residents more in their operations. So despite their public power pursuit not achieving all of their aims, what the advocates in Minneapolis gained was increased leverage to push for more clean energy. While Minneapolis’ story is unique, it shares some common themes with cities all across the country looking to move to public-owned utilities that provide cleaner energy. This episode previews a new six-part series from the Local Energy Rules podcast that debuts August 17, telling these stories. The series, “The Promise and Perils of Public-Owned Power,” traverses cities’ trajectories towards controlling their own power.   What to look forward to: What public power means Four ingredients that improve the odds of success in moving to public-owned power What cities learned and accomplished in their advocacy for public-owned power Other ways cities can leverage their power to address clean energy   “What’s so important about the idea of public power is that it localizes the decision making. This is one of those key benefits that we’re gonna talk about in this series about what you win if you fail, which is all of a sudden you get engagement from your local elected officials who are really accountable and close to you, you know, like a couple phone calls to a city council member is all it takes to get them to pay attention to an issue. So if we can get cities passionate about renewable energy and caring about renewable energy to address the needs of the community, all of a sudden we have folks that are lot easier to work with.” – John Farrell Related Resources Local Energy Rules Podcast (find “The Promise and Perils of Public-Owned Power on August 17 here) Local Energy Rules Episode on Minneapolis’ clean energy partnership The Sum of Us by Heather McGhee (buy at your local bookstore!) Heather McGhee talking about The Sum of Us on NPR, How to Citizen with Baratunde, The Ezra Klein Show, and more! Other energy sources that have alliterated titles: ILSR Asks Arizona Commissioners to Consider Community Solar Implemented Correctly, Community Choice Energy Can Support Colorado Communities in Their Goals Transcript John Farrell: And what’s amazing and I think what’s so important about the idea of public power is that it localizes the decision making. This is one of those key benefits that we’re going to talk about in this series about what you win, if you fail. Reggie Rucker: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance dedicated to challenging corporate monopolies and expanding the power of people to shape their own future. I am Reggie Rucker, one of the hosts on this journey, along with my co-host, Luke Gannon, who frankly, does all the work. I just get to show up and look pretty. Luke? Luke Gannon: Thank you, Reggie. My mom was listening to the most recent episode and she was like, “I really like how Reggie summarizes what the guests say. It’s really useful.” So, I wouldn’t say that I do all the work. But I’m Luke Gannon, the other co-host. And without further ado, today on the podcast, I am welcoming my colleague and co-director of ILSR, John Farrell. John is also the director of the Energy Democracy Initiative. I am sure you recognize his voice because he has been on here many of times. John and the energy team are releasing a new six part series on public power. So, we welcome him on the show today to find out just exactly what this series is all about, and why you all should be marking your calendars in anticipation of its release. Welcome, John. John Farrell: Well, thank you so much. It’s great to be here. Luke Gannon: So John, to start off, can you briefly describe to us what this series is about?...

Reggie Rucker and Luke Gannon are joined by guests Shayna Englin and DeAnne Cuellar who discuss how the digital divide is closely tied to housing, healthcare, immigration, and civic education concerns. As the pandemic moved everything online, they explained, we realized that connectivity is an issue that affects the entire human ecosystem. … Read More

What does it really mean when people talk about the digital divide? And what power do communities have that find themselves on the wrong side of that divide? Shayna Englin is our guest on this episode of Building Local Power discussing how she approaches these issues as director of the Digital Equity Initiative at the California Community Foundation. Joining Shayna in this episode is ILSR Community Broadband Outreach Team Lead DeAnne Cuellar. Shayna and DeAnne discuss how the digital divide is not isolated as an issue of broadband access, but tied to housing justice, healthcare access, immigration policies, and education. As the pandemic moved everything online, they explained, the whole country experienced how fundamental internet connectivity is to the entire human experience. Highlights include: How the California Community Foundation is using a systems change approach to creating digital equity. Giving decision-makers access to accurate information to invest in local communities. The funding sources and policies that are expanding opportunities for municipalities to come up with local solutions. Creating power and policy frameworks to mobilize communities.   “The digital divide is the gap in access to what is a modern utility. Whether it’s access in terms of a subscription or access in terms of devices or access in terms of having apps and utilities, especially from the public sector that are user friendly and meet the needs of the communities they are intended to serve.” – Shayna Englin “The early numbers that came back from the pandemic was that 80% of people over 60 years old were the people who were dying from COVID. 42% of that population didn’t have access to the internet. So that’s why we talk about the digital divide as a social determinant of health, it’s a life or death issue.” – DeAnne Cuellar   Related Resources California Community Foundation Digital Equity Initiative: https://www.calfund.org/digital-equity-initiative/ Community Networks (ILSR’s Community Broadband Networks Initiative): https://muninetworks.org/ Transcript Reggie Rucker: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. For more than 45 years, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance or ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. My name is Reggie Rucker and I am the new communications director at ILSR and co-host for Building Local Power. Luke Gannon: And I am Luke Gannon, the other co-host. I am a communications and research associate at ILSR. Today on the podcast I’m welcoming my colleague, DeAnne Cuellar, who works on the outreach team for our community broadband initiative here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Along with DeAnne, I am eager to invite Shayna Englin, the director of the California community foundation, digital equity initiative. The digital equity initiative is a multi-year project that will activate a digital equity movement in Los Angeles county. With the power and capacity to successfully advocate for fast, reliable, and affordable broadband for all people living in Los Angeles. Welcome DeAnne and Shayna. DeAnne: Hello. Thanks for having me. Shayna Englin: Thank you. Luke Gannon: Of course. So, let’s get started for all of our dedicated listeners and new listeners on Building Local Power. We are going to break these difficult topics down, like broadband. So today we are talking about the digital divide and the intricacies that fall under that umbrella. So Shayna, I’m going to start with you, and ask what is the digital divide? Shayna Englin: I love that question because we throw that term around a lot. I don’t think we ever do a great job at articulating it. So I’ll say from the perspective of CCF and the work that we are doing,

On this episode of Building Local Power, hosts Reggie Rucker and Luke Gannon are joined by the Director and Project Manager of the Composting for Community Initiative, Brenda Platt and Linda Bilsens Brolis respectively. They discuss waste imperialism, composting equity, and the necessary paradigm shift within our consumer culture.… Read More

This episode marks a new beginning for Building Local Power – Reggie Rucker, Communications Director, and Luke Gannon, Communications and Research Associate are taking a step back to look at our work in a larger context. To kick this transition off we welcomed our colleagues from the composting team Brenda Platt, Director of the Composting for Community Initiative, and Linda Bilsens Brolis, Project Manager for the Composting team. We asked our guests how this rich organic matter, compost, is combating the climate crisis. Highlights include: How composting can reclaim disturbed sites. The consequences of “waste imperialism” on social and environmental structures. How different composting models make the practice more accessible. The necessary paradigm shift within our consumer culture.   “Waste historically has been an environmental justice issue. We’re dumping our waste on areas of least political resistance, whether it’s the garbage barges on Haiti from the ’80s or in our urban areas where trash incinerators get built.” – Brenda Platt   “Whenever you build something you’re compressing the soil so a lot of community gardens are actually based in places where things don’t readily grow and so you need to import soil. And being able to compost locally just helps reduce input costs because you can help create something that you would otherwise have to buy to help improve your soil to grow.” – Linda Bilsens Brolis   Related Resources ILSR infographic: Compost Combats the Climate Crisis ILSR training: Community Composting 101 Online Certificate Course ILSR web post: Home Composting: Its Time Has Come ILSR report: Stop Trashing the Climate ILSR web post: Waste Disposal Surcharges ILSR web post: Soil Health Policies Project Drawdown (identifies reducing & recycling food waste as a top climate solution) Transcript Reggie Rucker: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. For more than 45 years, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. You might be thinking, this isn’t Jess. It’s not. Jess is now leaving communications for the Midwest Climate Adaptation Science Center, we just wanted to say, “Thank you, Jess, for your dedication and integral voice to this podcast.” My name is Reggie Rucker and I’m the new Communications Director at ILSR and co-host for Building Local Power. Now, when I say co-host, that means I have somebody else who needs to introduce themselves. Luke? Luke Gannon: Hi, everyone. My name is Luke Gannon and I am a Communications and Research Associate here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m super excited to be working with Reggie to produce and co-host this podcast. And I would also like to give a shout-out to Jess who was an amazing asset to the ILSR team. Already in this last month, I have missed her immensely but the Midwest Climate Adaptation Science Center is really lucky to have her. But without further ado, we have a big topic today so let’s dive right in. Luke Gannon: Today on the show, we are asking our guests how is composting combating the climate crisis? Right now we are experiencing the glaring implications of climate change firsthand. Last year we saw wildfires rage across the west coast and we are starting to see it again. Warming ocean temperatures are killing off species. Just to name one recent event in the news, both Yellowstone National Park and Glacier National Park are flooding which is due to extreme weather shifts driven by climate change. So as we can see, the consequences of climate change are devastating. And in order to alter these realities, we must drastically reduce global carbon emissions, and most importantly modify our practices to be more responsive to the world around us. Reggie Rucker:

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by her colleagues John Farrell, Stacy Mitchell, and Ron Knox, where they discuss the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission's plan to overhaul their merger guidelines. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by John Farrell and Stacy Mitchell, Co-directors of ILSR, and Ron Knox, a Senior Researcher on our Independent Business team. The group discusses the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission’s plan to overhaul their merger guidelines. Highlights include: The history of anti-merger laws in the United States. How the lack of merger regulation has impacted workers, consumers, and our democracy. ILSR’s recommendations that detail how we can change merger guidelines. How new merger policy could revitalize local economies. “The Great Depression was in large part, and the stock market crash, driven by the merger and concentration of electric utility holding companies.” – John Farrell “So you allow these mergers to happen and it’s like when Spider-Man shoots a whole spider web at a villain. These mergers shoot a whole spider web at the economy, every part of it, and really tamp down the ability for folks to earn a living, start a business, do all these kinds of things.” – Ron Knox “I think our chief recommendation was instead of calling them the merger guidelines, we should call them the anti-merger guidelines in keeping with Congress’ intent and being clear about the new direction and policy that at least we’re hoping to see.” – Stacy Mitchell Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: And hello everybody. Today we are going to talk about merger policy. If you’re thinking, “I am not an economic policy wonk. I don’t want to hear about merger policy,” don’t turn the episode off because it is going to be a great conversation. And I promise it’ll be interesting for everybody. Joining me to talk about this are my colleagues, John Farrell and Stacy Mitchell, who are co-directors of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, as well as Ron Knox, who is a senior researcher with our independent business team. Welcome to the show everybody. Ron Knox: Hey, Jess. Thank you. Stacy Mitchell: … be here. Jess Del Fiacco: So I can just give a little bit of a background, I think, before we dive into questions, although I’m sure I won’t do as good of a job as everybody else will on this call, but I will do my best. So the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission recently announced that they’re going to overhaul their guidelines around mergers. And ILSR has submitted comments, which detail basically how these guidelines should change in order to stop corporate concentration and support a more decentralized economy. So with that kind of context, I think I’m actually going to start with asking Ron and Stacy to talk a little bit about the history of anti-merger legislation in the US and how this enforcement has changed pretty dramatically over the course of the 20th century. Ron Knox: Yeah Jess. Thanks. So there is a lot of history, of course, behind the reason that we look at mergers in this country, the reason we prohibit mergers that would be bad for the economy, for workers, for small business, and for communities, but I think it’s important to understand what the result is when we don’t do that very well, when we don’t stop those mergers. Like I think about beer a lot, not just because I enjoy beer. I do. But I also think about it because it’s a great example of how corporate concentration has really gotten out of control in this country and why. So for a long time, we’ve had two really dominant brewers, right? We have Budweiser,

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by members of ILSR's Community Broadband Networks team: Ry Marcattilio-McCracken, Sean Gonsalves, and Christine Parker. They discuss the importance of mapping for building broadband networks.… Read More

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by several ILSR colleagues: Susan R. Holmberg, Senior Researcher and Editor for the Independent Business initiative; Katie Kienbaum, Senior Researcher for the Energy Democracy initiative; and Sophia Jones, a Fellow with the Composting for Community initiative.… Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, Jess Del Fiacco and Neil Seldman are joined by several guests who are involved in the canning community. Canners, also called waste pickers or scrappers, collect recyclable materials such as cans and bottles from the streets and redeem them at recycling centers. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, ILSR's John Farrell is joined by Michael Murray, President of Mission Data. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, John Farrell, Co-Director of ILSR, is joined by Michael Murray, the President of Mission Data. Mission Data is a national coalition of innovative technology companies that empower consumers to access their own energy usage data. John and Michael discuss how structural market problems prevent consumers from accessing electricity data and possible solutions for utilities to create a more decentralized energy system. Highlights include: How energy usage data plays a critical role in lowering costs for all customers. How monopoly utilities are exploiting smart meter data. The difference between the U.S. and the U.K. in their approach to using electricity data. “The usage data is really the fulcrum of the whole system because that’s how the aggregator goes to the wholesale market operator and gets paid for their service and in turn those payments can flow through and part to the consumers who are donating their flexibility and their power usage.”- Michael Murray “We reward utilities for spending money on capital investment, but not for figuring out how to use it well.” – John Farrell “How quickly do utilities acknowledge the existence of a problem and actually resolve it? […] I think it’s time for public utility regulators to take up the mantel and really think about themselves as overseers, as a tech support platform – that is an important part of accountability. – Michael Murray Related Resources Drone Data Helps a Minnesota City Conserve Energy How Big Utilities are Impeding Clean Energy, and What We Can Do About It Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. This week, John Farrell, a co-director of ILSR speaks with Michael Murray, the President of the Mission Data Coalition. John and Michael discuss why clean energy advocates should be paying more attention to the value of customer electricity use data and how we can extract this data from the protective claws of monopoly electric utilities. Without further ado, here’s John. John Farrell: Michael, welcome. Michael Murray: Thank you, John. I am a big fan of the podcast and very happy to join you today. John Farrell: It was such a pleasure to meet and talk to you earlier this year for the first time, and then to get a chance to read your recent report, Digital Platform Regulation, because it really intersects well with the way that ILSR and other folks across the country are looking at this issue of, who controls the platforms that we do business on and who has access to the information about themselves? Some people might think of this in the context of Facebook, as a Facebook user, this company controls a lot of data about you that you’ve given them voluntarily, and then sometimes you’re trying to figure out like, “Wow, maybe I want to cancel my account or close my account. How do I have access to that data? How can I get back my data?” Or you have Amazon, which uses data about the different sellers on its platform in ways that can enhance its ability to compete or unfairly compete with the independent sellers on its platform. John Farrell: And then we have the utility business, and this is where I was so pleased to come across your work, because I wasn’t aware that someone had thought through so carefully, not just this idea of access to customer data as something that might be useful, but you’ve really thought through it in terms of, what are the structural market structure problems that prevent us from getting access to customer data?

Leah Douglas is a reporter at Reuters covering the politics of food, agriculture, and the environment. Douglas discusses how the poultry industry is structured by contract production, how dairy farms are the bedrock for many rural communities, and Earl Butz's conviction for farmers to plant "fence row to fence row" to enable economic food production. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Stacy Mitchell and Arlene Martínez who discuss the use of nondisclosure agreements, the acceleration of mega-deals during the pandemic, and what true economic development looks like. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, Stacy Mitchell, Co-Director of ILSR, is joined by Arlene Martínez, Deputy Executive Director and Communications Director at Good Jobs First. Good Jobs First promotes government accountability in economic development and tracks corporate subsidies. Stacy and Arlene discuss the use of nondisclosure agreements, the acceleration of mega-deals during the pandemic, and what true economic development looks like. Highlights include: How states have used the Care Act and American Rescue Plan funding for economic development. Defining opportunity zones and exposing how the wealthy are profiting from their favorable tax treatment. Revealing how one of the main consequences of subsidy giveaways is exacerbating racial disparities. Why a campaign called Ban Secret Deals is trying to end the use of nondisclosure agreements. “Amazon is eager to use its power to get what it wants.”- Arlene Martínez “For the 4.1 billion that cities gave to Amazon over the last ten years we could have built 672 new locally-owned grocery stores in underserved communities – connected to, say, local farmers and food producers. The scale of this money is extraordinary.” – Stacy Mitchell “The problem with the way that so much of economic development is done in this country, and the ways that these deals are structured, is that the community loses in the end, because the giveaways are so big that tax money that was given will never pay for itself.” – Arlene Martínez Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. A podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities. Where power, wealth, and accountability, remain in local hands. This week, ILSR Stacy Mitchell talks with Arlene Martínez. Arlene is the deputy executive director and communications director at Good Jobs First. Good Jobs First is an organization that promotes corporate and government accountability, and economic development. As well as smart growth for working families. Stacy and Arlene are going to discuss Amazon’s use of public subsidies to advance their growth, the company’s tax avoidance and more. Without further ado, I’m going to hand things over to Stacy to lead the interview. Stacy Mitchell: Well, Arlene, it’s so great to have you on Building Local Power. Thanks so much for joining us today? Arlene Martínez: Thanks for having me Stacy. Stacy Mitchell: You all, Good Jobs First, your organization just does extraordinary work around the problem of corporate subsidies. These giveaways that happen across the country to big corporations. Tell us a little about what these corporate subsidies are all about? And maybe give a couple of recent examples of some of the kinds of bad deals that you’re tracking and why you see them as harmful? Arlene Martínez: Yeah. Corporate subsidies are when a corporation comes to a community and wants to bring a facility, a project, and they always promise a lot of jobs. They ask for public money to help [inaudible 00:01:44] the cost of the project. They come and they say they’re going to bring a lot of capital investment. They say they’re going to bring a lot of jobs and officials get excited and start opening up their wallets. The problem with some of these deals is that, first of all, it’s done out of public view. Sometimes the community doesn’t know the company name, don’t know how much money’s being offered. That’s the case even after the deal’s closed. In some states, we never know how much money the company got. A recent deal that just happened, first when you asked that question came to mind, was [inaudible 00:02:24].

Listen to highlights from a recent ILSR event called "The Progressive Fight for Small Business" featuring Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal and White House Advisor Tim Wu. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, we share highlights from a recent ILSR event called “The Progressive Fight for Small Business” featuring Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal and White House Advisor Tim Wu. Rep. Jayapal talks about the intersectionality between small business, health care, minimum wage, and racial inequity. Wu discusses how we need to relearn the virtues of a true American economy and how consolidation and the rise of a middleman are two of the biggest problems we face today. Highlights include: How the Paycheck Recovery Act would help small businesses if it is reintroduced. The effects of Biden’s Executive Order and how the Competition Council are working towards a more equitable economy. How the economic principles that our nation subscribed to 40 years ago were not interested in maintaining a diverse set of businesses. Why it is critical for small businesses to thrive. “We have a real opportunity to use the bipartisan momentum to prevent dominant companies from maintaining market power and using their extensive resources to stifle independent and small competitors from entering the market and also to think about our communities in a holistic way and I think that is what small businesses do particularly well.” – Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal “Our country has become too centralized, too national, too centered on consumption as opposed to production, and too many of the returns go to too few people. ” – Tim Wu Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: For today’s episode, we’re bringing you highlights from a recent event that we put on. The event is all about the momentum that is building in Congress within the Biden administration and within many state houses to reign in monopoly power and level the playing field for small, independent businesses. You’ll hear from Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, who’s the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and Tim Wu, who is a special assistant to the president for Technology and Competition Policy. This event was called the Progressive Fight for Small Business, and if you’re interested in watching the whole recording, you can find that and related resources archived on archive.ilsr.org. Jess Del Fiacco: With that, I’ll let you listen to the show. Stacy Mitchell: I’m Stacy Mitchell. I’m the co-director of ILSR, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. More than a decade ago, I helped launch an initiative here at ILSR focused on independent business. We were, and continue to be, deeply concerned about the sharp decline in small, independent businesses that we’ve seen across virtually every sector of the economy. Back at that time, there were very few political leaders on either side of the aisle who had much concern about this trend. The widespread assumption at that time was that small business didn’t matter much, the bigger corporations were better, more efficient, more productive, and so on. Stacy Mitchell: Today, we know that economic concentration and the losses that we’ve seen, both for working people and for small businesses, have had devastating effects on communities, that the decline of small business and the growing concentration across our economy is really driving racial and economic inequality, and ultimately undermining our democracy. We know that the primary driver of this trend is concentrated corporate power, whether it’s the power that these corporations wield in the market or the political power that they have to rig gover...

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, Jess Del Fiacco is joined by John Farrell and guest Ari Peskoe who is the director of the energy law initiative at Harvard Law School. They discuss the acts that Congress has passed to increase (but hasn't) competition in electric utilities, the four orders the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) ruled between 1996 and 2011, and the cost utility's evading competitive processes has on consumers. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by her colleague John Farrell, director of ILSR’s Energy Democracy Initiative, and guest Ari Peskoe, who is the director of the Energy Law Initiative at Harvard Law School. They discuss the attempts Congress has made to increase competition in electric utilities, the four orders the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) ruled between 1996 and 2011, and the how the lack of competitive processes negatively impacts consumers. Highlights include: The reasons why Congress passed the Public Utility Act and its impacts on the concentration of economic and political power. The FERC recognizing that the single greatest impediment to competition is Investor Owned Utilities. How the conviction “bigger is better” impacted the electric utility sector for nearly a hundred years. Whether Peskoe’s recommendations to the FERC; independent planning, information transparency, and burden of proof on the utility to show that costs are reasonable will be considered moving forward. “I worry about innovation in this space. It is a hallmark of the capitalist system that competition brings innovation. When we have an industry like the transmission sector here that is dominated by the century old incumbents who for decades have been planning among themselves without any competitive pressure I wonder if that is a system that can yield the benefits that I think we get from innovation.” – Ari Peskoe “The transmission system is so novel in a way of being so balkanized and so controlled by the incumbents.” – John Farrell Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build driving equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability are made in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Welcome to today’s episode. I’m actually going to hand over hosting duties to ILSR’s John Farrell today. John is a co-director of ILSR and he directs our energy democracy work. John is joined by his guest, Ari Peskoe, who is the Director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard Law School. They’re going to talk about how utilities have gained outside market power by owning energy infrastructure and how federal regulators could reintroduce competition through targeted regulation. With that, I’m going to hand things over to John. John Farrell: If you’ve heard of transmission lines in the context of clean energy, it’s probably a complaint about not in my backyard, or NIMBY, opposition to the large steel towers and wires that carry electricity long distances. However, utilities themselves have as much to do with the barriers to expanding the electricity grid. Like with rooftop solar, the exercise of monopoly power has much to do with the problem. Ari Peskoe is the Director of the Electricity Law Initiative at the Harvard Law School Environmental and Energy Law Program, and author of a new paper, Is the Utility Transmission Syndicate Forever? John Farrell: He joined me in December, 2021 to talk about the battle to overcome monopoly, utility opposition, to making transmission line planning and construction more competitive and more cost effective. I’m John Farrell, Director of the Energy Democracy Initiative at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Ari, thank you so much for joining me on Building Local Power. Ari Peskoe: Thanks for having me. John Farrell: I feel like this is a really timely conversation with the passage of the federal infrastructure bill, which does include money for high voltage electricity transmission lines. There might be other ordinary folks who would be curious since John O...

Harry First, law professor and co-director of New York University’s Competition, Innovation, and Information Law Program discusses moving antitrust away from a technocratic approach, the politicization of law enforcement, and how to reinvigorate strong antitrust legislation. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by her colleague Brenda Platt who leads the Composting Initiative and guests Sarah Boltwala-Mesina, Monique Figueiredo, and Kourtnii Brown who each run composting programs. They discuss solid waste franchising and how it impacts community composting. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by her colleague Brenda Platt who leads ILSR’s Community Composting Initiative and guests Sarah Boltwala-Mesina, Monique Figueiredo, and Kourtnii Brown. Sarah is the Executive Director of Inika Small Earth Inc., which operates Food2Soil, a community composting collective in San Diego; Monique is the founder of Compostable LA, a food scrap collector in Los Angeles; and Kourtnii Brown is the co-founder and CEO of the California Alliance for Community Composting and runs Common Compost, a community composting operation in Oakland. They discuss solid waste franchise districts, which are waste collection zones that a municipality or county has assigned to one or more contractors on an exclusive basis to provide collection services for trash and recycling. As the system typically only allows large companies to compete to win a zone, smaller competitors are kept out of the playing field. Highlights include: How franchise districts have impacted community composters’ operations, and the creative ways some have navigated the agreements in order to build successful businesses. The difference between a non-exclusive franchise and an exclusive franchise and how they impact communities. How local leaders have responded to the issues facing small-sized composters. How cities could change contracts to better support small-sized composting and recycling operations (such as through carve outs) and help them grow. “It’s not an us or them. It is an us and them. The more we can have our human based systems mimic our ecosystems, the more no one is left behind. ” – Monique Figueiredo “As community composters who want to focus on turning these scraps into soil that rejuvenates our landscape, we have to deal with regulations, attorneys… We are not made for that. We don’t have the deep pockets for that.” – Sarah Boltwala-Mesina “A lot of the attraction to an exclusive franchise agreement is because these cities have put a lot of work into establishing their zero-waste goals and their diversion targets. It is very attractive for cities to look for large scale service providers and that are capable of implementing large scale collection programs.” – Kourtnii Brown   Related Resources Mallory Szczepanski, Waste360, Commercial Franchise Zones Explained, January 25, 2017. New York City Department of Sanitation, Commercial Waste Zones: A Plan to Reform, Reroute, and Revitalize Private Carting in New York City, 2018. LA County Residential Franchise System Greggory Moore, Random Lengths News, Hauling Green Waste for Compost Is a Legal Gray Area in Long Beach, October 10, 2020 Palm Springs Sustainability Commission’s Standing Subcommittee on Waste Reduction Meeting, July 1, 2021 The Sustainable Economies Law Center’s Soil Policy Party Curriculum and Legal Guide to Community Composting (with examples from Alameda County) CalRecycle’s Model Franchise Agreement and Webinar (Scope of Contract terms starting at min 34) ILSR’s Hierarchy to Reduce Food Waste & Grow Community Food2Soil’s Model Franchise Agreement and Model Solid Waste Ordinance enhanced for community composting. Food2Soil’s story of Temecula, California’s first community compost pile. Food2Soil’s The Supermaze of Regulations Preventing Community Composting. Transcript Jess: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies, and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power, and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities, where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Hello, everybody. Today, we’re going to be discussing the challenges solid waste franchise agreements pose to community composters.

Kevin Erickson, Director of the Future of Music Coalition discusses how music is being impacted by monopoly power and what kind of marketplace breeds broad participation.… Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by her colleagues on the broadband team, DeAnne Cuellar and Sean Gonsalves. They discuss where the bulk of the broadband funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is geared towards and how to engage local champions to create community broadband strategies. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power Podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by her colleagues on the broadband team, DeAnne Cuellar who leads our community broadband outreach work, and Sean Gonsalves who is a senior reporter and editor. They discuss where the bulk of the broadband funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is geared toward and how to engage local champions to create community broadband strategies. Highlights include: How states will be impacted by the fact that cooperatives, nonprofits, public utilities, and local governments are eligible to use Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act funds to build networks. Which states are well-poised to submit a five year strategic plan before accessing the broadband money and which states are not. How digital equity organizing efforts in LA County are a perfect example of a willingness to collaborate, design community solutions, and be community-driven in terms of building better broadband infrastructure. Why having access to telehealth and remote learning are human rights.   “The bill largely targets rural America, which is sort of unfortunate, because it feeds into this idea that the digital divide is between urban and rural America, which isn’t the case. A digital divide exists within any locale that you are in.” – Sean Gonsalves “As advocates of digital inclusion… and building community broadband networks, we see connectivity as critical infrastructure, life-saving critical infrastructure.” – DeAnne Cuellar   Related Resources Infrastructure Bill Passes: ‘Our Broadband Moment’ MuniNetworks.org Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. Jess Del Fiacco: I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build driving equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: And hello, everybody. Welcome to our show today. I’m joined by my colleagues, DeAnne Cuellar who leads our community broadband outreach work and Sean Gonsalves who is a senior reporter and editor on our broadband team. We’re going to talk about a few different things today, but well, first of all, welcome to the show. Let’s start there. Sean Gonsalves: All right. CBN is in the building or buildings. DeAnne Cuellar: Hi. Jess Del Fiacco: Hi, and we have, it’s DeAnne’s debut for Building Local Power, so it’s always a special episode. DeAnne Cuellar: Hello. Thanks for having me. Jess Del Fiacco: So happy to have you guys on the show. And with that, let’s dive into some questions for Sean. So last fall, I believe Congress passed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act so Sean, could you talk about that as it relates to the broadband world? Maybe we can start with just a general description of what’s in this bill. Sean Gonsalves: Good question. Good question because there’s different pots of money that are floating out of there, floating from the federal government to states and so this shouldn’t be confused with the American Rescue Plan money, which has already made its way to state coffers and the difference really between the money that’s available in the American Rescue plan and the money that is going to be available once it makes its way to the states in the infrastructure bill is that the American Rescue Plan money is a lot more flexible, which is important. Sean Gonsalves: So the money that goes to the states and local communities, it gives a lot of wiggle room, the spending rules. There’s a lot of wiggle room on how you can spend those funds, which includes the ability of local communities to define what’s considered affordable and reliable and use that to justify deploying networks or initiat...

In this miniseries, we return to our most insightful podcast conversations. These five minute episodes highlight critical themes that are still relevant today. Jeremy Greer and Solana Rice argue for organizers of color to be embedded and centered in the antimonopoly fight.… Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, we share a recording of ILSR's recent event Democratizing Power: New Citizen Initiatives Challenge Monopoly Electric Utilities. Across the country, powerful utilities are actively blocking decentralized solar energy, degrading the reliability of the power lines even as they raise prices, and failing to make the grid investments needed for a clean, carbon-free future. Listen to ILSR's Stacy Mitchell and John Farrell facilitate conversations with the advocates who are leading the movement to take back control from electric utility monopolies. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, we share a recording of ILSR’s recent event Democratizing Power: New Citizen Initiatives Challenge Monopoly Electric Utilities. Across the country, powerful utilities are actively blocking decentralized solar energy, degrading the reliability of the power lines even as they raise prices, and failing to make the grid investments needed for a clean, carbon-free future. Listen to ILSR’s Stacy Mitchell and John Farrell facilitate conversations with the advocates who are leading the movement to take back control from electric utility monopolies. Highlights of the event’s discussions include: Rep. Seth Berry and Sen. Rick Bennett of the Maine State Legislature discuss Our Power, a citizen-led ballot campaign in Maine that aims to convert the utility serving most of the state to a consumer-owned electric company, allowing for competition and innovation on a public grid system. Jean Su, Energy Justice Director at the Center for Biological Diversity, explains how advocates in Arizona are using antitrust and anti-monopoly laws to fight a big utility’s plans to crush customer-owned rooftop solar power. Mariel Nanasi, Executive Director of New Energy Economy in New Mexico, tells the story behind a recent and highly unusual rejection of a proposed utility merger in New Mexico, brought about by grassroots advocacy effort. “Clean electricity is how we get out of the climate emergency. And all of that needs to flow over the poles and wires. Those poles and wires are a monopoly. And because of the last 150 years or so of the evolution of that industry, we have allowed it without really thinking about it. Without really noticing, we’ve allowed it to globalize, we’ve allowed it to conglomerate. We’ve allowed it to be the province of the few in order to extract value from the many. And so this is about power. It is about money. It’s also very much about climate. If we’re going to decarbonize, we know that we need to shift to consumer ownership because it works.”     Related Resources Democratizing Power: New Citizen Initiatives Challenge Monopoly Electric Utilities The Role of Antitrust Law in Creating Energy Justice — Episode 127 of Building Local Power Mainers Consider Putting Electricity, Internet in Local Hands — Episode 103 of Building Local Power In Santa Fe, Momentum Builds for Locals to Take Charge of Electricity System – Episode 39 of Local Energy Rules Podcast A David and Goliath Fight to Tap World Class Solar – Episode 14 of Local Energy Rules Podcast Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello. Welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Hello, today we have something slightly different for you. Last week, ILSR hosted an event called Democratizing the Grid. And at that event ILSR Co-directors, John Farrell and Stacy Mitchell were joined by Representative Seth Berry and Senator Rick Bennett of Maine, as well as Mariel Nanasi of New Energy Economy in New Mexico, and Jean Su of the Center for Biological Diversity. This group discussed the people-powered movements around the country that are taking on the electric utility monopolies with the aim of accelerating the shift to clean energy and winning democratic community control. We’re going to share a recording of that conversation with you today. So without further ado, here’s ILRS’s Stacy Mitchell. Stacy Mitchell: Hello everyone. Welcome today. My name is Stacy Mitchell. I’m the co-executive director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, and I’m super excited about today’s event. I’m excited to welcome all of you.

