This Wed. May 4, at 6pm listen to my conversation with Reginaldo (Regi) Haslett-Marroquin, Program Director, Rural Enterprise Center and founder of Hillside Farmers Cooperative.

Regi launched the Rural Enterprise Center program of Main Street Project in 2006, but has a long history of successful transnational entrepreneurial leadership. He began working on economic development projects with indigenous Guatemalan communities in 1988, and has served as a consultant for the United Nations Development Program’s Bureau for Latin America and advisor to the World Council of Indigenous Peoples. He founded the Fair Trade Federation and co-created Peace Coffee, a successful fair-trade coffee company, and then went on to work with woodland owners in the Midwest and Guatemala where he organized several stewardship-certified cooperative forestry businesses.

Regi was recognized for his work in 1996 when he was named one of the Twin Cities International Citizens of the Year. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Northfield Area Foundation and is an active member of the Rotary Club of Northfield. A Guatemalan native, Regi received his agronomy degree from the Central National School of Agriculture and studied at the Universidad de San Carlos in Guatemala. He also received a bachelor’s degree in International Business Administration from Augsburg College, Minneapolis.

I’ve spent the last several months discussing the Green Acres changes with local officials and landowners who would be affected by these changes to figure out the best legislative course of action we need to take this session. I have co-authored a bill moving through the legislative process to resolve the problems created by the 2008 changes and it has already passed through the Agricultural and Rural Economies Committee. I’ll keep you updated as these bills move forward this session.

I encourage anyone with further questions to contact me and we can discuss it in more depth.

Eligible organizations include:

Owners of MN facilities producing bioenergy;

Organizations that provide for on-station, on-farm field-scale research and outreach to develop and test the agronomic and economic requirements of diverse stands of prairie plants and other perennials for bioenergy systems; or

Certain non-governmental entities for development of business plans and structures related to community ownership.

The MN Dept of Ag will issue the grants, in consultation with the NextGen Energy Board. Proposals must be received no later than 4:00 PM, July 31, 2008. Proposals will not be accepted by e-mail or fax. For more information, contact:

Andrew Carter, MN Dept of Ag

625 Robert St. N, St. Paul, MN 55155-2538

Tele: 651-201-5699

email: Andrew.Carter@state.mn.us

You may go to the MN Dept of Agriculture website for more information on grant money.

We sat on a quilt and read a story about a father and son who walked along the beach to discover the “little bits of heaven” all around them.Most of the children found flowers and leaves and held them up as we looked at the pictures in the story.  The father and son stopped under an oak tree just like the one we sat under enjoying the shade and the breeze.  We talked about the picture of the acorn and how something so small could grow into the big tree above us.  A few children at the edge of the quilt found acorns they could share with us too.  After the story they shared their flowers with us and told us why it was special to them.  I shared a leaf from a grape vine and explained that it reminded me of the parable that says we are like a grape vine in our church because we are all fruit of the vine, all connected in community. We owe it to ourselves and to our children to elect legislators who fully appreciate the value of the natural resources with which we have been so richly blessed.

Dick recently submitted the following OpEd piece to a metro paper but it was rejected, it gives you a sense of his message:

Unions are the solution, not the problem
By Richard A. Levins

   The process of devolving from a middle class society into a banana republic is well under way.  The signs are everywhere.  Wages, even for college graduates, are falling behind inflation.  The number of families in poverty is growing.  The middle class debt load is off the charts and the personal savings rate is below zero.  The costs of a college education, of health insurance, of energy for heating and driving, and of pharmaceuticals grow out of reach for ever more Americans with each passing day.
   What economists call the “income distribution” is, from a middle class perspective, as bad as it has been since the Great Depression.  During the Roaring 20’s, the split between rich and poor grew exceptionally large, leaving relatively few in the middle class. In the decades following the Depression, things began to change for the better as income and wealth became more evenly distributed.  But now we are back to where we were as the nation stood on the brink of its greatest economic catastrophe ever.  The very rich are richer than ever, but the rest of us are falling behind at an increasingly rapid pace.
   What caused these changes in the balance between a middle class society and neo-Feudalism?  The history of labor unions in America gives an important clue.  Private-sector unionization was legislated during the Depression.  Union membership grew into the mid-twentieth century, then began a slow decline that continues today.  Remember the income distribution numbers:  a weak middle class in the Depression, a strong middle class in the decades following, and a weakening middle class now.  The way these income distribution numbers generally track those for union activity is no coincidence.
   Unions equalize power in the market place between those who work for a living and those who own something for a living.  Those who work for a living are the stuff of which the middle class is made.  Those who own something for a living fill the ranks of the very wealthy.  When the balance of power is with labor unions, the gains from production stay with the middle class.   When the balance shifts as it has today, the very wealthy take an ever-larger share from economic activity.
   As the very wealthy become even more so, they do not spend money in the way middle class people do.  After all, how many houses and cars, no matter how fine, can one have?   Once people have more money than they can possibly spend on goods and services, they no longer use it in ways that stimulate the economy.  Instead, they use the power their money brings to get more tax breaks, less regulation, more support for globalization, and policies that favor capital over labor.  The middle class continues to weaken.
In spite of all this, we are told not to worry, because the United States is becoming what some politicians call an “ownership society.”  Instead of supporting unions that bring decent wages to working people, we are advised to buy shares in the corporations that profit when wages are falling. Meanwhile, we ignore the most important part of our economy—we are a great market for goods and services.
   The trouble with all strategies that trade good jobs for cheap toasters is that they eventually erode the market for the goods and services being provided.  A handful of hyper-wealthy individuals along with millions of people living on the economic edge are not the sound, stable market needed for growth.  Only the middle class, with buying power widely distributed, can provide that.  And that is what we are losing.
   Rebalancing power in the economy is essential if the middle class is to thrive.  Doing this, however, will require more than our government alone can reasonably be expected to deliver.  We must act together in the market place as well.  The way to do that is the way we have always done it—to join and support the unions that built the middle class in the first place.

Richard A. Levins is Professor Emeritus of Applied Economics at the University of Minnesota.  His most recent book Middle Class * Union Made (June 2006) is available from Itasca Books at www.itascabooks.com or 1-800-901-3480.