Speaking from the site of one of Sustainergy’s solar installation projects, Flequer Vera says we think of worker co-ops as being good for the community (and they are!). But that worker co-ops are also very efficient businesses. Sustainergy’s strategy of pairing energy-efficient insulation with solar installs also means savings for their clients, because they can purchase a smaller solar array! Efficiency abounds. Check it out.
Renting Partnerships!
Carol Smith explains Renting Partnerships’ innovative model, which stabilizes rent AND helps residents build wealth at the same time. Potential residents have started meeting to organize a second building - located right next door to their first property!
Queen City Commons!
Queen City Commons is bringing composting service to both residential and commercial clients, along with a healthy dose of respect for the Co-op Cincy ecosystem. Listen to Queen City founder Marie Hopkins talk about the deep respect between individuals in all of our co-ops.
Cincy Cleaning Cooperative
Araceli Ortiz was working in social services when she realized that the biggest need in her community was good, stable jobs. Now a group of experienced cleaners has formed the Cincy Cleaning Co-op, and they’re expanding to new neighborhoods!
The NEW statewide network we’re building with the Ohio Employee Ownership Center and Co-op Dayton will make it easier for this to happen around the state. Please vote for us to hire a statewide organizer here!
Our Harvest Cooperative
Our Harvest Cooperative has been sustaining worker-owners like Food Hub Coordinator Zeke Coleman for the last 8 years, and now they’re mentoring new workers from Cincinnati, Bhutan and Nepal.
Help us grow more co-ops like this across our state, in partnership with Co-op Dayton and the Ohio Employee Ownership Center. Vote ➡️g.co/OhioChallenge
Careshare Childcare Cooperative
Our Ohio cooperatives help people to shape the world they want to see. CareShare Cooperative is a prime example. CareShare co-founder Ellen Vera is speaking to members of the U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives and the New Economy Coalition about this exciting co-op model this afternoon.
We’re also creating a statewide network, with the deep expertise of the Ohio Employee Ownership Center and Co-op Dayton!
A touch of TLC Homecare Cooperative
“In the 3 months since we started working with Co-op Cincy, we've made more progress than we did in the last year and a half on our own.”
-- Victoria Russell, worker-owner at A Touch of TLC
Check out the powerhouse women of our newest worker co-op, A Touch of TLC Home Health Care.
Check out our 2019 annual report
A Touch of TLC Home Health Care Services
We're happy to introduce Cincinnati's newest worker co-op!
Co-founder Victoria Russel says, "I'm launching a worker-owned home care co-op with four of my friends. Co-op Cincy's help has been invaluable. In the three months since we started working with Co-op Cincy, we've made more progress than we had in the last year and a half on our own. The co-op model of shared risk and reward, and shared ownership, just makes sense to us. It's how we tended to do things even before we knew what co-ops were."
Excitingly, their first client is one of Co-op Cincy's co-founders, Phil Almadon, who continues to skillfully navigate Parkinson's disease. Phil says, "One of the most important things about taking care of someone with a disability is respecting who the person is outside of the disability. In my case, how I was before I became disabled. Victoria has a real clear picture of what a respectful connection is. She has been helpful to me and very respectful of who I am. I'm grateful for the help. She helps me keep my apartment clean and caught up. She makes my life easier. I don't trip as often. I would heartily recommend A Touch of TLC."
Call 513-580-9520 or email ATouchOfTLCHealthCare@gmail.com for your free in-home consultation.
Ramping up with even more healthy local food
What a lesson this Spring was! We all saw first-hand how important local produce and other local foods are to the health of our community. After pivoting to a smaller number of outdoor-only pick-up sites, when most indoor pick-up locations closed this Spring, Our Harvest Cooperative has now increased access to local organic produce by more than doubling.
Retaining at-risk businesses
We are reaching out to local business owners who may choose not to re-open in the wake of COVID-19. Business owners who are nearing retirement may find the challenges of re-opening under changed conditions to be too daunting. However, they may be able to preserve their legacy and save their employees’ jobs by transitioning their businesses to employee ownership. We will work to educate the local small business community around this option, during this critical period of time.
Small-scale child care is more important than ever
CareShare is expanding the successful “nanny share” pilot program. At a time when most daycares have been forced to close or scale back considerably and many are in danger of shutting down completely, parents need creative child care solutions like CareShare more than ever.
