Development

Hempcrete Could Change The Way We Build Everything

August 9, 2017 Joe Martino, www.collective-evolution.com Create! Development, New Economy

By Joe Martino for Collective Evolution - First off, what is Hempcrete? As the name suggests, hempcrete is a building material that incorporates hemp into its mixture. Versatile and hardy, it can be used for wall insulation, flooring, walls, roofing, and more, and is fireproof, waterproof, and rot-proof, provided it’s used aboveground. Derived from the shiv or inside stem of the hemp plant, it’s then mixed with a lime base binder to create the final, negative carbon footprint product. Hempcrete is much more versatile and pliable than concrete, making it an easier material to work with. In fact, earthquakes cannot crack these structures, as they are three times more resistant to damage than regular concrete. Hempcrete also requires less energy to produce, since lime doesn’t need to be heated to the same degree as industrial concrete. What’s more, because it contains cellulose, Hempcrete also sequesters carbon. Through its growing life cycle, it takes in large amounts of carbon, which are then built into the home or building being constructed. Carbon is thus stored rather than released into the atmosphere, and as a result, a home can save about 20,000lbs of carbon when being built out of Hempcrete.

Maryland: African Cemetery Protests Win Government Response

March 22, 2017 Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, www.blackagendareport.com Resist! Development, Gentrification, Racism, Sacred sites

By Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo for Black Agenda Report. Bethesda, Maryland - After months of public pressure and protests, Montgomery County Government has reluctantly suggested to “bring all parties together to address the various concerns that have been expressed and seek a solution that all can agree upon before we move forward.” The suggestion was made in a March 16, 2017, joint letter from County Executive, Isiah Leggett, and Council President, Roger Berliner, issued to Casey Anderson, Chair of the Montgomery County Planning Board. Black Agenda Report has covered this struggle extensively. From outward appearances, the casual observer would never be able to discern the presence of the cemetery as every day hundreds of cars drive over what now is the Housing Opportunity Commission (HOC) apartment parking lot.

New Orleans’ Ninth Ward Fights Freeway Through Historic Black Neighborhood

March 21, 2017 Michael Stein, www.truth-out.org Resist! Development, New Orleans

By Michael Stein for Truthout - There were about 200 Ninth Ward community members in the Saint Mary of the Angels church that night to see what the Department of Transportation had planned for their home. This situation was unfortunately familiar for them. Ninth Ward residents continuously contend with infrastructure projects that disregard their well-being and ignore their input. It's these polices that isolated the Lower Ninth Ward from the rest of the city, robbed it of public resources and caused it to suffer the worst devastation during Hurricane Katrina. There was national recognition after Katrina that much of the storm's destruction was human-made

Battle For The Amazon: Tapajós Basin Threatened By Massive Development

January 23, 2017 Sue Branford and Maurício Torres, www.news.mongabay.com Resist! Amazon, Brazil, Dams, Development

By Sue Branford and Maurício Torres for Mongabay - The Tapajós River Basin lies at the heart of the Amazon, and also at the heart of an exploding controversy: whether to build more than 40 large dams, a railway, roads, canals and port complexes, turning the Basin into a vast industrialized commodities export corridor; or to curb this development impulse and conserve one of the most biologically and culturally rich regions on the planet. Those struggling to shape the Basin's fate hold conflicting opinions, but because the Tapajós is an isolated region, few of these views get aired in the media. Journalist Sue Branford and social scientist Mauricio Torres travelled there recently for Mongabay, and over coming weeks hope to shed some light on the heated debate that will shape the future of the Amazon.

‘Tesla Of Eco-Villages’ Is Developing Off-Grid Villages

October 10, 2016 Dana Varinsky, www.businessinsider.com Create! Development, Ecology

By Dana Varinsky for Business Insider - If you move into a new neighborhood being constructed outside of Amsterdam, your salad greens might come from the greenhouse attached to your home. Your eggs could be gathered from the village chicken coop, and your food waste would all get harvested for compost. ReGen Villages is a startup real estate development company aiming to build small, self-sustaining residential communities around the world.

Tired Of Tax Breaks, Baltimore Activists Disrupt Developer Fete

July 7, 2016 Staff, www.therealnews.com Resist! Affordable Housing, Baltimore, Development, Protests

By Staff of The Real News Network - This is Taya Graham reporting for the Real News Network here in Baltimore City, Maryland. Im here at Port Covington, where developers are asking for a historic tax break. But this evening, community concerns intruded. If Baltimore is indeed two cities, one rich and one poor, then nowhere was this divide more evident than at City Garage in Port Covington Tuesday Night. I

From Livelihoods To Deadlihoods

July 4, 2016 Ashish Kothari, www.localfutures.org Create! Development, Farming, India, Inequality, Poverty

By Ashish Kothari for Local Futures for Economics of Happiness - In India, economic development and modernity have transformed livelihoods into deadlihoods. They are wiping out millennia-old livelihoods that were ways of life with no sharp division between work and leisure, and replacing them with dreary assembly line jobs where we wait desperately for weekends and holidays. Economic progress, we are told, is about moving from primary sector jobs to manufacturing and services. And so the livelihoods that keep all of us alive – farming, forestry, pastoralism, fisheries, and related crafts – are considered backward.

