Building Local Power

Jacqui Patterson, the director of the NAACP’s Environmental and Climate Justice Program, talks with ILSR’s Neil Seldman and Nick Stumo-Langer about the practical implications of environmental justice.… Read More

In this episode of ILSR's Building Local Power podcast, Chuck Marohn of Strong Towns sits down with Stacy Mitchell to discuss why the conventional wisdom about economic growth often leads communities down a dark path of decay. … Read More

This roundtable discussion between ILSR's Stacy Mitchell, John Farrell, and Christopher Mitchell delves into the growing movement against monopoly power in the political economy.… Read More

Zero waste activist Paul Connett joins ILSR's Neil Seldman and Nick Stumo-Langer to detail how to move communities across the world to a zero waste reality as well as how this activism fits within the grassroots landscape.
 Along with Paul's insights on zero waste policies -- from corporate redesign to community fun in participating in sustainability policies -- he regales listeners with a version of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, zero waste edition.… Read More

Matt Rantanen, Director of Technology at the Southern California Tribal Chairmen’s Association, and Hannah Trostle, an ILSR research associate talk with Christopher Mitchell about the challenges to better Internet connectivity on tribal lands across America.… Read More

Joe Maxwell of the Organization for Competitive Markets details how our economy is tilted against family farms and rural communities, and how he’s working to build a political movement to change that.… Read More

John Ikerd, an agricultural economist, sits down with Stacy Mitchell to discuss the consolidation of our food system and why he supports family farms as opposed to corporate mega-farms.… Read More

San Francisco has one-third as many chain stores as the national average. That's thanks in large part to a city ordinance that restricts "formula" businesses. We talk with AnMarie Rodgers, senior policy advisor to the city’s planning department, about how the city implemented the policy, how it works, and what advice she has for other cities that want to do it too.… Read More

In this episode of the Building Local Power podcast, ILSR co-director Stacy Mitchell sits down with Barry Lynn, head of the Open Markets Institute, to talk about how we fight concentrated corporate power and its impact on our liberty and democracy.… Read More

Electric vehicles are enabling energy democracy.
 
 That's the takeaway from the latest Building Local Power podcast episode, a discussion between guest host and Communications Manager Nick Stumo-Langer, Energy Democracy initiative director John Farrell, and Energy Democracy initiative researcher Karlee Weinmann. The conversation features a number of topics, including: the trajectory electric vehicles hold in renewable energy technology, generally; the ways that cities in the wake of recent hurricanes can rebuild to better weather the storms thanks to energy resiliency; and how residents of cities, large and small, can pressure their communities to enact better policies.… Read More