Yes you can. You can buy food from the Gorge Grown Food Network [www.gorgegrown.org] farmer's market, local grocery store and from several restaurants.
We would like to know more about the circulation of the notes. Do you have a weekly or monthly potluck dinner? Do you create events or meetings to help facilitate the spending or demand for the currency?
We have had a few potlucks, but not a lot of members attended. Now we have potlucks for our monthly Steering Committee meetings! ;-)
Are there any other trade groups in the area in competition with River Hours? Are there similar barter groups operating on a large scale in your area such as LETS?
There are some trade groups and barter organizations in Portland, but nothing that I am aware of locally. There are "Chamber Dollars" for various Chamber of Commerce in the area, but once you spend a chamber dollar, it goes out of circulation.
If I lived in your area, used River Hours and needed to purchase something from Seattle or another non-local city, do you have any reciprocal arrangements with other communities? In other words, our community agrees to accept your local money if you accept ours in Seattle? Is there such a thing?
The bigger picture is to get an even wider local currency which would include Portland and eventually all of Washington and Oregon. But we don't really talk about the expansion much because we are still trying to get our own community members to accept RiverHOURS. We have a long way to go.
Portland is starting their own local currency as far as we know. There is a possibility of a merger down the road with them.Are the designs on the notes based on a local artist's work? Who designed the notes for you?
Yes, a local artist helped design our currency. But the whole Steering Committee had input on the design as far as color, graphics, the salmon, oak leaf, and osprey, etc.
In your years in operation, how many times or how many series of notes have been printed?
We have more than 80 current members and about $19 thousand of local currency in circulation. There are three denominations of bills. Our initial printing of all three was in 2004. Our second printing in 2005 included all three denominations. Our third printing in 2006 was for only the 1/10 RH denomination. Our fourth printing in 2007 was for the ½ and 1 RH denominations. Our fifth printing in 2008 was for only the 1/10 RH. Each printing is for about 500 bills.
What company handles your printing and would they be open to receive more of this type of work if readers asked, "where can it get my notes printed"?
A local printing store does our printing. You would need to ask them if they would be open to receive more work printing currency. For inventory control we use two printers to produce our bills, both located in The Dalles, Oregon. I am sure they would be willing to print currency for any organization. The way we do it is the first printer prints the bills on 8-1/2 by 11 sheets of imported paper that we provide. We deliver those sheets to the second printer who shears them to size and adds serial numbers.
Do you have an opinion on how the Federal Reserve and US banks put money into circulation as debt? In other words, your local currency is backed by labor which is a tangible asset adding value and worth to the community. USD Federal Reserve notes are created when the bank issues a loan, USD enters the world as debt. Do you have an opinion on this topic?
The introduction of privately owned banks printing and issuing money for the United States as was done with the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 will ultimately result in the economic collapse of our nation which we are witnessing right now." Bruce adds, quoting from Ben Gisin, veteran banker “Lenders and borrowers, by virtue of how they invoke debt when creating and distributing money, have saturated the national economy with what the Fed reported on 3/12/09 was $52.6 trillion of debt.” Obviously, this is a huge burden on the national economy and is not sustainable.You offer a very good web site with lots of detailed information and transparency. I like it a lot. Can you tell us more about the duties of the GLCC Steering Committee?
We have a Facilitator which facilitates the Steering Committee meetings. We have a Scribe which takes the minutes at each meeting. We have a Steward which does all the treasury duties. Except for the Steward, we have all done the other two duties. We are a consensus board and it has been a true pleasure being on the Steering Committee. Very bright and passionate people on the Steering Committee.
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