In Nicaragua, The Latest Zombie Megaproject

July 4, 2016 Jennifer Goett, www.nacla.org Educate! Canal, Development, Environment, Nicaragua

By Jennifer Goett for Nacla - Most recent media coverage on Nicaragua’s Interoceanic Grand Canal conveys a good deal of skepticism about the project’s viability. Since the Nicaraguan state granted rights to build and operate the canal to a Chinese corporation in 2013, the project has become the centerpiece of Sandinista development policy for this economically impoverished nation. One of the world’s largest infrastructure projects to date, the canal comes with a $50 billon price tag and a host of environmental and social costs that have provoked wide ranging opposition.

Cleveland’s Greater University Circle Initiative

June 18, 2016 Walter Wright, Kathryn W. Hexter and Nick Downer, www.democracycollaborative.org Create! Cleveland, Development, Nonprofits

By Walter Wright, Kathryn W. Hexter and Nick Downer for Democracy Collaborative - Cities are increasingly turning to their “anchor” institutions as drivers of economic development, harnessing the power of these major economic players to benefit the neighborhoods where they are rooted. This is especially true for cities that are struggling with widespread poverty and disinvestment. Urban anchors— typically hospitals and universities—have sometimes isolated themselves from the poor and struggling neighborhoods that surround them.

Can Neighborhoods Be Revitalized Without Gentrifying Them?

April 16, 2016 Michelle Chen, www.thenation.com Create! Development, Gentrification

By Michelle Chen for The Nation - Last year, the death of Freddie Gray in police custody placed his neighborhood in a tragic spotlight, highlighting an all-too common urban misery: epidemic poverty, blighted lots, and shattered homes. Gray’s Baltimore has become notorious as the site of failed “urban renewal” projects, rife with liberal talking points but showing precious little progress in alleviating poverty and joblessness. There’s now a plan to generate change from the inside out, creating community housing as a source of collective healing.

Corporate Buy Out: Our Cities Are Not Our Own

March 15, 2016 Laura Flanders, www.alternet.org Educate! Cities, Corporations, Development

By Laura Flanders for The F Word and Alternet - Think you can tell the difference between a city and a business park? It may not be so clear. A corporate buying boom since the financial crash is gobbling up city property and leaving us with places that are literally not our town. Purchasing took off after 2008, when foreclosure rates were high, bank loans were drying up, and record levels of commercial properties were standing vacant. Last year, major acquisitions by corporations topped a $1 trillion in 100 large cities and by major we do mean major — in New York, that’s only counting property-buys of worth $5m or more.

Equity Sought In Baltimore’s Development Strategy

February 2, 2016 Megan Sherman and Dharna Noor, www.therealnews.com Create! Baltimore, Development

By Megan Sherman and Dharna Noor for The Real News - Baltimore's penchant for offering tax breaks to downtown developers while ignoring less affluent neighborhoods came under scrutiny Thursday, as stakeholders from across the city presented a more inclusive vision for growth at a University of Maryland conference on unequal development in Baltimore. The one on the right is a redlining map from 1937 where bankers and the federal government got together, and classified every neighborhood in the city based on age, condition of housing, race, ethnicity, class, religion, economic status of residents.

Reinventing Banking: From Russia To Iceland To Ecuador

December 14, 2015 Ellen Brown, www.maxkeiser.com Create! Banking, Development, Money

By Ellen Brown for Max Keiser - Global developments in finance and geopolitics are prompting a rethinking of the structure of banking and of the nature of money itself. Among other interesting news items: In Russia, vulnerability to Western sanctions has led to proposals for a banking system that is not only independent of the West but is based on different design principles. In Iceland, the booms and busts culminating in the banking crisis of 2008-09 have prompted lawmakers to consider a plan to remove the power to create money from private banks...

The Struggle Continues: Garifuna Land Defender Shot In Honduras

December 8, 2015 Sandra Cuffe, www.intercontinentalcry.org Educate! Development, Honduras, Land

By Sandra Cuffe for IC Magazine - "This is where the first bullet grazed me," says Vidal Leiva, pointing to the side of his face. Shot three times outside his home on Nov. 27, the Garifuna community leader survived and is now recovering from the gunshot wounds to his torso. However, since the attack, members of Leiva's family and of the Land Defense Committee he heads report receiving threats. Sitting up carefully, Leiva lifts his shirt. On his right shoulder, front, and back, stitches mark bullet entry and exit points. A bandage covers the middle of Leiva's abdomen, where a bullet pierced internal organs before exiting through his back.

Water Concerns Loom Over Proposed Tusayan Project

May 24, 2015 Emery Cowan, www.azdailysun.com Educate! Development, Environment, Water

Flagstaff, AZ - The water-related impacts of a massive development proposed near the town of Tusayan were a top concern for Flagstaff residents who attended a public comment session connected to the project on Wednesday night. “Anything to do with water is key in this state,” Flagstaff resident Walt Taylor said. “With the amount of water this scale of project would be using, it couldn’t help but have an effect on the groundwater in the area.” The Forest Service hosted the comment session as part of its environmental review of a road easement application submitted by the town of Tusayan last year. Gaining road access is crucial for the development to move forward on the two parcels, totalling about 350 acres. Without that approval, the town would not be able to pave roads or install utilities to serve the hundreds of homes as well as thousands of square feet of commercial space, lodging and visitor amenities that landowner Stilo Development Group has plans to build.

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