In this miniseries, we return to our most insightful podcast conversations. These five minute episodes highlight critical themes that are still relevant today. Alec MacGillis discusses how economic concentration leads to regional disparity. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by John Farrell, ILSR Co-Director, and Ron Knox, Senior Researcher with ILSR's Independent Business initiative. They take a look back at ILSR's work in 2021 and share big wins, challenges, and interesting trends from the year.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by John Farrell, ILSR Co-Director, and Ron Knox, Senior Researcher with ILSR’s Independent Business initiative. They take a look back at ILSR’s work in 2021 and share big wins, challenges, and interesting trends from the year. Highlights of their conversation include: ILSR’s influence at the federal level, including our 30 Million Solar Homes campaign; our research and organizing around Congressional action to reign in the power of Big Tech; and our role in the development of the COMPOST Act. Progress at the local level, including several legislative wins in Maryland to advance composting, the launch of a New York coalition to hold powerful corporations accountable, and more. How ILSR’s impact has grown in recent years. Looking ahead to what 2022 might bring.   “We’re seeing some really encouraging signs that things are being taken seriously around the idea of monopoly and market power. Especially at this moment, we have so many awesome ways that we can generate energy and supply services to our electricity system in a way that’s cleaner, that can employ people who’ve been left behind, that can lower their energy bills. You name it.”   “Lawmakers have really started to listen and have really started to understand that this consolidation that’s gone on over the past several decades, half century let’s say has hurt the economy. And that in order to undo some of the bad policies and the bad legal precedents that have created this issue, the laws themselves ultimately need to change.”   Related Resources ILSR’s 2021 Annual Report ILSR 2021: A Year of Building Local Power 4 New Maryland Laws to Spur Local Composting Statement on the House Judiciary Committee’s Vote Approving Legislation to Break Up and Rein In Big Tech Fact Sheet: How Amazon Exploits and Undermines Small Businesses, and Why Breaking It Up Would Revive American Entrepreneurship Small Business Rising Rep. Seth Berry on the Movement for Publicly-Owned Power in Maine — Episode 132 of Building Local Power Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge perfect monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: And hi everybody. I am joined today by my colleagues Ron Knox who’s a senior researcher with our Independent Business Initiative, as well as John Farrell who directs our Energy Democracy work and is one of ILSR’s co-directors. Our other colleague Brenda Platt was going to join us, but she’s unfortunately sick. So I am going to be sharing some highlights from our composting team as well as we go through things here. So welcome to the show, Ron and John. Ron Knox: Hey Jess. Good to be here. Thanks. John Farrell: You know, if you welcome us together, it’s Ron John. And then we’re just a surf shop instead of policy- Ron Knox: Just a Tampa area surf shop. Nothing more. [crosstalk 00:01:09] which is a good, strong, Independent Business by the way, Tampa area surf shop. Jess Del Fiacco: This is also our very last Building Local Power episode of 2021. So that’s why we’re celebrating it with the Hawaiian shirts. Ron Knox: Right. John Farrell: It’s amazing how comfortable this Hawaiian shirt is in my cold basement in Minnesota. Jess Del Fiacco: So we’re going to talk about some highlights from our work this year. And I wanted to start by, I’m looking at some of the work that we did at the federal level, which may not be the first thing you think of when you hear the name the Institute for Local Self-Reliance is us working at the federal level,

In this miniseries, we return to our most insightful podcast conversations. These five minute episodes highlight critical themes that are still relevant today. Zephyr Teachout and Stacy Mitchell discuss the increased recognition of the intersection between race and antimonopoly. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power podcast, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell speaks with Luis Reyes, General Manager of the Kit Carson Electric Cooperative in New Mexico. John and Luis discuss the many benefits of distributing solar power through the community and Kit Carson's plan to provide members 100% of their daytime electricity from local solar projects.… Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power podcast, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell speaks with Luis Reyes, General Manager of the Kit Carson Electric Cooperative in New Mexico. John and Luis discuss the many benefits of distributing solar power through the community and Kit Carson’s plan to provide members 100% of their daytime electricity from local solar projects. Highlights include: How rural electric co-ops are adapting to new challenges and expectations after serving rural areas for more than 100 years. Why, due to contracts with coal plants, Generation and Transmission cooperatives (G&Ts) often hold back distribution cooperatives like Kit Carson from generating much of their energy locally. How Kit Carson connects members to high quality Internet access — and how they rose to the challenge of distance learning by connecting schools and Internet hotspots at no cost. How co-op members are shaping future renewable energy projects.   “I continue to see the co-ops in the forefront of this new energy world we’re facing, and we’re probably the best equipped to address it. I think that’s positive for the co-op nation.” “We have to get out of these scare tactics and, and say, the sun doesn’t shine at night, so let’s put some batteries. Or let’s get wind that follows that nighttime profile. And instead of us as co-ops and utilities making excuses why we can’t, we should figure how we can.”   Related Resources Read ILSR’s updated report on How Cooperatives Are Bridging the Digital Divide. Listen to our 2018 Local Energy Rules episode featuring Luis Reyes and Warren McKenna of Farmers Electric Cooperative. Read more about Kit Carson’s clean energy and broadband Internet programs. Read our 2014 report on rural electric cooperatives: Re-member-ing the Electric Cooperative. Listen to episode 139 of Local Energy Rules, detailing how a Colorado Law Creates Transparency at Rural Electric Co-ops. Check out the New Economy Coalition’s Rural Electric Cooperative Toolkit or listen to our Local Energy Rules episode featuring two of its creators. For concrete examples of how towns and cities can take action toward gaining more control over their clean energy future, explore ILSR’s Community Power Toolkit. Explore local and state policies and programs that help advance clean energy goals across the country, using ILSR’s interactive Community Power Map. Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the Host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Today you’re going to hear from ILSR Co-director, John Farrell, who is joined by Luis Reyes, who is the general manager of Kit Carson Electric Cooperative in New Mexico. Starting in 2022, Taos, New Mexico and surrounding communities will receive 100% of their daytime electricity from local solar projects. Kit Carson Electric Cooperative, which is the utility that serves that area, is also connecting everyone of its 30,000 members to high speed affordable internet service. You’ll hear John and Luis discuss the advantages of self-reliance in rural communities and how Kit Carson’s progress has been driven by member engagement. With that, onto the show. John Farrell: Without further ado, Luis, welcome. Luis Reyes: Yeah, thanks John, it’s nice to talk to you again. John Farrell: Now, your cooperative has gotten in the news for all sorts of reasons around clean energy, but one of the things I think most people don’t realize is that you’ve really been at the helm at Kit Carson for a long time. I looked up in your bio and I think you’ve been there now for over 25 years.

In this miniseries, we return to our most insightful podcast conversations. These five minute episodes highlight critical themes that are still relevant today. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR's Linda Bilsens Brolis and Sophia Hosain speak with Emma Jagoz, owner of Moon Valley Farm in Maryland. Their discussion focuses on the importance of supporting local food systems and how Emma's farm is operated with community and sustainability in mind.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR’s Linda Bilsens Brolis and Sophia Hosain speak with Emma Jagoz, owner of Moon Valley Farm in Maryland. They discuss the benefits of local family farms to food system resilience, food accessibility, and having more nutritious and delicious food. Highlights include: What motivated Emma to get into farming, and her long-term mission to improve soil health and the biodiversity of farms. How Moon Valley Farm uses compost to build healthy soils. How the pandemic impacted farm operations and increased the public’s interest in local food. Challenges small farmers face such as land access, labor, and the lack of sustainable agriculture training programs. The importance of farming year-round and partnering with other farmers to build a sustainable and robust food system. Regenerative agriculture practices are rooted in Indigenous knowledge and practices. Read ILSR’s land acknowledgement here. “I wanted to shorten the chain between myself, my neighbors, and their food. Because it just connects the farmer and the consumers so directly. And I can communicate with my customers exactly what’s in season, exactly how to prepare it. It just felt so magical.” “I think COVID brought to light a lot of different issues, especially with the food supply and what is considered essential. Our community members were able to access food through our farm via home delivery, and also pick-up locations with some new COVID safe practices throughout the whole time — from when COVID began in March in 2020 to today.”     Related Resources Posters: Compost Impacts More Than You Think Hierarchy to Reduce Food Waste & Grow Community ILSR’s On-Farm Composting & Compost Use Webinar Series Journey to Soil Health… with Emma Jagoz, Moon Valley Farm Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies, and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: On today’s episode. You’re going to hear from my colleagues Sophia Hussein, and Linda Bilsens Brolis, as well as a farmer named Emma Jagoz. They’re going to discuss the role of composting in farming and in our food system. But before we get to that main conversation though, Sophia and I are going to briefly set the table for you guys. So I’m here with Sophia Hussein. Hey Sophia, welcome. Sophia Hosain: Hi everyone. Jess Del Fiacco: But a few minutes, our listeners are going to hear from Emma about her farm, which is called Moon Valley Farm, and her journey that she took to feed her family and feed her community. So Sophia, could you just give us a bird’s eye view of the role of composting in a sustainable food system? Sophia Hosain: Absolutely! I think it’s really fitting that we’re publishing this episode around Thanksgiving. A day when many of us are thinking about food, abundance, and gratitude even more so than usual. So in this interview, we talk with Emma from Moon Valley Farm, about how she’s created a resilient farm ecosystem by harnessing biodiversity, partnering with other farmers and by using compost. And I think it’s important to note that as our population grows, so does the importance of supporting local food systems. Sophia Hosain: By avoiding those long shipping distances, like bringing food over from California. We’re able to cut the carbon footprint of what we eat, and build local food system resiliency by keeping those resources in our own local economy. And before we dive in, I do want to take a moment to acknowledge that it is indigenous communities who really spearheaded the regenerative agricultural movement.

On this episode of the Building Local Power podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by two members of ILSR's Community Broadband Networks initiative: Sean Gonsalves and Emma Gautier. They discuss new research they've been working on, including tracking how communities are spending federal infrastructure money on broadband projects and why shopping for a new Internet service is such a frustrating process. … Read More

On this episode of the Building Local Power podcast, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by two members of ILSR’s Community Broadband Networks initiative: Sean Gonsalves and Emma Gautier. They discuss new research the team has been working on, including tracking how communities are spending federal infrastructure money on broadband projects and explaining why shopping for a new Internet service is such a frustrating process. Highlights of their conversation include: Why and how ILSR decided to create a “Big List” of local broadband projects supported by American Rescue Plan funding — which now includes more than 100 communities! How states compare when it comes to spending on community broadband projects. Interesting local election results related to broadband issues in New Jersey, Maine, and elsewhere. ILSR’s new report that grades Internet Service Providers’ (ISPs) transparency — or lack thereof — around the Internet service packages they offer. “This problem, providers not being transparent, might kind of seem like something that’s annoying or inconvenient, but it’s actually a really big problem beyond that because we know, especially in the context of the pandemic, that broadband is a very important thing to a household. So a household or a person’s ability to make informed decisions about what kind of service they’re going to subscribe to is really important.” “When a community network is built and operated and maintained by the people in your community, that in and of itself brings a level of accountability that is unmatched. You’re bumping into those people in the grocery store. Your kids play sports together… And one of the things that is tough to quantify, but I hear anecdotally all the time in talking to folks in various communities, is the difference between before they had a municipal network and they had to rely on the monopoly provider, and then after they got one is the difference in the customer service experience. And that is hard to quantify, but it’s something that’s huge for people.”   Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at The Institute for Local Self Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, everybody. Today I am joined by two of my colleagues, both from ILSR’s community broadband initiative. We’ve got Sean Gonsalves, you’ve heard on the show before, he’s a reporter and editor with the team, as well as a newbie to Building Local Power, it’s Emma Gotye, and she is on the community broadband team. Welcome to the show, guys. Sean Gonsalves: Top of the morning. How are you doing? Emma Gautier : Good to be here. Thanks, Jess. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah. As you all might expect, we’re going to be talking about community broadband today. And per usual, there’s a lot going on. We’re going to talk about how communities are using new federal funding. We’re also going to take a look at a new scorecard we’ve put together that grades different internet service providers based on how transparent they are about the services that they offer. But we’re going to start with a question for Sean, which is something the whole team’s been working on, but I know you’ve done a lot of work on this specifically. Looking at what communities are doing with American Rescue Plan funding to invest that in community broadband projects. Basically first, why’d you guys decide to track this information? Sean Gonsalves: Yeah, no. That’s a great question. I mean, we’re tracking it because the American Rescue Plan funding is really an unprecedented massive federal investment being made available.

Host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR's Brenda Platt are joined by Jacob Hannah, Conservation Director at Coalfield Development. Coalfield Development works across many sectors -- solar energy, agriculture, manufacturing, deconstruction, reuse, and more --  as it pursues its mission of rebuilding the Appalachian economy. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco and Director of ILSR’s Community Composting initiative Brenda Platt are joined by Jacob Hannah, Conservation Director at Coalfield Development. Coalfield Development works across many sectors — solar energy, agriculture, manufacturing, deconstruction, reuse, and more — as it pursues its mission of rebuilding the Appalachian economy. Highlights of their discussion include: The requirements of a just economic transition for the region. Coalfield Development’s impact on the region — hundreds of new jobs, dozens of new businesses — and the diverse economic enterprises they are supporting. The important role of partnerships and community engagement in their work. Why replacing the coal-centric economy with diverse, community-led solutions is key to sustainable success in the region. “A lot of times there’s a false narrative that for a just transition, everything that was a brown economy has to be replaced by a green energy economy. And that’s not always the case. There’s never going to be one silver bullet that replaces all of what coal used to be. And so that’s what we’re trying to make sure that we iterate in the diversity of our options right now, whether it’s agriculture, woodworking, entrepreneurship, solar, manufacturing, we want to have a large toolbox of opportunities for folks in the region. And so that just transition for us looks very different from, let’s say, the European model where it’s a very top-down approach, where the government owns the coal mine and say, phases it out.”   Related Resources How The ReUse Corridor is Creating Wealth From Waste in Appalachia Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Today, I’m joined by my colleague, Brenda Platt who directs ILSR’s Community Composting Initiative. And we’re going to be talking about zero waste moving away from a coal focused economy and local economic development with Jacob Hannah. Who’s the conservation director at Coalfield Development, organization that is rebuilding the Appalachian economy from the ground up. So welcome to the show, Jacob and Brenda. Brenda Platt: Hello. Jacob Hannah: Thanks for having me. Jess Del Fiacco: And I think to get us started, Jacob, could you just give us a very brief overview of what Coalfield Development is and what’s the meaning behind the name? Jacob Hannah: Sure. So Coalfield Development is a nonprofit organization here in West Virginia. We cover about five counties and the name is a clue to not only the region, but the focus this region has historically been very, not only dependent, but productive for coal generation and coal consumption. So essentially it was a mono economy built around serving that one industry. So all the towns were built around the coal mines, all the roads and trains and infrastructure built to serve this economy. And so now that that industry has gone into decline. We have this massive power vacuum in it’s place. And so how do we address that in a way that is a just transition to new and diverse economies that doesn’t leave people behind like what we’re seeing right now with the opioid epidemic, massive rates of unemployment, lots of folks leaving the state and lots of health issues as well. Jacob Hannah: So how can we tackle those factors by offering folks some re-skilling opportunities, new economic employment opportunities, training, education, and also of course, diversified portfolio of different opportunities for folks to choose from. We are a nonprofit,

In this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell is joined by Chris Villarreal, President of Plugged In Strategies and an Associate Fellow with the R Street Institute. Their discussion focuses on monopoly power in the energy sector, and how lack of competition impacts consumers and stands in the way of progress. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell is joined by Chris Villarreal, President of Plugged In Strategies and an Associate Fellow with the R Street Institute. Their discussion focuses on monopoly power in the energy sector, and how lack of competition impacts consumers and stands in the way of progress. Highlights of their conversation include: What’s behind growing interest in public takeovers of electric utilities. Why electricity markets were originally designed as monopolies and why that structure doesn’t fit the way energy use and production has evolved. How utilities use their monopoly power to shape regulation and limit competition. Rethinking utilities and the energy distribution system in order to incentivize competition.   “What I’m hopeful for, and what we’re seeing, is that with the growth of distributed resources like rooftop solar, community, solar and the like, is that consumers, you and I, have more options now available to us if we so choose. We don’t need to rely 100% on the utility to provide us electricity. We have abilities now to put solar on our roof or participate in a community solar garden project, which introduces competition, which is good because now it should be imparting cost pressure onto the company.” “Just because it’s public doesn’t mean it’s going to be run well. Just because it’s private doesn’t mean it’s going to be run poorly. It really all is in the rules.”   Related Resources How Big Utilities Are Impeding Clean Energy, and What We Can Do About It Is Energy Still a “Natural Monopoly”? Spreading Like Wildfire: An Interest in Making Electric Power Public The Role of Antitrust Law in Creating Energy Justice Why Utilities in Minnesota and Other States Need to Plan for More Competition Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. This week, I’m actually handing things over to ILSR codirector, John Farrell. He also directs our energy program here at ILSR. And he’s going to be joined by Chris Villarreal, who is the president of Plugged In Strategies and a fellow with the R Street Institute. Jess Del Fiacco: They’re going to discuss the structure of the energy market which is a sector you’ll hear John refer to as a hidden in plain sight monopoly in a few minutes. With that, I’m going to let you go on to the show. John Farrell: Welcome to another edition of Building Local Power, a podcast hosted by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m John Farrell, the director of the Energy Democracy Initiative and one of ILSR’s two codirectors. And today, I’m really excited to be joined by Chris Villarreal. He’s the president of Plugged In Strategies. He’s a fellow with the R Street Institute, a think tank that promotes free markets and limited effective government. He’s got experience at two different state public utilities commissions, so he knows a great deal about what we’re going to talk about which is the market structure and the market sector, the electricity market. John Farrell: If you follow him on Twitter in addition to excellent information about energy, you will also find out that he is a Baylor University grad, a Kansas City Chiefs fan and many other things. Chris, thanks so much for joining me on Building Local Power. Chris Villarreal: Thanks, John, for having me. John Farrell: So I feel like I need to start off with knowing that our audience cares about issues, about monopoly and concentration by just saying that the electricity sector is almost like this hidden in plain sight monopoly,

Host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell interview Chuck Marohn, President of Strong Towns. Chuck is also the author of the new book Confessions of a Recovering Engineer: Transportation for a Strong Town, which explores what conventional transportation planning is costing our communities. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell interview Chuck Marohn, President of Strong Towns. Chuck is also the author of the new book Confessions of a Recovering Engineer: Transportation for a Strong Town, which explores what conventional transportation planning is costing our communities. Highlights of the conversation include: How Chuck’s background in engineering and planning informed the book. How conventional transportation planning values disregard the complexity of human behavior and end up negatively impacting safety, economic growth, and community. How flawed transportation policy allowed big box retailers and chains to take over communities and why good street design could revive Main Street. Streets, roads, and “stroads” — and the key design decisions that can help communities flourish. The small steps city leaders can take to start rethinking transportation policy.   “The idea of roads and streets is really to put the focus back on what are we trying to accomplish with our transportation system. On a road we’re trying to move people quickly between two places. On a street, we’re trying to create wealth. We’re trying to create a place. We’re trying to create someplace that people want to be, a productive place where we can live, have economics, have commerce, have entertainment, have high quality of life. A street is not conducive to fast throughput and a road is not conducive to development to things that slow things down.” “Congestion is actually our greatest ally if we want to build great places, if we want to build local economies, it will actually drive the outcomes we want to see. And so the best places in America, the places that have I think the best economics, the best local small business options, are all places where you have overwhelming levels of congestion combined with… a more flexible development framework where people can actually then respond to these local needs by building stuff, to serve their neighbors.”   Learn more about Confessions of a Recovering Engineer and check out free resources here.   Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. A podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m [Jess 00:00:18] Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Jess Del Fiacco: For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. And welcome to today’s show. I’m here with my colleague, Stacy Mitchell, who is one of ILSR co-directors. And we are joined by Chuck Mahron, who is the president of Small Towns. Small Towns is an organization that is rethinking how we build our communities. And Chuck is the author of a new book called Confessions of a Recovering Engineer:Transportation for a Strong Town. Chuck, welcome to the show. We’re very happy to have you. Chuck Marohn: Hey, thank you. It’s really nice to be here. I love the work that you all do and it’s exciting to be able to chat. Stacy: We’re such big fans of Strong Towns too. So it’s awesome to have you. Chuck Marohn: Yeah. Thank you. I know we have so much in common and so much overlap and I really appreciated like everything that you guys have put out since I’ve become aware of the work you’re doing. So yeah, this might be a love Fest for a while, but that’s fine. That’s fine. We can mutually admire each other. Jess Del Fiacco: So to get us started, I just wanted to ask, and if you got a little bit about your background, I mean, you were trained as a transportation engineer and this book is essentially your confession, you are criticizing your critique of the whole profession. What’s that all about? Chuck Marohn: Yeah, well,

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth initiative. Jess and Neil interview Gary Liss, Vice President of Zero Waste USA, and Bob Gedert, President of the National Recycling Coalition, about the Recycling Is Infrastructure Too (RIIT) campaign and the proposed American Recycling Infrastructure Plan (ARIP).… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth initiative. Jess and Neil interview Gary Liss, Vice President of Zero Waste USA, and Bob Gedert, President of the National Recycling Coalition, about the Recycling Is Infrastructure Too (RIIT) campaign and the proposed American Recycling Infrastructure Plan (ARIP). Highlights of their conversation include: Why now is the right moment for investing in recycling infrastructure, and how this could reshape American recycling. The current landscape of federal legislation and how the RIIT campaign is influencing policy decisions and rulemaking. Key provisions in the proposed American Recycling Infrastructure Plan and how each of them move the recycling needle forward in the US. How the ARIP would help level the playing field for small-scale reuse and recycling enterprises.   “Zero waste is all about not only diverting tons, but reinvesting those resources in the community. And the American Recycling Infrastructure Plan is based on that idea: that we should not only invest in recycling and composting, but also in those other activities upstream, to redesign the systems and to set up reuse programs and reuse facilities, and help with innovations like fix-it clinics, and repair fairs, and other new reuse systems for reusable foodware that are being pioneered all over the country… We’re not just investing in diversion from landfills and incinerators. We’re investing and reinvesting those resources in the local economy.”   Join the next Recycling Is Infrastructure Too Webinar, “What’s IN the Infrastructure Bills for Recycling?” on September 28th! Learn more and register here. Related Resources How Recycling and Reuse Created Thousands of Jobs and a $1 Billion Boost to Austin’s Economy — Episode 120 of Building Local Power American Recycling Infrastructure Plan Letter to Biden-Harris Administration: Recycling is Infrastructure Too Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies, and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities, where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Welcome to the show. Today, I am joined by Neil Seldman, who is the director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth program, as well as Gary Liss, who is the vice-president of Zero Waste USA, and Bob Gedert, who is the president of the National Recycling Coalition. So welcome to the show, all of you. Neil Seldman: Thank you. Gary Liss: Thank you. Bob Gedert: Thank you very much. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah, we are so happy to have you. We’re going to talk about the Recycling is Infrastructure Too campaign, which Neil, Gary and Bob are all involved with, as well as the proposed American Recycling Infrastructure Plan. And I think Neil, I will give it to you to maybe give us a little bit more context before we get going with questions, so. Neil Seldman: Thank you, Jess. And thank you, Gary and Bob for joining us. I want to point out that Gary and Bob have each put in decades upon decades of work on recycling, zero waste, and it’s been a pleasure working with them from the point of view of the Institute for Local Self Reliance. We’ve done many projects and many good discussions together. This is a very nice occasion for myself. We’re addressing recycling in the middle of a lot of dynamic change in the country, in the recycling and wasting fields. And we’re hoping to clarify some of those. Neil Seldman: I just want to point out that the key, in my opinion, to the next few years is getting money, investment capital, to the local governments for the necessary infrastructure changes for compostin...

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken and Sean Gonsalves, Senior Researchers with ILSR’s Community Broadband initiative, as well as Christopher Ali, an Associate Professor in the Department of Media Studies at the University of Virginia. Christopher discusses his new book Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity and recent news in the broadband policy space.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken and Sean Gonsalves, Senior Researchers with ILSR’s Community Broadband initiative, as well as Christopher Ali, an Associate Professor in the Department of Media Studies at the University of Virginia. Christopher discusses his new book Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity and recent news in the broadband policy space. Highlights of the conversation include: The communities Christopher visited while writing his book, and some of the local success stories he heard. Why the concept of “rural” deserves a more nuanced definition than it is usually afforded. How high quality, affordable broadband access can revitalize rural economic development in direct and indirect ways. Where (and why) federal efforts to improve rural broadband infrastructure have fallen short, and how local solutions have shown the way forward. “Cooperatives to me are the unsung heroes of broadband, particularly in rural communities. They operate… on a different mindset, because they are not driven by quarterly profit returns to investors and shareholders. They can take a much longer view in terms of return on investment. I also think that because they’re local, the accountability is different. I mean, when you run into folks in the grocery store or walking your dog down the street, that level of accountability, when someone says, ‘Hey, why don’t I have broadband yet?’ Or ‘Why has my Internet been out for two days?’ Or ‘Why is my bill so high?’ That level of accountability is so different that you don’t see with Comcast or Charter, or Verizon, AT&T, Century Link. I mean, that’s accountability from afar. This local accountability, and community service mindset of the cooperative, has been so important. And I think this is why we’re seeing so many… electric cooperatives move into broadband, willing to take that long-term return on investment.”   Related Resources Farm Fresh Broadband by Christopher Ali Broadband Infrastructure Bill: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly by Sean Gonsalves Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power, and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. And hello, today I am joined by my colleagues, Ry Marcattilio-McCracken, and Sean Gonsalves who are senior researchers with LSR’s community broadband team. Welcome to the show guys. Sean Gonsalves: Thanks for having us. Ry Marcattilio-…: Thanks Jess, good to be here. Jess Del Fiacco: And Sean has been on the show before, but Ry is this your Building Local Power debut? Ry Marcattilio-…: It is, yep. Jess Del Fiacco: Very exciting. All right. That means we have to haze you just a little bit. And we are joined by Christopher Ali, who is an associate professor in the department of media studies at the university of Virginia. Welcome to the show, Chris. Christopher Ali: Thank you so much. Great to be here. Jess Del Fiacco: Listeners might remember you from an episode you were on earlier this year, where we did mention that you would have a book coming out in a little while, and the book is now here, it’s called Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity, which is very exciting. And I think we can just start there. So do you want to talk a little bit about the writing process for this book? How did you approach doing the research for it? Who did you talk to? Christopher Ali: Yeah, so this is a book about five years in the making. And when I started it, I mean, I think everyone on this podcast and probably all of the listeners know that when you...

Host Jess Del Fiacco, ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell, and Senior Researcher Kennedy Smith are joined by Ilana Preuss, the founder of Recast City, a firm that works with city officials and local leaders to integrate space for small manufacturers into placed-based development projects.… Read More

Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Baltimore, Md., 1936. On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco, ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell, and Senior Researcher Kennedy Smith are joined by Ilana Preuss, the founder of Recast City, a firm that works with city officials and local leaders to integrate space for small manufacturers into placed-based development projects. Ilana, Jess, Kennedy, and Stacy discuss how small, locally-scaled manufacturing fits into the broader small business landscape, and how it can contribute to vibrant downtowns and commercial districts. Some highlights from their conversation include: The history of manufacturing in America’s downtowns and how the modern small scale manufacturing movement compares. How manufacturing can contribute to the vibrancy of downtowns and complement the benefits of retail shops, restaurants, and other businesses. Small scale manufacturing’s role in equitable economic development. Small scale manufacturing success stories from communities across the country and how funds from the American Rescue Plan Act have the potential to make a huge impact. Purchase Ilana’s new book Recast Your City: How to Save Your Downtown With Small Scale Manufacturing at your local bookshop or through Island Press (enter the promo code RECAST at checkout for 20% off). “One of the things that I find most exciting about working with small scale manufacturing business owners is they cut across every different part of our demographics. So when we’re working to build inclusive communities of business owners that really represent our demographic diversity, small scale manufacturing is a really exciting way to get there. It doesn’t matter what community divide we’re looking across, income, race, ethnicity, immigrant status, people make stuff. In fact, it’s the basis of a lot of people’s culture or heritage. And so the opportunity to teach entrepreneurship and to help build wealth in communities across the country across our demographics is really potent because so many people have this ability to make things and build wealth for themselves, their households and their communities because of it.”   “I think people are really at a moment where more people are open to what they deem new ideas even if they’re really old ideas like what you were describing. They want to do more good for more people in their community, which is great. They’re conscious or they’re aware of what they haven’t done for people in their community in their past. And so I do think we are at this really exciting transformational moment where communities can make these different decisions and say, we want to be not just a place that consumes but a place that produces. And how do we support that in all of the spending of the community and all of the ways, all of the decision-making that happens in the community can do this.”   Related Resources Recast Your City: How to Save Your Downtown With Small Scale Manufacturing by Illana Preuss Open Works Baltimore Made in Baltimore’s Home-Run Accelerator Scaling Up! South Bend Bull Moose Music Xometry Saltbox Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps Ivy Bookshop in Baltimore Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: In today’s episode, we’re going to discuss how locally scaled manufacturing can fit into the broader small business landscape and how it can contribute to vibrant downtowns and commercial districts. I’m joined by my colleague, Stacy Mitchell and Kennedy Smith. Also joining us to talk about her work on small scale ma...

John Farrell, Director of ILSR's Energy Democracy initiative, interviews Representative Seth Berry, House Chair of the Maine Legislature's Joint Standing Committee on Energy, Utilities, and Technology. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, John Farrell, Director of ILSR’s Energy Democracy initiative, speaks with Representative Seth Berry, House Chair of the Maine Legislature’s Joint Standing Committee on Energy, Utilities, and Technology. Farrell and Berry discuss how consumer ownership of the electricity system could prioritize service, reliability, and clean power. Their conversation also touches on: Berry’s background in energy policy work. Recent developments in Maine, including the legislature passing a bill which would have created a consumer-owned replacement for the private utility Central Maine Power / Versant. The bill was then vetoed by the governor. Why the legislature felt compelled to take action regarding Central Maine Power, including the company’s high costs, poor customer service and reliability, lack of accountability, and absentee ownership. How the fight for consumer ownership will continue in the state.   “Important concept here: the utilities profit more when they build more. That is the fundamental truth of the US investor owned regulatory system, the more you build the more you make.”   Related Resources Our Power Maine Maine House Bill 1708 Mainers Consider Putting Electricity, Internet in Local Hands (Episode 103) Is Energy Still a “Natural Monopoly”? (Episode 104) Should Big Utilities Pay for Their Bad Choices? — Episode 124 of Local Energy Rules The Role of Antitrust Law in Creating Energy Justice — Episode 127 of Building Local Power ILSR coverage of Green Mountain Power A summary of the Bluefield and Hope SCOTUS decisions that laid the framework for utility regulation and compensation: Utility Rates: Fair, Just and Reasonable A helpful chart of utility return on equity (ROE): Gearing Up for Grid Modernization Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. Jess Del Fiacco: I am Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities, more power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. In this week’s episode, ILSR Co-director, John Farrell interviews Representative, Seth Berry of Main. Seth actually joined us on the show a few months ago, and today he’ll catch us up on the movement toward public power in Maine. With that, I’m going to hand it off to John and Seth. John Farrell: Well, welcome to another edition of Building Local Power, a podcast of the Institute for Local Self Reliance, where we confront the issues of corporate concentration and the solutions that allow communities to advance and control their future. John Farrell: Joining me today is Representative Seth Berry, he’s in the House Chair of the Legislature’s Joint Standing Committee on Utilities, Energy and Technology in Maine. He’s been working on some terrific legislation that we’ve been following and I’m so glad that he can join me today. Seth, welcome to the program. Seth Berry: It’s great to be with you, John. Big fan of all your work. John Farrell: Well, I often ask guests when I start our conversations, what has motivated them to be interested in the energy sector. I feel like the issue that you’re working on, which is around this concept of ownership of the transmission grid in Maine, was probably more thrust upon you from what I understand of the different challenges that have come up and the complaints that consumers have had. But did you have an interest or a history of working on energy issues before this became such a central issue in Maine? Seth Berry: I did, actually. I’m 52-years old, grew up in Maine, and came of age during the ’70s when energy was very much talked about for somewhat different reasons. Climate change was something that a few people w...

