Full Circle Associates

Some local email lists have alerted me to two new initiatives in Seattle that use the web to support local business. The Central Cinema and Find it in Fremont are about local businesses serving local needs both in action and in spirit.

The Central Cinema is a dinner-and-a-movie joint which grew out of Kevin Spitzer's transformed artist's space in Seattle's Central District. Kevin writes "You can expect things like chocolate truffles while seeing "Chocolat" or Spicy Noodles while seeing "Tampopo"." I like that! More importantly, Kevin hopes to create 5-8 jobs in the neighborhood which is home to some of Seattle's lower income families.

The website ain't a work of art, but it functionally told me what I needed to know about the Cinema, it's operating principles, the bus routes near it (get outta ya car!) and the menu. Mmm. Oh, and yes, what movies are playing. It made it easy for me to begin supporting a local business. And it leveraged the viral nature of the web -- I got the link from a local email list. Web to local.

Find it in Fremont is a more meta approach from Coop Fremont. "The Find it in Fremont Directory is a community-based initiative to create an on-line information source of locally-owned and sustainable businesses in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle, WA." I believe this is an outgrowth of some work community members have been doing for a couple of years to build both business and awareness of the impact of buying locally vs. supporting external corporate interests. By identifying who is doing what (and many of the business listings actually share their organizational beliefs) Find it in Fremont gives us another option - with help from the web - to inform our choices.

As I think about community development - regardless of if it is here in my hometown of Seattle or in a village in Armenia - I look to models like these and ask myself, what does it take to go from this point to really making change in a community and what is the role of the internet along the way?