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Public Banking

Ocasio’s Proposed Green New Deal Includes Public Bank Funding

December 1, 2018 Public Banking Institute , ,
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — one of two insurgent progressive candidates to succeed in their races for Congress — submitted draft text for a select committee on a Green New Deal financed by a system of national and regional public banks and the Federal Reserve. The plan calls for a sweeping mobilization to make the US carbon neutral and draw down greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere and oceans. The inclusion of public banking is an important indicator that awareness of its value has reached the federal level, in good measure due to local advocates who have been pressing the case to Ocasio-Cortez and her team.

4 Reasons Why Los Angeles’ Upcoming Public Banking Ballot Initiative Is A Huge Deal

September 14, 2018 Phoenix Goodman, Laprogressive.com , , ,
On November 6th, the citizens of Los Angeles will have a chance to decide if their city should pave the path towards creating the first municipal public bank in the country. No doubt, a ‘yes’ vote for Charter Amendment B will be significant for the city, as it will put the immense power of banking in the hands of accountable officials bound by a mission of social good—a radical shift from the status quo of giving that business to Wall St. Today, the privilege of financing city services is reserved for private speculators. Last year, the City of Los Angeles paid $170 million in banking fees and $1.1 billion in interest to big banks and investors—money that would be recycled into public coffers for reinvestment if Los Angeles had a Public Bank instead.

Oakland Takes Step Toward Public Bank With Unanimous Committee Vote

September 14, 2018 Staff, Publicbankinginstitute.org , ,
The City of Oakland's Finance Committee accepted the Public Bank Feasibility Study and staff report, and recommended placing it on the full City Council's agenda so that all Councilors may have an opportunity to discuss the report and options.  Watch as banking experts, elected officials, and advocates alike give overwhelming support for Oakland’s public bank: VIDEO (note: link takes a bit of time to load). The feasibility study author, a banking expert, and stake holders from the community spoke in support of moving forward with a full business plan to answer the questions that were not addressed in the study.

The Crisis Next Time: Planning For Public Ownership As An Alternative To Corporate Bank Bailouts

July 25, 2018 Thomas Hanna, Thenextsystem.org , , , ,
The next financial crisis is all but inevitable. While its exact timing and severity cannot be predicted, both the accelerating frequency of crises in recent decades and the continued consolidation of the banking sector in an increasingly financialized economy suggest that we should be prepared for a crisis sooner rather than later. In the Great Financial Crisis of 2007-2008, the US federal government intervened at an unprecedented scale to bailout our largest commercial banks after they became entangled in the mess of risky financial products built on top of an unsustainable housing bubble. The effect of these massive bailouts was, in the end, to preserve the status quo: the modest attempts made to regulate the financial sector to protect consumers and avert further devastating financial crises have largely been rolled back, and the banks that were then “too big to fail” are today even bigger.

2018 Is Indeed Proving To Be The Year Of The Public Bank

July 21, 2018 Staff, Publicbankinginstitute.org ,
In January, we at PBI proposed that 2018 would be the “Year of the Public Bank.” Now midway through the year, we’re delighted to see the idea is indeed proving true. With huge strides forward in so many cities and states — and the tremendous landmark of American Samoa launching the second Public Bank in the U.S. — the energy continues to build for public ownership of the financial institutions entrusted with public funds. This article in The Progressive, published in February, saw the same potential we did and describes the successes and promising opportunities. It’s amazing to see the progress even since February.

#ParadigmShift Campaign Launched In NYC For Public Banking

June 8, 2018 Staff, Publicbankinginstitute.org ,
Activists from more than two dozen grassroots organizations including New Economy Project and Public Bank NYC took to the streets of Wall Street on Tuesday to launch a campaign for a NYC Public Bank. Carrying signs reading “Public Bank for Public Good,” and chanting, "Wells, Chase, B of A, public bank's a better way!” advocates called for a paradigm shift: “Every year, New York City deposits billions of dollars of public money in big banks like Chase, Bank of America, and Citibank. On top of that, Wall Street extracts many millions of dollars in fees and interest from New York City. This means that our public money is supporting Wall Street’s destructive activities: foreclosing on our homes, fueling the climate crisis, redlining communities of color, backing private prisons and immigrant detention centers, and financing war -- to name a few.

Why Public Banking Is The End Goal Of The Divestment Movement

May 26, 2018 Phoenix Goodman, Medium.com ,
Something big is starting to happen in the world of activism. Grassroots campaigns are beginning to coalesce into coherent, focused missions with definable outcomes. The Divest campaign is a classic example of how the People can have a tangible effect on society by speaking the language of the dominating classes: money. Divestment is what it sounds like: removing public investments from corporate institutions, and repurposing them into organizations which will benefit the common good. This means leveraging the collective will through mass individual actions to force the perpetrators of corrupt and unscrupulous behavior to directly lose profits; in essence, to divest is to boycott. Even in the world of international affairs, we hear of sanctions, which are nothing more than state actors divesting from another nation in order to conduct economic war.

What It Will Take For Public Banking To Win

May 26, 2018 Matt Stannard, Occupy.com , , ,
In 2014, then-Santa Fe Mayor Javier Gonzales recognized that poverty and shrinking city budgets were problems that needed out-of-the-box solutions. Deeply concerned with inequality, Gonzales welcomed a discussion about public banking and even participated in a conference featuring leading figures in the movement. He later cheered on his Santa Fe City Council’s approval of a feasibility study that concluded that a city-owned bank would have an impact of millions of dollars a year in savings and investment potential for the city. After the study, though not particularly because of it, Gonzales’s position would gradually move from supportive to lukewarm. This should have come as no surprise. Whenever a citizens group pushes for the public takeover of any sector of the financial industry, bankers and financial professionals push back.