Host Jess Del Fiacco and Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR's Waste to Wealth initiative, interview three zero waste advocates from Gainesville, Fla. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco and Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth initiative, interview three zero waste advocates from Gainesville, Fla. Amanda Waddle and Nina Bhattacharyya are the Co-Chairs of Zero Waste Gainesville, and Sarah Goff is the Cofounder and Executive Director of the Repurpose Project, where Amanda is also the director of Zero Waste. Their discussion touches on: The importance of pay-as-you-throw (PAYT) programs, and Zero Waste Gainesville’s campaign to keep PAYT in the city. (Update: The campaign was successful!) How the Repurpose Project got started, how the pandemic impacted operations, and current efforts to expand into a new, larger space. The relationship between the Repurpose Project and the city of Gainesville. The impact the Repurpose Project has on the local economy, the community, and the environment. The ties between environmental justice and reuse, and how to ensure reuse programs are equitable.   “And one of my favorite moments was at checkout. We had a line and it was just so diverse. It was almost like every single stereotype of a person was in line together. And they were talking to each other about what they were going to do with the items that they were buying. And it just felt so good. We were much more than a store. We were building this community, bringing people together, that maybe wouldn’t be brought together otherwise. For the common goal of just creating and salvaging and saving money… I just feel like there’s so much potential there on so many levels with expanding Reuse.”   Related Resources Zero Waste Gainesville The Repair Revolution by John Wachman and Elizabeth Knight Webinar Recording: “Reuse & Repair: Creating New Jobs and Enterprises Through Zero Waste” Wealth in Our Walls Report, City of San Antonio, Texas Reuse Minnesota Building Materials Reuse Alliance (BMRA) Recycle Hawaii Department of Resource Recovery, Austin, Texas Cynthia Isenhour, University of Maine Economic and sociological data on the reuse sector. Contact: [email protected] Second Chance Deconstruction, Baltimore Contact: Mark Foster, [email protected] The Reuse People Contact: Ted Reiff, [email protected] Clean Air Action Network, Glens Falls, NY Contact: Tracy Frisch, [email protected] Hawaii Island Zero Waste Summit Contact: Jennifer Navarra, [email protected] ReUse Corridor, Central Appalachian Regional Network Contact: Jacob Hannah, [email protected] Rural Action Contact: Ed Newman, [email protected] Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. A podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability and made in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: And hello, today I’m here with my colleague Neil Seldman, who directs ILSR’s waste to wealth program. And we’re joined by a great group from Gainesville, Florida. Amanda Waddle and Nina Bhattacharyya are the Co-Chairs of Zero Waste Gainesville. And Sarah Goff is the Co-founder and Executive Director of the Repurpose Project, where Amanda is also the Director of Zero Waste. So welcome everybody. Neil Seldman: Howdy. Sarah Goff: Hello. Nina Bhattacha…: Thank you for having us. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah, absolutely. I think a good place to start, would be if each of you could maybe talk very briefly about your organizations, your background and why you decided to get involved with Reuse. Let’s start with Sarah. Sarah Goff: Okay. I started the Repurpose Project 10 years ago. I had already been involved in Reuse, but when it came to Gainesville,

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by ILSR's Linda Bilsens Brolis and Amanda Cather of the Million Acre Challenge to discuss regenerative agriculture. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by ILSR’s Linda Bilsens Brolis and Amanda Cather of the Million Acre Challenge. The Million Acre Challenge (MAC) views healthy soil as the foundation for regenerative agriculture and is working to achieve one million agricultural acres in Maryland using healthy soil techniques by 2030. Amanda, Linda, and Jess discuss: The different approaches MAC is taking to advance their mission — including working groups focused on science, policy, farmer engagement, public outreach, and the business case for healthy soil practices. What Amanda views as the biggest challenges facing MAC. The ongoing trend of farm consolidation and the importance of working with farms of different sizes. How the current regenerative agriculture movement fits within the long history of Indigenous American agricultural practices. “The current agricultural system that we all buy into and participate in as consumers creates huge challenges for farmers to make change on their operations, and farmers are squeezed on both sides because consumers expect and sometimes need cheap food and input costs are rising.” “I think that one of the downsides of the extreme productivity that we’ve managed to achieve… is that we now employ a very small portion of the population in farming. And so I think we really need to work on increasing the number of farmers on the land. So we really need more farmers, not fewer farmers, and to be always thinking about farm profitability and resilience and that balance of efficiency and resilience and increased food security and regional food systems along with, as you said, improving access to land financing and equity in those processes.”   Related Resources Guidelight Strategies Soul Fire Farm A-dae Romero-Briones, Director of Programs at the First Nations Development Institute English Pastoral by James Rebanks Animal, Vegetable, Junk by Mark Bittman Perilous Bounty by Tom Philpott Compost: Carbon Sequestration & Climate Change, a webinar hosted by the Compost Research and Education Foundation. Farming Honors the Past and Considers the Future by Kristyn Leach   Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hi, everyone. Welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Hello today we have some great guests. Joining me is ILSR’s Linda Bilsens Brolis who works with our composting program, and Amanda Cather, who’s the Project Director of the Million Acre Challenge. We’re going to talk a lot about Amanda’s work today with the Million Acre Challenge, which focuses on the importance of improving soil health on America’s farmland. So welcome to the show, both of you. Linda Bilsens B…: Thank you. Amanda Cather: Thanks. Excited to be here. Linda Bilsens B…: Great to be here. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah. Linda, do you want to start us off with any further context before we jump into things? Linda Bilsens B…: Sure. Thanks, Jess. So great to be back on BLP and to have Amanda joining us. So for those of you out there who don’t know who I am, I am as Jess mentioned, part of the composting initiative and this Million Acre Challenge, which you’ll be hearing more about throughout this episode is something that’s really near and dear to me because it gets to why I got into composting to begin with, composting as a tool to support more resilient and sustainable food systems. And so the Million Acre Challenge is an initiative that ILSR has been part of the founding core team of organizations that have helped to launch this program over the last few years. Linda Bilsens B…:

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR's John Farrell, Stacy Mitchell, and Christopher Mitchell discuss some of the exciting things happening in different sectors of ILSR's work. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by ILSR’s John Farrell, Stacy Mitchell, and Christopher Mitchell. They discuss some of the exciting things happening in different sectors of ILSR’s work, including: How rules established by the U.S. Department of the Treasury will affect how funds for broadband infrastructure are used by cities. The ways in which the Emergency Connectivity Fund, which was established by the American Rescue Plan Act this spring, falls short when it comes to investing in long-term connectivity solutions. How monopoly power drives energy decisions in Minnesota and other states — and how these decisions end up hurting communities and the climate. The New York Senate’s approval of the 21st Century Antitrust Act, and what this means for the future of state-level antitrust enforcement. The “Big Tech Bills,” a package of Congressional legislation that aims to rein in the monopoly power of tech giants (Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Apple). The bills include three key things: Recognizing that break-ups are needed. Stopping and preventing unfair discrimination. Helping to end corporate consolidation.   “I think there are a lot of people who see these issues, the issues of monopoly, and the tech companies in particular, as being really fundamental to questions of democracy, questions of how our economy works, questions of equity and liberty.”   Related Resources Heather McGee’s The Sum of Us Barbara Freese’s Coal In the Star Tribune: Wrong Incentives Drive Energy Decisions in Minnesota, Most States Connecting Customers to Create a Virtual Power Plant — Episode 126 of Local Energy Rules New York Bill Moving Through Senate Takes on Monopoly Power FCC’s Emergency Connectivity Funds Ineligible for School and Library Self-Provisioned Networks U.S. Treasury Clarifies American Rescue Plan Broadband Funding The Antimonopoly Happy Hour Community Broadband Bits Small Business Rising Athena Coalition Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. And hello, today I am here, I’m joined by some familiar voices on this podcast. My colleague, Stacy Mitchell, John Farrell and Chris Mitchell. Welcome to the show everybody. Chris Mitchell: Hi. Stacy Mitchell: Really great to be here. John Farrell: Woo-hoo. Jess Del Fiacco: Woo, loving the enthusiastic opening. Thank you for the woo-hoos, John. So this conversation is going to touch on everyone’s work and recent events, but I think we’re going to start off with Chris. A few months ago, the Biden administration was hyping up, community broadband solutions, and yet where are we now? What’s happening? What went wrong? Chris Mitchell: Well, there are some things that went wrong, but the Biden administration still does seem to be very much in support of both municipal and cooperative solutions. The Biden administration came out and somewhat unexpectedly said that it felt that the solution for broadband across America was structural reform and adding new competition, breaking up the monopolies effectively, I mean, breaking up is a bit of an overstatement, but at least no longer blindly supporting the monopolies and supporting more local structures that would provide a better restraint in terms of price increases and things like that. Chris Mitchell: And they specifically cited municipal solutions and cooperative solutions. So that was tremendously exciting. And then a little bit more recently, the Biden administration’s Treasury department came out and- Jess Del Fiacco:

Host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell are joined by Solana Rice and Jeremie Greer of Liberation in a Generation. They discuss their recent publication Anti-Monopoly Activism: Reclaiming Power through Racial Justice. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell are joined by Solana Rice and Jeremie Greer of Liberation in a Generation, an organization dedicated to achieving economic liberation for people of color. They discuss their recent publication Anti-Monopoly Activism: Reclaiming Power through Racial Justice, which argues that the fight against monopoly is intertwined with the fight for racial justice, and that organizers of color must be centered in the antimonopoly movement. Their conversation touches on: The harms communities of color experience due to extreme corporate concentration. How Jeremie and Solana came to realize that corporate concentration and racial inequality needed to be more explicitly connected. The impact of this report in the activist community. The vision of a liberation economy, and what it will take to get there.   “When Amazon buys Ring and has this tool for surveillance, and police use it in Black communities to surveil Black people and arrest Black people, that is not accidental, that is not a disparate impact. That is an intentional action that has been taken. […] So my struggle with stating it as a disparate impact makes it seem as if this thing that kind of happens on accident. When what we know, and what we talk a bit of a lot about in the report, is that there are historic underpinnings for the type of racism that we see in our economy. And that what is being produced is being produced by a system that has intentionally put structures and systems in place to oppress Black and Brown communities and Black and Brown people.”   Related Resources Anti-Monopoly Activism: Reclaiming Power through Racial Justice Fighting Monopoly Power Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. A podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. Jess Del Fiacco: I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power, and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Today I’m with Stacy Mitchell, who’s the co-director of ILSR, and we are very excited to be joined by Jeremie Greer and Solana Rice. They are the co-founders and directors of an organization called Liberation in a Generation, which is normalization dedicated to dismantling the current oppression economy and in its place building a liberation economy where all people of color have their needs met, are safe from harm and are valued and belong. Jess Del Fiacco: So Jeremie and Solana, welcome to the show. Solana Rice: Thank you. Jeremie Greer: Hello. Thanks for having us. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah. And so what we’re going to dig into today is a report that you recently released called anti monopoly activism, reclaiming power through racial justice. And it’s fantastic. And it’s so vitally important in this space right now. Stacy, I’m actually curious what your initial thoughts were when you read the report. And then maybe you can kick us off with the question for Jeremie or Solana. Stacy Mitchell: It’s a really great addition to the conversation about monopoly power and about racial justice, and really begins to aluminate the intersection between those two things. And I think the question that I’m curious about is to just learn more about the path that you took to examining the intersection of monopoly power and racial justice, and what it is that led you to feel like those two issues needed to be explored in conjunction and put out in a report like this. Jeremie Greer: Yeah, I’ll start. And I, for me, it’s something that, it’s one of those things that’s kind of always been a reoccurring theme for me, but though I didn’t know it that way all the time as I was going through my career.

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell interviews Jean Su, director of the Center for Biological Diversity's Energy Justice program. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell interviews Jean Su, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Energy Justice program. Their conversation touches on: The history of state-granted monopolies in the electricity sector, and whether this monopoly system still works. A current antitrust case in Arizona, where a utility, the Salt River Project, is fighting competition from rooftop solar. The energy violence inflicted upon communities of color and what a more just energy system might look like. What we can do to build a just fossil-free future. “Given that electricity is a human right, and that it is a life and death issue, why is it that we have given private corporations the ability to govern that access? Why is it that they solely, a private corporation, whose sole interest is to reward shareholders, why are they in charge of life and death in this country?”   Related Resources Competition and Freedom at Stake – Episode 37 of Local Energy Rules Podcast Should Big Utilities Pay for Their Bad Choices? — Episode 124 of Local Energy Rules Is Energy Still a “Natural Monopoly”? — Episode 104 of Building Local Power Why Utilities in Minnesota and Other States Need to Plan for More Competition Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: In this week’s episode, ILSR co-director John Farrell interviews Jean Su, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Energy Justice program. Their discussion focuses on the role of antitrust law in the US electricity sector, and in particular, how the law backs up advocates that are working to make these monopolies more accountable to their captive customers. With that, I’m going to turn it over to John Farrell. John Farrell: Here to talk to me about an interesting strategy to get these utilities to respect competitive markets is Jean Su from Center for Biological Diversity. Jean, welcome to building local power. Jean Su: Great. Thanks, John. And it’s an honor to be here. John Farrell: I like to start off my interviews with folks by just asking a little bit about their background, kind of like how they got into this kind of work. And I’m curious, how did you end up at the Center for Biological Diversity? Why are you motivated to be out here, doing legal work, and talking about antitrust in the electric utility sector? Jean Su: Yeah. So it’s a bit of a long story, but I guess to cut it pretty short, all my work, since I began after college, has been dedicated to climate and climate justice work. Then I actually start off as a micro-finance development worker in Madagascar. And it was there, actually in the early 2000’s, that a series of really horrific cyclones ended up hitting communities with hundreds of thousands of people, and it really was just, for the first time, a true understanding of what climate change actually looks like on a real basis. And what it looked like for those communities out there was completely wiping out any food source for the next year because the harvest was completely gone. It was ridiculous malaria rates that climbed up so high, that killed children ultimately. And it was just a wiping out of the economy in general, in a place that was already so fragile. Jean Su: And when I was there, people were saying in Malagasy, “The climate is changing. The climate is changing.” Like nobody had no idea what was going on. And it was really at that moment that I totally understood that if we were going to try to tackle extreme poverty issues and t...

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by three ILSR colleagues to discuss recent news and upcoming policy decisions that could have major ramifications on local-level solutions.  … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Maren Machles, Senior Researcher and Multimedia Producer for ILSR’s Community Broadband initiative; Ron Knox, Senior Researcher for ILSR’s Independent Business initiative; and Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth initiative. They discuss recent news as it relates to each of their programs, and how upcoming policy decisions could have major ramifications on local-level solutions. Highlights include: How local efforts in Franklin County, Ohio to close the digital divide could be used as a model by other communities. The ongoing debate around Extended Producer Responsibility in recycling legislation, and why we must localize recycling and reuse programs in order to make real progress. Lina Khan’s nomination to the Federal Trade Commission and what it means for the future of that federal antitrust enforcement. What we can expect from antitrust bills that will be introduced by Congressman David Cicilline, Chair of the House Judiciary’s Antitrust Subcommittee.   “The American public and businesses, and governments, are in the middle between one set of monopolies that produces everything we eat and use, et cetera, and on the other side is a big set of monopolies that takes the stuff away and we pay both times. So, as we all know, the Institute is fighting the monopolies on both ends of the scale.”   “It feels like a precipice; things could go well or things could not go well, so we’ll see what happens. But the two questions that were really on the mind of antitrust and anti-monopoly folks going into the new year and going into the new administration was, one, who would the Biden administration appoint to lead the antitrust agencies… And then what legislation was going to get introduced in the house and the senate to amend, strengthen, reinforce the antitrust laws… We have a little bit of clarity now I think, on both of those points.”   Related Resources Liberty from All Masters by Barry Lynn Antitrust: Taking on Monopoly Power from the Gilded Age to the Digital Age by Amy Klobuchar Small Business Rising MuniNetworks.org Letter to Biden-Harris Administration: Recycling is Infrastructure Too Commentary: Cities and Counties Need Recycling Infrastructure Investment, But Is The “Breaking Free From Plastic” Bill The Answer? Department of Resource Recovery in Austin, Texas   Transcript Jessica Del Fia…: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. So today, if you remember a few months ago, we did a prediction episode where we were looking at what might come in 2021 for federal policy and local policy, as it relates to our different program areas and antitrust in general. So I am joined by a few of my colleagues, Maren, who works on our Broadband team, Ron, who works on our Independent Business team and Neil who works on our Waste Wealth team. We’re all going to share what they’ve seen happening so far this year, and any changes that they see coming down the line. So with that, welcome everybody. Neil Seldman: Thank you. Nice to be here. Ron Knox: Hey Jess, thanks. Jessica Del Fia…: And Marin, maybe you can start us off by just giving us a brief overview of what’s happening with broadband right now at the federal level. Biden’s been talking about it a lot, so what’s happening? Maren Machles: Yeah. There’s a lot going on. There’s a lot of money currently that’s being talked about being invested in broadband, especially community networks across the country. The one thing that I think our team and a number of other...

ILSR's Jess Del Fiacco and Brenda Platt are joined by Tom Gilbert of Black Dirt Farm and Lor Holmes of the CERO Cooperative. Their discussion focuses on the need to support local and distributed infrastructure for food scrap recycling and composting.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR’s Jess Del Fiacco and Brenda Platt are joined by Tom Gilbert of Black Dirt Farm and Lor Holmes of the CERO Cooperative. Their discussion focuses on the need to support local and distributed infrastructure for food scrap recycling and composting. Highlights include: The many ways in which on-farm and local composting enterprises nourish healthy soils and community. How state-level legislation and implementation policies around food scrap recycling have affected their businesses. How large-scale businesses are being privileged at the expense of local operations — and how this can harm the environment and the economy.   “I think if we’re really hoping to manage resources effectively to capture their full value for the community, but also to address issues of white supremacy and gender violence and all of these other aspects of society that we don’t think of as necessarily purely economic issues… all of that work boils down to relationships. We need to build currencies of trust that allow us to act in solidarity and allow us to build out economies and communities that have really clearly articulated values.”   Related Resources Black Dirt Farm CERO Cooperative Vermont stakeholder letter to legislature: Legislative Hearing on ANR’s Implementation of the Organics Management provisions of the Universal Recycling Law (February 16, 2021) Lor Holmes, CERO Cooperative, Inc., presentation to MA-Zero Waste Caucus (April 12, 2021) ILSR Written Comments on NY DEC Proposed Rules for Food Waste Recycling (April 27, 2021) Waste Dive, Maryland becomes latest state to pass organics diversion mandate (April 14, 2021) Small Business Rising ILSR’s Hierarchy to Reduce Food Waste & Grow Community Readings Recommended by Guests: Leverage Points by Donnella Meadows Emergent Strategies by Adrienne Marie-Brown Viking Economics by George Lakey Revolutionary Ecology by Judi Bari Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 25 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Today, we’ll be discussing the need to support local and distributed infrastructure for food scrap recycling and composting. I’m excited to be joined by my colleague, Brenda Platt, as well as two folks who are helping to keep compost local. Tom Gilbert is a Vermont farmer who runs Black Dirt Farm and Lor Holmes is a worker-owner of the CERO Cooperative, a food waste pickup service provider for a wide range of commercial clients in the Boston area. So, welcome to the show, both of you. Tom Gilbert: Thanks for having me. Lor Holmes: Thank you. Jess Del Fiacco: So, you’re both a part of the Sustainable Food Movement. Could you tell us just super briefly what it is you do, what your businesses are, and how you’re supporting your local agricultural economy? Tom, maybe we can start with you. Tom Gilbert: Sure. I own and operate Black Dirt Farm, we’re in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont and our business model is designed to mimic the carbon cycle in a mature ecosystem. And so we start by going off the farm and collecting discarded food. We serve about 90 businesses and institutions and collect about 30 tons a week. And then we forage laying hens on that compost mix and ship eggs throughout Vermont and down into Boston. And then we make compost and worm castings with the resulting material. And then we also grow a small number of crops here. And in terms of the local economy, we really prioritize getting food into the mouths of our neighbors and do a lot of solidarity work locally to just build our community more than anything...

Small business owners Danny Caine and Natasha Amott discuss Small Business Rising, a coalition that is calling on federal policymakers to reign in monopoly power.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Mary Timmel, ILSR’s Small Business Organizer, along with Danny Caine, owner of The Raven Book Store, and Natasha Amott, owner of Whisk, a homewares store. Caine and Amott are among many other business owners and independent business groups that have joined Small Business Rising, a coalition that is calling on federal policymakers to reign in monopoly power. Their conversation touches on: Trends they’ve seen in their industries, and at what point they realized monopoly power was behind many of the challenges they are facing. Why independent businesses are so important to communities. Why it’s important for small businesses to come together across sectors to challenge monopoly power, and why small businesses and labor shouldn’t be pitted against each other. The interconnected harms Amazon causes communities, including negative impacts on health, jobs, the environment, and more.   “To make this whole thing seem like this is just a single bookstore that’s mad about its prices makes it too easy to write it off. It’s much too narrow of a view of the argument. And as soon as you do any reading on the Amazon issue or about big tech monopolies, you realize just how many industries are affected by this, and how big Amazon is. So coalition building and teaming up both at the local and the national level, is vital to actually get something done, and also to convince people of the importance of this.”   “I hear David versus Goliath tossed around a lot, because we’re a little bookstore that has a really vocal anti-Amazon stance. But that’s not how I see it because it affects so many people. And if we all get together, we’re not actually that small. And I think Small Business Rising is a really important way to do that.”   Related Resources Whisk The Raven Small Business Rising Athena Coalition Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Today, really excited to talk about a new coalition of which ILSR is a part. It’s called Small Business Rising. And it’s a growing group of independent businesses who are asking policymakers to reign in monopoly power. I’m joined by my colleague Mary Timmel as well as Danny Caine who’s the owner of The Raven Book Store in Lawrence, Kansas, as well as Natasha Amott who’s the owner of Whisk, which is a kitchen store in Brooklyn. Welcome to the show all of you. Danny Caine: Thank you [crosstalk 00:01:02]. Jess Del Fiacco: And I think we can get started if Danny and Natasha, if you just want to give very brief descriptions of your businesses and your background? Natasha Amott: Sure. I’ll go first. So my name as you said is Natasha Amott. I’m the owner of Whisk, which is a kitchen where retail store. We’re located in Brooklyn, New York. I opened whisk in 2008. In 2018, I had three locations. Two in Brooklyn, one in Manhattan. Now I have just the one location located in downtown Brooklyn. And we sell everything needed for kitchenware, and we are brick and mortar, and also online. Danny Caine: Yeah. And I’m Danny. I’m the owner of The Raven. The Raven has been a small new bookstore in Lawrence, Kansas since September, 1987. I’m the third owner. 1,200 square feet, about 13,000 books. We’re working on a move to a new location just around the corner. But just long time leaders and advocates for literacy and small business in a small college town in the Midwest. Jess Del Fiacco: Could you both talk about how your businesses or how your industries have chan...

Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Christopher Mitchell and Christopher Ali, Associate Professor at the University of Virginia. Their conversation focuses around the idea of what it means to be local during a time when more and more pieces of our lives are shifting online. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Christopher Mitchell, Director of ILSR’s Community Broadband initiative, and Christopher Ali, Associate Professor in the department of Media Studies at the University of Virginia. Their conversation focuses around the idea of what it means to be local during a time when more and more pieces of our lives are shifting online. Other highlights of the discussion include: Ali’s recent Congressional testimony around rural broadband issues. Where federal broadband data is falling short. A rundown of recent and upcoming federal funding programs earmarked for broadband projects. How physical and virtual spaces can overlap, and the heightened importance of virtual community in rural areas. The case for connecting everyone to Internet access that goes beyond “good enough.”   “I also think when we talk about local broadband networks there’s also this idea of return on investment that can’t be measured by the quarter, as in quarterly shareholder returns. It’s measured in communities and people connected, it’s measured in the longterm — decades, sometimes. It’s a very different way of thinking about broadband deployment — much less as a commodity, much more as a service and a utility. And that’s why you’ll see me and read me say over and over again, the best broadband is local broadband.”   Related Resources Media Localism: The Policies of Place by Christopher Ali Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity by Christopher Ali (Coming Soon) Transcript Jessica Del Fia…: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to stop provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. And today we’re going to have a discussion about what it means to be local in a time when so much of our lives is virtual, including this podcast recording itself. So welcome to the show, Christopher Ali, who is an Associate Professor at department of Media Studies at the University of Virginia, as well as Christopher Mitchell, who’s the Director of the Community Broadband Initiative here at ILSR here at ILSR. Welcome to the show. Christopher Ali: Thank you very much. Christopher Mit…: You, you missed the other important part, which is Chris, has the best pipeline of people who come out of college ready to do important work on broadband. I’ve worked with many of his former students and I mean, Kat Blake, Katie Jordan, and then also, I didn’t want to forget Anna Higgins because she works with Katie Jordan and the work that they’re doing at Internet Society is so important. I shouldn’t have started naming names because I won’t get through them all. But now Jericho is on our staff currently just a lot of really great people who I think were inspired to do this work, Chris, so thank you for that. Christopher Ali: Well, thank you. And, yeah, those are some amazing young people doing amazing work and I love being able to follow their careers and the impact they are making specifically in this place or space of broadband deployment and the importance of kind of evangelizing the importance of community networks, local networks, broadband networks, more generally, I could not be more proud of them. Christopher Mit…: This is important. We desperately need more of these people. Jessica Del Fia…: That’s actually a call for recruits, sort of broadcasters. Christopher Mit…: Right. If you’re listening to these words and you have any interest in this, please come work. Jessica Del Fia…: All right, Chris, our guest, you recently testified before the Senate on Rural Broadband Policy generally,

Host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell are joined by Brad Lander, who represents Brooklyn's 39th District on the New York City Council. Brad shares his perspective on how the pandemic has affected NYC neighborhoods. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell are joined by Brad Lander, who represents Brooklyn’s 39th District on the New York City Council. Brad shares his perspective on how the pandemic has affected NYC neighborhoods, the parallels he sees between now and past crises — including the 2008 financial crash and the city’s near-bankruptcy in the mid-1970s — and how the city can avoid repeating past mistakes. They also discuss: How the city can protect small businesses and families from being priced out of neighborhoods by spiking rents and the financial impacts of the pandemic. How a city-run “land bank” would strengthen communities, boost economic development, and expand affordable housing by keeping property in the hands of non-profits and co-ops instead of for-profit developers. The successful community land trusts in Burlington and Albany that helped inspired this work and how other communities can pursue social ownership models. “Our model for community economic development for affordable housing construction and for economic development investment has really been very substantially for-profitized, so that 80% of the subsidies the city gives out for affordable housing go to for-profit private developers. And then lo and behold, 30 years later, when the mortgage is up, they’ve got the right to take it to market, and we wonder where the affordable housing went. But we don’t have to make those choices. We could pull our affordable housing back.”   Related Resources How to Avoid a Post-Recession Feeding Frenzy by Private Developers Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson Community Ownership of Commercial Spaces Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Today I’m here with Stacy Mitchell, who’s the co-director of ILSR, and we’re joined by Brad Lander, who represents Brooklyn’s 39th district on the New York City Council. Welcome to the show, guys. Brad Lander: Thank you so much. I’m a big fan, so I’m really honored to be here. Jess Del Fiacco: We only let big fans come on the show so they can praise us the whole time. That’s the secret. Before we get started, I also want to note that you’re involved with Local Progress, which is a network of progressive local officials around the country, so we might touch on that a little bit too. But Stacy, anything you want to say before we hit the ground? Stacy Mitchell: No. I’m so glad you’re here. I think we should dive right in. I think what’s on my mind is thinking about the huge impact that COVID has had on New York City, both people and the business community. I am imagining that there are a lot more vacancies than there used to be when you walk around city streets. I’ve read that hundreds or maybe even thousands of businesses have shuttered. Can you talk about what you’re seeing, particularly at the street level and with local businesses, and how the fabric of neighborhoods has changed? Brad Lander: Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me on. I think what ILSR is doing all across the country is really inspiring. And that model of supporting communities to take more control democratically is really powerful, and an urgent time for it. So yeah, I mean, New York City has been so hard hit, and I still think even though you see it in vacant storefronts that in most of our minds, we’re back in March and April hearing those sirens. Brad Lander: So the death toll and how unequal that death toll was, we’re all holding it.

LSR Co-Director John Farrell speaks with John Romankiewicz, Senior Analyst for the Beyond Coal Campaign at Sierra Club. Their discussion focuses on a new report from the Sierra Club called The Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges, which takes an in-depth look at electric utilities' public commitments to lower carbon emissions. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-Director John Farrell speaks with John Romankiewicz, Senior Analyst for the Beyond Coal Campaign at Sierra Club. Their discussion focuses on a new report from the Sierra Club called The Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges, which takes an in-depth look at electric utilities’ public commitments to lower carbon emissions. Highlights include: Romankiewicz’s background working on clean energy and the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. Why it’s important to monitor utilities’ commitments around clean energy, understand the financial incentives driving their decision-making, and track whether they keep their promises. The equity implications of utilities’ actions. How city leaders can hold utilities accountable and reach their own climate goals.   “It’s striking that you’re talking about how costs, financially and environmentally, have already fallen hardest on marginalized communities, on communities of color, and that continuing to operate them will continue to have that disproportionate impact… Shutting them down is a win-win. And same thing for energy efficiency. You not only get people who have lower bills and more comfortable homes, but then everybody pays less for energy because you have to use less of it.”   Related Resources The Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges Transcript Jessica Del Fia…: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies, and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power, and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jessica Del Fia…: This week, we have a conversation about climate change and the utility sector. Specifically, we’re going to be taking a look at a new report from the Sierra Club. This report is called the Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges, and it looks at how big utility companies oversell these pledges, and the ways in which they often fall short. This will be conversation between ILSR Co-Director, John Farrell and John Romankiewicz, who’s a Senior Analyst for the Beyond Coal Campaign at the Sierra Club. With that, I’m going to turn you over to their conversation. John Farrell: So joining me to talk about his report is Senior Analyst with the Beyond Coal Campaign at the Sierra Club, John Romankiewicz. John, welcome to Building Local Power. John Romankiewi…: Thanks for having me. John Farrell: Well, I’m really excited to talk to you about this. In part, because I always think it’s important to have a lot of scrutiny on utility companies, which often act as monopolies. Which is to say, in an anti-American fashion we have set aside the service territories that give these utilities customers, and therefore they have this really important public responsibility and sometimes are not living up to it. John Farrell: What I want to start with though is just… Before we get into the weeds of this report and the findings that you had, could you explain a little bit about what got you interested in this at Sierra Club, in tracking on this? And how did you come to doing this kind of work in general? Why are you working at Sierra Club on the Beyond Coal Campaign? What got you passionate about doing this work on climate and clean energy? John Romankiewi…: Great. Lots to dive into there. I’ve been an energy analyst for 10 to 15 years with different types of organizations, government research labs, federal government, private consulting. Sierra Club was my first nonprofit, which I came to about four and a half years ago. Coming out of public policy school, I did a Master’s at UC Berkeley, I really wanted to dive into the advocacy directly. I read this article about the Beyond Coal Campaig...

Host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell are joined by award-winning journalist Alec MacGillis to discuss his new book, Fulfillment. Their conversation focuses on how the shift toward online shopping — led by Amazon — has reshaped America. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director Stacy Mitchell are joined by award-winning journalist Alec MacGillis to discuss his new book, Fulfillment: Winning and Losing in One-Click America. Their conversation focuses on how the shift toward online shopping — led by Amazon — has reshaped America. Highlights include: How this shift has reshaped jobs and physical landscapes around the country. Amazon’s ever-growing influence on the Washington, D.C., metro area. The troubling dynamic between local governments and Amazon, which often includes cities working on Amazon’s behalf. The social and political consequences of the dramatic — and growing — gulf between rich and poor places in the United States. Whether or not these changes are inevitable, and what elected officials can do to shape our economy’s future. “You’re unable to even talk about problems because the issues manifest themselves so differently in different parts of the country. And housing is the best example. It’s just surreal to be in cities where the housing debate is all about high cost and affordability… And then you go to other parts of the country where the housing problem is the absolute reverse, where it’s just a problem of depopulation and blight and abandonment…. The most extreme or clearest example, of course, of this incomprehensibility to each other, is what’s happened in our politics, in our electoral politics, these last few years.” Related Resources Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast, dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for local self-reliance. For more than 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remained in local hands. In today’s episode we’re going to talk about how a shift towards online shopping, which was led in part by Amazon has reshaped our country. Jess Del Fiacco: I’m here with my colleague, Stacy Mitchell, the co-director of ILSR, and joining us is the award-winning journalist Alec MacGillis whose work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, and many other places. Alec has a new book out, which is called Fulfillment, Winning and Losing in One-Click America. Welcome to the show. Alec, we’re happy to have you here. Alec MacGillis: Thanks for having me. Jess Del Fiacco: Could you just tell us a little bit about this book and why did you decide to write it? Alec MacGillis: This book has been in the works for a long time, and it’s really goes back many years to my upbringing in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, small city in Western mass. That’s gone through a really hard time after it lost General Electric and just becoming more and more worried about the huge gap, growing gap between places in America, places that all these towns and cities that really have been kind of left behind, even as you had these pockets, these other cities that were growing just more and more wealthy, more and more concentrated in their prosperity and watching this happening as I was about 10 or 12 years ago out on the road, a lot reporting as a political reporter for The Washington Post and going out to towns in Ohio or Wisconsin all over the country. And then coming back to Washington and Metro Washington, as it was becoming more and more intensely wealthy and kind of complacent in its wealth. Alec MacGillis: And this is around the time of the great recession, 2009, ’10, when you could barely even see the great recession hitting in Metro Washington and seeing this divide growing ever wider between places and being really bothered by it and really worried about it, and also surprised that more people weren’t talking about it. And then Trump gets elected in 16,

Gena McKinley of Austin, Texas, discusses the economic and environmental benefits of the city's Circular Economy Program — including highlights from a recent economic impact report that found it resulted in more than $1.1 billion in total economic activity and approximately 6,300 permanent jobs.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Brenda Platt, Director of ILSR’s Composting for Community Initiative, and Gena McKinley, Strategic Initiatives Division Manager for Austin Resource Recovery. Their discussion touches on: The economic and environmental benefits of the Circular Economy Program in Austin — including highlights from a recent economic impact report that found it resulted in more than $1.1 billion in total economic activity and approximately 6,300 permanent jobs. The importance of the city’s Zero Waste Plan and how the plan has evolved over the past ten years. The many different reuse and recovery programs Gena’s team helps facilitate, including fix-it clinics and skill-sharing events. How Gena views the role of local leadership in tackling the climate crisis, building equity, and creating a sustainable economy.   “I mean if you’re talking about $1.1 billion, then definitely we want to continue to invest in this in our community, so that we can be prosperous and we can encourage the sector… the benefit of the way that this program is configured within the government organization itself — by having it housed in the solid waste utility but partnered with economic development, especially coupled with solid data verified by an independent consultant — that really is powerful.”   Related Resources City of Austin: Fix-It Clinics City of Austin: Host a Fix-it Clinic Guide City of Austin: Zero Waste By 2040 City of Austin: Circular Economy Program City of Austin Report: Recycling and Reuse-Related Economy of Austin Austin Approves New Zero Waste Plan Austin Universal Recycling Ordinance City of Austin, TX, Reuse Programs – Gena McKinley presentation (12/2/20 to Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments) Repair Revolution: How Fixers Are Transforming Our Throwaway Culture by John Wackman & Elizabeth Knight Transcript Jess: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power, a communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For more that 35 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess: In today’s episode, we’re going to be discussing how cities not only can cut waste, but they can do so while creating local jobs and otherwise boosting the local economy. And we’re going to be talking specifically about the City of Austin. And here to join us is Gena McKinley, who is a longtime environmental planner with the City of Austin, and now manages the Strategic Initiatives division of Austin Resource Recovery. Welcome to the show. Gena: Thank you. Good to be here. Jess: And also with me is Brenda Platt, who leads our Composting for Community initiative at ILSR. Welcome, Brenda. Brenda: Hi, nice to be here. Jess: And do you want to kind of get us started with a question? Brenda: Sure. It might not be a question. I just want to say, it’s so nice to have Gena here representing the city because the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, we have such a long history working to cut waste with the city. We helped defeat a planned trash incinerator I think more than 30 years ago, and the city had already invested something like $40 million in that incinerator but still canceled it in order to get on the path of zero waste. And we helped develop the first zero waste plan in Texas with this city, which I think was approved back in 2009. And that set that goal to reduce the amount of waste by 90% by 2040. Brenda: And now we’ve been advocating for zero waste planning around the country for so many years, and I always point to Austin, always. Austin is such a model in zero waste planning, your resource recovery master plan,

