How Bernie Sanders changed municipal government is the U.S.
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But now, 34 years later, as Sanders launches a campaign for the presidency, many of the radical solutions he imposed — free arts and culture for the masses, local-first economic development, wresting money from rich nonprofits, and, most shockingly, communal land for affordable housing — have become mainstays of the American municipal governance playbook.
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Early in Sanders’ tenure, his treasurer discovered $200,000 in the city’s coffers and the mayor determined to plow it into a bold initiative. Inspired by the garden cities of England, Isreali kibbutzim and Indian communes set up by the followers of Gandhi, he proposed to buy land and hold it in a communal trust for affordable housing, while the housing itself would be owned by occupants.
An opposition group, Homeowners Against the Land Trust, or HALT, labeled it a “communist scheme.” But the plan went through. In 1984, the Burlington Community Land Trust became one of the first affordable housing trusts in the world, and the very first to receive municipal funding. Today, there are over 250 such trusts in the United States — in places like Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Boston and Chapel Hill, North Carolina — most of which receive some form of government funding.
When it came to economic development, the “Sanderistas” in City Hall, as his supporters were known, decided to ditch the prevailing “smokestack chasing” approach, which called for local government to entice employers to move to town and set up shop. Instead, they promoted local ownership of business and sought to minimize leakage from the local economy to amplify the multiplier effect of money spent within the economy.
“That was an early initiative for sure,” said Evelyn Blumenberg, a professor of urban studies at UCLA. “It’s become more common in cities to think about economic development from within.”
The approach also put Burlington at the forefront of a “buy local” movement that’s now very much in vogue across the country.
Read more:
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/how-bernie-sanderss-radical-ideas-entered-the-municipal-mainstream-118447.html#ixzz3blMKmpqe
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