Refugee-owned grocery delivery in a food desert
One of our most exciting responses is the pivot that the group of Bhutanese refugees have come up with! Besides reconnecting to their agricultural roots out at the farm, with Our Harvest Cooperative, this dynamic group is stepping up to fill a need in their community. Mount Airy--home to over 500 Bhutanese families--became a food desert when the neighborhood’s Kroger store closed last March. Now a group of 10-12 Bhutanese refugees are developing a new grocery delivery service to fill this need!
Deep breath
Dear Co-op Cincy Community,
This is going to be another newsletter that’s a little different than our normal format. We promise to get back to sharing updates about the amazing work our co-ops are doing—including pivots to address COVID-19—soon.
For now, we need to pause to respect not just our deep, deep pain, but also the incredible organizing happening in the Movement for Black Lives all over the country, and especially in Minneapolis, where George Floyd died at the hands of the police.
We also believe very strongly that the organizers in this movement have opened up an opportunity that we cannot afford to miss, and we want to heed their urgent calls to action. In just one week, we saw four major victories in the fight for Justice for George Floyd: the arrest of police officer Derek Chauvin, the removal of Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman and assignment of Attorney General Keith Ellison to the case, yesterday’s vote by the Minneapolis Public Schools to cut their contract with the Minneapolis Police Department, and yesterday’s announcement that AG Ellison is elevating the charges and holding all four officers accountable.
In the coming weeks, we have an opportunity to channel our collective rage and heartbreak into real, tangible change, with lasting impact for years to come. That’s why we’re putting our usual newsletter on pause—and pieces of our usual work, as well.
We know that many of you are doing the same.
If you can create any more space in your day, in your evening, or in your heart, to support the Movement for Black Lives, please do.
If you can push yourself to make phone calls, donations or take risks you haven’t before, please do. It is inspiring to see that several leading organizations in Minneapolis have started redirecting donations to other organizations, to build out a robust ecosystem. You can find the latest updates to this list at bit.ly/fundthecommunity.
Late last week, Minneapolis NAACP President Leslie Redmond said, “What you’re witnessing in Minnesota is something that’s been a long time coming. I can’t tell you how many governors I’ve sat down with, how many mayors we’ve sat down with. And we’ve warned them that you keep murdering black people, the city will burn. We have stopped the city from burning numerous times, and we are not responsible for it burning now.”
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar explained further in his L.A. Times op-ed, “Don’t understand the protests? What you’re seeing is people pushed to the edge.” To say the fires hurt the Movement for Black Lives, Abdul-Jabbar says, “You’re not wrong—but you’re not right, either.”
But it wasn’t long at all before long-time activists for Black Lives, like Hennepin County Commissioner Angela Conley started reporting from the ground that violence and arson was being committed much more widely by white supremacists.
Minneapolis residents quickly banded together to organize community-driven fire response teams, and organized all-night watches on the level of their neighborhood, their block and their house or apartment building. This while also organizing the massive outpouring of donations of food and diapers all across the city—where residents don’t have access to grocery stores at this time. And continuing to show up and show out in the streets. The movement in Minneapolis is an incredible show of solidarity, intersectionality, interconnectedness and community care. This is part of the vision we have for our networked community of co-ops in Cincinnati, and for co-op networks around the country.
For more up-to-date information and calls to action from Minneapolis, you can follow the Black Visions Collective on Instagram, Facebook or Twitter. For national calls to action, follow the Movement for Black Lives. Here in Cincinnati, we suggest looking to the leadership of organizations like the NAACP, the Community Economic Advancement Initiative (CEAI) and donating to organizations like Mortar, which is building out an ecosystem of black-owned businesses. If you work in philanthropy, you may be inspired by the ways Rodney Foxworth of Common Future is leveraging his experience as a black man in the U.S. to develop a radically different way to resource our communities. If you don’t find a way to tap in there, you can check out this long-term, broad list of steps for white allies, written a few years ago. Some of these are relevant for all of us. Another opportunity is to take action for meaningful police reform in partnership with the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and 400 organizations.
For now, we’ll leave you with this 2015 vision poem, a true gift to us all, from Minneapolis author, artist and activist Junauda Petrus-Nasah.
--Mari Mancini,
Director of Communications and Strategy at Co-op Cincy
with the support of all the hearts and minds on the team
Could we please give the police departments
to the grandmothers ?!!!