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by three members of ILSR's broadband team to discuss new resources that focus on tribal broadband projects and municipal broadband projects throughout the country. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by three members of ILSR’s broadband team: Christopher Mitchell, Program Director; H. Trostle, Project Manager; and Sean Gonsalves, Senior Reporter, Editor, and Researcher. The first half of the discussion is focused on new ILSR resources on tribal broadband projects and the second half features an overview of an upcoming report on municipal broadband projects throughout the country. Highlights of the conversation include: The diverse benefits increased connectivity can bring to tribal lands, including increased local economic development. The importance of spectrum sovereignty, which treats spectrum like a natural resource and respects tribes’ right to manage spectrum on their land. How the road to success can differ greatly between different municipal broadband projects. The progress we’ve seen on municipal broadband projects throughout the U.S. over the last 10 years. “They thought if they just kept asking for small amounts of money for some of their community need, that that would eventually be enough. It turns out that [the Fond du Lac Band of Ojibwe] needed to dream big, be clear about their community needs, and then the federal government was able to fund their network in a way that actually works for the longterm.”   Related Resources Building Indigenous Future Zones: Four Tribal Broadband Case Studies Indigenous Networks resource page Transcript Jessica Del Fia…: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I am Jessica Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build driving equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. And, Hello. Today I’m here with a few of my ILSR colleagues. First up is Christopher Mitchell who you have heard on the show before, more likely than not. Christopher Mit…: I’m ready to provoke some thought. Jessica Del Fia…: That’s what we try to do here. And we also have two other members of the broadband team, H. Trostle, who is our Project Manager on the Broadband team. H. Trostle: Yes, I am a Project Manager. Jessica Del Fia…: And we have Sean Gonsalves, who is a… oh my God, what are you, Sean? Reporter, researcher, writer? Sean Gonsalves: All of that. Jessica Del Fia…: Senior reporter. Christopher Mit…: All of that- Sean Gonsalves: It’s a terrible title, and then some. Jessica Del Fia…: You guys, we’ve got to standardize these. They are going to talk about some exciting new research that they’ve been working on, and I think, unless Chris you want to say anything to set us off here, we will start with our Native Networks report. Christopher Mit…: Just that this is an exciting time. I think I’ve said before, I’ve been disappointed at the level of government response to the pandemic, and we’re going to talk about some things that we’ve been seeing happening. But I will say, I feel like government’s catching up now, local, state, federal. I’m hopeful that we will see more seriousness, and there’s a lot of good stuff happening out there at the local level. Jessica Del Fia…: 2021, a year for seriousness. H, do you want to start us off by explaining why did you decide to do a report on Broadband projects and tribal lands across the United States? H. Trostle: Yeah. This is an area that requires so much more information sharing. So, you know how Muni Networks is the clearinghouse for information on municipal networks. Well, there isn’t the same thing for our tribally owned networks. And this is just like a huge gap in the research. This is a huge gap for policy makers who are trying to figure out what to do about the continual lack of access in Indian country. And so,

John Farrell, Co-Director of ILSR, interviews Leslie Glustrom, founding member of Clean Energy Action about how we can equitably transition to a clean energy future. … Read More

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Neil Seldman and Captain Charles Moore, author of Plastic Ocean, to discuss Moore's his vision for turning landfills into "resource recovery parks."… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth initiative, and Captain Charles Moore, author of Plastic Ocean: How a Sea Captain’s Chance Discovery Launched a Determined Quest to Save the Oceans. Their conversation focuses on Moore’s latest article, Mine Landfills Now!, which describes his vision for turning landfills into “resource recovery parks.” They also discuss: The benefits communities can gain from recognizing all waste is, according to Moore, “a resource waiting for recovery.” How Moore’s scientific and political background informed his reaction to discovering the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in the late 90s. Why a global grassroots political movement is needed to address climate change and plastic pollution and save the oceans. Moore’s upcoming projects, including determining a methodology for measuring plastic in drinking water.   “The goal is to use technology to liberate mankind. It has that potential. There’s no question that liberating technology is already in place and has helped millions of people. The question is ‘What about the billions that haven’t been helped by it?’ We can’t ever lose sight of that.”   Contact Captain Charles Moore: captain-charles-moore.org [email protected] Algalita Marine Research and Education   Related Resources Plastic Ocean: How a Sea Captain’s Chance Discovery Launched a Determined Quest to Save the Oceans. Mine Landfills Now! Save the Albatross Coalition Urban Ore St. Vincent de Paul of Eugene, Oregon Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver Utopia for Realists by Rutger Bregman Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Today I’m here with Neil Seldman, who’s the director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth initiative, as well as Captain Charles Moore, who’s the author of Plastic Ocean and a long-time zero-waste advocate. So welcome to the show, guys. Neil Seldman: Thank you. Charles Moore: Thank you. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah. Neil, if you want to get us started? Neil Seldman: Yes. I will, and it’s a pleasure to have Charles here. Known Charles for many years, and we both coordinate the Save the Albatross Coalition, which is a grassroots organization, and I’ll just let people know that Charles has been a pioneer researcher. He’s continuing his research through several research organizations, which we’ll hear about, and he is an international leader, but he’s also a national leader involved in all aspects of retaining plastic, protecting the oceans, and helping the country as well as the world get to zero waste. Neil Seldman: Having said that, I’d like to ask Charles to start us off by just indicating what led you to inquire about the garbage patches that you discovered now some 25 years ago. Charles Moore: Well, it was an accidental kind of discovery, although I hesitate to call it a discovery, because it was just a feeling of unease about seeing so much anthropogenic debris as far from human civilization as you can get. This Eastern North Pacific Subtropical Gyre is huge. It’s probably the largest climatic feature on the planet, and I crossed it in 1997 during the largest El Niño on record, and it was very calm, and that allowed whatever trash was there to float to the surface, and I couldn’t come on deck without seeing some form of human-made debris pass by the vessel, and that happened for a whole week. So as a self-described marine mammal, growing up here on the ocean in Long Beach, California,

From small business relief to a solar homes stimulus, we look ahead to policy opportunities in the new year and beyond in this episode of Building Local Power. … Read More

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by ILSR staff members John Farrell, Christopher Mitchell, and Ron Knox to discuss the 2020 election and what the results may mean for ILSR's work.… Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by ILSR staff members John Farrell, Christopher Mitchell, and Ron Knox to discuss the 2020 election and what the results may mean for ILSR’s work. Their conversation touches on a number of topics, including: Interesting ballot initiatives that passed in communities around the country, such as: Support for municipal action on broadband issues in Denver and Chicago. Establishment of a climate sales tax in Denver, a climate fund in Albany, Calif., and community choice aggregation in East Brunswick, N.J. and Columbus, Ohio. Support for restrictions on payday lending in Nebraska, a tax on the wealthy in Arizona, and a $15 minimum wage in Florida. How we can reckon with the huge ideological gap between political parties, especially regarding specific policies that receive broad public support. What a new administration could mean for federal broadband, climate, and antitrust policy.   “When voters are faced with these really clear policy choices, it turns out that these policies are actually popular and they’re often wildly popular and then they win. I think that’s just such a clear lesson for our work… and the work of organizers everywhere, it’s no mystery that issue campaigns can be really successful and can lead to really immediate and important policy changes.”   Related Resources Is it Finally Time to Break Up Big Tech? The Post-Election Potential for a 30 Million Solar Home Stimulus Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities or power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Good morning. I’m here with my colleagues, John Farrell, Chris Mitchell and Ron Knox, and this is ILSRs special post-election episode of Building Local Power. Before we get started, I just want to specify that we are recording this on Friday morning. We do not have a call in the presidential election and states are still counting. FYI, if you’re listening to this in the next few days, next week, that’s where we’re at, still held in suspense in many ways. Chris Mitchell: If you’re much farther into the future, let’s hope it’s a much, much brighter future than our year of 2020. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah, 2021 listeners, I hope you’re having a great time. To get to our actual conversation, if hypothetically, purely hypothetically, if I was a person who had only spent the last 48 hours refreshing results, refreshing the stats on Pennsylvania and Georgia and not paying a whole lot of attention to other local elections throughout the country, what have I missed specifically? I know you guys have had your eyes on some interesting ballot initiatives in different cities. I’m curious how those line up with how people came out to support any particular candidate or the different parties. Maybe we could start with Chris. I know some interesting stuff happened in Chicago and Denver. Chris Mitchell: Yes. I’m going to start big and we’ll see if anyone can top me, but we had referenda to do more on broadband, would probably be a way to characterize it. In particular, Denver had to overcome a state law which says that a city has to pass a referendum in order to basically build a network or to partner with a network, even if they just want to provide access to public housing or something like that. This is a law that’s one of 19 states that have this sort of a thing passed by in the big monopolies through a pliant legislature. In Denver, they voted 83.5% to restore that authority to be able to make those decisions locally but that, that was a tight election compared to Chicago,

Host John Farrell interviews Jill Mangaliman of Got Green and Abigail Juaner of Puget Sound Sage about Seattle's JumpStart tax. The tax will be used to fund local projects centered around affordable housing and the city's Green New Deal. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-director John Farrell interviews Jill Mangaliman, Executive Director of Got Green, and Abigail Juaner of Puget Sound Sage. They discuss Seattle’s JumpStart tax, which city council passed this summer, and how it will be used to fund local projects centered around affordable housing and the city’s Green New Deal. Their conversation touches on: How their organizations were involved in pushing for the JumpStart legislation. Opportunities for similar action to take place in other cities and why collaboration between different local entities is key. The overlaps between investing in affordable housing and the Green New Deal and why climate justice must be prioritized in the transition to a clean energy future. How the community is involved with decisions around how to spend JumpStart tax revenue.   “How do we move away from fossil fuels? Not just new infrastructure, but also existing infrastructure needs to make that transition. And again, how do we support the communities and the workers in that transition? There has to be some real investments. … We really want to make sure that if we are going to make those goals by 2030, to move away from climate pollution, that we actually do so in an intentional way that doesn’t leave any of our community behind.”   Related Resources Decriminalize Seattle King County Equity Now Got Green Puget Sound Sage Transcript Jessica Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jessica Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and Communications Manager here at the Institute for Local Self-reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jessica Del Fiacco: In this episode, ILSR co-director John Farrell interviews Jill Mangaliman, Executive Director of Got Green, and Abigail Juaner from Puget Sound Sage about Seattle’s Jumpstart Tax. This tax applies to businesses with annual payrolls over $7 million, and the revenue is used to fund local projects centered around affordable housing and the city’s Green New Deal. With that, let’s head to the show. John Farrell: We could just start with, at the basic level, I’m interested in hearing about the Jumpstart Tax. What was the idea behind it? How much money is it going to collect? And who’s paying for it? Abigail Juaner: Jumpstart is the progressive revenue legislation that the Seattle City Council passed this summer, in July. It’s estimated to bring around 214 million a year. And who’s paying for it? It’s businesses with payroll expenses for employees with at least $150,000 in annual compensation. It’s structured in three tiers, if you want me to go over it really quickly? John Farrell: Yeah, I think that’s useful. I think it’s really intriguing for folks in other cities to even just understand a little bit about this kind of structure of local taxation. Abigail Juaner: Yeah. It is structured in three tiers. Businesses with payroll expenses up to a hundred million? Their rates are 0.7% of employees with annual compensation between $150,000 and $400,000. Then it will be 1.7% of those with annual compensation above $400,000. The next year is for businesses with payroll expenses between a hundred million and 1 billion. The tax rate for that is 0.7% for employees at annual compensation between $150,000 and $400,000, and then 1.9% for those with annual compensation about $400,000. Then the third tier is for businesses with payroll expenses over 1 billion. The rate for that is 1.4% for annual compensation between $150,000 and $400,000, and then 2.4% for those annual compensation above $400,000. Businesses with parallel expenses under 7 million are exempted from this. John Farrell: So it’s really progressive, I guess,

Stacy Mitchell and Ron Knox dig into the new report from the House Antitrust Subcommittee on monopoly power in digital markets.… Read More

In this bonus episode of Building Local Power, ILSR Co-director Stacy Mitchell and Senior Researcher Ron Knox dig into the new report from the House Antitrust Subcommittee on monopoly power in digital markets. The report is the result of a more than a year-long investigation into the anticompetitive behavior of the four biggest tech companies: Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Apple. Jess, Ron, and Stacy discuss: Highlights from the report’s findings. The most important recommendations from the report, including that these companies should be broken up along product lines. How this report and its recommendations fits into the history of antitrust action in the United States. What we can expect to happen next and how the impact of this report might go beyond these four companies.   “…we should recognize that the power that these companies have, and their ability to engage in those kinds of behaviors and to use those sort of predatory tactics, is a function of shifts in policy. I mean, had Amazon come along in an earlier era, things that it did to gain this incredible position would have invited criminal prosecution.”   Related Resources Investigation of Competition in Digital Markets: Majority Staff Report and Recommendations Don’t Let Amazon Get Any Bigger by Stacy Mitchell, New York Times Why Antitrust History Is So Important by Ron Knox, Washington Post Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. A podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. Today, I’m joined by ILSR co-director Stacy Mitchell and senior researcher, Ron Knox. And we’re going to talk about the house antitrust subcommittee’s new report, which focuses on competition in digital markets. What you’ve gotten a few updates from us along the way. It’s been a more than a year long investigation, I believe. They’ve produced 400 plus, 500 plus pages. So Stacy and Ron, what is in this report? Ron Knox: Thanks Jess. So yeah, 450 pages, like right on the dot I think was the final version of that. So well, that’s the report and you’re right. More than a year long investigation, 16 months, 15 months, 16 months, something like that. And the report is essentially the comprehensive findings of this more than a year long investigation into the monopoly power of the four big tech companies, as we think about them, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Amazon. So I think the report was really successful in showing the ways in which these four tech companies came to dominate and came to monopolize their respective markets. The report correctly connected the threads between these companies to show that the problem, that is the reason for their monopolization, are common among the companies. And in that way, they’re more systemic in their problems of policy that can ultimately be corrected with some changes to the law. Ron Knox: So the prime example identified in the report and identified in the investigation were mergers, right? The investigation found that the poor companies had collectively closed hundreds of mergers over the last decade. And that at least some of those mergers happened because the tech monopolies wanted to extinguish competition from smaller companies that they thought could challenge its dominance in some way and at some point down the line. So the evidence showed that this was for example, Facebook’s broad strategy when acquiring Instagram, when acquiring WhatsApp and other rivals. Now Facebook’s monopoly position is so strong that it mainly competes with its own apps. Rather than any other social media company out there.

Host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Denzel Mitchell, Deputy Director of the Baltimore Farm Alliance, and Sophia Hosain, leader of ILSR’s composting work in Baltimore.… Read More

On this week’s episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Denzel Mitchell, Deputy Director of the Baltimore Farm Alliance, and Sophia Hosain, leader of ILSR’s composting work in Baltimore. The Baltimore Farm Alliance is a membership organization of urban farms, neighborhood growers, and friends that use connection, resource sharing, and collective advocacy with respect to food, land, and water to expand communities’ self-determination and power. Jess, Denzel, and Sophia discuss: How the history of redlining and systematic disenfranchisement which destroyed Black wealth and land ownership is contributing to current day food insecurity. The importance of Black agricultural land ownership and land sovereignty in building self-reliant communities, and how the Baltimore Farm Alliance is supporting this vision. Food apartheid and why the term “food desert” is an inaccurate term that should be retired. The importance of composting as an act of resistance, and the role that ILSR’s Community Composting Initiative is playing to expand composting in Baltimore. How composting is bringing communities together, creating new ways to look at our relationship to the Earth, and why we should all be composting. Educational and inspirational reading (and watching) recommendations. Don’t miss Denzel and Sophia’s suggestions in the resources section below!   “We are here. We are the children, we are the descendants of these folks that you moved out, that you did wrong, that you did dirty, and we are taking control of the food system and making ourselves a part of the conversation.”   Related Resources Black Yield Institute Baltimore’s Strange Fruit Lovecraft Country Karen Washington: It’s Not a Food Desert, It’s Food Apartheid Not in My Neighborhood: How Bigotry Shaped a Great American City by Antero Pietila Dispossession: Discrimination Against African American Farmers in the Age of Civil Rights by Pete Daniel Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good by Adrienne Maree Brown Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson The Warmth Of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson Freedom Farmers: Agricultural Resistance and the Black Freedom Movement by Monica M. White, Ladonna Redmond Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought-provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving, equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: Today I am here with my ILSR colleague, Sophia Hosain, who leads ILSR’s composting work in Baltimore, as well as Denzel Mitchell, who is the deputy director of the Baltimore Farm Alliance. Welcome to the show guys. Denzel Mitchell: Thanks for having us. Jess Del Fiacco: Happy to have you here. Thanks for taking the time. Denzel, could you start us off by just giving us a brief overview of the work that you do with the Baltimore Farm Alliance? What’s your mission in the city? Denzel Mitchell: Our mission is to build a sustainable community of farmers, food workers, and land-based progressive activists through racial equity and land tenure and ownership lens. The organization was founded by Maya Kosok in 2008 through an OSI fellowship. I was one of the founding members, and we’ve been working towards technical services, education and support of urban agriculture, teaching, training, collective marketing, community building, and sustainable agriculture, specifically based around building soils in the city since then. And I’ve been their deputy director since February of this year. Jess Del Fiacco: Very cool stuff. Sophia, maybe you could talk about ILSR’s connections with...

ILSR's Christopher Mitchell interviews Rebecca Woodbury and Air Gallegos, who helped lead a local effort to build a Wi-Fi mesh network to connect residents in the Canal neighborhood of San Rafael, Calif.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, Christopher Mitchell, Director of ILSR’s Community Broadband Networks initiative, interviews Rebecca Woodbury, San Rafael’s Director of Digital Services and Open Government, and Air Gallegos, Director of Education and Career for Canal Alliance. Rebecca and Air helped lead a local effort to build a Wi-Fi mesh network to connect residents in the Canal neighborhood of San Rafael, Calif. Christopher, Air, and Rebecca discuss: How the mobilization of local volunteers, combined with the efforts and expertise of the city and Canal Alliance, allowed them to quickly develop and implement a solution. The impacts they’ve seen so far in the community. The many issues they took into consideration as they planned the network, including power outages, digital literacy barriers, housing inequities, and language barriers, in order to ensure that it works for as many residents as possible both now and in the future. What other communities can learn from San Rafael’s success. Learn more about San Rafael and other communities working to connect residents to high quality Internet access on MuniNetworks.org and ILSR’s Community Broadband Bits podcast. “One of the things that’s been wonderful about this project is we’ve been living with deep inequities in the Canal for a very long time. And I think what’s interesting about COVID is they’re giving us an opportunity to build something new and build something different. It’s allowing a space for productivity and creativity to really happen, so that in some ways has been a really big blessing of everyone coming together… we live in a very crazy world and we have to be willing to try everything.”   Related Resources Connecting A Neighborhood in Need in San Rafael, California – Community Broadband Bits Podcast Episode 427 Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving equitable communities where power, wealth, and accountability remain in local hands. Jess Del Fiacco: For today’s episode, we have an interview with two women who are helping to lead a very cool project to connect a neighborhood in the Bay Area of California to internet access. But first I’m here with Christopher Mitchell, who’s the Director of ILSR’s Community Broadband initiative to give us a little context for their story. So, Chris, could you give us a very brief overview of the project? Christopher Mitchell: Yeah, I feel duty bound to actually start instead by commenting on the visualization I had in my head as you were reading the intro of ILSR being like a person throwing pottery and shaping their future, so I just wanted to… I wanted to give the listeners the visual. Jess Del Fiacco: It’s not exactly what we’re going for there. Christopher Mitchell: This WiFi Mesh Network is very interesting. It’s very inspiring. It’s a reminder of the fact that we should all take charge. We should take responsibility, take action and even if we’re not clear on how to do it, stepping up can really get other people excited about stepping up as well. Jess Del Fiacco: They’re not going into people’s homes and giving them routers and running fiber, this is outside, right? On the street, although it reaches into apartment buildings, people’s individual homes, right? The WiFi? Christopher Mitchell: Yes, for people who may live just off of the street, they may have a signal that’s strong enough to get into their homes. I think a lot of people will probably be using it outside. It’s easier to do that in California than Minnesota depending on the season. And the important part in my mind is that we have people who have gone from having subopt...

Host Jess Del Fiacco talks with John Farrell, Director of ILSR's Energy Democracy Initiative, about how cities are taking action around climate change.… Read More

Zephyr Teachout, author of the new book Break 'Em Up, shares her thoughts on building an antimonopoly movement, what she finds encouraging and discouraging in our current moment, and how she approaches antimonopoly work as a democracy activist.… Read More

ILSR's Stacy Mitchell and Ron Knox discuss the House Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee's recent hearing on monopoly power in online platforms, which featured testimony from the CEOs of Facebook, Apple, Amazon, and Google. The hearing was part of an in-depth, year-long investigation of anti-competitive behavior in these companies — the first time in more than 40 years that Congress has conducted a detailed investigation of monopoly power. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, David Dayen discusses his latest book, Monopolized: Life in the Age of Corporate Power, which tells the story of the daily impact of monopoly power on Americans’ lives. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Zach Freed, researcher with ILSR's Independent Business initiative, and John Farrell, ILSR co-director. The three discuss the Fighting Monopoly Power guide, ILSR's latest release, which spans the banking, broadband, electricity, food and farming, pharmacy, small business, and waste sectors. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, John Farrell, ILSR Co-Director and Director of the Energy Democracy initiative, interviews Scott Hempling, a lawyer and professor with decades of experience working on utility regulatory issues. Scott and John talk about why energy utilities were once considered to be "natural monopolies," and how that assumption is being challenged by new energy technologies and the push for more choice in the energy market.… Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, John Farrell, ILSR Co-Director and Director of the Energy Democracy initiative, interviews Scott Hempling, a lawyer and professor with decades of experience working on utility regulatory issues. Scott and John talk about why energy utilities were once considered to be “natural monopolies,” and how that assumption is being challenged by new energy technologies and the push for more choice in the energy market. Scott and John discuss: The lengths monopolies will go to retain their control of the energy industry. Scott’s monthly essays and upcoming book, Regulating Mergers and Acquisitions of Public Utilities: Industry Concentration and Corporate Complication. The flawed regulatory process that has enabled the decades-long trend of consolidation in the energy industry, and why it is at odds with the current trend toward decentralized, local, customer controlled power sources. Why relying on existing monopoly providers to meet renewable energy goals may be a mistake. Update: As discussed in the podcast, Scott’s book — Regulating Mergers and Acquisitions of U.S. Electric Utilities: Industry Concentration and Corporate Complication — is now available. “…when you have a century of control in a particular company, that breeds a culture of entitlement and it breeds a huge self-interest in maintaining that monopoly. So, the first thing is to recognize just the natural human instinct to protect what’s yours. And a monopoly will do everything it can legally and sometimes unlawfully to protect that monopoly.” Related Resources Regulating Public Utility Performance by Scott Hempling Scott Hempling’s monthly essays Transcript Jess Del Fiacco: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast dedicated to thought provoking conversations about how we can challenge corporate monopolies and expand the power of people to shape their own future. I’m Jess Del Fiacco, the host of Building Local Power and communications manager here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For 45 years, ILSR has worked to build thriving equitable communities where power, wealth and accountability remain in local hands. For today’s episode, ILSR co-director John Farrell, interviews Scott Hempling, a lawyer, Professor, expert witness and author, who has worked on utility regulatory issues for almost 40 years. John Farrell: Scott, welcome to Building Local Power. Scott: Thank you for having me. John Farrell: So, as I was saying before, when we talk about monopoly, folks are often using this term figuratively to talk about a corporation or even a government that exercises a lot of market power, but in the electricity in industry it’s literal. The entities that manage the electric grid are the only ones allowed to do it in a certain geographic area. And when we establish these monopolies, it was often because we considered them “a natural monopoly,” meaning it made the most sense economically to allow one business to have this government granted monopoly over power generation, transmission and retail sales. In terms of this concept of natural monopoly, it’s a term that comes out of economics, have there been things that have changed since the time that we set this up 100 years ago? Scott: Yes, the change is dramatic. Many of us have used the term natural monopoly so often, in so many different contexts that we’ve forgotten what it means. Technically, a natural monopoly is a service or a product whose per unit cost declines over the entire size of the market. And so when you have a natural monopoly, the way to minimize costs for all customers, is to have only a single company. If you had multiple companies, each one would have a cost structure that was higher than necessary. And so the assumption that was made over a century ago in the electric industry was that the combination of generation, transmission, distribution and customer service, putting that all together into a single company for a single service t...

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Christopher Mitchell, director of ILSR's Community Broadband Initiative, and Representative Seth Berry of Maine.… Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco is joined by Brenda Platt, Director of ILSR's Composting for Community Initiative, and Kesiah Bascom, founder of OffBeet Compost.… Read More

Host Jess Del Fiacco talks with Kennedy Smith, Senior Researcher with ILSR's Independent Business initiative, about efforts at the state and local level to support small businesses affected by the pandemic.… Read More

Host Jess Del Fiacco and ILSR Co-Director John Farrell speak with Gina Schaefer, ILSR board member and owner of A Few Cool Hardware Stores in the D.C. area. Gina talks a little about how she got into the hardware business and explains how they have adapted operations to safely serve customers during the pandemic.… Read More

Chris, John, Stacy, and Jess discuss the bumpy rollout of federal relief funding for America's small businesses, which are facing an unprecedented crisis in the COVID-19 pandemic. … Read More

Host Christopher Mitchell speaks with Fordham Law School Professor Nestor Davidson and National League of Cities Research Director Christiana McFarland about a recent report on home rule. … Read More

Host Zach Freed speaks with Jim Hrncir, owner of Las Colinas Pharmacy in Irving, Texas. Zach and Jim discuss how independent pharmacies are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. … Read More

Jess Del Fiacco talks with ILSR Co-Director John Farrell about recent publications from ILSR's Energy Democracy initiative, including the 2020 Community Power Scorecard and a report on community choice energy. … Read More

Stacy Mitchell speaks with Sandy Grodin, a small business owner, about the catastrophic impact of the coronavirus pandemic on small businesses across the country. … Read More

On this episode of Building Local Power, host Jess Del Fiacco talks with Stacy Mitchell and Christopher Mitchell about how communities are responding to the unprecedented challenge of Covid-19. The pandemic is already drastically impacting local businesses, and is on track to further exacerbate existing inequalities. … Read More

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Brenda Platt speaks with Elsa Higby and Aleks Jagiello of the Queens Botanical Garden Farm and Compost Site.… Read More

Host Christopher Mitchell is joined by ILSR Co-Founder David Morris for a wide-ranging conversation about whether or not modern populist movements are tied to concerns about centralized control. … Read More

Host Stacy Mitchell talks with Harry First about how competition policy has become captured by technocratic lawyers and economists, and strayed from its roots as a political movement for economic justice.… Read More

Host Stacy Mitchell is joined by Harry First, law professor and co-director of New York University’s Competition, Innovation, and Information Law Program. They chat about how competition policy has become captured by technocratic lawyers and economists, and strayed from its roots as a political movement for economic justice. They also discuss: The movement to “depoliticize” antitrust, and how decisions about how to enforce the law are always political on some level How State Attorneys General can intervene to stop mergers when the FTC and DOJ refuse to intervene The increasing number of students enrolling in antitrust classes What can be done, and what is already being done, to reinvigorate antitrust enforcement   “Everyone uses Amazon, everyone uses Google…this is not something that’s esoteric or removed from peoples’ lives. This is, particularly for the students we see, an integral part of their lives. They’re concerned about [monopoly power].”   Related Resources Harry First Antitrust’s Democracy Deficit by Harry First and Spencer Weber Waller Woodstock Antitrust by Michael H. Belzer The Microsoft Antitrust Cases: Competition Policy for the Twenty-first Century by Andrew I. Gavil and Harry First ILSR’s Anti-Monopoly Resources Transcript Zach Freed: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Zach Freed. Stacy Mitchell: And I’m Stacy Mitchell. Zach Freed: Today on the show we have a discussion between Stacy and professor Harry First of New York University law school. Harry is both a professor of law and a co-director of NYU’s competition innovation and information law program. Professor First is the author of several books and essays on antitrust, including one in particular called Antitrust Democracy Deficit with coauthor Spencer Weber Waller. Stacy sat down with Professor First to talk about that essay and what can be done to make up for antitrust laws democratic deficit. Just starting, one thing that stood out to me was how candid Harry First was about the need for democratic participation in this area of law. Stacy Mitchell: Yeah, he’s really got, I think an interesting analysis in that article and we hear about it in the podcast about how antitrust law has become more and more the domain of economists in this really highly technical expertise. And as it’s it gone in that direction, ordinary people have been more and more excluded and the broader public purposes of antitrust law have been lost and kind of gone, it’s all gone behind closed doors. Zach Freed: Another thing that stood out to me was how forthright Professor First was about the discussion of values and how it’s impossible to “politicize” antitrust law because you’re taking into account value judgments when you make decisions about who gets what. Yeah. That was another thread that also came up with our conversation with Professor Sanjukta Paul in our last podcast. Stacy Mitchell: Yeah. I think these two episodes actually pair really well together and you’re right, that was a common thread in both of them. And one of the things I learned a lot in this conversation with some of the details of history. And so one of the things a Professor First talks about is how Robert Bork, who we all know is a person who kind of appended antitrust law and helped to really neutralize it or even turn it on its head. And Robert Bork very directly said, “Antitrust is very political.” In today’s time, when people argue for stronger antitrust or that policy should incorporate a broader set of democratic values, the pushback from the establishment is often well you’re just trying to make it political. And the smarter, more accurate thing to recognize is that it’s already political. Stacy Mitchell: The question is, which values does it serve and whose values does it serve? One of the other things I thought was kind of interesting as just a historical fact that came up in this conversation, was that Harry First notes that in the 80s when these huge monumen...

Host John Farrell is joined by ILSR Senior Fellow David Morris to talk about how new transportation technologies are changing how cities prioritize public space. … Read More

John Farrell spoke with ILSR Senior Fellow and Co-Founder David Morris about how new technologies — such as app-based ride sharing, e-scooters, and online shopping — are changing how we move people and goods around cities. Their conversation focuses on how cities have to reevaluate the use of public space as companies like Uber move in. They also discuss: The long history of cities grappling with transportation revolutions, from bikes to scooters to delivery drones. How mobility, social movements, and equity are closely tied together. The cities that are leading the way in regulating these new technologies, such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Austin. How mass transit systems fit into our current mobility revolution.   “Cities are going to have to reassess the public spaces, reprioritize who has access to those public spaces, and gain a great deal more sophistication and capacity.”   Related Resources New York 2140 by Kim Stanley Robinson Transcript John Farrell: [00:00:00] John Farrell: Welcome to Building Local Power. I’m your host, John Farrell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For this episode we’re talking cities and the mobility revolution with David Morris, ILSR senior fellow and co-founder. From Uber to scooters to drones, we talk about the ways technology is changing how we move people and goods and how cities have to wrestle with prioritizing the use of public space to match the demand. I know that this is forgoing local power and I’m supposed to give some sort of like, clever intro or welcome or ask you about a number or something but I’m not good at that in the way Chris is. David Morris: That’s fine, by the way. John Farrell: That’s good. I just like to dive in. There’s so much interesting stuff to talk about. David Morris: Go. John Farrell: I think I’ll start by just saying, electric scooters. I’ve ridden on them a couple of times. I find them fascinating. I’ve also been in enough cities even across the world to see that they’re all over the place. I was hoping to start by talking to you about scooters and other mobility options, bikes and e-bikes. I feel like cities are confronting a sort of wild west of transportation mobility in this day and age. Where I wanted to start with, because I know that you are someone who researches deeply these threads throughout time, is this something that cities have had to confront before? David Morris: Well yes, cities did have to confront it before and when I say “this,” what I mean is a technology driven, in some ways, transportation revolution where cities are going to have to reassess the public spaces, reprioritize who has access to those public spaces and again a great deal more sophistication and capacity. This happened once before, it happened in the 1890s and it happened around the introduction of the bicycle. Actually the introduction of the safety bicycle, that was the bicycle that we ride today that has two equal wheels and the like. It was easy to ride and what it did, it became a craze in the 1890s. There was a million, more than a million bikes that people were riding. It was like a tidal wave and it was embraced most vigorously and aggressively by women. It was seen as a very liberating technology for women because they had the ability then to just get on their bike and go. Women were very constricted in their activities in those days and if they were on transportation there was a male chauffeur. David Morris: This was their liberation and Suzan B. Anthony, who was a leader of the women’s movement for many years, said in 1895, “Let me tell you what I think of bicycling, I think it has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world.” It also, since bicycles are cumbersome devices to ride on if you happen to have your corsets and your low flowing dresses and the like, low hanging dresses, it changed the dress code if you will for women. Women created what they called the “rational dress movemen...

