Buenos Aires Couple of things that have passed across my desk recently that are worth noting so I will share.
One is an architectural award that was recently announced by the American Association of School Administrators for the ACORN Woodland small school in Oakland, California. We received an honorable mention from this school for the design at ACORN Woodland. Big props to ACORN leaders, including national delegate from California, Fannie Brown, who are in fact on the Design Committee for the school, which means this mention is a big whoop for their work! Hey-Ya!
Another is a t-shirt and clothes store operation in the trend setting chic Haight-Asbury area of San Francisco called Be+cause. I personally loved this name, but even more so, I loved their spirit. Out of nowhere a couple of three weeks ago, I got an envelope from the ladies of Be+cause with a check for over $100 made out to ACORN. Seemed that they did a set of 4 t-shirts in their HERO’S line and donated a piece of the profits to four groups, and one of them was ACORN. I was so proud! I looked up their website and saw the shirts for themselves. One was an urbanyetti. Hero or not, that’s too cool not to buy (I bought one for self!). Another was the unknown guy at Tiananmen Square who stood up to the tanks. Even though this was in green (not my color), I bought one of these, too. Hard for me not to support such a good idea and people who are clearly, good people trying to do right out there, and definitely doing right by ACORN. Here’s to you, Be+cause, and the work that you do! With thanks!
Interesting report put out over the last couple of days by Texas ACORN on “Electric Choice” in the deregulated market found through a survey of more than 600 people that in fact either people did not know how choice worked or in the case of the customers who most needed savings, could not access the savings because of prohibitive deposit and other fees to change. More tellingly, Texas ACORN found that in the parts of Texas where electricity had been deregulated, consumers were paying 65% more for electricity at the end of 2006 compared to 2002 when deregulation began. This was twice as much as the price hikes for the regulated part of the market in Texas. This is a consumer skinning at the meter and the politicians in Texas need to feel the heat! Check it out: “Electric Choice: A False Choice for Working People.” You can find it at www.acorn.org/texas and then hit issues and wham, you are on it.
February 19, 2007
