We are pleased to bring you a wide variety of news items in this issue. If you have a moment, please let us know what items you find most useful or least useful. Our goal is to provide an overall monthly snapshot of the Georgist movement in action, and to offer a place where individuals and organizations can seek help or advice, share opportunities, and compare perspectives.
Please send in your own ideas, reports, requests and remarks. Deadline for our December issue: November 24.
You can always reach the Georgist News at gn@progress.org
CONTENTS: (to return here just click the headline)
Special News from Alanna Hartzok of the Earth Rights Institute:
The state's new Commissioner for Environment, Dr. Godson Omubo-Dede made this confirmation at a recent meeting with the Director of NDFI local partner, Africa Centre for Geoclassical Economics, Mr. Gordon Abiama in his office in Yenagoa, the state capital.
The conference, according to Dr. Omubo-Dede, is being born out of the government's genuine desire to ensure socio-economic and environmental justice and sustainable development in the state and the region in general with regards to oil extraction.
GN Comments: To bring Georgist justice to the people of Nigeria and
to demonstrate how natural resource values can benefit all people instead of
just a few, the Niger Delta Fund Initiative (NDFI) was launched by Alanna
Hartzok and is gaining recognition and endorsements. For more information
and to find out how you can assist in the success of the NDFI, contact
Alanna Hartzok at earthrts@pa.net and
visit:
http://www.earthrights.net/nigeria/index.html
GN Comments: We are pleased to feature a new report from Kim Yoon-sang, the Korean translator of Progress and Poverty.
Georgist solutions are being highlighted in South Korea, where housing prices have been soaring up for the recent two years. This is the first time ever in Korean history that land value taxation is considered seriously as a policy alternative.
Korean Georgists are excited, contributing articles to newspapers, having interviews and debates on national TV and radio, giving lectures on the Korean National Education TV, demonstrating on the streets of Seoul and Busan, and so on.
President Roh Moo-hyun said in the State Address delivered in the National Assembly on October 13, he is determined to bring real estate prices under control. He said, "For the sake of the daily security of citizens as well as the national economy, real estate speculations will not be tolerated. The Government is now preparing a comprehensive real estate policy." Roh added that if it should not work properly, he would consider introducing a stronger measure.
Mass media speculate that the "stronger measure" is probably land value taxation, because President's top policy aide, Mr. Lee Joung-woo, is a Georgist, who co-authored the book, "Henry George Revisited 100 Years Later," published in December last year. The book has been selected one of the excellent books of the year by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
Philadelphia's Tax Reform Commission has released its initial set of recommendations. Those recommendations including shifting property taxes away from improvements and onto site value instead. Land value taxation is truly being taken seriously in Philadelphia.
As the Philadelphia Daily News put it, "We're shocked. We didn't think it would happen. But we have to applaud the Tax Reform Commission."
Many organizations are endorsing the Commission's recommendations. To add your support, contact assistant city controller Bruno Moser at Bruno.Moser@phila.gov
Mayoral candidate Sam Katz has reacted favorably to the Commission's recommendations, but current mayor John Street is a known opponent of land value taxation. The two are nearly tied in political polls prior to the November 4 election. To connect with other Georgists supporting Katz, contact Joshua Vincent at joshuavincent@msn.com
"Financing Transport Infrastructure through Land Values: Making it Happen" will take place on Tuesday, July 6, 2004 in central London.
The one-day conference is organised by The Waterfront Conference Company in conjunction with the Land Value Taxation Campaign and The Labour Land Campaign.
Georgist Dave Wetzel will be chairing the conference and you can see the line up of eminent speakers on Waterfront's website: www.thewaterfront.co.uk/pdfs/current_conferences/landvalues.pdf
GN Comments: We have noticed a steady crescendo in Georgist influence over transportation policy issues in Great Britain. This event is sure to advance such activity even further.
In Scotland, a multi-party group of politicians, called The Friends of Land Value Taxation, is seeking a new song.
According to The Scotsman newspaper, the winning song will be announced at the "Time To Tax Land And Not People?" public meeting to be held in Edinburgh on November 24, 2003.
If you have an entry to submit, or can make one fast, try contacting George Morton at lvt@scottishgreens.org.uk
GN Comments: here are some further background notes on the 2004 CGO conference, by conference organizer Sue Walton.
Take a Trip on Route 66 when you attend the 2004 Council of Georgist Organization's 24th annual conference, July 21-25, 2004 in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Albuquerque has the Longest Original Stretch of the famed route remaining in the entire country! It's 17 miles full of service stations, theaters, commercial strip shopping centers, cafes, drive-ins plus cabin courts and motels dating from the late 1910s to the early 1960s. It's a microcosm of the way west in the 20th century.
When Route 66 was completed in the mid-1930's, it was New Mexico's first completely oil-surfaced road and its shortest east-west route. Plan to come to the conference and Take a Trip on Route 66!
For more information please contact Sue or Scott Walton at: swalton@surfbest.net
Ask Henry, the specialized search engine featuring all Georgist web pages, observes that the following new Georgist web sites have recently been launched:
GN Comments: Are you using Ask Henry?
Simply visit http://www.askhenry.com
The city of Winnipeg, Manitoba (Canada) is trying a "new deal" that will involve shifting taxes away from human initiative and onto natural resources instead. This green tax shift idea is often talked about, but less often embraced in meaningful ways. Recent news articles indicate that Winnipeg may be serious. See this item that recently appeared in The Progress Report: http://www.progress.org/2003/shift22.htm
The Banneker Center for Economic Justice is seeking a volunteer who will monitor the happenings in Winnipeg closely, looking for signs that their tax shifting will be serious and Georgist in nature, or signs that the plan is being derailed. If you are willing to become a temporary expert on Winnipeg's "new deal" as it moves forward, please let the Banneker Center know. You can reach the Center at banneker@progress.org
GN Comments: Here is a news note about a networking opportunity, from housing expert Ed Dodson.
If you have never heard of LISC (the Local Initiatives Support Corporation), a non-profit that focuses on community revitalization efforts, you might want to make contact with their local organization if one exists in your city. LISC is the largest community development support organization in the United States. Over the last 25 years, LISC has been the catalyst for raising $11 billion in funding for community development projects, the construction of over 128,000 affordable homes, 20 million square feet of retail, community and educational space, and the creation of over 40,000 jobs for people in these communities.
For those readers living in the Washington, DC area (or interested in making the trip), LISC is hosting a "Home Ownership Summit" on November 3rd and 4th at the Hotel Washington in the nation's capital. This summit will certainly be well-attended and would be a good networking opportunity. Visit the LISC website (http://www.liscnet.org) for the agenda and registration information.
"Claim Democracy" Conference
The Center for Voting and Democracy has brought together a large coalition of pro-democracy groups to support and participate in a major conference at the Washington, D.C. Convention Center on November 22-23, 2003.
For more information and the conference agenda, visit http://www.democracyusa.org/events/conference.html
Boom, Bust and Election-Year Economics
A panel and book discussion with
Monday November 3, 6 to 8 PM, St Peters Church, 54th & Lexington Aves., New
York City.
Admission $25; $10 students & seniors
Light refreshments before the event; Book signing after the event
Followed by Co-host dinner for speakers and guests at Da Antonio's Ristorante
Sponsored by United for a Fair Economy/Responsible Wealth & Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities/ True Majority
For more information, contact Polly Cleveland, UFE/RW, (212) 873-2982, polly@prdi.org
The San Francisco Green Festival will be held November 8 and 9, 2003. This Green Festival, co-produced by Global Exchange and Co-op America, brings together green enterprises, environmental groups, leading thinkers on the green economy, and thousands of other attendees for a two-day party with a very serious objective - strengthening the locally-controlled, green economy and expanding popular support for policies aimed at sustainability and social justice. The Green Festival is located at the Concourse Exhibition Center in San Francisco.
For more information, visit http://www.greenfestivals.com/sanfrancisco.htm
GN Comments: This is another networking opportunity. Wherever people are talking seriously about ways to get the economy working better and to promote social justice, the Georgist message is needed.
GN Comments: Jeffery J. Smith, who runs the Geonomy Society, is asking Georgist News readers for feedback on a shirt-design project. Here is Jeff's note.
Send your feedback to Jeff Smith at geonomist@juno.com
The fifth edition of Resources for Radicals, an annotated bibliography of
print resources for those involved in movements for social transformation,
is now available.
Its primary, but not exclusive, focus is on material related to effective
non-violent protest and practical alternative social institutions.
Resources for Radicals is available from Toronto Action for Social Change. Inquiries and orders should be sent to:
You're not obligated to win. You're obligated to keep trying to do the best
you can every day.
- Marian Wright Edelman
Consider the postage stamp: its usefulness consists in the ability to stick
to one thing until it gets there.
- Josh Billings
Victory belongs to the most persevering.
- Napoleon
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