Host Linda Bilsens Brolis sat down with Marvin Hayes of the Baltimore Compost Collective for an inspiring conversation about the future of small-scale composting in Baltimore. Marvin and Linda talk about how the Baltimore Compost Collective is empowering and employing local youth while also revitalizing South Baltimore, creating quality compost and fighting food deserts. … Read More

Host Linda Bilsens Brolis sat down with Marvin Hayes of the Baltimore Compost Collective for an inspiring conversation about the future of small-scale composting in Baltimore. Marvin and Linda talk about how the Baltimore Compost Collective is empowering and employing local youth while also revitalizing South Baltimore, creating quality compost and fighting food deserts. They also discuss: How 80% of Baltimore’s trash can be recycled or composted, instead of being landfilling or incinerated. The startling impacts of burning trash including $55 million per year in health costs due to one of Baltimore’s incinerators. The opportunities that local composting creates for engaging and empowering youth, including those with learning disabilities or those that are otherwise disadvantaged. How the Baltimore Compost Collective and their partner, Filbert Street Community Garden, have created the “Wakanda of South Baltimore.”   At Curtis Bay, we’re providing opportunity for youth in that neighborhood to learn small scale composting, entrepreneurial skills, and life skills for them to be supported to become the new leaders to lead Baltimore towards zero waste.   Related Resources Composting for Community Podcast Baltimore Compost Collective Composting for Community Initiative Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hey everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Building Local Power. I’m Hibba Meraay, communications manager at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. This episode we’re sharing a conversation from our Composting for Community podcast. Our very own Linda Bilsens Brolis sat down with Marvin Hayes of the Baltimore Compose Collective. Marvin and Linda talk about how the Baltimore Compost Collective is empowering and employing local youth while also creating a model that can be replicated throughout the city of Baltimore to build a distributed composting infrastructure. Marvin’s passion for the project is really contagious and his enthusiasm comes through as he talks about how composting helped make Filbert Street Community Garden the Wakanda of South Baltimore. So without further ado, here’s their conversation. Linda Bilsens Brolis: For this episode, we’re joined by someone I have a great amount of respect for, Mr. Marvin Hayes, who’s the program manager for the Baltimore Compost Collective. Marvin is born and raised in Baltimore and has been mentoring youth for more than 20 years. With the Compost Collective, he mentors and trains youth from the Curtis Bay neighborhood in composting and work skills. I’m so excited for you to meet him, so say hello Marvin. Marvin Hayes: Hello. My name is Marvin Hayes, and I’m the program manager for the Baltimore Compost Collective, a youth-led food scrap collection service. Linda Bilsens Brolis: Awesome. So Marvin, tell our listeners a little bit more about the Compost Collective and how composting fits into the work. Marvin Hayes: Okay. All right, excellent. So once again, we are a youth-led food scrap collection service. We serve an amazing place called the Filbert Street Garden. I like to call the Filbert Street Garden the Wakanda of South Baltimore. A reason why I call it, one of my favorite quotes from the Black Panther movie was, “In times of crisis, while the foolish make barriers, the wise make bridges.” We are in a crisis in Baltimore City because we are burning trash, and we know that compost is the alternative to trash incineration or landfill, so we serve one of the most toxic communities in Baltimore City. We provide soil enhancers for residents who rent raised beds at the Filbert Street Garden. The amazing thing about the Filbert Street Garden is that it’s located in a food insecure neighborhood, so those residents would have to travel about 25 minutes to get access to some fresh produce. So we provide the soil enhancer for residents who live in a concrete jungle to be able to grow their own food. Also, we serve as anti-trash incineration.

Host Christopher Mitchell interviews Matt Rantanen and Brandon Makaawaawa, while attending the Internet Society’s 3rd Annual Indigenous Connectivity Summit. … Read More

Host Christopher Mitchell interviews Matt Rantanen, Director of Technology for the Southern California Tribal Chairman’s Association, and Brandon Makaawaawa, Deputy Head of State for Nation of Hawaii while attending the Internet Society’s 3rd Annual Indigenous Connectivity Summit. Christopher, Matt, and Brandon discuss how the digital divide has impacted native Hawaiians and what communities are doing about it. They also discuss: The difficult history of the nation of Hawaii and how it has left indigenous people without sovereign nation status and access to funding. How Brandon’s community built the first community broadband network in Hawaii after large telecom corporations left them without connectivity. The significance of the Indigenous Connectivity Summit and the role of the Internet Society in promoting equitable Internet access.   With the lack of [Internet] provision by the existing incumbents to the Native American communities, it is our duty to provide for ourselves and dictate our future and become self-determined.   Related Resources Indigenous Community Launches First Community Broadband Network in Hawai’i – Community Broadband Bits Podcast 385 Internet Society – Indigenous Connectivity Summit Native Community in Hawaii Gets Broadband Network by Now This Transcript Hibba Meraay: Welcome back everyone to another episode of Building Local Power. I’m Hibba Meraay, communications manager at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, and our community abroad band director. Chris Mitchell is here to tell you a little bit more about today’s interview. Hey Chris. Chris Mitchell: Howdy. How are you? Hibba Meraay: I’m good. How are you doing today? Chris Mitchell: I think I’m doing really good today cause I’m not actually working today. We’re recording this ahead of time since it’s the day after Christmas and right in the middle of a nice little break that we’re taking. So I hope that people are having a happy holidays and preparing for a wonderful new year and all that sort of stuff. But I’m definitely excited to talk about this wonderful story about Hawaii. I was just going to make a reference to the famous Hawaiian Christmas song, but I think, or this the Christmas song that’s about Hawaii, but I’ll save that. Hibba Meraay: It would be great if you could actually sing us a little portion of that song. Chris Mitchell: This would be the episode that if we could have analytics for, nobody would listen past the third minute. If I started to sing, it would just be over. I was actually trying to work this out statistically, I think I am in the less than one percentile of people who can sing. Hibba Meraay: Oh-no. Chris Mitchell: I have the worst absolute worst singing, so I won’t do that. Hibba Meraay: Okay. So maybe we’ll just stick to talking about the interview then. Chris Mitchell: That’s probably safe. Hibba Meraay: So you met the folks that you interviewed at the Internet Society’s 2019 Indigenous Connectivity Summit. Can you tell us what is the Internet Society? Chris Mitchell: Yes, so this is actually an organization that I didn’t know enough about until recently and they’re in the news a lot for reasons that we’ll talk about. But when the Internet was being commercialized, Vint Cerf and several other people that whose names I should know, but I am not recalling right now, they were wanting to make sure there was an organization that would promote the values of the Internet in many ways and make sure that it lived up to the hope of being, a technology that was used for tech, for communicating, for promoting people’s good values that people would be able to use it and specifically that everyone would be able to use it in a safe manner. So they both promote connectivity and also things like encryption and security practices and keeping people well informed. They’ve been funded by money that every time someone registers a .org name. Chris Mitchell: So when reregister ILSR,

Host Stacy Mitchell is joined by Sanjukta Paul, law professor and antitrust and labor expert. They delve into how antitrust laws have been used to hamper the efforts of workers and unions while corporations get a blank check.… Read More

Host Stacy Mitchell is joined by Sanjukta Paul, law professor and antitrust and labor expert. They delve into the history of our antitrust laws, and how they were originally written to help working people and small businesses. Over the last several decades, however, antitrust has been weaponized against labor and small firms, while big corporations have been given free rein. They also discuss: Sanjukta Paul How current antitrust policy gives large corporations powerful “coordination rights” in the economy — but denies these same rights to workers and small businesses. Powerful examples of antitrust enforcement and how economic theory has been used against unions and small businesses in favor of corporate monopoly power. How today’s approach to antitrust harms Uber drivers and other people working in the gig economy. Why regulators must choose to balance competing interests and values, rather than look for a perfect economic equilibrium that may not exist.   We have to build a new edifice and the new edifice has to be built by many hands and not by a few hands. And that’s what antitrust law originally came from, was from a mass movement and a popular movement. Basically if we decide that there aren’t these sort of independent ideal theoretical answers that can be given by lawyers and economists, well then we need to give answers to more specific empirical questions, we do need people who are grounded, who are in those particular sectors. That’s how we determine how to govern those markets and sectors.   Related Resources Sanjukta Paul The Double Standard of Antitrust Law, The American Prospect by Sanjukta Paul Sweatshops on Wheels: Winners and Losers in Trucking Deregulation by Michael H. Belzer Socializing Capital: The Rise of the Large Industrial Corporation in America by William G. Roy Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hey everyone. Welcome back to Building Local Power from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m Hibba Meraay, communications manager, and today we’re bringing you an interview between Stacy Mitchell, ILSR’s co-director and Sanjukta Paul, law professor and antitrust and labor expert. Zach is with me today to give you a sneak preview of the conversation. Hey, Zach. Zach Freed: Hey, Hibba. Hibba Meraay: What I thought was really interesting was that antitrust law doesn’t always work the way it’s designed to work or protect the people it’s supposed to protect. What did you think? Zach Freed: Yeah, totally. Our antitrust laws were originally written to help workers in small businesses from corporate monopoly power, but if you look around today, small businesses and especially workers and unions are severely constrained by antitrust law. While businesses like Amazon and Walmart had the go ahead to do whatever they want for a long time now, those are really the results of political decisions as professor Paul goes into during the podcast. Hibba Meraay: Antitrust law really determines kind of who gets to coordinate for a better deal. Another interesting part of the conversation was how Stacy and professor Paul talk about how economics can’t always deliver us the answer in all cases, right? There isn’t really an objective economic equilibrium because what we’re really talking about is how we balance competing interests and even more than that, competing values. Zach Freed: So if you look at the history of antitrust enforcement, economics has really been weaponized against unions and small businesses in favor of corporate monopoly power. That’s why it’s so great that professor Paul is studying the history of these laws so closely and how they’ve been enforced because if we are going to take back power, we need to know how the other side won, so we can avoid making those same mistakes again. Hibba Meraay: Awesome. We hope you enjoyed this sneak preview and stay tuned for the full episode. Stacy Mitchell: Well, Sanjukta. Thanks so much for being on the podcast. Sanjukta Paul: Hi, Stacy,

Host John Farrell is joined by ILSR's David Morris and Maria McCoy, for a timely discussion on energy policy as it relates to Thanksgiving. First up, John and David chat about the perils of burning turkey waste to generate energy. Then Maria joins John to talk about the health risks of cooking with gas. … Read More

Host John Farrell is joined by ILSR co-founder and Senior Fellow, David Morris, as well as ILSR Research Associate, Maria McCoy, for a timely discussion on energy policy as it relates to Thanksgiving. First up, John and David chat about the perils of burning turkey waste to generate energy. Then Maria joins John to talk about the health risks of cooking with gas. They also discuss: ILSR’s advocacy efforts to stop Minnesota from burning turkey manure at both the state legislature and the public utility commission. Why burning turkey waste for fuel doesn’t make environmental or economic sense. How gas stoves can release pollutants into homes that are not properly ventilated, resulting in dangerously high toxin levels.   Anytime you’re burning something, it’s really not going to be clean. There’s a lot of things in that gas coming into your home that essentially if you don’t have the right ventilation, the toxins could actually be reaching levels that would be illegal outdoors.   Related Resources Why Gas Has to Go – And How Cities Can Show it the Door — Episode 87 of Local Energy Rules Podcast How City Policy Can Reduce Gas Use Why Minnesotans Should Not Subsidize the Burning of Poultry Manure Report: MN Biomass Mandate Fails to Meet Original Intent Turkey-manure power plant raises stink with environmentalists Transcript John Farrell: So, for our Thanksgiving Day episode of Building Local Power, we’re very topical, because we’re going to talk turkey turds and the perils of Thanksgiving Day. Actually, I should specify, we’re not talking about the threat to your waistline, but to your lungs when it comes to those perils, and I’ll be joined by two different guests for the conversation. John Farrell: I’m your host, John Farrell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. And for our first segment, we’re talking with ILSR co-founder and senior fellow, David Morris. John Farrell: David, welcome to the program. David Morris: Thanks for having me. John Farrell: So, we could call this thing Talking Turkey About Clean Energy, or we could say we’re talking about turkey turds. But what we’re really talking about is a recently closed power plant that was burning I guess what they call “turkey litter” to produce electricity in southern Minnesota. And I guess the idea of burning turkey litter, which is in Minnesota a local resource, we’ve got all sorts of large turkey farms, seems kind of like a good idea at first blush. But why is burning manure maybe not the best use of this material? David Morris: Well, let me back up for just two or three minutes, so one gets an understanding of the context. David Morris: First of all, turkeys are the largest birds, largest poultry generator of manure in Minnesota. If you happen to be in Delaware or Maryland, it would be chickens. But here it is turkeys. And secondly, there was a huge confrontation, if you will, in 1991, 1992 around the utility companies asking permission; and they needed permission to store their radioactive waste generated by their nuclear plant onsite. And coming out of that tumultuous legislative session was an agreement that they could do that for 10 years, but that they also then needed to meet renewable energy targets. And they were specified as a certain amount of wind energy and a certain amount of biomass energy. And the biomass energy was supposed to be used with fast-growing trees that would be converted into electricity and heat in a new process that had been developed in Minnesota. David Morris: If we then fast-forward a few years, almost 10 years, what we will find is that the wind energy mandate was going gangbusters, but the biomass mandate was having trouble meeting its numbers. And there was a choice, an alternative, of essentially forgoing the expansion of biomass and increasing wind, this was before solar was economical, or trying to find other forms of biomass. And so, the legislature began amending its initial law.

Host Hibba Meraay talks with John Farrell about the new and improved Community Power Toolkit.… Read More

Host Hibba Meraay talks with Energy Democracy Director and ILSR Co-Director John Farrell about the new and improved Community Power Toolkit and how it can guide communities to take action on clean energy locally. They also discuss: The advantages of the toolkit’s interactive, multi-media format and how it can complement more traditional research reports. The link between energy policy and climate change mitigation and how strategies outlined in the toolkit can help communities take action to protect the planet, locally. How the Community Power Toolkit gives communities access to over 20 tried and tested strategies for taking action on clean energy so they don’t need to reinvent the wheel but can instead learn from what is already working.   Cities have a lot of power that they can exercise to address climate change, to build local energy systems, to keep more of the energy dollars in the community. This can be a resource for elected officials and for city staff to understand, “I don’t have to come up with the first and most original climate mitigation plan for our city. We can look at these stories of what’s happening in other cities.” Related Resources Community Power Toolkit Innovation for All Podcast City Ballot Initiatives: A New Tool for Clean Energy Equity (Episode 58) Video: Advancing Energy Democracy with Community Renewable Energy Local Energy Rules Podcast and Voices of 100% series Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hey everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the Building Local Power podcast. I’m Hibba Meraay, Communications Manager at the Institute for Local Self Reliance. Today on the show, Energy Democracy Director and ILSR Co-Director John Farrell joins me to talk about the new and improved community power toolkit. Hey John. John Farrell: Hello. Hibba Meraay: So we get a lot of questions from folks asking us, “What can I actually do?” And the community power toolkit is something actually a lot of things that people can do to take local action on clean energy. So can you tell us a little bit, what is this new version and how is it different and better than the old one? John Farrell: Yeah, well I just have to start and say I really am amused always by the phrase new and improved cause my dad used to point out that how could something be both be new and improved. But in this case it actually is true. We have things that we had in the original toolkit that we have spiced up to be more accessible, like better about telling the story about how cities, how communities, how individuals, and groups of people have done exciting things around climate and clean energy and cities. We’ve also added a lot of new content as well, especially audio clips, video clips, photos, things that help people really connect with how these different kinds of climate solutions happened. And frankly, the reason that we did the toolkit in the first place, which I think is important to explain, is for two reasons. One is, people would email and be like, “Well, what can I do in my community? I’m really excited about doing something locally about climate change. I’m really motivated to do something.” Maybe we just elected somebody new who is making commitments on climate. Maybe my city is one of over a hundred that have said that we want to reach 100% renewable energy, but where do we start? And so part of the reason we developed the community power toolkit was to help people answer that question, “Where do we start? What can we do?” And it’s also a convenient library for me and for the staff on the energy program so that when we get that question, we don’t have to dredge it up from our memory or hand over a 30 page document for someone to read that we can say, “Hey go engage with this a little bit, click around, hear some of the stories of what communities are doing, and then we can still have a conversation with you if that’s helpful to help you continue to move forward some ideas in your community.” Hibba Meraay:

Host Jess Del Fiacco talks with ILSR's John Farrell and Chris Mitchell about the power outages in California and how a distributed energy system could avoid future outages and detrimental fire damage. … Read More

Host Jess Del Fiacco talks with ILSR’s John Farrell and Chris Mitchell. They talk about the power outages in California brought on by PG&E’s negligence and how a distributed energy system could avoid future outages and detrimental fire damage. They also discuss: Why it’s easier to hold essential utility providers accountable at the local level. What community choice aggregation is and how it can play a role in making energy systems more distributed and democratic in the U.S. How a “utility fee” can create widespread high-speed broadband Internet access competition and offer a low-cost option for all households.   We’re wrestling with similar questions about who owns critical infrastructure between these two things. With your internet service, you have a similar problem that you have in the utility sector where you have this legacy of monopoly management that has led to very high prices and poor service… In both cases there’s an opportunity for the public sector to step in and find ways to make sure that services remain reliable and accessible to everybody.   Related Resources Profiles of Monopoly: Big Cable & Telecom Visualizing California’s Booming Solar Market Community Choice Aggregation Transcript   Hibba Meraay: Welcome back everyone to another episode of Building Local Power. This is Hibba Meraay, I’m the Communications Manager at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and this week we have a conversation between Chris Mitchell, John Farrell and Jess Del Fiacco. So Jess is on with me today to give you a little sneak preview. Hey Jess. Jess Del Fiacco: Hey Hibba. Yeah. Just to introduce myself real quick, I do communications within the community broadband networks team here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m looking forward to talking about this talk that we had. Hibba Meraay: Yeah, actually Jess, is this your first time on Building Local Power? Jess Del Fiacco: It is my very first time. Hibba Meraay: Awesome. So the first topic you all talked about was basically the disaster that’s going on with PG&E right now and how they’re shutting off electricity for folks to avoid additional wildfires and things like that. Can you tell us a little bit more about that and how it’s tied to distributed energy? Jess Del Fiacco: John and I talked about what’s been all over the news coming from California. Pacific Gas and Electric has started turning off the power due to wildfire risk. And just a little context on them. PG&E was recently found liable for damage from wildfires last year and they’re now going through bankruptcy proceedings. And just hundreds of thousands of people have been affected from that and are likely to be essentially hung out to dry from all their losses. The reason they’ve gotten to this point is basically because they didn’t invest enough into their maintenance. They did not want to invest to trim trees, which is now, you know, trees fall on the power lines and spark these wildfires. Hibba Meraay: Right. It seems like such a simple thing, but I think what it comes down to is that it’s a lot easier to hold people accountable the closer they are to you, right. Jess Del Fiacco: Absolutely. Hibba Meraay: You talked a little bit about how if the person you have to complain to is your local City Council or municipal government, they are much more accessible than a giant shareholder owned utility. I think that’s really the thread that runs through the two topics. Because the second topic is the utility fee model, which is a new way of financing municipal broadband that could really solve the digital divide. Jess Del Fiacco: Yeah. That’s a model where everyone pays and everyone gets connected. It’s a tax increase, which wouldn’t necessarily pay for the network itself, but almost guarantees a certain amount of success. Communities can make that investment and they know people will get connected. And because you have everyone paying that smaller fee,

Host Stacy Mitchell is joined by Matt Stoller, fellow at the Open Markets Institute, for a conversation about Matt's new book Goliath: The 100 Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy. … Read More

Host Stacy Mitchell is joined by Matt Stoller, fellow at the Open Markets Institute, for a conversation about Matt’s new book Goliath: The 100 Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy. Stacy and Matt dive into the rise of corporate monopolies starting in the 20th century and American movements to control corporate power. They also discuss: Matt Stoller, Open Markets Institute What we can glean from history to oppose concentrated corporate power today and establish a fairer economy. Why small business used to be a core part of the constituency of the Democratic party. How the rise of the law and economics movement converged with the collapse of the New Deal to produce a shift in the Democratic party, causing Democrats to turn away from anti-monopolist views. How powerful financiers and monopolists like Andrew Mellon manipulated our tax code to favor big business in the 1920s, and pushed back against the anti-monopoly movement in the 1950s.     The question I tried to answer [in the book] is why did Democrats with power screw up so badly? And how can we not do that again? That’s a really important question to have right now because we see a lot of the same trends, the rise in autocratic and fascist movements all over the world, corporate concentration, regional inequality, despair, and also this amazing moment of potential hope and solutions. I think the lessons, the heritage that we have as Americans, we have a tradition of opposing concentrated corporate power.   Related Resources Goliath:The 100-Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy by Matt Stoller Open Markets Institute ILSR Monopoly Resources   Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Today on the show we have Matt Stoller, he’s a fellow at the Open Markets Institute and the author of a new book, it’s called Goliath: The 100-Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy. Matt, welcome to Building Local Power. Matt Stoller: Thanks for having me. Your work is amazing and then so I’m just really happy to be here. Stacy Mitchell: That’s great. Yeah, you do great work too. You’re one of my favorite followers on Twitter and of course Open Markets is a longtime friend and ally of ILSR’s. So the book is terrific and I wanted to get you on early, as it’s just coming out, to make sure that our listeners heard about it because I think it’s really one of the great, worthwhile reads out there. It’s Goliath: The 100-Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy. And there’s so much in this book that we could talk about. You start at the beginning of the 20th century and take us right through to today, and chart this back and forth war between monopoly concentration, corporate control on the one hand and democracy on the other. And really chart the rise of a democratic framework for controlling corporate power that’s pretty powerful for several decades in the 20th century, and then also chart its demise. And in thinking about how to approach this conversation, I think I want to take it in two parts. So I want to start first by just zeroing in on a few key periods in that history and asking you to tell us a little bit about what was going on. And then I want to step back and ask you a few questions about some of the broader themes and issues that the book raises and how we should think about those in the context of the current moment. So, the first period that I want to start with is the 1920s. This is a period that I think is kind of in popular imagination, it’s sort of the go, go ’20s, flappers, it’s roaring economic times supposedly. But you write that it’s actually quite a dark decade, that a lot of people aren’t doing very well at all. Fascism is very much in the air, not just in Europe, but here. There are academics who are saying that democracy doesn’t really work and we should get rid of it. And there is this powerful figure who really encapsulates a...

Host John Farrell talks to Berkeley city councilor Kate Harrison and affordable housing developer Sean Armstrong about why cities should help residents to switch from gas to electric for their energy needs. … Read More

Host John Farrell talks to Berkeley city councilor Kate Harrison and affordable housing developer Sean Armstrong about why cities should help residents to switch from gas to electric for their energy needs by exercising city authority over gas hookups. They also discuss: California’s complicated legacy of incentivizing gas use and how the rest of the country compares How detrimental burning gas can be to the health and safety of residents Why cities and towns are uniquely suited to get gas out of buildings How switching from gas to electric can cut energy costs, slow climate change, and lead to more affordable housing development   About 27% of our GHGs are coming from the use of natural gas in buildings. Usually when we think about this, we think about cars and factories, but to find out that it’s actually our homes that are producing this amount of GHG was stunning.   Related Resources Community Power Map Community Power Toolkit Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hey everyone. It’s Hibba, ILSR’s communications manager, and the host for today’s episode is John Farell, energy director. Hey, John. John Farrell: Hello Hibba Meraay: What do you have for us today, John? John Farrell: I have an interview with a city council member who authored the ordinance in Berkeley, California, or the new rule, we should say, banning the connection of new homes to the gas network. And also on the call, an affordable housing developer who has been building all electric affordable housing and saving money doing it. So, really cool conversation about how policy is intersecting with best practices around health and the cost of energy, and an idea that I think is already spreading even since we’ve recorded the episode. Hibba Meraay: That’s awesome. Yeah. So one of my questions for you in listening to this conversation was, you know, California is usually ahead of the curve on clean energy and green infrastructure, and I’m just wondering how does the rest of the nation compare to what’s going on in Berkeley with this gas ban? John Farrell: Yeah, it’s this really interesting dichotomy we talk about in the episode about how the Enron debacle 20 years ago, where Enron basically gamed California’s electricity market, led to the state putting a lot of pressure on cities to encourage the development of homes that used gas, basically diversification strategy to avoid further market manipulation. And while California has really surged ahead on clean electricity, it means that they are more reliant on gas in some ways than a lot of other states around the country for home heating, water heating, and for operating stoves and that kind of thing. And so one of the things that we get into in the conversation is this issue of how does California catch up now that we are seeing clean electricity be available for lots of these home services? And in particular that California has these unique risks that other places don’t have, like earthquakes. And when earthquakes happen and they rupture the gas network, it’s a big safety risk and a big environmental risk. Hibba Meraay: Yeah, that’s super interesting. I think another interesting part of the conversation is they really emphasized the health implications of having gas in your home, which I wasn’t aware of, but especially for low income folks. The housing developer talked about how gas can be really detrimental to health, especially causing asthma and children and just really dangerous in terms of if something leaks, the gasket catch on fire. So I think that was another interesting part. It’s both cleaner and safer to have electric instead of gas in homes. John Farrell: It was really surprising to me too because I expected this being, you know, it’s Berkeley, California, it’s sort of a hotbed of liberalism, you know they’re going to be taking action around climate change, and they’re in California. California has been really pushing around climate solutions as well.

This week we’re bringing you a bonus episode from our friends at the Green Dreamer podcast. The episode explores how decentralized energy grids can make communities more resilient against natural disasters, like Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.… Read More

Host Hibba Meraay is joined by Brenda Platt to discuss the climate crisis and what communities are doing at the local level to address it.… Read More

Host Hibba Meraay is joined by Brenda Platt, Director of ILSR’s Composting for Community Initiative. Hibba and Brenda dive into the climate crisis and what communities are doing at the local level to address it. They also discuss: Why scale matters in how we manage our waste and how small-scale composting can play a big role in mitigating the climate crisis How big corporations are fundamentally at odds with being low carbon Why climate issues need to be central to the work of all people working in public policy The intersections of climate change and equity Promising developments to address the climate crisis at the municipal and local level   Right now our waste is going to landfills and trash incinerators that are owned by big waste companies. So, we can take away some of their power and some of their influence and expand decision making to local communities [when we compost locally].   Related Resources Draw Down by Paul Hawken Walmart’s Assault on the Climate The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells Baltimore Compost Collective Voices of 100% podcast series Survey of Residential Food Waste Collection Access in the U.S. Compost Climate Connections Webinar Series: Compost Sequesters Carbon & Delivers Other Ecosystem Benefits Marin Carbon Project The Soil Story, Kiss the Ground Composting for Community Podcast Stop Trashing the Climate Report Transcript Hibba Meraay: Welcome back to another episode of Building Local Power. I’m Hibba Meraay, communications manager at the Institute for Local Self Reliance. This time on the show I talked to Brenda Platt, director of our composting for community initiative. We talked about the climate crisis and what communities are doing at the local level to address it. Hey Brenda. Brenda Platt: Hey Hibba Hibba Meraay: So the climate crisis is increasingly captivating people’s attention and is at the forefront of a lot of people’s minds. Especially given recent headlines like the burning of the Amazon and Hurricane Dorian in The Bahamas. And even political plans that we’ve seen are making a lot of news, like the Green New Deal, and more recently Bernie’s climate plan. So we thought it would be a good time to talk about how our work at the Institute protects the climate, specifically both on the composting team, which you direct, but also how climate change fits into our larger mission at ILSR. Brenda Platt: So glad to be joining you for this conversation, because climate destruction is certainly keeping me up at night. Hibba Meraay: Yeah, I think I actually read some recent articles about how stress about climate change impacts people, like in their daily lives, which is increasingly an issue for everyone. So glad to be here as well. I think first I’d just love to talk about kind of how your work specifically addresses climate protection. And maybe you could talk a little about why it’s better to have a community based system to deal with waste rather than big corporations managing your waste system. Brenda Platt: Yeah. Well first let me just start by saying there is a direct link between soil and climate protection, and then again between compost and soil. New studies are showing that soil can act as a huge carbon sink to help balance out greenhouse gas emissions. And that could have the potential of holding up to three times as much carbon as what’s found in the atmosphere. So it’s so crucial that we look at practices that enhance healthy soils. And healthy soils, just to be clear, are those that are rich in microbes, high in organic matter, store carbon, are stable, can retain water. And one of the beauties of compost is that compost provides all of those benefits and it is the best way to add organic matter to soil. So it’s great to be working in a field advancing composting. Something that everybody can do, every community can do, no matter where you are in the country. And we can make compost from many types of organic materials, yard and garden trimmings,

Host Chris Mitchell is joined by Kim Haddow for a robust conversation on preemption and Kim's efforts to get power back into the hands of local decision makers.… Read More

Host Chris Mitchell is joined by Kim Haddow, Director of the Local Solutions Support Center, for a robust conversation on preemption and Kim’s efforts to get power back into the hands of local decision makers. Kim Haddow, Local Solutions Support Center They also discuss: The origins of preemption and what it has been used to accomplish in the past. How preemption has grown since 2010 and how the Citizens United Supreme Court decision played a role in strengthening preemption. What we can do about preemption, including hopeful stories from Colorado and Arkansas. How cross-issue coalitions can help stop preemption and give power back to local communities.   If you look at preemption issue by issue, it’s death by a thousand cuts. It’s only when you aggregate it and look at the erosion of local democracy, undoing the ability of local government to reflect the views and values of their own constituents, that there’s a reason to come together and object preemption.   Related Resources Local Solutions Support Center The Growing Shadow of State Interference: Preemption in the 2019 State Legislative Sessions State Capture by Alex Hertel-Fernandez The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek Mayors Take on Preemption to Defend Local Solutions (BLP Ep. 17 Feat. Andrew Gillum) Transcript Chris Mitchell: Hey, Hibba, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s communications manager. Are you back from your short vacation and ready for some Building Local Power? Hibba Meraay: Hey Chris, I am and I’m so ready for another episode of Building Local Power. Chris Mitchell: Nothing like hitting the desk and getting right back to work. I’m excited about this interview. I’ve been wanting to do it for a while. Hibba Meraay: So today you talk about a really interesting topic and that is preemption. So I think the first important thing to say to our listeners is what is preemption and why is it important? Chris Mitchell: Hey listeners, tell us what preemption is. Sorry. I think this is really important. Preemption is basically where the states tell the cities … or where a higher unit of government tells a lower level of government that it cannot do certain things. We’re going to talk about a report from the Local Solutions Support Center in which they talk all about this. They define it really well but just to give people a very brief sense leading into it, I wanted to note, there’s 25 states that preempt local minimum wage laws in which a locality would want to set a higher minimum wage than the lowest one for the state or the federal government. 23 states ban local paid sick days, 44 states ban local regulation of ride sharing networks. We talk frequently about the 20 states that ban, or have barriers to, community networks. So there’s all kinds of different preemption in some states. Some of this is growing, like four states that ban soda taxes and it’s a rapidly growing movement as we’ll talk about in the interview but the overall point is that states are telling local governments they cannot legislate or do anything in these issue areas. Hibba Meraay: Right. Like you said, the issue areas are really broad and a lot of them are hot topics that people are paying a lot of attention to, like minimum wage law is something that you guys touch on as well. I think my other question for you, Chris, is why are we specifically at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance talking about this? To me the answer is that this is really an issue of power. We’re talking about decentralizing power and we’re essentially arguing that decision making should be made by the people who are most affected by it. Chris Mitchell: Absolutely. Yeah, I don’t know if I could even add anything to that because I think you’ve covered it very well. We think decisions should be made locally. We think people should have power over their own lives and if they are not allowed to legislate on important things, or even on a plastic bag law,

Building Local Power Host Zach Freed is joined by ILSR's Stacy Mitchell to discuss the team's most recent efforts in fighting monopolies.… Read More

Denise Fairchild, Author of Energy Democracy Host John Farrell speaks with Denise Fairchild, President of Emerald Cities Collaborative and author of Energy Democracy. Denise and John delve into the connections between the environment, the economy and equity. They also discuss: The benefits of decentralizing control of and ownership over our energy system. What is energy democracy and what does it look like to achieve energy democracy? Parallels between the abolition movement and the fight for energy democracy How do we undo past harm to communities of color to ensure they have access to the money and resources to transition to clean energy and engage in energy democracy? How a bottom up approach to clean energy can scale rapidly   Energy democracy is a way to reimagine, re-engineer, rebuild our economy. It acknowledges the intersectional relationship between the environment, economy and equity. And recognizes that fixing income inequality, fixing racism, fixing gender inequality, fixing environmental degradation really requires changing an economy that’s screwing up everything.   Related Resources Energy Democracy Emerald Cities Collaborative How Homeownership Became the Engine of American Inequality by Matthew Desmond Democratizing the Electricity System How ILSR defines energy democracy and the 4 steps to get there The big picture, ILSR’s anti-monopoly and pro-local approach to advancing energy democracy Transcript John Farrell: Welcome to Building Local Power. I’m your host, John Farrell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. For this episode We’re talking energy democracy. It’s not just a concept, but a wonderful book edited by Denise Fairchild and Al Weinraub and Denise, President of the Emerald Cities Collaborative, joins me today to talk about the book. Welcome, Denise. Denise Fairchild: Well, thank you John. Glad to be on the program and have a conversation about this important topic. John Farrell: Yes. Well I just want to say thank you again for taking time and thank you for putting together this book. It was delightful. I really enjoyed reading it, especially as I work on energy democracy issues through the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and many of the organizations that we collaborate with. I was hoping that we could start with a story of how energy democracy is playing out. You know, is there something happening out in the world that you see sort of embodying this notion of energy democracy that you draw inspiration from? Denise Fairchild: Well, you know the book itself that Al and I put together really is a book of stories. There’s stories of all the wonderful efforts that are going on in the grassroots frontline communities, really trying to bring energy into a clean energy future that’s owned and controlled by communities. So I mean we, you know, the voices of nontraditional environmentalists, as you might think about it, are, it’s just what the book is about, from the young suburban high school students who just wanted to put solar on their roofs and accidentally politicized an entire community that is now fueling a national co-op movement. I mean, I love that story, but then there’s, there’s a story of immigrant refugees, Chinese immigrants, basically monolingual populations on the west coast that are not only fighting Chevron and in the fossil fuel industry because it’s keeping them in the hospital with respiratory and asthma cases. But they are, these are folks that are now at the forefront of California’s progressive energy policies. But what’s most even compelling about that, is that they’re also participating in rallies for black lives matter as an example, because they’re seeing the connections between the environment, the economy and equity. That is all sort of rooted in this notion of how our economies is screwing everybody or even the fight of the local clean energy alliance, which is fighting to make community choice a reality are really about community and not...

This week, we’re bringing you Building Local Power a little early in light of recent developments with the Sprint and T-Mobile merger. Host Chris Mitchell, interviews two telecommunications experts to get their take on the merger and its potential impact. First Chris talks to Gigi Sohn, a Distinguished Fellow at the Georgetown Law Institute for Technology Law & Policy. Chris also talks with Blair Levin, a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institute. They discuss: How the T-Mobile and Sprint Merger could raise prices for millions of Americans, especially low-income households, and otherwise harm innovation. The importance of mobile when households can’t afford a fixed Internet connection Precedent for blocking the merger, including the failed AT&T and T-Mobile merger How Wall Street thinks about mergers and what local policymakers can learn from Wall Street analysts Wall Street understands that the world is about probabilities, not certainties. And, in Washington, that is really a bad way of thinking about it because in Washington you don’t actually own a problem, you own a narrative, and you should never be anything other than 100% certain of the correctness of your narrative. But that’s just not the way that the real world works. Related Resources 4 Competition Coalition Updated Report Shows How Cooperatives Are Bridging the Digital Divide Shining a Light on Anti-Competitive Behavior (Episode 69) What’s Going on With the Internet? (Episode 57) Gigi Sohn Blair Levin Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hi, everyone. It’s Hibba, ILSR’s Communications Manager. And today on the podcast, we have Chris with me here. Hey, Chris. Chris Mitchell: Hey, Hibba. How’s it going? Hibba Meraay: Good. How are you? Chris Mitchell: I’m a little bit worried. I think we’re talking about the 2020 election. I didn’t prepare a whole lot. It’s 476 days away. I’m getting a little bit nervous about it. I’m sure how ready I am to talk about it today. Hibba Meraay: Don’t worry Chris. You can just catch up watching all of the political comedy commentary. I don’t even watch the debates anymore. I just watch the Daily Show recap of it. It’s fine, but that’s actually our topic for today. Chris Mitchell: Oh. Whew, I was really worried when I woke up. Hibba Meraay: You actually interviewed some folks to talk about the T-Mobile and Sprint merger, which is a topic we have touched on before. So, my question for you is, why isn’t this over yet? Chris Mitchell: I would say because we’ve gotten to a point in time in which, if you’re powerful enough, you can’t lose. You can just drag it out. This merger, I think, is more than a year old now, or approaching it. I think many of us thought we’d know if we’d won or lost. And by the way, winning means preserving competition. Losing would be losing competition in this sector. In an ordinary time, we might have seen a decision made, but we are not living in ordinary times. I don’t know if you’d noticed that. Hibba Meraay: Yeah. I would say that’s even an understatement right now. You interviewed two people. A little bit later we’re going to hear from Blair Levin. But first, Gigi Sohn. Why her? Chris Mitchell: Gigi has very unique characteristics. I mean, not only is she very knowledgeable on these, but anyone who knows her knows that she also has this characteristic of in-your-face honesty, I would say. Which is that she sticks to what she believes, and she’s not going to sugarcoat it, and she’s not going to try to change her message based on who she’s to talking to so much. She’s going to tell you what she thinks, and I’ve always really respected that. She’s spending a lot of time working on this issue. Gigi is someone who … We’ll talk in the interview briefly about her background, but she’s spend a lot of time in public interest, telecom, and working at the FCC recently, the Federal Communications Commission. So I though she’d be a perfect person to discuss this issue with. Hibba Meraay: Yeah,

Host Zach Freed is joined by Kevin Erickson, Director of the Future of Music Coalition. Zach and Kevin talk about the music industry’s role in the growing anti-monopoly movement and Kevin’s work at the intersection of music, community organizing and policy advocacy. They also discuss: how increased concentration in the music industry has impacted independent musicians, including how major record labels use their market power to shape the marketplace for everyone else organizing musicians to advocate as a collective on issues like healthcare changing business models in the music industry and the impacts of recent mergers how to build a media ecosystem that can better serve the needs of diverse local music communities   At this political moment where we have this growing, collective, all-hands-on-deck, national anti-monopoly moment, I think that there’s something really important that the music community can contribute, just because we’ve got so much direct experience with the impacts of ownership consolidation and monopolies in our own industries.   Related Resources Future of Music Coalition Mechanic’s Guide to Putting Out Records Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hey, everyone, it’s Hibba, ILSR’s communications manager, and I have Zach with me here today from our Community-Scaled Economies team. Zach Freed: Hey! Hibba Meraay: So Zach has been involved in producing Building Local Power. You’ve probably heard his name on the credits of the show, but today, he actually did the interview you’re about to hear. Zach Freed: That’s right. I interviewed Kevin Erickson, who works at the Future of Music Coalition, which is an organization that helps do political advocacy on behalf of working musicians. We talked a lot about the music industry’s connection to our growing anti-monopoly movement. Hibba Meraay: I really enjoyed this interview because it’s a little bit outside the bounds of the issue areas we normally work on, like energy or broadband, but still very much related, and really illustrates why concentration is bad across all sectors of the economy. I’m wondering, Zach, what inspired you to do the interview? Did you know that concentration was an issue in the music industry beforehand? Zach Freed: Oh, yeah, definitely. So, aside from, like most people, being a lifelong music fan, I have two working musicians in my family, and most of my friends are musicians. I also help organize shows in DC and did college radio in school. So it’s a topic that’s always been near and dear to me, and definitely notice trends towards consolidation in the music industry at large. Hibba Meraay: That’s great. I think it’s really cool to hear what inspired the conversation. I don’t have a lot of background, so I learned a lot of new things about the music industry listening to the interview. I was really shocked to hear that there are only three major record labels left today, down from six in 1995. So Kevin explains how they are really the gatekeepers, and they have the ability to use their market power to shape the marketplace for everyone else. It was one of those moments where you know something is important and it’s an issue, but I realized, “Wow, this is really bad,” and it was a wake-up call. Zach Freed: Hibba Meraay: Hey, everyone, it’s Hibba, ILSR’s communications manager, and I have Zach with me here today from our Community-Scaled Economies team. Zach Freed: Hey! Hibba Meraay: So Zach has been involved in producing Building Local Power. You’ve probably heard his name on the credits of the show, but today, he actually did the interview you’re about to hear. Zach Freed: That’s right. I interviewed Kevin Erickson, who works at the Future of Music Coalition, which is an organization that helps do political advocacy on behalf of working musicians. We talked a lot about the music industry’s connection to our growing anti-monopoly movement. Hibba Meraay: I really enjoyed this interview because it’s a little bit outsid...

This week we’re featuring a special episode brought to you by our Local Energy Rules podcast and their Voices of 100% series. Each episode in the series profiles a city that has committed to 100% renewable energy and showcases how city leaders are implementing these renewable energy commitments. In this episode, host John Farrell chats with Jonathan Koehn, the Regional Sustainability Director for Boulder, CO. Jonathan explains how Boulder plans to get 100% renewable energy by 2030. They also discuss: Boulder’s long history of pursuing sustainability, which helped set the stage for the city’s adoption of its 100 percent renewable energy commitment. How shifting to a municipally-owned and operated model would give the city freedom to make its own energy decisions. Regional advocacy efforts through the Colorado Communities for Climate Action coalition that have given cities like Boulder a seat at the table in state policy discussions on renewable energy. How communities can help consumers access clean energy and clean transportation in an affordable way. Advice Jonathan has for other cities looking to transition to 100% renewable energy.   “Local government is the place where we interact and interface with our community values. You don’t see that happening at the national level, or the federal level, or the state level. So, we have to react to the needs, and desires, and values of our community.”   Related Resources Voices of 100% Series Local Energy Rules Podcast (all episodes including Voices of 100% series) Community Power Toolkit Colorado Communities for Climate Action   Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hey, everyone, welcome to Building Local Power. This is Hibba, ILSR’s Communications Manager. This week we’re featuring a special episode brought to you by our Local Energy Rules podcast. More specifically, from their Voices of 100% Series. Each episode in the series profiles a city that has committed to 100% renewable energy, and showcases how city leaders are implementing these renewable-energy commitments. In this episode, host John Farrell chats with Jonathan Cohen, the Regional Sustainability Director for Boulder, Colorado. Jonathan explains how Boulder plans to get to 100% renewable energy by 2030, and there’s also this really great discussion about how local government is the level of government where you can most directly interact with community values, much more so than state or federal government, so stay tuned for that. If you’ve been listening to Building Local Power for a while, you might remember we brought you the story of Georgetown, Texas, and their transition to 100% renewables back in the fall. That was the very first episode in what was initially planned to be a six-part Voices of 100% series. Since then, the series has really taken off and expanded beyond just those six episodes. There really are a lot more than six stories to tell, given that over 100 cities have now committed to 100% renewable energy. So, without further ado, here’s the episode. We hope you enjoy it, and also that you check out the rest of the Voices of 100% series. You can find links on our show page. Marie Donahue: Across the country, more than 100 cities have adopted ambitious goals to transition to 100% renewable power, but how do these cities plan to get there? A small city on the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Boulder, Colorado, has long been in the pursuits of clean and renewable energy, and back in 2016 made a community-wide commitment to reach 100% renewable electricity by the year 2030. Our host, John Farrell, caught up with Jonathan Cohen, Boulder’s Regional Sustainability Director, last fall to learn more about what motivated the city to act, and what progress it has made toward reaching its goal. This is an episode of our special Voices of 100% series of Local Energy Rules, where we’re speaking with local leaders from across the country to understand why their city has made such a goal,

Host John Farrell is joined by David Pomerantz, Executive Director of the Energy and Policy Institute. David Pomerantz, Executive Director of the Energy and Policy Institute John and David discuss how electric utility companies have become so powerful and how they use this power to protect their profits rather than the interests of their customers. They also touch on: How monopolies in the energy sector differ from monopolies in other parts of the economy How monopoly utilities are threatening renewable energy progress in some states in order to preserve profits they make from expensive, polluting power plants. Monopoly utilities efforts to undercut the health and safety of Americans by lobbying against environmental regulations. Ways people can hold monopoly utilities accountable. Pro tip: you can start in your own state by pressuring legislators not to accept campaign donations from monopoly utilities.   In most states the monopoly electric utilities are some of the most powerful political players in that state. They control many of the levers of government almost like puppeteers, and that makes it really hard for them to be effectively regulated in the public interest. Related Resources Energy and Policy Institute The Energy Industry’s Secret Campaign to Get Us to Build More Power Plants (EPI) A Tweet Thread Illustration of the Problems with Monopoly Power (ILSR) The Big Picture: Pro-Local, Anti-Monopoly––ILSR’s Energy Democracy Work Report––Mergers and Monopoly: How Concentration Changes the Electricity Business (ILSR) Utility Political and Monopoly Power (Two of Three Forces Threatening Local Renewable Energy; ILSR) Transcript John Farrell: Welcome to another edition of Building Local Power. I’m John Farrell, Co-Director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. This week we’re talking about exposing the power of monopoly companies. David Pomerantz is the Executive Director of the Energy and Policy Institute, a national nonprofit organization that exposes how monopoly utility companies exercise outsize power in deciding our energy future. I’m a big fan of his work and I’m delighted to ask him to help us understand how utility companies have become so powerful, how they use this power, and what lessons we can learn from David’s work to manage monopolies in the rest of the American economy. David, welcome to Building Local Power. David Pomerantz: Thank you so much for having me John. John Farrell: Well, I have always really admired the work that you do. I’m a big follower on social media as you guys release more information about what the utilities are up to. Your website is chock full of information about utility shenanigans, for lack of a better term. But I wanted to help people understand a little bit about how the area in which you and I work, focused on energy, is related to but not quite the same as the rest of the economy. So we at ILSR talk a lot about monopoly power across the economy, in banking and social media and internet. You focus on the utility sector, electric and gas utilities generally. Could you explain a little bit about how monopolies in energy are different from ones like in banking or social media? David Pomerantz: I think one of the key ways that energy monopolies, electric monopolies, are a little bit different is they are providing a service that we really can’t live without in the modern economy. So just as an example, if you are fed up with Facebook’s practices as a monopoly, you don’t like maybe some of the political spending or you don’t like things that Facebook is doing to control the market of social media, you can always delete your account on Facebook. With electricity it’s different. Everybody has to have electricity, and they really only have one choice, in many parts of the country at least. People only can buy electricity from a single provider that has been granted a monopoly by their state. Because of that, it’s really important that those monopolies are tightly ...

This week, we’re bringing you a bonus episode from one of our friends and favorite podcasters Laura Flanders. On the Laura Flanders Show the people who say it can’t be done take a back seat to the people who are doing it. This episode is titled “Who’s Economy Is it? Ours.” In this special report, experts talk about the new conversations regarding economic democracy that are happening between labor unions and community members in NYC.   Related Resources Special Report: Whose Economy Is It? Ours. Laura Flanders Show Podcast   Like this episode? Please help us reach a wider audience by rating Building Local Power on iTunes or wherever you find your podcasts. And please become a subscriber! If you missed our previous episodes make sure to bookmark our Building Local Power Podcast Homepage. If you have show ideas or comments, please email us at [email protected]. Also, join the conversation by talking about #BuildingLocalPower on Twitter and Facebook!   Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS   Audio Credit: Funk Interlude by Dysfunction_AL Ft: Fourstones – Scomber (Bonus Track). Copyright 2016 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial (3.0) license. Follow the Institute for Local Self-Reliance on Twitter and Facebook and, for monthly updates on our work, sign-up for our ILSR general newsletter.

This week we’re rebroadcasting an episode of our Community Broadband Bits podcast that details our recent report on San Francisco’s innovative efforts to close the digital divide in public housing. Host Chris Mitchell is joined by former ILSR intern and report co-author, Hannah Rank, to discuss how this model can be used as a blueprint by other cities. You’ll also hear commentary from Chris and Lisa Gonzalez, Senior Researcher at ILSR, as they chime in to clarify some details of the report. The trio also cover: How cities can make smart one time investments to make sure buildings are able to connect to Internet infrastructure. How the local Internet Service Provider, Monkey Brains, was able to get funding for the project and potential sources of funding cities can tap into. How a smart digital inclusion program can help lower-income households and keep overall costs down. What having 1 gig enables residents to do including applying to jobs, completing homework, and creating content online. The Internet can be a tool to participate in the economy, whether it’s going on a job board or starting a small business. All of those make you feel like a participant in one of the most powerful forms of connection, the Internet.   Related Resources A Public Housing Digital Inclusion Blueprint A Monkeybrainey Plan to Improve Connectivity in San Francisco Public Housing – Community Broadband Bits Podcast 319 Connecting San Francisco Low-Income Housing with Monkey Brains – Community Broadband Bits Podcast 264 Evicted by Matthew Desmond Transcript Lisa Gonzalez: Chris, why are you so out of breath? Chris Mitchell: I’ve just been so busy building local power, Lisa. Lisa Gonzalez: And that makes you out of breath? Chris Mitchell: It’s a lot of work, you know, and you really gotta put your whole body and mind into it. Lisa Gonzalez: All that building, building, building. Chris Mitchell: You know, my three year old son, I read a lot about building, building, building. Lisa Gonzalez: So what kind of building does he like to do? Chris Mitchell: He likes to do different building than we do here. He likes the Legos, he likes the, the big machines, building big buildings and things like that. Lisa Gonzalez: Speaking of big buildings. Chris Mitchell: Oh yeah. That’s a great, great intro to what we’re gonna be talking about here. Buildings that house lots of people. Lisa Gonzalez: Yeah. People who might not necessarily be able to afford Internet access that you and I can afford. Chris Mitchell: Right. Because in many ways for people who are of very limited income, the market is broken. In fact, it’s so broken that we would say there’s no market for it, particularly in the larger urban areas. Those people are just left behind. Lisa Gonzalez: And we actually released a report recently about that. People who live in San Francisco. Chris Mitchell: We did, and it has one of the best names of any of our reports because it includes the word Monkey Brains. Yes, which is the name of an Internet Service Provider in San Francisco that’s been around for like 20 years. They are quite irreverent, but they’re also very good at their job and they’re very dedicated to improving Internet access for everyone. They have a business model in which they serve, I would guess thousands of people in businesses in San Francisco. I don’t know what the exact number is. They’re doing great things, and you remember this because you’ve already edited a podcast about it. Lisa Gonzalez: I do remember that interview. It was with Hannah Rank and I think it was a really good interview. Chris Mitchell: Hannah, I remember her because she wrote the report that I put my name on. She was the first author, I helped out with it. Lisa Gonzalez: Yeah. In fact, we are going to play that interview again, but we decided that since this audience is a little different than the Community Broadband Bits podcast, we’d go ahead and offer a little extra explanatio...

Host Chris Mitchell is joined by ILSR co-directors Stacy Mitchell and John Farrell as well as ILSR co-founder David Morris to discuss the 2020 election and policy platforms that focus on anti-concentration. They also touch on: Elizabeth Warren’s proposals to roll back corporate power in the big tech and agriculture sectors and the implications for our economy. How federal agencies can be instrumental in policy change rather than relying on the presidency or a divided congress. Why the rhetoric around a candidate’s electability can impede progress on policy. Universal basic income as a policy proposal and its implications for the economy and the future of work. What worries me and particularly watching a campaign unfold where there’s much more focus on who’s electable instead of being on policy is that we end up with a candidate who sort of runs loosely on these ideas and issues but doesn’t actually have any plan to back it up in a real way.   Related Resources Elizabeth Warren Has a Theory About Corporate Power Statement on Sen. Warren’s proposal to Break Up Big Tech A Better Way to Think about the Future of Work (Episode 47) Why Aren’t Wages Rising? The Answer Sounds a Lot Like Monopoly (Episode 42) This Ag Economist Preached Bigger is Better. Now He Says the Evidence Favors Small Farms. (Episode 32) Supporting Family Farming in the Age of Monopoly with Joe Maxwell (Episode 33) People Love Local Food. Yet Local Farmers are Disappearing. What’s Going On? (Episode 65) Transcript Chris Mitchell: Hey, Stacy. I understand that there’s an election coming up at some point, at least we’re hoping it’s going to be coming up in 2020. Stacy Mitchell: Well you’d have to think so because there’s certainly a lot of people out there running. Chris Mitchell: Well we’re getting pretty close to Memorial Day in 2019 so I guess we should talk about the election because all podcasts have to by law. Stacy Mitchell: Yeah, and apparently for what? The next 18 months, that’s what we’re going to do. Not on this show. Chris Mitchell: Right. Exactly. We’re going to talk about things that we can make a difference in rather than just endlessly speculating on things that will have no value a week after they air. Stacy Mitchell: Right. Chris Mitchell: Which is not to criticize any of the many shows that I love. Please stop talking about 2020. So Stacy Mitchell is co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Welcome back, Stacy. Stacy Mitchell: Nice to be with you, Chris. Chris Mitchell: I’m Chris Mitchell, no relation to Stacy Mitchell. I am sitting here with two of my bosses on a television screen in front of me. John Farrell is the other one. John’s co-director here in the Minneapolis office. John Farrell: Hello, Chris. Chris Mitchell: Hey, John. John does energy. Stacy does independent business. I do broadband type stuff. We also have superstar David Morris sitting next to me here who you may all know from the founding of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. David Morris: Hi, Chris. Chris Mitchell: We’re going to talk about some of the things we’re seeing in some of the Democratic platforms, things that we like from an Institute for Local Self-Reliance perspective. We’re going to talk about how they can help to build local power which is our mission, and I think we’re going to start with a focus on anti-concentration. Elizabeth Warren seems to be the person who has certainly talked about this the most and developed the most policy papers around it. So I’m going to now hope that Stacy can provide us with some good information because I don’t know much more than that. Stacy Mitchell: It’s great to kick off with that. I think so many Democrats are busy talking about who’s electable and I think that’s a fool’s errand, and it’s much more interesting and useful to actually talk about what are really substantial differences in matters of policy that have a lot of big implications down the road. So yeah.

In celebration of ILSR’s birthday, hosts Stacy Mitchell and Hibba Meraay talk with co-founder David Morris about ILSR’s journey over the past 45 years. They reflect on the Institute’s growth given changing political, economic and technological contexts. They also discuss: What led to the founding of ILSR and how the governing structure of Washington D.C. played a role. How ILSR evolved from being a neighborhood organization to becoming a national organization. ILSR’s innovative model of marrying policy and practice. ILSR’s work on anti-monopoly issues and what that work looks like at different levels of government. Why it’s important to work at both the national and local levels of policy making and how the two inform each other. Most people, when they talk about Amazon or Facebook, they’re talking about privacy issues, and those are important issues, but our take on it is that they’re hurting the retail sector, the independently owned business sector. And that’s a sector which, if mobilized, can help change the zeitgeist and can help change the context within which policy making is done.   Related Resources ILSR’s 40th Anniversary Timeline Capitalisn’t Podcast Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, and I’m joined today by my colleague Hibba Meraay, who is our communications manager. Hey, Hibba. Hibba Meraay: Hey Stacy! Stacy Mitchell: So, we have a special episode, today. It’s ILSR’s 45th birthday, which is kind of amazing. We were born in 1974, and so today, we’ve got a conversation with Hibba and I had with one of ILSR’s founders, David Morris, and I thought it was a really interesting conversation because to kind of see what’s stayed the same and sort of what’s changed and the threads of ILSR’s work and some of the approaches and values that we’re bringing to looking at policy issues, how some of those things have changed and then also some of the ways in which context has changed. What did you find interesting about the conversation, Hibba, especially as someone who’s kind of new to ILSR? Hibba Meraay: I thought it was so interesting how David talked about how ILSR marries policy and practice and how we’ve been doing that pretty consistently for 45 years. I think as a newer staff member, it’s such a unique model in the policy space that it’s sometimes hard to wrap your mind around it, but we’ve been doing it for a long time, so that was cool to hear about. Stacy Mitchell: Yeah, I really loved that image of Neil in the early days riding around on a garbage truck to actually understand how solid waste works, and that’s sort of on-the-ground, very direct kind of hands-on kind of experience in terms of shaping, “What would early recycling policy look like? How should cities approach this issue of solid waste?” and also just kind of married with this vision of seeing it as a resource instead of actually a waste. Hibba Meraay: Yeah, we’ve had Neil on a couple of podcasts and I’m sure folks that are listening to those aren’t surprised by his level of enthusiasm and commitment to the Waste to Wealth work. Stacy Mitchell: Yeah, it’s true, and you also just see that, I think, across the work, whether it’s the broadband work or, really, any of our other initiatives. You’re very much both on the ground but also working on the bigger picture analysis and the policy development at the same time. I also thought it was really interesting to hear some about the fact that Washington DC where ILSR was founded had really been stripped of any political pounder and that ILSR was founded partly because the city was starting to get some of that political power back, and so there was a real opportunity to take charge, and, what could residents of the city actually do? How could they take hold of their own future? So, I thought that was interesting to hear about as well and just thinking about how much cities have changed over thi...

Host John Farrell talks with Marcel Castro Sitiriche, co-director of CoHemis at the University of Puerto Rico Mayaguez, about the challenges Puerto Rico faces in building a clean and resilient energy system. They also discuss: The impact of hurricane Maria and why it took nearly a year to restore power to some residents of the island after the storm. Using the framework of customer hours of lost electricity service to calculate the impact of hurricane Maria and compare it to other storms. How solar and storage can be instrumental in making Puerto Rico’s energy system more resilient. The impact of Puerto Rico’s colonial past on its present effort to build an energy system for everyone. Clean energy legislation in Puerto Rico and near term opportunities to create a more distributed energy system.   We’re talking about the benefit of people. And I think that’s something that we can agree on, that we should focus on the people aspect of energy.   Related Resources Hurricane Maria Effects on Puerto Rico Electric Power Infrastructure by Marcel Castro Sitiriche Puerto Rico Legislature Approves 100 Percent Renewable Energy Target Can Puerto Rico Overcome a Colonial Past to Build a Greener Grid? Video: Accountability and Ownership Matter for Puerto Rico’s Future Grid Call to Action: Puerto Rico Energy Policy Brief   Transcript John Farrell: Welcome to another edition of Building Local Power. I’m John Farrell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self Reliance. This week we’re talking about Puerto Rico. The island was ravaged by Hurricane Maria in September 2017 but also by a colonial past and present I speak with Marcel Castro Sitiriche, co-director of CoHemis at the University of Puerto Rico Mayaguez about the challenges the island faces in building a clean and resilient energy system despite an unresponsive utility and an island government with limited self determination. Welcome Marcel. Marcel Castro Sitiriche: Thank you for having me here. John Farrell: I think most people are familiar because it was such a big news story at the time that the power was out for a long time one Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria struck in September 2017. I was hoping that you could start us off by helping people understand a few reasons that it took nearly a year to reconnect power to the last customer when the same hurricane also hit Florida but power was restored much more quickly. Marcel Castro Sitiriche: Yes, this is a very important question and something that I have looked at experiencing part of it, part of the blackout. I recovered the power in my house 90 days after Hurricane Maria and the reasons are many but there is one particular one that the system is centralized. The system in other places are also centralized but the centralized nature in Puerto Rico plays a major role in terms of recovering back. Now, there are other reasons why it took much longer than other places. For example, then before Hurricane Maria, PREPA was already diminished by austerity measures. So there were less things in stock to replace poles and materials and also there was less personnel working with PREPA compared to 20 years ago when George’s impact of. Another important thing was Maria was very strong. When it got to Florida it was not as strong as when it hit Puerto Rico and just looking at the average wind speed in the impact lab. Estimated throughout the whole Puerto Rico land area, only five storms were more intense than Maria and they were all in the Pacific Ocean. That is from the 1950s until now. So when we look at that is very strong hurricane. Also the devastation due to tree falling and landslides. There were thousands of landslides across Puerto Rico but particularly in the center of the island where recovery at first took longer to get and restoration took a month, almost a year. In addition to that we had a slow start. Government didn’t call for aid for more than a month. It took six weeks for the government to call on aid as...

Host Chris Mitchell is joined by ILSR Co-Directors Stacy Mitchell and John Farrell for a conversation on various anti-competitive corporate actions and state policies that might have slipped under your radar. Topics discussed include: The recent AT&T and Time Warner merger. Stacy explains how the vertical merger enables AT&T and Time Warner to dominate their industry by owning the pipelines for content distribution as well as owning the content itself. The trio discuss why mergers continue to happen despite empirical evidence that prices rise instead of fall after mergers have gone through. How a state’s clean energy policy could ultimately hurt its residents. The Energy Transition Act sets the stage for New Mexico to transition to 100% renewables but it includes a very damaging compromise which promises the monopoly utility company a big chunk of the profits from the transition instead of allowing local communities to reap the benefits. The rise of cashless retail and how it enables credit card companies and banks to skim a lot of money ($64 billion yearly) from the U.S. economy without providing much value in return. Amazon’s continuing efforts to influence government and set the rules for the market. And book recommendations, of course! As these companies become less accountable to us, they hurt their smaller rivals in the market, they raise our prices, and generally harm our democracy.     Related Resources What’s Going on With the Internet? (Episode 57) John Kwoka: economist focusing on mergers Twice Burned, Once Shy—Why Californians Should Be Wary of Bailing Out PG&E Again Don’t-Miss Opportunity for Local Choice in Landmark Carbon-Free Bills — Episode 72 of Local Energy Rules Podcast How the Other Half Banks by Mehrsa Baradaran Boise has the largest geothermal system in the country. Here’s how it works The Battle For Paradise: Puerto Rico Takes on the Disaster Capitalists by Naomi Klein Transcript Chris Mitchell: We have an amazing Building Local Power today. We have several subjects that we’re probably going to have to cut short because they’re so interesting, and we’re so interested in them, but we’re going to try and get through all of them. We’re going to talk about AT&T and Time Warner, something that we teased you about a few months ago and never got back to. We’re going to talk about how a certain utility policy regarding renewable energy may seem like a quick win, but could be a real bad problem. Then we’re going to talk about cashless retail and some Amazon interesting moves. We’re going to talk about all that stuff with me, Chris Mitchell, who runs the broadband program at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, and we’ve got Stacy Mitchell from the Portland office. Stacy Mitchell: Hey Chris, hey John. Chris Mitchell: And we’ve got John, John Farrell, the head of the energy program. John Farrell: Hey Chris, hey Stacy. Chris Mitchell: We’re not going to rehash 5G, which I wanted to do, but it turns out we talked about that in Episode 57. If you’re really interested in that, that was a fun conversation Hibba and I talked about at the end of our talk. But we’re going to start off by talking about some of the mergers in telecom because there’s been a few interesting revelations lately. Stacy, I’m wondering if you maybe just want to set a little bit of background as to why you found it interesting, this AT&T attempting to purchase Time Warner, which owns CNN and HBO but is not Time Warner Cable. This is AT&T buying a company that has a lot of content. Why is that interesting from your perspective? Stacy Mitchell: You’ve got this vertical merger where you have a company that owns a lot of pipelines for distribution by a company that has a lot of content. It raises questions about how AT&T, for example, might use control of that content to disadvantage companies that it competes with. The merger went through. The government did, actually, interestingly, oppose it,

Host John Farrell speaks with Marie Donahue, ILSR researcher, and Neil Seldman, Director of ILSR’s Waste to Wealth Initiative, about the harmful impacts of burning trash to generate electricity. The trio dive into ILSR’s recent report Waste Incineration: A Dirty Secret in How States Define Renewable Energy. They also discuss: Baltimore’s recent passage of the Clean Air Act, a bill that will effectively shut down the Wheelabrator incinerator. Three key reasons why incinerators are a bad deal for communities including: financial risk, environmental injustice, and public health concerns. The story behind the successful efforts to shutdown two incinerators in Baltimore. Neil details how residents of the marginalized Curtis Bay neighborhood organized at the grassroots level to advocate for their community. How 23 states are providing subsidies to incinerators by allowing them to benefit from renewable energy tax credits. What communities and cities can do instead of hosting incinerators to manage their waste, foster a healthier environment, and create jobs. The economics of incinerators don’t add up. Incinerators are risky investments for the local governments and utilities that support and subsidize them, particularly as energy prices decline [thanks to renewable alternatives.] Related Resources Report: Waste Incineration: A Dirty Secret in How States Define Renewable Energy Webinar: Waste Incineration: A Dirty Secret in How States Define Renewable Energy Baltimore’s Historic Clean Air Act Could End Stagnation in Recycling Report on the Proposed Baltimore Clean Air Act Report: Why Should Baltimore Recycle More? 2019 Community Power Scorecard The Zero Waste Solution by Paul Connett Plastic Ocean by Capt. Charles Moore Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds by Adrienne Maree Brown Reduce, Reuse, Reimagine by Beth Porter Transcript John Farrell: Welcome to another edition of Building Local Power. I’m John Farrell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. With me this week are Marie Donahue, ILSR researcher and author of Waste Incineration: A Dirty Secret in How States Define Renewable Energy. Welcome Marie. Marie Donahue: Thanks for having me John. John Farrell: Also with me is Neil Seldman ILSR co-founder, director of our waste to wealth initiative, and the death knell to dozens of garbage incinerators across the country. Welcome Neil. Neil Seldman: Pleasure to be here with both you and Marie. John Farrell: Today I’m excited to talk to the two of you about how communities can save money, have healthier kids, and create more jobs by shutting down garbage incinerators. And I’d like to start with something very recent. Neil I was hoping you could explain how a recent city council decision in Baltimore will impact the Wheelabrator Incinerator that’s responsible for so much of the city’s industrial pollution. Neil Seldman About two weeks ago the city council voted unanimously, 14 to zero with one absent person, one city council member absent, who would have voted for the act as well. But the Baltimore Clean Air Act sets new standards for both burning garbage, and burning hospital and hazardous waste in the city of Baltimore. It requires that both incinerators meet the state of the art best practices in pollution control equipment, it requires constant monitoring coming out of the incinerator, which is technologically possible, and it also requires that the information on the constant monitoring be made public on a webpage as is being done in Montgomery County Maryland just to the south of Baltimore, Maryland. The situation in Baltimore is slightly different from Montgomery County, which we can get into. But in Baltimore the Wheelabrator company owns a facility called Bresco. B-R-E-S-C-O. And that facility is about 35 to 40 years old. The city sends its non recycled waste to that incinerator in downtown Baltimore. Most of the materials generated in Baltimore go there,

Susan Crawford, Author Host Christopher Mitchell speaks with Harvard Law Professor and broadband champion Susan Crawford about her book Fiber: The Coming Tech Revolution — And Why America Might Miss It. Christopher and Susan talk about bringing better connectivity to rural and urban areas.They also discuss: What cities should be doing to get better Internet access including examples of places where local leaders are building fiber networks. Reasons to be hopeful about the future of Internet access in the U.S., including bipartisan support for better connectivity. How we can foster more competition in telecommunications. Susan explains why quality service will only come from an open access approach. What the federal government can do to take action on broadband and policy recommendations that the executive branch can implement. The transformative impact of treating Internet access like other utilities. Susan details the story of Tiffany Cooper who was able to gain high-quality connectivity while living in public housing and has seen major improvement in her son’s grades and her own employment opportunities as a result.   “What we need to do is to help people understand that the best interests of our country depend on reframing this entire issue. That this [Internet access] is not a luxury, that’s it’s basic to every form of business and every policy we care about.”   Related Resources Fiber: The Coming Tech Revolution — And Why America Might Miss It. Community Broadband Bits Podcast Oregon’s MINET: New Approach, New Expansion – Community Broadband Bits Podcast 340 Susan Crawford Transcript Lisa Gonzalez: Hey, Chris, read any good books lately? Chris Mitchell: Oh, always. So many good books. Lisa Gonzalez: Have you read any good books on fiber lately? Chris Mitchell: I’ve read one good book on fiber lately. Lisa Gonzalez: And who was the author of that book? Chris Mitchell: Susan Crawford. Lisa Gonzalez: Oh, I know her. In fact, she even mentions me in this interview that we’re gonna listen to on Building Local Power. Chris Mitchell: Yes, the woman behind the scenes, who keeps things rolling, you finally got your moment in the sun. And well deserved, from Susan Crawford. Lisa Gonzalez: Why thank you. And thank you, Susan. Chris Mitchell: I know who Susan is, you know who Susan is. Can you describe Susan for our audience? Lisa Gonzalez: Susan Crawford, in addition to being a professor at Harvard Law, and an author of Fiber: The Coming Tech Revolution and Why America Might Miss It, is one of America’s broadband champions. One of the most well-known broadband champions. And she’s gonna be the guest on this week’s Building Local Power Podcast. Chris Mitchell: And she’s touring the country promoting that new book. I’ve read it. It’s wonderful. You’ve read it. Katie read it, Jess read it. We’ve all enjoyed it. It’s getting very good reviews. It’s selling hot. But we wanted to introduce the interview to make sure that people have a sense of all the concepts we’re gonna talk about. Because when I did the interview, I kind of forgot to do it for a general audience. I was doing it primarily for an audience that’s focused on broadband issues already. And we thought the interview was so good and made so many great points, we wanted to share it with this audience, also. Lisa Gonzalez: Right, because we originally published the interview in the Community Broadband Bits Podcast, which is from the Community Broadband Networks Initiative at ILSR. Chris Mitchell: Right, and we’re very much a community here. Lisa Gonzalez: Yes. We certainly are. Chris Mitchell: Community, community, community. So one of the things that we wanted to make sure people were familiar with is that Susan had written a previous book called Captured Audience, which was about the fact that most of the country has a cable monopoly as the best or only option for high quality Internet access in their area.