The elders, healers, lovers and sweeteners?
Poem by Junauda
Could we please give the police departments to the grandmothers? Give them the salaries and the pensions and the city vehicles, but make them a fleet of vintage corvettes, jaguars and cadillacs, with white leather interior. Diamond in the back, sunroof top and digging the scene with the gangsta lean.
Let the cars be badass!
You would hear the old school jams like Patti Labelle, Anita Baker and Al Green. You would hear Sweet Honey in the Rock harmonizing on “We who believe in freedom will not rest” bumping out the speakers.
And they got the booming system.
If you up to mischief, they will pick you up swiftly in their sweet ride and look at you until you catch shame and look down at your lap. She asks you if you are hungry and you say “yes” and of course you are. She got a crown of dreadlocks and on the dashboard you see brown faces like yours, shea buttered and loved up.
And there are no precincts.
Just love temples, that got spaces to meditate and eat delicious food. Mangoes, blueberries, nectarines, cornbread, peas and rice, fried plantain, fufu, yams, greens, okra, pecan pie, salad and lemonade.
Things that make your mouth water and soul arrive.
All the hungry bellies know warmth, all the children expect love. The grandmas help you with homework, practice yoga with you and teach you how to make jambalaya and coconut cake. From scratch.
When your sleepy she will start humming and rub your back while you drift off. A song that she used to have the record of when she was your age. She remembers how it felt like to be you and be young and not know the world that good. Grandma is a sacred child herself, who just circled the sun enough times into the ripeness of her cronehood.
She wants your life to be sweeter.
When you are wildin’ out because your heart is broke or you don’t have what you need the grandmas take your hand and lead you to their gardens. You can lay down amongst the flowers. Her grasses, roses, dahlias, irises, lilies, collards, kale, eggplants, blackberries. She wants you know that you are safe and protected, universal limitless, sacred, sensual, divine and free.
Grandma is the original warrior, wild since birth, comfortable in loving fiercely. She has fought so that you don’t have to, not in the same ways at least.
So give the police departments to the grandmas, they are fearless, classy and actualized. Blossomed from love. They wear what they want and say what they please.
Believe that.
There wouldn’t be noise citations when the grandmas ride through our streets, blasting Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone, Marvin Gaye, Alice Coltrane, Jimi Hendrix, KRS-One. All that good music. The kids gonna hula hoop to it and sell her lemonade made from heirloom pink lemons and maple syrup. The car is solar powered and carbon footprint-less, the grandmas designed the technology themselves.
At night they park the cars in a circle so all can sit in them with the sun roofs down, and look at the stars, talk about astrological signs, what to plant tomorrow based on the moon’s mood and help you memorize Audre Lorde and James Baldwin quotes. She always looks you in the eye and acknowledges the light in you with no hesitation or fear. And grandma loves you fiercely forever.
She sees the pain in our bravado, the confusion in our anger, the depth behind our coldness. Grandma know what oppression has done to our souls and is gonna change it one love temple at a time. She has no fear.
Beauty, clarity, and possibility in these trying times
Dear Co-op Cincy Community,
With COVID-19, the status quo is gone. We are in new times. What happens when the world as we know it stops?
Beauty is revealed. Horrors exposed. Values are clarified. New possibilities open up.
Beauty
Love and solidarity are breaking out in communities everywhere - from people organizing mutual aid, to participating in efforts to make masks or PPE, to those stepping up to meet the needs of our most vulnerable neighbors including those without homes and those without documents.
The Earth is getting a breather. The air is cleaner. Pollution in some cities is down by 60%! Greenhouse gas emissions are way down.
Our deep interconnectedness is made visible. We affect one another profoundly. Something we can't ignore as we grapple with this virus worldwide.
Clarity
Deep structural inequalities exposed. So much disease, death, fear, misinformation. So many of us are living paycheck to paycheck. So much economic pain. So many broken systems, so many people left out, struggling to meet basic needs.
The importance of health, connection, love, and relationships comes into focus.
The dignity of work as well as the importance of frontline workers. An awareness has emerged about how critical frontline workers are - people who clean and disinfect, provide transportation, provide groceries, ship and deliver goods, farm, work in food processing, people who take care of and teach our kids, care for our elders, care for our sick.
The importance of resilient, local economies, economies where communities and workers have a voice--economies that can meet people's needs.
The opportunity to create better systems that serve the needs of all.
