Last night, Berkeley City Council unanimously adopted a set of recommendations provided by the Sustainable Economies Law Center (Law Center) and a coalition of worker coop members and advocates. In doing so, Berkeley became a national leader in supporting worker cooperative businesses.
“Berkeley is among the first US cities to earmark funding specifically to help local businesses convert to democratic worker ownership,” says Sara Stephens, Staff Attorney at the Law Center. “Berkeley is also the first city to commit to enacting a procurement incentive for worker cooperatives and tailoring its revolving loan fund to explicitly target worker cooperatives and businesses converting to cooperative ownership.” Council’s motion also committed the City to funding three years of technical assistance and support to local worker cooperatives and coop conversions.
