permaculture

[venaurafarm <venaurafarm@bellsouth.net>]

On 10/10/2012 10:19 AM, michael judd wrote:

> Folks, We at Project Bona Fide, Nicaragua, are seeking understanding
> and contacts to learn more about putting our 22 acre permaculture
> farm into a trust or other similar long term security.  The land has
> been permaculturally designed and planted with wide diversity for 11+
> years.  The project has grown successfully as a registered 501(c)3 in
> the U.S. and is a regional center for education, research and
> community outreach.  The land originally bought by myself for the
> project still remains in my name. We would like to find out how to
> put the land and project into perpetuity. Any leads, ideas, direction
> would be most welcome and appreciated. En Paz, Michael Judd
> www.projectbonafide.com

Michael:

I suggest you contact these people; S.O.L. offers an umbrella land trust
you could become part of. Look into it:

School Of Living
http://www.schoolofliving.org/landtrust.htm
The Community Land Trust
Introduction

The Community Land Trust concept was formed out of the underlying 
principle, which has been accepted by most people throughout most of 
history, that: Land and its Resources are Nature given to all of us. 
Thus, it might be said to be owned by all of us in common. The private 
ownership concept applied to land, is a very recent historical event. 
What is important about this concept is not that each person should have 
an equal amount of equally good land, but rather that each person should 
be entitled to a fair share of the return on land and its resources. 
Land and its resources is a major component in the creation of wealth. 
The major disparity between the rich and the poor has its roots in the 
private accumulation of land resources, which has given a few the bulk 
of the economic advantage from its use and impoverished many.

Marx saw the solution as State Ownership. But this has only resulted in 
the bureaucrats who run the state getting most of the benefit with 
incentive drained from the rest. A proposal by Henry George, clearly saw 
that it was not ownership or use rights that created the disparity but 
rather the maldistribution of income (unearned increment) resulting from 
ownership and use rights. He saw a mechanism already in place whereby 
local governments could collect a tax on land and its resources equal to 
the annual economic value of the resource and that such tax could either 
be used to support all public functions (no other tax would be 
necessary) or as some have proposed could be distributed to each member 
of society. Under such a system, who owned and used the land made little 
difference, so long as the economic value was justly distributed among 
all. Such a common heritage fund would produce an income credit of 
thousands of dollars per person each year.

Since governments have been extremely reluctant to institute a land 
value tax in proportion to the actual value of the land (except in some 
isolated and very successful instances) it was the idea of Ralph Borsodi 
(based on Ghandian Trusterty principles) to accomplish the same goal 
through private initiative, and the Community Land Trust was born.

Twin Oaks Intentional Community
http://www.twinoaks.org/
Communities Conference
http://www.communitiesconference.org/
Earthaven Ecovillage
http://www.earthaven.org/

Christian Stalberg
a subscriber to this permaculture list

LL