Find Me at Synergia Cooperative Institute https://synergiainstitute.org/mooc-overview/

Sunday, April 13, 2014

Local Capital

The first part of this 2012 paper discusses the ‘financing gap’ and dominant trends in the international world of finance and how local capital can be regarded as somewhat of an alternative to these trends. The second part analyzes how local capital not only mobilizes local investment dollars, but also other community resources to foster growth and development. The report explores some of the mechanisms for raising local capital using debt and equity to finance community owned businesses and presents some successful examples. The last section of the paper introduces several financing mechanisms that could be used by rural communities in Alberta to raise local capital.
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2149/3207

Friday, April 11, 2014

Westlock Terminals New Generation Cooperative: A Case Study

This is a bit out of date now, but worth reading to grasp how one community used local community investment and the cooperative model to finance retention of a community asset. Westlock Terminals is now one of the most successful of its kind.


Source: Westlock News

In 2002, Tawatinaw Community Futures (CF) and Miller Thompson Legal Services assisted in the formation of the Westlock Grain Terminals New Generation Cooperative. Their model processes allowed the community to raise over a million dollars in local investment using a new generation cooperative share offering, and another $1.2 million in 2005 (Cabaj, et.al. 2009). The NGC allows co-operatives to raise capital within a larger network beyond their membership. It invites and permits community members, patrons, suppliers, and other groups to become involved in owning local economic resources. However, unless they are a member, investors (shareholders) cannot vote on matters related to the co-operative, although the Management Board includes some respected local business people. The same model of local investment through a NGC was used by Battle River to raise $3.5 million for the purchase of a short-line railway - the Battle River Railway (Barney, 2011, 2012a, 2012b). Both community assets, the grain terminal and the railway, were owned by large corporations outside the community, and were under threat to be closed by these corporations.