Host Stacy Mitchell speaks with Maurice BP-Weeks, co-director of the Action Center on Race and the Economy (ACRE). After spending years as a community organizer, Maurice now works with community organizations on campaigns that fight wealth destruction in communities of color. Stacy and Maurice talk about ACRE’s work at the intersection of racial justice and Wall Street accountability. They also discuss:   How our current economic structure is built on extracting wealth from people of color. How Wall Street preys on public budgets to further extract wealth from Black and brown folks and how cities can take back control of their finances and bank differently. ACRE’s recent report on Amazon’s selective policing of the White supremacist propaganda available on their platform and its implications. Maurice’s eye opening experience working with Black and brown families to save their homes during the foreclosure crisis. Reasons to be hopeful about the future of the economy, including more public discourse about bold new ideas that can restructure the economy in big ways.   Most everything that we identify as economic justice problems for Black and brown folks can find their roots in this wealth extraction model, and therefore if we’re going to change them, we really have to go after the entities and the forces and the messages and everything that drive that model forward. Related Resources Action Center on Race and the Economy Delivering Hate: How Amazon’s Platforms Are Used to Spread White Supremacy, Anti-Semitism, and Islamophobia, and How Amazon Can Stop It Bankers and Empire: How Wall Street Colonized the Carribean by Peter James Hudson Bankers and Bolsheviks: International Finance and the Russian Revolution by Hassan Malik Rebel Cities by David Harvey Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello everyone, and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacey Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Today on the show, we have Maurice BP-Weeks, who is the co-executive director of the Action Center on Race and the Economy, also known as ACRE. Maurice also works with community organizations and labor unions on campaigns that go on the offensive against Wall Street to beat back their destruction of communities of color. Maurice, it’s so nice to have you on the show. Maurice BP-Weeks: It’s a pleasure to be on. Thank you, Stacy. Stacy Mitchell: I want to start, ACRE is a research organization and a campaign hub. You work at the intersection of racial justice and Wall Street accountability. What is lurking at that intersection? Maurice BP-Weeks: Ooh, so much is lurking at that intersection. It might be helpful to just say a bit of how ACRE was started because I think that might answer the questions. I come to ACRE from years of doing community organizing, most notably during the foreclosure crisis in California, and my co-director comes from doing years of research at a labor union around that same period of time. I think we’ve both shared this analysis that if the way that organizations then and even now, I’ve talked about economic justice work, the way that race has been incorporated in it has been really through the frame of dispirit impact. I remember saying at press conferences and putting in materials like, “And the foreclosure crisis disparately impacts black and brown folks,” or something like that. While that is true, I mean I think all your listeners probably know that that’s obviously true, it also doesn’t really quite tell the full story of intentionality and actual function and how the economy is working. So, it’s more than just dispirit impact, but the very design and baked into how our economy works is based on wealth extraction. Those are the things that end up causing those dispirit impacts. They’re not just going into a mystery box and then popping out of the other end. So, I think most everything that we experience as what we would identify as economic justice problems for black and brown folks are,

Host Stacy Mitchell speaks with Leah Douglas, a staff writer and associate editor at the Food and Environment Reporting Network. As a reporter, Leah focuses on corporate power and political economy in the food sector. Her work sheds light on alarming consolidation in the food industry and its implications for farmers and consumers. Leah Douglas, Journalist Although grocery stores offer an illusion of choice with many different brands lining shelves, most brands are owned by just a handful of companies. Leah and Stacy unpack how consolidation in the food industry is bad for both consumers and farmers. They explore this problem by examining the poultry industry, where vertical integration of the supply chain has rendered chicken farmers dependent on the whim of their corporate buyers, forcing farmers out of business. Stacy and Leah also discuss the dairy sector. Dairy farms have long been the backbone of many rural towns across the nation. Leah explains why the number of dairy farms in America has dwindled from 600,000 to only 40,000 today. Stacy and Leah discuss how a major change in U.S. farm policy in the 1970s led to the consolidation we see today and the growing debate about whether we should reverse course and return to supply management, a policy approach that’s more conducive to independent farming. They also explore some encouraging examples of communities fighting back against giant corporate actors including the success of a small town in Missouri, which blocked a large scale livestock farm from coming to their community. Tune in to hear how advocates, local communities, and states are taking on agriculture monopolies! Anything you can point to in the food system has really been rolled up to the point where just a few companies are controlling 50, 60 or as much as 80 percent or more of the market. Related Resources Factory Farms No Longer Have to Report Their Air Emissions. That’s Dangerous for Their Neighbors A Democrat Hopes to Tip the Vote in Pennsylvania’s Cow Country Farmers Are Struggling to Make Ends Meet. This Controversial Policy Could Help Federal Appeals Court Strikes Down Idaho’s Ag-gag law How Rural America Got Milked African Americans Have Lost Untold Acres of Land Over the Last Century Psst! The Farm Bill Includes a Rare Provision That Could Help Black Farmers Farmers increasingly look to supply management to steady U.S. agriculture ABI’s Venture Capital Fund Quietly Expanding the Mega-Brewer’s Reach Weighing In: Obesity, Food Justice, and the Limits of Capitalism by Julie Guthman Freedom Farmers: Agricultural Resistance and the Black Freedom Movement by Monica M. White Right Proper Brewing Company DC Brau Running for Congress on an Anti-Monopoly Platform (Episode 53) Supporting Family Farming in the Age of Monopoly with Joe Maxwell (Episode 33) This Ag Economist Preached Bigger is Better. Now He Says the Evidence Favors Small Farms. (Episode 32) Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello and welcome to building local power. I’m Stacy Mitchell of the institute for local self reliance. Today on the show we have Leah Douglas, Leah is a reporter who covers food and agriculture. Her main focus is corporate power, consolidation and political economy in the food sector. She’s a staff writer and associate editor at the food and environment reporting network. And you can find her work online at theFERN.org. She’s also a regular contributor to mother Jones. And before that, she created the website food and power, which is a project of the open markets institute. Leah, so nice to have you on the show. Leah Douglas: Thank you so much for having me. Stacy Mitchell: I feel like if we had done this right, we would be recording this after work over some craft beer. Leah Douglas: That would be great. Yeah I would come up to visit in Maine and we could go to one of the many local breweries. Stacy Mitchell: Yeah it would be nice. Except these days what’s kind of challenging is that you go to reach for a craft...

Jeremy Schroeder, Minneapolis City Council Member Host John Farrell speaks with Minneapolis City Council Member Jeremy Schroeder. Jeremy and John discuss the city’s plans to combat climate change, increase affordable housing, and make sure Minneapolis is accessible to all residents. They explore how Minneapolis is working together with their utility companies to transition to renewable energy equitably by 2030 through the Clean Energy Partnership. The partnership serves as an alternative to the city taking over the utilities and instead hopes to leverage policies such inclusive financing to make sure folks that haven’t had access to energy efficiency upgrades are able to finance them. John and Jeremy also dive into Minneapolis’ 2040 plan, a comprehensive zoning plan developed by the city every 10 years. The latest rendition of the plan includes a controversial change allowing up to 3 units on a single property. Jeremy explains how this density change will enable more affordable housing to be built and help mitigate historic redlining that has divided communities and kept people of color out of certain neighborhoods. As Minneapolis is planning for a 10% population increase in the coming decade, Jeremy explains the importance of intentionally centering equity in policy discussions.   It really is a balance of how do we be a good place for people to invest in and really have people that are building buildings for 100 years. How do we have that and at the same time, make sure that we have our core goals of being a city for everybody and a city that’s going to be thinking about the next generation and our impact on the Earth? Related Resources Local Energy Rules Podcast Minneapolis 2040: The City’s Comprehensive Plan Food and the City by Dorothée Imbert The Reactionary Mind by Corey Robin Transcript John Farrell: Welcome to another episode of the Building Local Power podcast from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m John Farrell, ILSR co-director and this episode I’m talking with Jeremy Schroeder, City Council member from Minneapolis, Minnesota, about the ways cities can exercise their local power to confront climate change. We’ll also get a brief cameo from former ILSR staffer and now City Council Policy Aide, Karlee Weinmann. Jeremy, welcome to the program. Jeremy Schroeder: Hello, thanks for having me. John Farrell: Absolutely, and Karlee, welcome back. Karlee Weinmann: Thanks, John. John Farrell: Karlee says she’s just going to sit and watch this amazing conversation, but you never know. She may feel an urge to jump back in but at any rate, we have lots of stuff to talk about today. What I’m most excited to talk about is in general, the power of cities, so as the federal government has become less relevant, both with a major government shutdown that is continuing even as we have been planning this podcast episode and also an administration that’s failing to lead and many major economic issues from climate change to economic concentration. Cities have been stepping up. In the energy sector, the challenges for cities overlap as in more than 30 states including Minnesota, the utility companies that provide electricity or gas service have monopolies that are given to them by the state. Cities don’t control the utilities or where their energy comes from and yet, Minneapolis is one of a hundred cities that have, for example, committed to get 100% of its electricity from renewable resources in a decade. Jeremy, I want to start off by just asking you what I hope is a relatively simple question which is why has Minneapolis made this commitment to 100% renewable electricity? Jeremy Schroeder: Simple answer is we have to. We get the same data the federal government does and when you look at that, we have to act now. If we are serious about stopping and reversing climate change, the time to act was a long time ago. Now, we have to take much more immediate action, much more tougher action.

Host Chris Mitchell speaks with community broadband pioneer Billy Ray. Billy is the Superintendant of the Glasgow Electric Plant Board, the municipally owned electric power, cable television, and internet utility for the City of Glasgow, Kentucky. He brings a plethora of experience in building local power as a longtime advocate for both municipally owned electricity and broadband. Chris and Billy make the case for restructuring the electric grid and generating power locally rather than relying on giant, centralized utility companies that extract wealth from communities. Billy shares his insights on why it matters that electricity is generated locally and how making the switch can save customers money. They talk about the parallels between the movements for municipal electric utilities and community broadband networks. The two also identify the ways in which the Internet fight against monopoly is almost word-for-word replaying the electric monopoly history. As a veteran of the movements, Billy explains what a difference it can make to get your internet from a community broadband network versus a monopoly Internet service provider, like Comcast. Tune in to hear more about overhauling our energy system and Internet infrastructure and how far we’ve come in the past 30 years.   For a public power system, the whole puzzle should mainly be focused on how can we make people’s lives better in this community? And how can we keep this community from being used by some distant corporate board to feather their nest at the expense of our local nest? Related Resources The Grid: Electrical Infrastructure for a New Era by Gretchen Bakke Electricity for Rural America: The Fight for the REA by D. Clayton Brown Power Struggle by Scott Ridley and Richard Rudolph The Birth of Community Broadband Transcript Chris Mitchell: Welcome to another episode of the Building Local Power Podcast from The Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m Chris Mitchell from the Minneapolis office, and today I’m talking with Billy Ray, Superintendant of the Glasgow plant board. Welcome to the show Billy. Billy Ray: Thank you, Chris. I’m glad to be here. Chris Mitchell: Billy, you’re an old time friend of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, I think you’ve been involved with my colleague Stacy’s work with BALLE over the years. And I think of you as being a major thinker about local economies and smart investments for the long haul and things like that. I’m curious, if someone asked you to give your biography in a minute, how would you give it? Billy Ray: Well, I’m trained as a civil engineer but I’ve spent my whole career in public power. And public power was pretty much invented by FDR and his gang of new dealers and so there’s always been a very direct relationship between public power systems or publicly owned electric utilities and local economies. To a large part, they were invented for two reasons, number one, because rural areas wanted electric power and number two, the ones that had it were generally paying way too much for it and every bit of their local treasure that was spent for electricity was going to some distant board that took that treasure away from ever benefiting the local economy. So I have been interested in all elements of local economies and local control and trying to implement pretty much the electric power micro grid concept with respect to all aspects of a local economy. There’s gotta be a way to make it work by eating your own dog food as I like to say, and concentrating on things that people are gonna buy that can be provided locally. Chris Mitchell: I feel like you’ve lived the same story twice, and we’re gonna get to this in a little bit with community broadband, which you more or less created, in terms of community broadband Internet systems. But what you just described about electricity and the dynamic of many people not having it and those who do have it, often unsatisfied with the rates or the quality,

Host Chris Mitchell is joined by ILSR Co-Directors Stacy Mitchell and John Farrell for a year in review. The trio take a look back on developments in the movement against corporate concentration in the past year and reflect on what more it’ll take to grow local power in 2019. Stacy explains how public opinion on Amazon has shifted this year as more and more people realized the search for HQ2 was really a play to gather data and further advance Amazon’s stranglehold on the economy. Chris and John discuss how they saw the truth about Amazon come to light in the media. They also discuss massive shifts in the energy sector, as batteries proliferated this year making it possible for people to store the renewable energy they produce locally. John details how individual actors are collectively transforming the energy system, including the million customers in California that have installed solar on their own rooftops. Tune in for a lively recap of 2018!   This year was a moment when people became increasingly concerned about the ways that Amazon’s tentacles are reaching into every part of the economy, and not just dominating markets, but really controlling markets in ways that are deeply disturbing. Related Resources ILSR Resources on Amazon Dollar Stores Are Targeting Struggling Urban Neighborhoods and Small Towns. One Community Is Showing How to Fight Back Winners Take All by Anand Giridharadas Reverse Power Flow: How Solar+Batteries Shift Electric Grid Decision Making from Utilities to Consumers Visualizing California’s Booming Solar Market Community Broadband Bits Podcast Year in Review Transcript Chris Mitchell: So it’s the end of 2018, and last year we got together here, John Farrell, the now co-director of The Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Welcome back John. John Farrell: Thanks for having me Chris. Chris Mitchell: And Stacy, the other co-director, Stacy Mitchell. Welcome back. Stacy Mitchell: Nice to be here. Chris Mitchell: So I started to say that last year the three of us got together for building local power and we talked about monopolies and sort of the year end review and things like that, and we thought we’d do it again. The big question on my mind is will Santa sleigh the monopolies? That’s my big hope for the end of the year. John Farrell: How long have you been working on that concept Chris? Chris Mitchell: Michelle and I decided that it’s probably in bad taste but I should do it anyway, but I came up with it about 30 minutes ago. So we’re going to talk some about Amazon, we’re going to talk about utility, where that’s going and how that’s going to really shape the future. I mean, you know, it’s funny, we were talking a little bit about how we were afraid won’t think it’s very exciting, but frankly this is just the future of like whether or not the planet is habitable, what price we’re paying for energy, and things like that. So we’re going to talk about what John’s been looking at and the timeline in which the entire electric system is changing, where we get our energy from. We’ll talk a little bit about broadband regarding AT&T buying Time Warner and the Department of Justice really trying to challenge that, even though it has kind of a flawed argument and it seems clear that the world is stacked against it. But let’s start, Stacy, with Amazon, a year in review. And is it two years ago you released your big Amazon report around this time? Stacy Mitchell: That’s right. We released Amazon’s stranglehold in November of 2016. Chris Mitchell: And I think when we did that, I mean that was the time … There was no real opposition to Amazon. There was no even real popular sense that there was anything even wrong with what Amazon was doing. Stacy Mitchell: That’s right. I mean it’s changed dramatically in the last two years, and especially this year. I mean I think the Whole Foods acquisition in 2017 was moment when people kind of woke up and looked around and said oh,

Terry Craghead, Founder of Fertile Ground In this episode, host Brenda Platt speaks with Terry Craghead. Terry founded Fertile Ground, a worker-owned cooperative collecting and composting food scraps on a small scale in Oklahoma City. They discuss the power of community composting to transform the monopolized waste system and build up the local economy by reducing food waste, creating jobs, and combatting climate change. Terry got started in his own backyard by composting scraps from his garden and using the resulting soil to grow food with neighbors in a community garden. Today, Fertile Ground has nine worker-owners and is part of the growing community composter movement across the country. Brenda and Terry also discuss worker-owned cooperatives and how setting up a business as a cooperative allows the workers to earn a livable wage, build wealth, and cycle money back into their local community. Listen in to hear how community composters are playing a vital role in building up their local economies! “I think there’s potential here for local, community scale folks to disrupt the waste industry. When we accumulate waste in these giant landfills, giant incinerators, we’re really creating a disaster. We want to teach people how to compost in their own backyards. We want to teach people that they can compost at their community garden, at their neighborhood schools, at their workplaces, hospitals, universities.” Related Resources Fertile Ground ILSR Resources for Community Composters Monopoly and the U.S. Waste Knot US Federation of Worker Cooperatives Democracy at Work Institute Industrial Cooperative Association Shared Capital Cooperative Local Enterprise Assistance Fund Crowdfund Main Street Transcript Brenda Platt: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m Brenda Platt, the director ILSR’s Composting for Community Initiative, and I’m super excited for you to hear this week’s podcast. We’ll be discussing an option for building local power that can address a wide range of problems: soil fertility, soil erosion, food waste, food insecurity, climate destruction, and the threat of corporate concentration. This option can address all these issues while at the same time creating local jobs and enterprises that build community. Well, what could this one solution be you might ask? If you guessed compost or more specifically community-oriented or community-scale composting, you are right. Our guest this week is Terry Craighead, a founding member of Fertile Ground, a worker owned cooperative collecting and composting food scraps on a small scale in Oklahoma City. He oversees day to day operations in the cooperative. Terry, welcome. Terry Craghead: Hi, Brenda. Thanks for having me. Brenda Platt: I am so excited to talk to you today because it’s rare to find a single solution that can address so many issues at once. As we know, compost is a soil amendment often called black gold and can be made from a range of waste materials. As we get started in this discussion, tell us a little bit about Fertile Ground and what services you offer? Terry Craghead: Fertile Ground is a worker owned cooperative here in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and we provide a series of environmentally beneficial services. Primarily, our flagship service is residential composting service. We do a bike-powered compost service and we do a truck-powered service for folks who are outside of the downtown area. We provide commercial composting for businesses, for offices with break rooms, cafeterias, residential and commercial recycling for apartments and multifamily buildings that don’t have recycling, for businesses that have small volume needs of recycling. Then we also do Zero Waste Events where we help plan, strategize events for small private events and big public events, how to reduce the waste that’s created by those events. Brenda Platt: Can you tell us a little bit more about the composting part...

Kimber Lanning, Founder of Local First Arizona In this episode, host Stacy Mitchell speaks with Kimber Lanning, founder of Local First Arizona. A seasoned entrepreneur and community development expert, Kimber has made it her life’s mission to cultivate self-reliant communities. Her work focuses on implementing systems and policies to ensure a level playing field for entrepreneurs. Currently only 7% of Arizona’s total deposits are in Arizona-owned banks and credit unions, well below the national average. Kimber started the “Move Your Money” campaign to encourage cities, businesses and individuals in Arizona to bank with local banks. Stacy and Kimber discuss how crucial access to credit is for small businesses and how community banks play an important role in providing that credit. Kimber’s record store. They also discuss land use policies and Phoenix’s innovative approach to turning vacant buildings into great spaces for local businesses. Thanks to shifts in zoning policy, more than 125 new businesses have moved into and renovated formerly blighted and abandoned buildings in Phoenix. Local First Arizona built a strong case for preserving, rather than tearing down, older building stock, in part by showing how historic mixed use areas provide a better environment for local entrepreneurs than new development. Because of their efforts, Phoenix has the most effective adaptive reuse program in the country. Kimber also explains how Phoenix’s government decided to spend no money with Amazon — in contrast to many cities that have turned over much of their procurement to the online giant. Instead, Local First has built a database of local business to help Arizona cities spend their money locally. Listen in to hear more about how Arizona First is leveling the playing field for small businesses and how other states can follow suit! We aren’t going to put our money into a company that extracts wealth from our communities. We are going to invest in the companies that are here, investing in our future together with a shared vision.   Related Resources Local First Arizona Older, Smaller, Better Report from Preservation Green Lab Adaptive Reuse of Commercial Buildings Report: Amazon’s Next Frontier: Your City’s Purchasing Guide to Policy Tools that Expand Opportunity for Independent Businesses Local Policy Matters: How to Grow Independent Businesses in Your City Winners Take All by Anand Giridharadas Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Today on the show we have Kimber Lanning. Kimber is founder of Local First Arizona and Local First Arizona Foundation, two distinct state-wide organizations working in tandem to strengthen Arizona’s economy. Under Kimber’s leadership Local First Arizona has grown to a membership of more than 3,000 independent businesses across the state. Kimber herself is an entrepreneur and she’s also a community development specialist who works to cultivate strong, self-reliant communities and inspire a higher quality of life for people across Arizona. Kimber, welcome to Building Local Power. Kimber Lanning: Thank you so much for having me. Stacy Mitchell: I want to start by asking you what led you to found Local First Arizona. Tell us a little bit about the conditions and the state, what it is that you’re trying to change? Kimber Lanning: Sure. It’s a really interesting place in that we were the last of the continental states to actually become a state. It wasn’t until 1912 that we had statehood, and we grew very rapidly after the 1950s. Phoenix is very much built after the advent of the automobile and we grew in such a way that there wasn’t a lot of sense of place because two-thirds of the people living here came from somewhere else and so therefore there’s not a lot of loyalty to old school companies that you might see in a place like Philadelphia or Boston. To have a company here in Arizona that’s been here more...

Since 2011, the number of chain dollar stores has grown from 20,000 to a staggering 30,000 locations nationwide, as these stores profit off of continued economic distress and insecurity across the country. In this same period, the number of full-service grocery stores supplying communities with healthier food options has been in decline. The city of Tulsa, Okla., is no stranger to this phenomenon. There are 50 dollar stores within the city limits, many concentrated on the city’s north side, where residents are left with few if any other options to buy their groceries. Tulsa City Councilor Vanessa Hall-Harper In this episode, co-hosts Stacy Mitchell and Marie Donahue speak with Tulsa City Councilor Vanessa Hall-Harper. Earlier this year, Vanessa led a successful effort to convince the City Council to pass an ordinance restricting dollar stores from building new locations in the community of North Tulsa, a historically and predominantly African-American area of the city. The ordinance was part of community members’ and Vanessa’s efforts to address the lack of healthy food options in their neighborhood. Drawing some inspiration from ILSR’s policy tools, Vanessa was able to amend the city’s zoning code to stop the proliferation of chain dollar stores that have crowded out full-service grocery stores in North Tulsa. She overcame opposition from developers, chambers of commerce, and even some city agencies that were hesitant to exercise Tulsa’s local authority in this unique way. Stacy, Marie, and Vanessa discuss the two-year journey to pass the ordinance. They cover both the challenges and successes Vanessa had along the way, concluding with a discussion of Vanessa’s more recent efforts to bring a full-service grocery store to North Tulsa. Tune in to learn more about Tulsa’s innovative example of building local power! If we continue to just accept Family Dollars and Dollar Generals, that’s all we receive, then we’re not going to get anything better. We have to make our voices heard, and we have to demand better. That was a lot, to a large degree, a part of this process in saying, no to this, and this is what we want. Interested in learning more about the rapid proliferation and impacts of dollar stores? Our team has released an in-depth feature “Dollar Stores Are Targeting Struggling Urban Neighborhoods and Small Towns. One Community Is Showing How to Fight Back.” We have also compiled a shorter 2-page fact sheet The Impact of Dollar Stores and How Communities Can Fight Back, with facts and strategies to take action. Sign up for our Hometown Advantage Bulletin newsletter to get updates and related resources straight to your inbox.   Related Resources Dollar Stores Are Targeting Struggling Urban Neighborhoods and Small Towns. One Community Is Showing How to Fight Back. — Featured Story on How Dollar Stores Impact Local Economies The Impact of Dollar Stores and How Communities Can Fight Back (2-Page Fact Sheet) Dollar Store Dispersal Restrictions ‘They was killing black people’: In-Depth Feature of the Tulsa Race Massacre via The Washington Post 1921 Tulsa Race Riot History, Tulsa Historical Society & Museum Guide to Policy Tools that Expand Opportunity for Independent Businesses Formula Business Restrictions Want to Strengthen Independent Businesses? Use These Policies (Building Local Power Episode 51) Transcript   Stacy Mitchell: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell, of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. Today, I’m joined at hosting this episode by my colleague, Marie Donahue. Hey, Marie. Marie Donahue: Hi, Stacy. Happy to be here. Stacy Mitchell: In the years since The Great Recession, many retail chains have been closing their stores, but one striking exception to this trend, are dollar stores. Since 2011, the number of dollar stores has grown from 20,000, to nearly 30,000. If you map the location of these stores, it quickly becomes clear that these chains have figured out how to prof...

In this episode, ILSR’s Co-Director, John Farrell, is joined by Alan Hipólito of Verde. Alan joins several activists in leading the fight for clean energy equity in Portland, Oregon. To move this goal at the local level, Verde participates in a coalition campaigning for an important ballot initiative this year. The proposed policy could raise an impressive $30 million a year through a 1% surcharge levied on big business. It would help ensure an equitable transition to 100% renewable energy, a goal Portland committed to in 2017. Alan and fellow organizers have brought together a broad coalition of grassroots organizations representing communities on the frontlines of climate change. Their efforts have resulted in more than 300 endorsement statements for the ballot initiative, more than any previous ballot initiative in Portland! With elections less than a week away, Alan explains why it’s critical to invest in climate solutions targeting low income and people of color.   There’s a great hunger in our communities for climate solutions that also address poverty and meet the growing income disparities that we see in our communities. We’ve seen tremendous support all the way across the board, from other mainstream environmental organizations, from labor — and that’s both service unions, public employee unions, and building trades —, housing organizations — so groups that advocate or provide affordable housing —, advocates for the homeless, faith communities, neighborhood associations. All the way across the board. The vote takes place on November 6, and may set a precedent for how cities can fund equitable climate solutions.   Related Resources Portland Clean Energy Initiative Local Clean Energy on the Ballot this November Verde Voices of 100% podcast series Transcript John Farrell: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m John Farrell, ILSR Co-Director and head of our Energy Democracy Initiative. In this episode I interviewed Alan Hipólito of Verde, a nonprofit in the Cully neighborhood of Portland, Oregon. We discussed their landmark campaign with over 300 organizational endorsements on a city ballot initiative to invest in climate solutions targeting low income and people of color. So across the country more than 80 cities of all sizes have adopted ambitious goals to generate 100% of their electricity from renewable sources, but very few of these cities have concrete plans how to get there. This week I talk with Alan Hipólito at Verde, a tax-exempt nonprofit in the Cully neighborhood of Portland about a powerful initiative that’s on the November 6 ballot to guide Portland towards meeting its 100% renewable energy commitment. Alan, welcome to the program. Alan Hipólito: Thank you. It’s great to be here. Appreciate it.   John Farrell: Absolutely. Now, before we get in to the details of the ballot initiative. One, of the things I was curious to start with was just, what relationship does this ballot initiative have, to last years commitment by the city and the county, to get to one hundred percent renewable energy? Alan Hipólito: That’s a great question and I’m happy to provide some background there. So, as you mentioned both Multnomah County and the city of Portland in 2017, advanced tandem 100% renewables resolutions and Verde along with a number of other frontline community-serving organizations. Like, The Coalition of Communities of Color, OPAL Environmental Justice Oregon, as well as a number of mainstream environmental organizations, were able to access those processes and really move the ball forward on the commitments the two resolutions made to meeting the needs [and] addressing the priorities low income people and people of color. We call them frontline communities because, as your readers know well, low income people and people of color are on the frontline of climate change in the United States and around the world.

Host and ILSR’s Communications Manager, Hibba Meraay, is joined by Chris Mitchell, Director of the Community Broadband initiative, for an update on the progress of community broadband networks. Community networks have come a long way in the past few years including impressive developments in business models, financing options and quality of service. They also discuss the Internet in current events including: California passing statewide net neutrality, why Colorado always seems to have a municipal network related ballot initiative, and the buzz around 5G. Tune in for an update on all things community networks! For more on broadband check out our Community Broadband Bits podcast. Cities aren’t building this network just to brag. They’re building them to attract jobs. You might think of Chattanooga, which has brought more than a billion dollars of investment to the community.They were the first city in the nation, and I actually think possibly the first city on the planet, in which anywhere in the city, and in a lot of the county that is surrounding the city, you can get 10 gigabits per second. Related Resources Ammon’s Model: The Virtual End of Cable Monopolies Fiber Film Festival Old Man’s War by John Scalzi We the Corporations: How American Business Won Their Civil Rights by Adam Winkler Fooled By Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance of Life and in the Markets by Nassim Nicholas Taleb Transcript Hibba Meraay: Hello, and welcome to Building Local Power, a podcast from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I’m Hibba Meraay, ILSR’s communications manager, taking over for Nick Stumo-Langer, who recently started grad school. I’m really excited for you to hear this week’s podcast. My guest this week is Chris Mitchell, a frequent guest and host on the show, and the director of our Community Broadband Initiative. This week, we’ll be talking about what’s going on in the world of Internet access. Chris, welcome back to Building Local Power. Chris Mitchell: Thanks, Hibba. I was tempted to issue a quick boo for Nick leaving to go on and further his education, but I didn’t want to disrupt you and bother you on your first episode. Hibba Meraay: Yeah. We wish Nick all the best and definitely want to encourage him to do the awesome work that he’s doing. Chris Mitchell: Yeah. I guess I wouldn’t deny him the same education that I got. He’s gone on to the Humphrey School for Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota, where John and I went. I wish him the best, miss him a lot. Hibba Meraay: Yeah. You can’t be too mad at him. It’s been a while since we’ve talked about community broadband on Building Local Power, so I wanted to kick off this episode with just talking about the state of affairs in community broadband. How does where we are today compare with where we were two or three years ago? What kind of growth have you seen? Chris Mitchell: We’re definitely two or three years later than we were two or three years earlier, that’s for certain. No, it’s an interesting question. Two or three years, it’s the right timeline, because that was when we’d started to see an upsurge of interest in community networks. I would include both cooperatives and municipal networks under that label, cooperatives being more common in rural areas and municipal networks being more common in more urban areas. We tend to think of both of them as community networks. Both of them were seeing tremendous drives. In coops, it’s a bit more rapid, I’d say, but in the municipal space, we’ve seen a lot of interest and a fair amount of more investment. We’ve seen a lot more cities considering these investments, but we haven’t seen the same level of rise of them building them, although we have continued to see an increase of new cities building networks. Hibba Meraay: As all of these communities are doing that, can you think of any examples that really jump out at you? Chris Mitchell: One of the things to keep in mind is that there’s so many differ...

In this episode, Stacy Mitchell, ILSR’s co-director, chats with author and journalist David Dayen. David is the author of the acclaimed book Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great Foreclosure Fraud, which was named the winner of Studs and Ida Terkel Prize. David is also the Goodman Fellow at In These Times and a contributing writer to the Intercept and New Republic. David’s work focuses on the underlying policies that allow the big and powerful to rig the economy and get away with it. He’s great at shining a light on corruption and connecting the dots between systems of injustice and people’s everyday experiences — whether that’s paying exorbitant airline ticket prices or losing a home to foreclosure. Stacy and David discuss: how candidates are talking about corporate concentration on the campaign trail, the ten-year anniversary of the financial crisis and what today’s reporting about it is getting wrong, bringing local control back into politics, how we ended up with a two-tiered criminal justice system that’s soft on fraud, and what makes a good story for investigative journalism.   J.D. Scholten is running in a farm state and he is really looking at issues of big agriculture, monopoly power in the farming sector… issues that are really very immediate for Iowa families, particularly farmers. So, that’s a way to bring these issues to a very direct and immediate level. When you’re talking about family farm financing, when you’re talking about the systems by which seed monopolies or livestock monopolies make it difficult for the livelihoods of family farmers. That’s a way to really bring those messages [around corruption and corporate power] into focus. Related Resources David Dayen Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great Foreclosure Fraud The Rise and Fall of the Word ‘Monopoly’ in American Life by Stacy Mitchell, The Atlantic Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World by Adam Tooze The Ticket Monopoly is Worse Than Ever (Thanks, Obama) by David Dayen, The New Republic Unfriendly Skies by David Dayen, The American Prospect Below the Surface of ICE: The Corporations Profiting From Immigrant Detention by David Dayen, In These Times Big Banks Were Meant to Gain From Bipartisan Deregulation Bill All Along, Senate Letter Reveals by David Dayen, The Intercept The Hidden Monopolies That Raise Drug Prices by David Dayen, The American Prospect Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. The 2018 midterm elections are just weeks away and they’re taking place against a backdrop of unprecedented corporate power and widespread corruption. We have Wall Street banks that are rewriting the rules for how we regulate banks for their own benefit. We have Jeff Bezos emerging as the richest person in the world with a net worth of around 160 billion dollars, even as median wages for ordinary people haven’t budged in more than two decades. We have private tech companies that are profiting from our immigration policies. Everywhere it seems the structural imbalance of power is becoming ever more apparent and deeply troubling. One journalist who has been working tirelessly to shine a light on injustice and corruption is my guest today, David Dayen. What I love about David’s work is that it isn’t just about bad actors, it’s about the underlying policies that allow the big and powerful to rig the economy and get away with it. With the election coming up, I was eager to get David on the show to see if he sees any signs of hope in what candidates are talking about on the campaign trail. I also want to ask him about being an investigative reporter, how he looks for stories and what makes a good story. David is the author of a really terrific book that if you haven’t read you should. It’s called Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great F...

In this episode, host John Farrell, ILSR’s Energy Democracy Initiative Director is joined by Neil Seldman, ILSR’s co-founder and director of the Waste to Wealth program, to discuss how convenient single-bin recycling may have made things easy for the consumer, but harder for cities to capture the economic benefits of recycling. Recently, China made good on a promise to stop accepting U.S. recycling due to the low quality of materials. The problem has been exacerbated by consolidation. Four giant waste companies, profiting more from disposal than recycling, control half the market. The combination of contamination in the bin and poor processing practices by industry giants means missed opportunities to grow local economies. Although the Chinese embargo shocked the industry, Neil explains how this turn of events is an opportunity. Cities can redesign waste handling systems to recover cleaner glass and plastic, support local jobs, and provide raw material for local industry. How can communities move towards a decentralized recycling system and capture more value from their waste stream? Tune in to find out! The cost of solid waste management, in the United States, because of these large companies is 30% higher than it should be. Related Resources Single Stream Recycling: Explaining the Waste Knot Plastic Ocean by Captain Charles Moore The Zero Waste Solution: Untrashing the Planet One Community at a Time by Paul Connett Worms Eat My Garbage by Mary Appelhof Transcript John Farrell: We’re talking this week with Neil Seldman. He’s co-founder of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, the director of The Waste to Wealth Program, which has for decades now been helping communities capture more of the value on their waste stream. Neil, I’m just so glad to be able to talk to about this because obviously I already took up half of a staff meeting trying to ask you questions about it, so thanks for taking the time to share with the rest of the world what’s going on in the recycling business. Neil Seldman: Sure, my pleasure. John Farrell: I just had to say, what got me so excited about talking to you about this was, as you have said, as so many of us talk about and the issues we work on, these are often inherently local issues but waste disposal is more inherently local than just about anything. But it’s actually something that China changed recently, way on the other side of the world that has put recycling in the news. And so I was hoping you could start by just explaining what did China change about its recycling policies that is impacting recycling at the local level across the United States? Neil Seldman: Okay, for the last let’s say 20 years, China has been purchasing recyclable material from the United States and using it in its industries. The markets in China were extremely tolerant, meaning that US cities and waste companies could ship recyclables that were contaminated, sometimes up to 40% with either things that aren’t recyclable or the process of single-stream recycling, wherein all recyclables are mixed in the same bin, they get transferred in the same truck and then transferred once again to larger trucks and overseas shipping, the glass breaks, the glass contaminates, glass shards contaminate plastic and glass. Around 2013, China announced that they were going to start cleaning up their industry and they did not want to receive contaminated recyclables from the United States. One of the reasons is environmental but the other is economic. Labor in China has been increasing in cost and the Chinese figured, why should they pay to clean up US recyclables? So over the next few years, they kept on restricting more and more imports from the United States of single-stream material, and in 2007 they announced a very strict policy in which they literally stopped taking US imports through a variety of means. They stopped issuing permits, they started requiring inspections in the United States then doubling inspectio...

This week, we’re featuring a special episode brought to you by our Local Energy Rules podcast as part of their series on cities transitioning to 100% renewable energy called Voices of 100%. Each episode in the six part series will showcase how city leaders are implementing their renewable energy commitments. In this episode, host and director of ILSR’s Energy Democracy Initiative, John Farrell, chats with Mayor Dale Ross of Georgetown, Texas. Tune in to hear all about how Georgetown has been getting 100 percent of its electricity from wind and solar power since 2016!   Everybody has this preconceived idea that renewable energy and clean energy is this liberal, progressive, primarily democratic thing. And what we did is, we just put the silly, partisan, national politics aside and made the decision based on the facts. And the facts led us to wind and solar energy was the best fit for our city. Related Resources Voices of 100% Podcast Series Local Energy Rules Podcast Can Other Cities Match Georgetown’s Low-Cost Switch to 100% Wind and Sun? Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. We have a special treat this week. We wanted to introduce you to one of our other podcasts, it’s called Local Energy Rules, and in particular they’re doing a special six part series called, Voices of a 100%, so today on the show we’re going to play you the first episode of that series. Here’s what it’s all about. A growing number of cities, big and small, are making commitments to transition to a 100% renewable energy and Voices of a 100% will be highlighting the voices of some of the city leaders that are doing this, to learn how they’re implementing these big renewable energy commitments. First up, we interview Mayor Dale Ross from Georgetown, Texas. I hope you’ll enjoy the conversation. If you want to listen to the rest of the Voices of a 100% series, or check out all of our podcasts, you can go to ILSR.org/podcasts. That’s ILSR.org/podcasts. Thank you so much and enjoy the show. Marie Donahue: Across the country more than 50 cities of all sizes have adopted ambitious goals to generate 100% of their electricity from renewable resources, but how do these cities plan to get there? In our new multi part series, Voices of 100%, from the Institute For Local Self-Reliance Local Energy Rules Podcast we’re speaking with local leaders with insights about their cities 100% renewable energy commitments. How their cities plan to achieve their goals, and what these visionaries see as the future of local renewable energy. Across the country more than 50 cities of all sizes have adopted ambitious goals to generate 100% of their electricity from renewable resources, but how do these cities plan to get there? In our new multi part series, Voices of 100%, from the Institute For Local Self-Reliance Local Energy Rules Podcast we’re speaking with local leaders with insights about their cities 100% renewable energy commitments. How their cities plan to achieve their goals, and what these visionaries see as the future of local renewable energy. John Farrell: Over 50 US cities have adopted a goal to generate 100% of their electricity from renewable resources, but only a few have actually done it. This week, we learn about a city that used its power of ownership to achieve a bold clean energy goal two years ago, that most other cities don’t plan to reach for a decade or more. Dale Ross is the mayor of Georgetown, a Texas city whose locally owned utilities signed contracts to get 100% of its electricity from wind and solar power in 2016. Ross recently spoke with me about that decision and why wind and sun makes sense. I’m John Farrell, Director of The Energy Democracy Initiative at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, and this is Local Energy Rules, a podcast sharing powerful stories about local renewable energy. Mayor Ross, welcome to the program. Dale Ross:

In this episode, Stacy Mitchell, ILSR’s co-director, chats with former Congressional candidate Austin Frerick. During the Obama Administration, Frerick was a young economist at the Treasury Department when he started noticing how consolidated many industries have become. Pouring over the data, he realized that just two companies produce most of our hearing aids, and the same was true for many other goods, from toothpaste to beer. After Donald Trump took office, Frerick left Treasury and headed back to his home state of Iowa. There, in rural southwest Iowa, he began to notice how concentration was playing out in the real world, not just on a spreadsheet. He saw farmers going into crippling debt because a couple of global giants control the market for corn seed. He saw his mom lose her job at Target because of Amazon’s rising market power. That’s when Frerick decided to do something: At age 28, he launched a campaign for Congress in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District. Austin and Stacy talk about: how raising money from affluent coastal cities impedes the Democrat Party’s ability to connect with rural voters; why we all need to make small donations to our favorite candidates; how monopolies are fraying social ties and leaving more Americans isolated an lonely; and more. Tune in to hear it all. “You have the world’s best farmland yet the poverty is increasing. You have Red Oak, Iowa, which is a town of four or five thousand. Home to Senator Joni Ernst. Two out of three kids there are on free or reduced lunch. It’s boils your blood. This system’s broken. You can get a better locally sourced meal in D.C., New York, L.A. than I can at a diner in Iowa.” Related Resources Austin Frerick The Unlikely Case of the Brick-and-Mortar Store with Lower Prices than Amazon Watching Recommendation – RuPaul’s Drag Race (Season 4) ILSR’s Anti-Monopoly Resource Page Related BLP Episodes: Episode 36, Episode 33, Episode 31 Transcript Stacy Mitchell: Hello and welcome to Building Local Power. I’m Stacy Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. The 2018 midterm elections are just around the corner. Much has been said about how divided Americans are these days, especially along rural and urban lines. And yet, polls show that voters across the spectrum are actually quite aligned when it comes to several core economic issues. Large majorities of voters believe that big corporations have too much power, and that public policy has rigged the system to favor these corporate giants at the expense of whole communities that have been pushed to the margins. To help us think about these dynamics and how election campaigns that focus on challenging concentrated power might just be the key to fixing our politics, I’ve asked Austin Frerick to join us on the show today. Austin launched a campaign last year to win the Democratic nomination for Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District. It’s a district that encompasses the city of Des Moines and a large rural swath of southwest Iowa. Austin eventually had to drop out of the race because he spent too much time talking to voters and not enough time fundraising, but before he stepped aside, he built a strong grassroots following and he’d drawn considerable local and national media attention for the anti-monopoly ideas he was talking about on the campaign trail, and the response he was getting from rural voters. Austin is a seventh generation native of Iowa. He’s also an economist and a fellow at the Open Markets Institute. He joins us today from Kansas City where he’s participating in the Annual Conference of the Organization for Competitive Markets. Austin, welcome to Building Local Power. Austin Frerick: Thanks for having me on Stacy. Stacy Mitchell: Well, I want to start just by asking you what led you to decide to run for Congress? I mean, that’s a big thing to take on and I’d like to know more about where you come from and what the motivation was. Austin Frerick:

Amazon recently secured a contract to do business with local governments. The contract has an estimated value of $5.5 billion over a potential 11-year term — but almost no one’s talking about it. This contract, and Amazon’s growing relationship with the public sector, is the subject of the latest report from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, Amazon’s Next Frontier: Your City’s Purchasing It’s also what we talk about in this episode of the Building Local Power podcast. In the episode, ILSR Communications Manager Nick Stumo-Langer, co-director and Community-Scaled Economy initiative director Stacy Mitchell, and Community-Scaled Economy initiative senior researcher Olivia LaVecchia dig into this issue. The group talks about how Amazon’s new contract favors the company at the expense of the public, from its pricing to its terms and conditions. Nick, Stacy, and Olivia also cover how the contract poses broader threats — like Amazon using it to position itself as the gatekeeper through which local businesses have to go to sell to local governments. There’s good news in this episode though, too, especially for concerned citizens and public officials: Amazon’s push into the public sector offers a way to take action at the local level. In fact, some cities are already pushing back. In addition to the report, we’ve also developed an action sheet that outlines three strategies that everyone can use to take action — along with specific asks to make and resources to use.   “We’ve found that this contract is yet another tool for Amazon to suppress competition, and is a particularly pernicious way to use local governments to facilitate their market power.” — Stacy Mitchell Related Resources This podcast is based on a new report that the Institute for Local Self-Reliance released on July 10th, 2018. We’ve included the report and related resources below: The full report is available at: Report: Amazon’s Next Frontier: Your City’s Purchasing The action sheet on what citizens and public officials can do: “As Amazon Moves to Capture Local Government Spending, Here’s What You Can Do“ The press release, which gives a good overview of the issues: “Release: Amazon’s National Contract to Supply Local Governments Puts Cities and Schools at Risk, ILSR Report Finds“ Finally, in the last section of this podcast, all three participants discuss a recent example of monopoly power. Olivia gives a personal anecdote about airlines (see this explainer for more information), and Nick and Stacy reference these news stories: Whole Foods’ new limits may squeeze small suppliers by Sam Bloch, The New Food Economy These 11 Companies Control Everything About the Fourth of July by Claire Kelloway, Vice Transcript Nick Stumo-Langer: Hello and welcome to episode 50, that’s right, five zero, of the Building Local Power podcast from the Institute of Local Self-Reliance. I’m Nick Stumo-Langer your ILSR communication manager. We have a really interesting podcast for you this week featuring most of our community scaled economy team. Today is a frequent topic. We talk about Amazon a lot on this podcast. You can go back to episode six where we discussed a giant, comprehensive report on Amazon as well as episode 28 of this podcast feed where we talked about Amazon’s acquisition of Whole Foods. But this episode’s a little bit different. We’re going to be talking about some original research that we’ve done into a widely under-reported phenomenon about Amazon’s relationship with local procurement and some of the hidden things that they’re doing in our economy. Before we get started I will introduce our two guests today. Stacy Mitchell is the frequent host of this very podcast and is the Co-Director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and the director of our independent business work. How’s it going, Stacy? Stacy Mitchell: Good. Nice to be with you, Nick. Nick Stumo-Langer: And Olivia LaVecchia is a research associate and an excellent writer on all things...

L-R: Christopher Mitchell, Stacy Mitchell, and John Farrell If you’ve been a fan of our site for any amount of time, you might have noticed that we feature a number of policies and projects from Vermont as paradigms of local self-reliance. That’s why we had three of our policy experts sit down and discuss what is going right in the Green Mountain State. How did Vermont come to have more small businesses and fewer big-box stores per capita than any other state? Why does it have a much higher rate of rooftop solar installation than many sunnier regions? And how has Vermont become a leader in developing community-based Internet access solutions? In this episode of the Building Local Power podcast, host and Community Broadband Networks initiative director Christopher Mitchell sits down with co-director and Community-Scaled Economy initiative director Stacy Mitchell and Energy Democracy initiative director John Farrell to answer those questions. The three all note the high level of civic engagement in Vermont and the way that it contributes to an environment conducive to strong local economies. “[T]his has been bottom up and it’s not that there’s something magical about [Vermont’s] state government being enlightened so much as it is that citizens have really driven this process… It speaks to the importance of hands-on democracy and the role that we all have in that,” argues Stacy Mitchell of the myriad pro-local economy policies happening in the Green Mountain State. Related Resources Throughout the conversation, Stacy, John, and Chris all mention research and reporting on the exciting ways that Vermont is enabling local self-reliance: Vermont’s Act 250 Policy — This policy, which Stacy mentions as enabling responsible economic development, ensures local and regional review for any large-scale development project. Are Lightly Regulated States Really More Friendly to Small Businesses? — Our 2012 takedown of a popular ranking of “business friendliness,” complete with maps! Shining Cities 2018: How Smart Local Policies Are Expanding Solar Power in America, Environment America — The Burlington metropolitan area gets some love in this report from Environment America for how much rooftop solar capacity per capita there is. The 2018 Community Power State Scorecard — In the recent update to our Community Power Map, we pulled the information for all of the states at how best they enable local renewable energy. Vermont’s score is referenced in this conversation. Podcast: Why Local Self-Reliance (Episode 22) — David Morris talks with Christopher Mitchell, Director of ILSR’s Community Broadband Networks initiative about why the message of local self-reliance is as relevant today as it was when ILSR opened its doors in 1974. This wide-ranging conversation examines the rising concentration of economic power and cities’ responses. Local Energy Rules: Mountains Beyond Mountains: How Green Mountain Power Became More Than An Electric Utility — John interviews Green Mountain Power’s CEO Mary Powell about why the utility has moved to a benefit corporation structure that ensures that their investments benefit the local economy. MuniNetworks.org Tag: Vermont — As Christopher mentions, MuniNetworks.org’s coverage of all the different projects in Vermont are covered very well on our blog including the history of Burlington Telecom, EC Fiber, and a number of small-scale Internet access projects. Reading & Watching Recommendations The group recommend a number of items for our audience, including: Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America by Nancy MacLean, available at your local independent bookstore from IndieBound. Stacy also recommends a talk at the University of Southern Maine regarding Democracy in Chains from the author, Nancy MacLean. Embedded below: Christopher recommends both the book series and Netflix show, Altered Carbon. Book series available at your local independent bookstore from Indie...

If unemployment is so low, why aren’t workers getting cut in on the deal? That’s a question that our guest, economist Marshall Steinbaum, has been trying to answer. In a new study, which was featured in the New York Times, Steinbaum and his co-authors find that one of the main reasons that wages have not kept pace is that most local labor markets are highly concentrated. Only a few companies are hiring and, as a result, these dominant firms have the power to set wages below the rate that people would earn in a more competitive labor market. (The technical term for this is “monopsony,” a close cousin of monopoly, which refers to a situation in which a buyer — of labor, in this case — has the power to dictate the price.) Steinbaum, who’s Research Director at the Roosevelt Institute, joins Building Local Power host and ILSR co-director Stacy Mitchell to discuss his research and how elected officials can fix the broken market for labor. “Antitrust can do a lot in the labor market to make it more competitive, and it’s absolutely appropriate to talk about things like merger review on the basis of labor market definition, and [to] take wage reduction seriously as a potential threat of anti-competitive conduct,” says Marshall Steinbaum. Photo Courtesy of Roosevelt Institute “But antitrust alone cannot solve the labor market’s problems, and specifically the wage-setting power of employers or just employer power more generally. This is why historically we have had labor market regulations, why we have protections for collective bargaining, because we recognize that the employer/employee relationship is inherently one of unequal power.” Reading Recommendations Our guest, Marshall Steinbaum, provided a book recommendation, and we’ll also share some of his original research: “Social Control of Business, 1939 Edition” by John Maurice Clark, available on Google Books Why Is Pay Lagging? Maybe Too Many Mergers in the Heartland by Noam Scheiber and Ben Casselman, New York Times “Concentration in US Labor Markets: Evidence from Online Vacancy Data,” by José Azar (University of Navarra, IESE Business School), Ioana Elena Marinescu (University of Pennsylvania – School of Social Policy & Practice; National Bureau of Economic Research), Marshall Steinbaum (Roosevelt Institute), & Bledi Taska (Burning Glass Technologies) “Labor Market Concentration,” by José Azar (University of Navarra, IESE Business School), Ioana Elena Marinescu (University of Pennsylvania – School of Social Policy & Practice; National Bureau of Economic Research), & Marshall Steinbaum (Roosevelt Institute) Map courtesy of The Roosevelt Institute with this caption: “A map of the average concentration of the 200 occupations that appear most frequently in the Burning Glass data, by Commuting Zone.”   Related Resources 6 Ways to Rein in Today’s Monopolies — Monopolies are strangling competition and cutting off opportunity. In this feature for The Nation, we show how to stop them. The New Brandeis Movement: America’s Antimonopoly Debate — This article by Lina Khan in the Journal of European Competition Law & Practice details the work that a coalition of academics, policymakers, and thought leaders have done to change the conversation about monopoly in America. Listen: Stacy Mitchell on “We the Podcast” with Rep. Keith Ellison and Lina Khan — Taking on Amazon. It’s a big subject. But in this episode of Rep. Keith Ellison’s podcast, “We the Podcast,” ILSR’s Stacy Mitchell and Lina Khan of Open Markets join Rep. Ellison to talk about how to do just that — and why we need to. The three also discuss how Amazon is part of a trend of market concentration more broadly, and what that means for the middle class and communities. Report: Monopoly Power and the Decline of Small Business — This report from ILSR’s Stacy Mitchell details how the United States is much less a nation of entrepreneurs than it was a generation ago. It suggests that the decline of small businesses is owed,

The latest Building Local Power podcast episode features a discussion between ILSR initiative director Christopher Mitchell and co-director Stacy Mitchell on the Amazon-Whole Foods deal. The conversation features a number of issues, including why Amazon’s growth isn’t that innovative after all due to their market power as a crushing force for consolidation. Much of the conversation is an extension of our Amazon’s Stranglehold report, co-authored by Stacy and ILSR researcher Olivia LaVecchia. Amazon’s role as a marketplace, a distributor, and as a producer of items paired with their ability to sell below cost marks it as a formidable force of consolidation in the American economy. As Stacy says, “concentration begets concentration.” Can another company come along and unseat them? I think it’s pretty remarkable that it’s now been quite a few years since we’ve seen an internet company come along and change things. Facebook, Google, Apple, Amazon, those guys are getting pretty old at this point, and there is no new entity that has come along, in part, because if one gets to be too successful, one of those big companies either pushes it out of the market in a predatory way, or they buy it up. How is it that we’re going to see a new competitor come along and challenge Amazon? Transcript Christopher Mitchell: Hey, Stacy. Stacy Mitchell: Hey, Chris, how are you? Christopher Mitchell: Hey, I’m doing pretty good. I’m curious if you have a number for us for this week. Stacy Mitchell: It’s 465. Christopher Mitchell: 465, what is that? Stacy Mitchell: That’s the number of Whole Foods stores that are now owned by Amazon. Christopher Mitchell: Yes, and we can say “now owned” because we waited a little bit to get a sense of what was happening before doing the show rather than just rushing in like other people. This week we’re going to be talking about Amazon’s acquisition of Whole Foods and some more monopoly power type stuff. Stacey is the famous Stacey Mitchell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance out in Portland, Maine. I am Chris, the less-famous Mitchell of the Minnesota office. I work on broadband issues. Stacey works on independent businesses, and we’re a part of the team here at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance that’s fighting to build local power to make sure that communities are strong, and that we’re all happy to wake up tomorrow morning. I think that’s kind of a good summary. Stacy Mitchell: That’s right. Christopher Mitchell: Let’s talk about Amazon, let’s just maybe some basic facts to refresh people’s memories and maybe people just heard about it without really getting into it. What exactly happened? To be clear, this is Amazon. It’s not Jeff Bezos personally, as in the acquisition of Washington Post. I think those are important distinction. Stacy Mitchell: That’s right. Back in mid-June Amazon announced its intention to acquire Whole Foods, the chain of natural foods grocery stores. Just about six weeks later it was quietly approved by the Federal Trade Commission, or the FTC. It was approved with lightning speed in what we can only assume was a fairly cursory review of the issues. This is despite the fact that a lot of people, including people in the food industry, folks like us who study concentrated market power, legal scholars, members of Congress, a lot of folks had raised serious concerns about this merger. Yet, it appears that the FTC approved it rather quickly and didn’t take a deep look at what those issues are. Christopher Mitchell: You say “appears”, this is an interesting point that goes along with the speed, which is that we don’t really know because, what’d they issue, three sentences in terms of their decision? Stacy Mitchell: Yeah, it’s really remarkable the lack of transparency. Yeah, it was a total of three very basic sentences in their statement that said that this merger had been approved. There’s no further explanation in terms of how they chose to look at this deal,...

In this episode of Building Local Power, host Christopher Mitchell, of our Community Broadband Networks initiative, interviews ILSR co-founder David Morris about the history of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and why the message of local self-reliance is as relevant today as it was in the 1970s. This wide-ranging conversation takes in the role that new communications technology is facilitating concentration and how cities are rising to the moment by exerting their own power. No matter whether you’re a conservative or a radical, you hate your utility company, and you hate your utility company because it’s a monopoly, and it’s remote, and it’s not responsive, and for a whole bunch of reasons. So when you’re starting to talk about energy that can be harnessed at the local level, and the rooftop level, and the neighborhood level, and the metropolitan level, people are extremely enthusiastic. That cuts across ideologies, and it’s that political, I think, as well as environmental dynamic that’s the most important of all. — David Morris Reading Recommendations Get caught up with the latest work from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance on fighting monopoly power across a variety of sectors: From Christopher Mitchell: Available here: https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/2011/10/benkler. From David Morris: Available here: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/51306.Mutual_Aid. Transcript Christopher Mitchell: David, when I tell people that I work for the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, they’ll often say, “Who could be against that?” So let me ask you, in 43 years of experience, who is against local self-reliance? David Morris: Well, in one respect, no one’s against local self-reliance if you define it as communities, you define it as mutual aid, you define it as self-help, so in that sense, both conservatives and liberals and radicals are all in favor of local self-reliance, but if you define it as the exercise of collective authority at the local level in order to make rules that can establish a firm wealth-producing economy, then you do tend to get a difference of opinion. Christopher Mitchell: You start to make enemies. David Morris: You start to make enemies. Conservatives are all for decentralization of political authority, as long as it’s not an exercise of political authority. Liberals would like a centralization or have, traditionally until very recently, wanted the federal government to exercise significant authority because they thought communities were parochial and racist and xenophobic, so both of them subscribe to the concept of local self-reliance, but they are very different when you’re talking about the exercise of authority and power. Christopher Mitchell: And this is what we’re going to be talking about today, local self-reliance, what does it mean? Where does it come from? Where are we going? Those sorts of things. I’m Chris Mitchell with the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. I direct our broadband work, and David Morris, one of the co-founders of the organization is back with us for, I believe, a third episode of Building Local Power. David Morris: Thanks, Chris, for having me on for a third episode. Christopher Mitchell: Well, many more are on the way, I have no doubt. So let’s explore this, and maybe we’ll start at the beginning, a time in which there was a polarizing president, discussion of horrible corruption at the federal level, a president under attack, 1974, not the modern era, so you get together with a couple of friends and decide you’re going to create the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. What did you have in mind, in terms of what was the idea of what local self-reliance meant then? David Morris: Well, local self-reliance in 1974 and in 2017 means a focus on cities, and a focus on cities for a number of different reasons. One is that historically, cities are the basis of innovation. That goes back hundreds and even a thousand years.

Welcome to episode thirteen of the Building Local Power podcast. In this episode, Christopher Mitchell, the director of ILSR’s Community Broadband Networks initiative, interviews Stacy Mitchell, co-director of the ILSR and director of the Community-Scaled Economies initiative. The two discuss the environment for small businesses in the United States, especially noting the fact that the rate of small business creation is at one of its lowest rates since the early 1970s. Additionally, Stacy and Chris talk about how the issue of small businesses and incentivizing their creation is a bipartisan issue that greatly benefits local economies. “The economy has grown very concentrated, in a lot of industries, there are just two or three huge firms that control most of the market,” says Stacy Mitchell of the current dismal rate of small business creation. “There’s evidence that [these firms] use that power to actually exclude and block smaller businesses from being able to get to market, to have a fair opportunity to compete.”   Related Resources For the report that Stacy referred to this week, check out our report, Monopoly Power and the Decline of Small Business from August 2016. Report: Monopoly Power and the Decline of Small Business Reading Recommendations From Stacy: Yale Law Review Journal’s “Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox” by Lina Khan   The Economic Innovation Group’s “Dynamism in Retreat: Consequences for Regions, Markets, and Workers“                             From Chris: “Anansi Boys” by Neil Gaiman Available from an independent retailer here: http://www.neilgaiman.com/works/Books/Anansi+Boys/. Transcript Chris Mitchell: Hey, Stacy. I hear that Americans aren’t creating new businesses anymore. What’s going on? Stacy Mitchell: The rate of new startup businesses in this country is half of what it was in the late 1970’s. We think of ourselves as a nation of startups, but we really aren’t anymore. Chris Mitchell: Well, that’s actually pretty disturbing that it’s late 1970’s, because that was when I was born, but also, I associate it with a period of economic stagnation in fact. Stacy Mitchell: Exactly. There are a lot of ways in which I think today’s economy creates this kind of illusion of dynamism and competition, when in fact if we peel back and look a little closer, there’s much less competition than there used to be. It’s harder and harder for ordinary Americans to start and grow a business. Chris Mitchell: It’s very disturbing. That’s what we’re going to be talking about for this show. You just heard the voice of Stacy Mitchell with our Independent Business Program at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. She’s coming out of Portland, Maine. I’m Chris Mitchell in Minneapolis. I work on our broadband work. Today, we’re going to be talking about basically what’s hurting local business and small business formation. Let me just ask you to remember to rate our program, the Building Local Power podcast, on iTunes or wherever you find it. Tell your friends to blog, tweet, do Facebook posts, tumble with it. Do whatever you need to do to get the message out there, please, to share this discuss. Now, Stacy. Let’s get back into this. Why aren’t new firms being created? Stacy Mitchell: Well, there’s one reason that a lot of people are looking at, which is that the economy has grown very concentrated. That is that in a lot of industries, there are just two or three huge firms that control most of the market, and there’s evidence that they use that power to actually exclude and block smaller businesses from being able to get to market, to having a fair opportunity to compete. We’ve seen this in lots of different industries where we see big businesses doing this and just making it harder for small businesses to actually get their products to market or be able to compete. Chris Mitchell: Stacy, you wrote a paper that was published last summer, “Monopoly Power and the Decline of Small Business: The Case for Restoring...

Welcome to episode six of the Building Local Power podcast. In this episode, Chris Mitchell, the director of our Community Broadband Networks initiative, interviews Stacy Mitchell (no relation) ILSR Co-Director and Senior Researcher for the Community-Scaled Economies initiative about their latest report: Amazon’s Stranglehold: How the Company’s Tightening Grip is Stifling Competition, Eroding Jobs, and Threatening Communities. Mitchell details the main points from the recent report including the startling fact that nearly $1 of every $2 spent online are spent on Amazon. Chris and Stacy discuss how Amazon’s impact is not only being felt by other online retailers, but it’s growing stranglehold over manufacturing, shipping and receiving, and online retail platform is harming workers, local communities, and the general health of our country’s economy. Read the report here: New Report: How Amazon’s Tightening Grip on the Economy Is Stifling Competition, Eroding Jobs, and Threatening Communities It has become the gatekeeper to online commerce,” says Mitchell of Amazon’s overwhelming online market dominance. “All these other business all have to play by Amazon’s rules, they all have to be dictated to by Amazon. Related Resource Here’s an image from the report, detailing Amazon’s growing monolithic presence: For more information on the issues that Stacy and Chris discussed, read the Amazon report here. You can follow the work of our Community-Scaled Economy initiative by following Olivia LaVecchia and Stacy Mitchell. Transcript Stacy Mitchell: It has become the gatekeeper to online commerce and so all these other businesses all have to play by Amazon’s rules. They all now have to be dictated to by Amazon.   Chris Mitchell: Stacy, welcome to Building Local Power.   Stacy Mitchell: It’s great to be here. Thanks, Chris.   Chris Mitchell: I’ve been really, really, really excited to talk with you about Amazon in this report. It builds on what Olivia and I had spoken about in what I think was the first episode of Building Local Power. It’s right before Black Friday which is to say it’s right before Thanksgiving, the best holiday. As you can tell from my voice, I’m very enthusiastic.   Stacy Mitchell: That’s great. We are too. We’re eager to release this big piece of research.   Chris Mitchell: Yeah, we’re going to talk about Amazon today and particularly about your program’s reaction to Amazon and trying to get people to wrestle with what Amazon is. Stacy, remind us who you are.   Stacy Mitchell: Well, I’m Stacy Mitchell and I direct the community scaled economy initiative at ILSR.   Chris Mitchell: I’m Chris Mitchell, the second Mitchell at ILSR, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. With no relation. We don’t have any family overlap from what we can tell although we both shop at the Redding Outlet Stores in our youth in Pennsylvania which was a pretty odd coincidence.   Stacy Mitchell: That’s right.   Chris Mitchell: I run the community broadband networks program here. I’ve been the host so far on this Building Local Power where we focus on local businesses, local approaches to making sure that we have political and economic power at home. Stacy, one other thing I wanted to mention, you wrote Big Box Window, a book that at this point is totally irrelevant, right?   Stacy Mitchell: Well, I wouldn’t go that far. But Big Box Window really charge the rise of big retailers and retailers as the power players in our economy. Amazon is a new iteration of that and in many ways, much more alarming, I would argue, iteration of that. It’s an extension of Walmart. Big Box Window is the foundation for what we’re now talking about in some ways.   Chris Mitchell: We’re going to be talking about this report on Amazon that you’ve just released, just releasing two days ago from [inaudible 02:22] podcast there so people can go to ILSR.org to read. One of the things that first hit me was half of all Americans are members of A...

Welcome to the fourth episode of the Building Local Power podcast. In this episode, Chris Mitchell, the director of our Community Broadband Networks initiative, interviews David Morris, the co-founder of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and the director of the Public Good initiative about the history behind North Dakota’s Non-Partisan League. In this podcast, Morris goes into detail on the League’s political influence and how their policies set North Dakota on a trajectory of local ownership and a tradition of fighting concentrated economic power. He also notes that North Dakotans are still fending off challenges from major banks and pharmaceutical chains, and that the tradition of local ownership is strong throughout the state. “This is an example of effective organizing that had an impact,” says Morris. “There are much more examples of that than there are top-down, ‘somebody created a great idea somewhere in Congress or the White House’ and they implemented it. It’s almost always pressure from the grassroots level that moves us forward.” For more information on the issues that David and Chris discussed, read his piece on the Non-Partisan League: How to Make a Political Revolution, and our report on North Dakota’s independent pharmacy law: North Dakota’s Pharmacy Ownership Law Leads to Better Pharmacy Care. If you missed the first couple episodes of our podcast you can find those conversations with Olivia LaVecchia here, Neil Seldman here, and John Farrell here. Also to see all of our episodes make sure to bookmark our Building Local Power Podcast Homepage. Transcript David Morris: This was an investment that they were making. It wasn’t a contribution to the betterment of the world. This was a personal investment.   Chris Mitchell: What are you going to have for lunch?   David Morris: I don’t know what I’m going to have for lunch. Probably a caesar salad, but I may splurge and have a hamburger, I have to ponder that.   Chris Mitchell: Today, I’m excited to be talking to David Morris, the co-founder of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. The guy who makes us all honest, in the office, otherwise I would be totally dishonest without your presence, I have to admit. Welcome to Building Local Power.   David Morris: Thank you, Chris, and thanks for the introduction.   Chris Mitchell: No problem. I just wanted to say that for people who are not familiar with the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, it’s almost forty-three years, now. You’re a co-founder of it. I’m Chris Mitchell, I run the internet related work for the Institute. When I started here almost ten years ago, I didn’t really have a sense of what it would be like to work in an environment like this, but I am very impressed with how seriously you take empirical research, and the truth over just ideology. It’s something that I’ve been inspired by.   David Morris: Thank you. I believe in evidence based ideology.   Chris Mitchell: Right. Today, we’re going to talk, it’s election season. We’re going to talk today about this populist uprising in North Dakota, and the reason that I find it very interesting is not just that it’s led to almost a hundred years of change, and set the tone for North Dakota, but that people don’t really know about it. Stacy Mitchell, one of our colleagues, incredible mind, here, she believes that the reason people aren’t familiar with it is that liberals don’t want to talk about North Dakota, and that conservatives don’t like the reforms, because they involve the government doing good things. That’s why we’re going to talk about it. What is your interest in talking about this? How would you describe it?   David Morris: My interest is that it came out of a certain period of American history, which in some ways is being repeated, in some ways it’s not, because it was a hundred and twenty years ago, but nevertheless, it was a time where people were not only concerned about inequality, but were tackling it,