Possibility
When the status quo dissolves, new openings emerge. How can we shift to a more resilient economy that works for all?
To nurture our vision and help shift things, David Korten writes, From Emergency to Emergence. George Lakey shows how mainstream publications are calling for systems change and invites us to help push that momentum forward.
What is this moment calling from us?
How can we help nurture a more humane, thriving community to emerge?
How do we stay grounded and healthy as we navigate this time?
These are the questions we are pondering at Co-op Cincy at this time.
We are finding that--in so so many ways--our union co-op network is just what's needed to meet this moment. We're also thinking about ways that we can strengthen our co-ops and our network to be even more prepared for future emergent moments, particularly as they affect the most vulnerable among us.
How about you?
Feel free to reply to this email. We'd love to hear where your minds and hearts are at this time.
Kristen and the Co-op Cincy Team
Solidarity in a Time of Social Distancing
To our Cincy Co-op Community,
The COVID- 19 outbreak is proving to be a huge economic and social challenge for our community, so it’s helpful to remember that our vision for building a network of worker owned businesses, was created 60+ years ago under the economic, social stress and aftermath of the Spanish Civil War.
It is in times of crisis like this, that you truly realize the power of solidarity. Solidarity is living from an awareness that our lives and futures are all tied together. We all do better when we all do better. So, we want to share with you a few ways, as part of this community, we are all helping to support one another and ways you can support each other to ensure our community is made stronger by this crisis.
Solidarity in Action
Ensuring Access to Healthy, Local Food
Our Harvest is putting a plan together to be able to offer drive thru pick up veggies at the Bahr Farm and Incubator Kitchen Collective.
Our Harvest and their customers are also stepping up donations of healthy produce to CAIN’s Rainbow Pantry which is seeing higher demand in these coronavirus days.
Supporting One Another
Last weekend, the team at Sustainergy, our energy efficiency and renewable energy co-op, came together for a full workday to help another co-op team in need.
Multiple Co-ops and members of the co-op community are pitching in to help raise money for a Sustainergy worker who had a serious accident while working with kids.
In a time when child care can be extremely difficult, CareShare, our child care co-op is exploring ways it can help facilitate Childcare swaps - Please like their Facebook page to be kept up-to-date with the latest information.
Cincy Cleaning Co-op is offering deep cleaning services for households to help alleviate that burden for families occupied with other issues during this crisis.
Easing Economic Dislocation
Seed Commons Financial Cooperative, of which Co-op Cincy is a member, has launched a GoFundMe page, Seed Commons Worker Response Fund, with a goal of helping co-op workers who can’t work due to coronavirus have the economic resources to weather the storm.
There are also emergency low interest loans available through Shared Capital Cooperative for more info contact info@sharedcapital.coop.
Helpful Resources
Free internet access for 60 days to households with K-12 and college students. See details here. How utility, phone, and internet companies are giving consumers a break
Evictions are suspended in Hamilton County for next 30 days
Duke Energy and Cincinnati Water works are suspending all disconnections and shut-offs for the time being
Unemployment is available to those being quarantined without any waiting period or those in bars and restaurants. Click Click Here to Apply
Click here for a full list of Community Resources during COVID-19 including Mental Health resources, educational resources, info about food distribution.
Some Inspiration and some fun
Everyday Actions We Can All Take to Help
Minimize Risk: Minimize your risk and the risk to those who are most vulnerable.
Take Care of Each Other: Look for ways you can help neighbors, co-workers, other members of the community who may have greater challenges than you at this time. Some opportunities include:
Joining Mutual Aid SW Ohio facebook group
If you need help or can give help, you can fill out the Mutual Aid Cincy SW Ohio form
Many neighborhoods have Facebook or Nextdoor groups where neighbors are asking/offering support
Walk around the block and check in on neighbors. Consider leaving a note!
Support co-op workers who are laid-off. Consider contributing to the Seed Commons Worker Response Fund
Support Local: Continue to support local businesses to ensure they survive and ensure your dollars stay in our community. Yummy Take-out! And gift cards are great.
Take Care of your Self! Stay hydrated. Eat well. Sleep. Connect
Vitality has a virtual daily sitting meditation at 12:15pm Connect with the Facebook Group!
Stay tuned for opportunities to take action in support of policies that can help mitigate this crisis and improve wellbeing. Policy Matters Ohio lays out ways to improve unemployment insurance. Center for Community Solutions identifies a fairly comprehensive list of coronavirus policy changes that could help Ohio Health and Human services be as effective as possible.
