April 21 Blog: Abundance: Looking Forward and Thinking Locally

Dear Friends:

I wanted to let my readers know about a project I have been involved with over the past six months: The Abundance Elected Network. 

The Network is a national community of local elected officials who are committed to results driven governance and work to remove unnecessary barriers to getting things done. Often those barriers came about for a good reason long ago, but while they no longer make sense, they are difficult to remove or even see sometimes. And, they can slow progress down to a glacial pace or block it completely. The Abundance movement comes from the ideas discussed in Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s book Abundance: How We build a Better Future. If we are to thrive as a country, we’ve got to be able to get things done and not spend decades doing it. “To build the future we want, we need to build and invent more of what we need.

Last fall, I was delighted to be asked to be a mentor for the first Abundance Network Fellows Program. There are 20 local electeds in the first class and 5 mentors. I have long thought that local electeds need much more support than they get both from each other and from former elected officials. They also, particularly in small cities and towns, need better access to expertise. It is so satisfying to be part of an organization working to meet important needs that I’ve seen for my whole career. We meet virtually once a month in smaller cohorts to discuss the projects on which fellows are working. All the fellows gathered for a kick-off conference last November in Arizona, and we will meet again in May in Denver. Each fellow will present to the larger Network conference here in Washington, DC, in December.  I am so impressed with the talent, energy and creativity of the fellows and enjoying my time with them immensely. I learn a lot and can sometimes be helpful to committed public servants working to improve the lives of their residents.

I view this work as building for the future I hope we will have when we defeat the Regime and save our democracy. I am finding many glimmers of hope as people start to think more about what comes next after this dark time. An important step is understanding where we are and how to make needed changes as the Abundance Network does. It is important to do this kind of working and thinking in many areas now, so we are ready to rebuild our government and nation. This podcast by Ezra Klein with Ray Madoff discussing how the US Tax System really works was revealing for me. It points at changes we need to make to create a more equitable, healthy and functioning government.

Meanwhile, we have today many neighbors in Arlington who need help and support. The Arlington Presbyterian Church (APC) at 918 S. Lincoln, Suite 1, Arlington, VA 22204 is creating A Pantry of often needed supplies that they want to keep on hand for immediate distribution when they are needed. APC welcomes

donations of white rice (Goya or Jasmine preferred), dry red beans, vegetable oil, maseca corn flour, or gift cards from Aldi and Giant. If you’d like to drop off any of these items Saturday the 25th from 10am-noon or Sunday the 26th from 1-3 pm you can be sure your donations will be gratefully received and given to people who need them. 

I am writing this on the eve of the redistricting referendum and will be out of town when the results come in. However it turns out, I hope there will be some study on the effect of the huge amounts of money and misleading advertising that has poured into Virginia. Hopefully all the lying will backfire.   

Yours in peaceful resistance,  

Libby