Healdsburg OK'd as First Sonoma County 'Fair Trade Town'

Healdsburg leaders said "yea" five times to give unanimous approval Tuesday night to a resolution designating the city as a "Fair Trade Town."
"I believe in this program," said City Councilman Steve Babb. "It's ideal for Healdsburg.
"As a city, we believe in fairness for the people around us and within us," he added. "This seems to fit."
Tuesday's vote means Healdsburg will become the first Fair Trade Town in Sonoma County. It indicates the city supports the concept of Fair Trade, which hinges on favoring products that are made and shipped from foreign companies where there are healthy working conditions and fair labor practices.
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Healdsburg City Council unanimously approved our resolution!

Healdsburg on Tuesday took steps toward becoming the first “Fair Trade Town” in Sonoma County, part of a movement to encourage fair labor practices and healthy working conditions in the production of imported food and goods.

The City Council unanimously approved a resolution expressing support for fair trade practices and a local committee's initiatives to make Healdsburg a “Fair Trade Town USA.”

“I believe in this program — its concept and idea,” said Councilman Steve Babb. He said it is compatible with local efforts to provide food, medical services and housing for low-income people.

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Healdsburg seeks 'fair trade town' status!

Fair Trade Healdsburg in the Press Democrat!

Healdsburg could become the first “Fair Trade Town” in Sonoma County, part of an effort to promote fair labor practices and decent work environments in the production of imported food and goods.

Healdsburg City Council members this week expressed unanimous support for a resolution in support of the designation, which is intended to promote a fair wage and safe and healthy working conditions.

Click link below to read full article:

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110817/ARTICLES/110819550?p=1&tc=pg

Resolution well recieved but delayed!

Fair Trade Healdsburg presented our initiative to City Hall last evening at 6:00pm with hope that the City of Healdsburg would pass resolution expressing support for Fair Trade practices.  This being the final step towards becoming the next recognized Fair Trade Town in the U.S. 

Steve Martin, Legislative Outreach Coordinator for Fair Trade Healdsburg, supported by several key Steering Committee Members, delivered an excellent presentation to the Healdsburg City Council, City Manager Marjie Pettus and Mayor Tom Chambers.

We were very well received with commitments of support from four City Council members as well as Mayor Tom Chambers and City Manager Marjie Pettus.

We are rescheduled for September 6th to allow time for the City Council to further discuss and we anticipate that the resolution will pass with ease.

This is great news for Fair Trade Healdsburg!

Upcoming City Council Meeting!

Tonight is the night! Fair Trade Healdsburg will present to City Council our grassroots campaign to raise awareness of Fair Trade and build demand for Fair Trade practices and products in Healdsburg. If all goes well, City Council will adopt resolution expressing support for fair trade practices and the Healdsburg Fair Trade Committee’s initiative to recognize Healdsburg as the next Fair Trade Town in the U.S.!

Goal Three "Engage your Town" Accomplished!

One of our goals was to "Engage our Town".  We have already listed on our blog and flyer where in Healdsburg folks can find Fair Trade products, now we want to encourage people to buy them!  Because of community ourtreach we now have several local organizations committed to serving Fair Trade beverages at monthly meetings and as part of their daily routine.  With a population of 10,000 people we had a goal of at least two organizations and we now have several.  We look forward to including more and more!

Now only one more goal to go, Passing a Fair Trade Resolution at City Hall!

We achieved our fourth goal!

Goal four for Fair Trade Healdsburg was to "get some love from the media".  Being a Fair Trade Town isn't just about helping our community to switch to products which better reflect our values, but also about reaching out to the general public.  We did this through generating media coverage.  Our many volunteers are doing a great job and we want to make sure someone hears about it! 

We were very fortunate to have had Ann Carranza, writer, blogger and photographer for Healdsburg Patch, attend one of our Steering Committee Meetings.  She thankfully gave us some supportive media attention:  .http://healdsburg.patch.com/articles/local-group-seeks-to-make-healdsburg-a-fair-trade-town#comments

We also had a wonderful article written by Crissi from Shop SoCo about our local Fair Trade Shop, One World Fair Trade: http://www.shopsoco.com/2011/03/one-world-fair-trade/

We also owe much thanks to Chris Love, longtime Healdsburg resident who believes we all need to make a difference in our world, for adding our movement to her "Community Corner" section of The Healdsburg Tribune: http://www.sonomawest.com/articles/2011/07/21/the_healdsburg_tribune/opinion/columns/doc4e28bede65dae908101372.txt