From the Board President: Locally Owned and Democratically Controlled

Two recent stories in the Courier have got me thinking more about our cooperative model. To me, they reinforce the value of local ownership. Too often we’re at the mercy of executives or shareholders who live outside our area.

The first story was about our Cedar Valley neighbor, Raymond, whose residents are fighting a proposed closure of the town’s only bank (“Small Iowa community fighting to keep its only bank,” May 18). The city council has even passed a resolution opposing the closing of the bank. Ultimately, though, the decision is not theirs. The second story involves a possible nursing home relocation from Ackley to Iowa Falls (“Ackley residents go to Iowa Falls council on nursing home move,” May 19). Ackley community members have made multiple efforts to keep the nonprofit called Grand JiVante in their north central town, but, as the Ackley mayor stated, “We cannot dictate to the Grand JiVante what its future role in Ackley will be.” 

How true.

Our hearts go out to Raymond and Ackley citizens for their situations, and we hope they can bounce back from the likely blows to their communities. Their stories, however, are not new. We’ve seen towns—and cities—face downward slides when businesses shutter their doors. How will towns like these reverse job losses, brain drain, and vacant downtowns? History is clear on this: local efforts, not outside corporations, fill the gaps and turn things around. According to an April 2010 article from the Stanford Social Innovation Review, “entrepreneurs create thousands of jobs, improve the quality of goods and services available to consumers, and ultimately raise standards of living.” As I understand it, the Cedar Falls downtown had, at one point, nearly become a ghost town, but the efforts of a local coffee shop helped reverse that trend.

So, yes, having locally owned business is great. The co-op model takes it one step further. Instead of relying on individual entrepreneurs, the co-op approach says “we can do this together.” We can create the jobs, improve the quality of goods and services, and raise the standards of living, and we do this democratically. We Americans love our democracy, but aside from voting, we have little examples of working democracy. (Could the Raymond residents vote on whether the bank would stay or close?) The second principle of cooperatives, Democratic Governance, gives the power to its members. We believe that our community would benefit from having a food co-op, but the value to the community is increased if we all have a say in it. Sure, we can hope that someday a (pick you favorite nationally known grocer) could come to town, or we can build and run our own. 

I don’t know about you, but I’d rather have the owners of the businesses I frequent live and work in our community. If that were the case, we would never have to read a headline about a business leaving town.

In cooperation,

Tom Wickersham

One Comment

  1. Hi Tom,

    Excellent letter. So true. An enterprise like the Co-op in Cedar Falls, will survive because the folks in CF are the owners of this endeavor. Ownership is always important in any venture and brings strength, honesty and caring to help a new business grow.

    Wishing you all the best in this co-op adventure. A proud member 🙂 Your mom-in-law

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