New State & Local Policies

SUPPORT ORGANIZATIONS

American Independent Business Association
www.amiba.net
AMIBA is a coalition with local chapters in which citizens, independent businesses, and community organizations unite to support hometown businesses in a city or region. These local alliance groups help maintain unique community character, ensure continued opportunities for entrepreneurs, build local economic strength, and prevent the displacement of locally owned businesses by chains.

Ballot Initiative Strategy Center
www.ballot.org
BISC provides funding, research, and training to support progressive ballot measure activity and to connect advocates across state and issue lines. Its website tracks a wide variety of state legislative and ballot initiative efforts throughout the country.

Brennan Center, Economic Justice Program
www.brennancenter.org/programs/pov/ej.html
The Brennan Center’s Economic Justice Program supports coalitions of community organizations, progressive unions, and legislative leaders working to address the problem of growing inequality.

Business Alliance for Local Living Economies
www.livingeconomies.org
Founded in 2001, BALLE is a group of socially conscious small businesses that believe in the importance of building strong local communities that are both economically and environmentally sustainable. BALLE has grown rapidly. It now has 18 local chapters in 13 states plus two chapters in the Canadian province of British Columbia.

The Center for Policy Alternatives (CPA)
www.stateaction.org
CPA works with state legislators at three levels: providing values-based leadership development programs to help legislators become more effective advocates for progressive policy; developing user-friendly policy tools on a wide variety of issues which support legislators in introducing and arguing for progressive legislation; and building a strong, coordinated network of legislators across the states.

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
www.cbpp.org/state/index.html
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities provides research and technical assistance on fiscal policy and public programs that affect low- and moderate-income families and individuals. About half of the groups work focuses on the state level. This work includes information and technical assistance to state non-profit organizations and government officials on issues ranging from state budget priorities and revenue structures to the design and implementation of low-income programs.

Demos
www.demos-usa.org
Founded in 1999, Demos is a multi-faceted research and advocacy organization that focuses on issues of democracy, the health of the public sector, and the creation of a public realm of debate and ideas. It also has an economic opportunity program that focuses on promoting new ideas in the areas of higher education, income and asset-based policy as means of building wealth among people of low and moderate incomes.

Economic Analysis and Research Network
www.earncentral.org
The Economic Analysis and Research Network (EARN) links national, state, and regional, advocacy, policy, and research organizations. The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) acts as the national secretariat for EARN. In addition, state and regional EARN groups receive a variety of assistance from EPI: technical assistance and data analysis; assistance with testimony and media interviews; experts to appear at local forums; pre-publication access to national group reports; organizational support and onsite visits to newly forming groups; and general media support and referrals.

Jobs with Justice
www.jwj.org
Jobs with Justice coalitions now operate in over 40 cities in 29 states in all regions of the country, made up of member organizations and thousands of individual activists. By building a base of diverse constituencies at the local level as well as providing training, coordination, and networking at the national level, Jobs with Justice aims to rebuild the infrastructure that gives communities a sense of their own power.

National Clearinghouse on the Direct Care Workforce
www.directcareclearinghouse.org/index.jsp
The National Clearinghouse on the Direct Care Workforce is a national on-line library for people in search of solutions to the direct-care staffing crisis in long-term care. A project of the Paraprofessional Healthcare Institute (PHI), the Clearinghouse includes government and research reports, news, issue briefs, fact sheets, and other information on topics such as recruitment, career advancement supervision, workplace culture, and caregiving practices.

New Cities Project
www.newcities.us
Launched in February 2005 by Madison, Wisconsin Mayor Dave Cieslewicz and the Madison based Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS), the group has since held semiannual meetings that provide mayors and their staff a forum to learn from one another and develop urban policies that put a premium of “high road” strategies that promote living wage jobs and community wealth building. Presentations from past conferences are available on the group’s website.

Partnership For Working Families
www.communitybenefits.org
Partnership for Working Families provides hands-on research and technical assistance on community benefit agreements to a growing and energized base of affiliates nationwide. The group currently includes 18 established or formative groups and is actively assisting a dozen more groups in community benefits coalitions and campaigns.

Smart Growth America
www.smartgrowthamerica.org
Smart Growth America is a coalition of nearly 100 advocacy organizations that have a stake in how metropolitan expansion affects our environment, quality of life and economic sustainability. Partners include national, state, and local groups working on behalf of the environment, historic preservation, social equity, land conservation, neighborhood redevelopment, farmland protection, labor, and city/town planning.

Sprawl-Busters
www.sprawl-busters.com
Sprawl-Busters is a private firm that provides consulting services to local community coalitions on how to design and implement successful campaigns against mega-stores and other undesirable large-scale developments.

Take Back Your Time
www.simpleliving.net/timeday
Take Back Your Time is an initiative designed to challenge the trend of increasing work hours in America that has contributed to the fraying of family relations, health, and community wellbeing. The group aims to bring parental and personal leaves laws in the United States up to the standards already in place in all other industrial countries. The website includes information about the group’s shorter work hours campaign, a collection of essays by over two dozen authors on the impact of increased hours of work on American communities, as well as public policy suggestions for remedies.

United for a Fair Economy
www.faireconomy.org
United for a Fair Economy is a national, independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization with a focus on tax and budget-related issues.

U.S. Action
www.usaction.org
U.S. Action and its affiliates in 24 states aim to pursue a broad agenda of social, racial and economic justice. Many U.S. Action affiliates have been leaders in campaigns to promote state disclosure of corporate economic development subsidy payments.

WalmartWatch.com
www.walmartwatch.com
In Spring 2005, Wal-Mart Watch, a coalition of labor, environmental, and religious groups, began its nationwide campaign to challenge the world’s largest retailer to become a better employer, neighbor, and corporate citizen. The web site contains a wide range of news, research reports, and other activist resources, both on the Wal-Mart campaign and on ways to protect small businesses in local communities.