As the coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak unfolds, we will continue to look for ways to help protect the health and safety of our co-op members, volunteers, and our community. The unique nature of this challenge offers us a special time to recognize that resiliency and sustainability are two of the most important reasons we’ve chosen to structure our businesses on this model.
May the solidarity you’ve nurtured in your community support you and your family.
The Co-op Cincy Team
Co-op U - Our work with the Bhutanese
Cincinnati hosts a significant population of refugees from Nepal, Bhutanese women and men settled here after 17-20 years in temporary camps. In partnership with Catholic Charities of Southwest Ohio and RefugeeConnect, Co-op Cincy was awarded $300,000 to manage a three year program assisting the Bhutanese, through the USDA Refugee Agricultural Partnership Program. In January, a group of 15 began the Co-op U training program. They are learning how to organize and manage a worker-owned business, while developing their skills for navigating US commercial operations. The group is assessing two potential businesses, co-ops growing vegetables to supply the numerous Bhutanese grocery stores in Cincinnati, and event management for the large social gatherings in their tradition it is not uncommon for a Bhutanese wedding to include 1000 guests!
Thank You and Farewell
Co-op Cincy staff celebrated Maria Dienger’s many and substantial contributions to our work at a farewell reception on January 29th. After four years advancing the work of CUCI/Co-op Cincy, Maria has chosen to apply her considerable talents in a new career opportunity. We are most grateful for her professionalism and flexibility—Maria worked in various capacities as the needs of our small team shifted. She very capably stepped into the management role for Our Harvest Co-op during their period of staff turnover. Maria managed the communications and design work for all our publications. The Worker Owner Workbook, nationally distributed and widely admired, is a credit to her design skills and coordination abilities. We will think of Maria as we share the new Co-op Cincy logo, and wish her the best in her new pursuits!
Symposium Reflection
On November 15 and 16, 2019, Co-op Cincy in collaboration with the 1Worker1Vote national network, hosted over 200 social entrepreneurs, labor organizers, co-op workers and community development practitioners at the 4th International Union Co-op Symposium. Attendees came from 16 states and 4 countries (UK, Spain, Canada, Mexico) to learn about practical tools on starting and running union worker cooperatives and networks. The diversity of both people and ideas was inspiring. You can see photos of all these wonderful folks on our Facebook page by our awesome photographers – Paul Davis and Marakah Mancini! (Photo above taken by Paul Davis.)
We are still in the afterglow of this well-attended and information-packed symposium! It is exciting to have this level of in-depth knowledge and interest in a shared space. There is so much to learn and absorb in order to grow our collective union co-op movement. Our excellent speakers offered both practical approaches and ideas that may have run counter to our own understanding, but that is where growth can happen. Looking beyond our immediate horizon sets the brain in motion.
An inspiring story came from Humberto Montes de Oca, Secretary of the Interior for the Mexican Electricians Union. He described his personal experience at a utility plant where 44,000 members of the union lost their jobs overnight when the government privatized their plant. The union’s 10+ year struggle and ingenuity has led to the recuperation of numerous plants and the reemployment of around 2,000 workers in a worker-owned utility company.
We thank all those who were speakers and who led the interactive breakout sessions. The sessions covered topics such as: Mondragon 101; Union Co-op Network Building; Education and Culture Building; Building a union co-op brand for social change; management and governance; policy; creative financing strategies; equity; grant’s; transitions; and more.
While there are many intangible takeaways for participants, some of the tangible results are:
Deeper collaboration with co-op networks in Miami, Brooklyn, and Nashville
Groundwork laid for passing proactive co-op policy in Cincinnati and other cities
A new national hemp co-op development working group
A Creative Financing Strategies Sub-committee to accelerate co-op development nationally and beyond
Co-op Cincy shared a Google Drive of all the materials used in the presentations along with extra material that wasn’t covered. Looking to the future, we are using the participant evaluations to plan for the fifth symposium in 2021! Hopefully, we’ll see you there!
Our Harvest Worker-Owner’s $700 Match to Close the Fundraising Gap.
Our Harvest supporters have helped them get over halfway to their $35k fundraising goal. Now they just need to raise a little under $15,000 more to close their gap and worker-owner Zeke has offered a $700 match!