Taking Steps Toward Public Options For Banking

May 15, 2018 Oscar Perry Abello, Nextcity.org , ,
It’s been an interesting few weeks for the idea of public banking — establishing banks owned by government entities as a values-based alternative to ‘Wall Street’ banks. In San Francisco, where the city has charged a task force with exploring how to set up a city-owned bank, that task force is now looking into how the cannabis industry might provide a key source of deposits and clients that could help get a public bank off to a running start. California’s legal cannabis industry is forecast to grow from $2.8 billion in 2017 to $5.6 billion in 2020, but banks are loathe to deal with the industry for fear of violating federal rules that classify marijuana the same category as heroin — the result being a cannabis industry run mostly on cash. San Francisco’s Municipal Bank Feasibility Task Force thinks a municipal bank might provide the industry an option for banking services.

The United States Has A Second Public Bank

May 6, 2018 Rob Blackwell, The American Banker. , ,
Washington, DC — American Samoa is finally getting its own full-service bank — and successfully creating only the second public bank in the United States. The Federal Reserve is allowing the Territorial Bank of American Samoa access to the U.S. payments system nearly two years after the bank first applied. The decision is a boon to the remote U.S. territory in the South Pacific, where more than half of the households are at, near or below the federal poverty level. Officials across the seven islands that comprise American Samoa have been scrambling for a way to maintain local banking services since the Bank of Hawaii announced in 2012 it was leaving the territory.

Legal Marijuana Propelling Public Banking

February 21, 2018 Staff, Publicbankinginstitute.org , , ,
Things are moving fast in California. A Los Angeles City Council committee approved a resolution February 16 to support the recently introduced state bill that would create a Public Bank that could take deposits from legal marijuana businesses. California Senate Bill 930, introduced at the end of January, would establish a state-chartered bank that would “allow a person licensed to engage in commercial cannabis activity to engage in banking activities in California”. The LA resolution to support SB 930 was proposed by Council President Herb Wesson and approved by the council’s Rules, Elections and Intergovernmental Relations Committee. Wesson proposed creating a Public Bank for the City of Los Angeles in July 2017.

SF Treasurer Announces Priorities Of Public Banking Task Force

February 7, 2018 Staff, Sftreasurer.org , ,
Treasurer José Cisneros announced today the 16 members of the Municipal Bank Feasibility Task Force. The formation of the Task Force was recommended by the Board of Supervisors to identify and pursue opportunities to extend access to credit for small businesses, provide banking services to the cannabis industry, expand capital for affordable housing, and research the viability and advisability of a municipal bank. “San Francisco has always been a leader in socially responsible banking and investment. I am eager to work with the Task Force to identify new approaches to support our City’s bold vision for inclusive innovation,” said Treasurer José Cisneros.   “My primary responsibility is to safeguard City funds, and I am confident that the Task Force will recommend solutions that also meet the stringent fiduciary and investment requirements set by state law.”

Public Bank: Time For Philadelphia To Invest In Philadelphia

January 19, 2018 By Tivoni Devor, Generocity.org , ,
From what magic bucket of money are we supposed to use to pay for all of this? The Philadelphia Municipal Pension Fund, which covers the pension costs of city workers. This $4 billion fund is entirely made up tax-payer dollars. It’s invested globally in all sorts of funds, stocks, bonds and securities to generate revenue for the city to cover its obligations, and it doesn’t always do that well: In 2016 fund had a net loss of $149 million (though 2017’s returns surpassed expectations). It’s one of the countries worst funded municipal funds. One of Philly’s biggest budget expenses is it’s annual contribution to this fund, which comes from tax revenues. A bulk of Philly’s tax revenue comes from wage taxes. If more people worked, and had higher wages for the jobs they did work, the city would have a higher tax revenues as well as increased savings on social safety net services, which would better position the city to cover its pension obligations.

Seattle: Diverse Coalition Emerging Around Public Banking

January 10, 2018 Staff, Publicbankinginstitute.org , ,
Activists as diverse as Black Lives Matter, local tribal members of the Standing Rock Coalition, 350.org, Democratic Socialists, and MLK County Labor council, as well as several experienced bankers, retired government officials and law school professors have coalesced along with Public Banking advocates in Seattle to pressure City Council to move forward on their newly approved $100,000 feasibility study. For those in the Seattle area, join the Seattle Public Banking Coalition here. The Seattle Public Banking Coalition is actively connecting these coalition members to communicate to City Council the urgency of moving forward with the feasibility study. They detail the gains the study would deliver including drafting of a mission statement, examining legal issues, and identifying sources of initial capital...

Seattle: Diverse Coalition Emerging Around Public Banking

January 5, 2018 Sarah Brink, Publicbankinginstitute.org , ,
Activists as diverse as Black Lives Matter, local tribal members of the Standing Rock Coalition, 350.org, Democratic Socialists, and MLK County Labor council, as well as several experienced bankers, retired government officials and law school professors have coalesced along with Public Banking advocates in Seattle to pressure City Council to move forward on their newly approved $100,000 feasibility study. For those in the Seattle area, join the Seattle Public Banking Coalition here. The Seattle Public Banking Coalition is actively connecting these coalition members to communicate to City Council the urgency of moving forward with the feasibility study. They detail the gains the study would deliver including drafting of a mission statement, examining legal issues, and identifying sources of initial capital...
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