July 2005 | Green Lines
July Green Lines
This Month: Shareholder rights, coffee and a better world, reinvent your home space online, flexing electric cars
By Heather Nordell
Bruce Herbert, president of Newground Social Investment, made national headlines after security escorted him out of a gavel-thumping Weyerhaeuser annual shareholder meeting. His offense: raising a point of order regarding the shareholder question/answer session, which was allocated only 15 minutes and then ended prematurely prior to voting. Throughout the meeting, Herbert and his Newground colleague Larry Dohrs were shocked shareholders were not allowed to speak, and Weyerhaeuser only accepted selected prescreened written questions. The standard of shareholders having a voice at their annual meeting is what gives Newground its entrée to influence social change and corporate responsibility. Example: Newground successfully influenced DuPont to move the site of a prospective strip mine proposed to operate only a stone’s throw from the protected Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge.
Green Bean Coffee House recently opened its doors in Greenwood. The café serves organic, fair trade coffee and homemade baked goods and soups. The coffeehouse was founded as a nonprofit with a mission to serve its community. Green Bean offers weekly story time for kids, open mic night and live music. After its first month in business, Green Bean was not only in the black, they raised $700 for the local Boys and Girls Club through collections in their tip jar. The June tip jar is allocated to funding the diabetes patients at the Greenwood Clinic. Founders Lisa Etter and Hayden Smith have an ultimate vision to create an intentional community for homeless women that would provide job training, organic gardening and cooking classes.
This month, Architect Your Life, LLC is launching an eye-opening home restyling website (www.architectyourlife.com) based on the principle that living spaces are a direct reflection of people’s inner selves. The basic concept: Enhance personal environment, help yourself achieve personal goals. For the past five years, chief Life Architect and founder Tamra Fleming has been helping individuals, couples and families to use their space as a means to express their life vision. Now, her new company brings her process to cyberspace. The site delivers information and services including life coaching, feng shui, color theory, clutter clearing, sustainable living, interior decoration and furniture placement among others. “Interiors are not just about furnishings,” says Fleming. “They are a mosaic of people’s lives.”
Flexcar and MC Electric Vehicles are collaborating to create more advanced transportation options in Seattle. MC Electric Vehicles is now selling “IT,” a small, energy-efficient vehicle perfect for short-distance transportation. At one to two cents a mile for operating and maintenance expenses, the “IT” zero-emission Neighborhood Electric Vehicle is ready to roll on streets with posted speed limits of up to 35 mph. When Seattle owners of the “IT” need to go farther or carry more, they can turn to Flexcar’s car-sharing program, which allows members to drive any of the hundreds of new, fuel-efficient Flexcar cars, trucks and minivans located across Seattle and several other metropolitan regions.
![[Send]](http://seattle.consciouschoice.com/sendlink/send.gif){kind=small}
Recommend this page to a friend
Top Ten pages recommended to friends:
