Minara
Promoting Business Social Responsibility

Minara is part of the Simplicity Circle. Watch the Projects page for the latest.

Insurance regulations tightened. Oct 20, Calling secret broker commissions a “serious problem that betrays the public’s trust,” Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi announced new regulations Wednesday to require agents and brokers to disclose any financial incentive they would receive for selling certain insurance products and steering business to specific companies.

Leak shuts down Greka! Sep 25, 2004. Greka, which has had a long list of environmental problems, has shut down operations of a Greka Energy Corp. site in Santa Maria following a potentially life-threatening hydrogen sulfide gas leak there. "They will not be allowed to make temporary repairs," said Capt. Charlie Johnson, a county Fire Department spokesman, according to the Santa Barbara News-Press.

MTD spares price hike! May 25 , 2004 -- In a victory for PUEBLO and low-wage workers SB MTD-riders were spared the threatened price hikes. Passes will be available which will cost the same as before ($1/ride), although per-ride cost will go up 25c.

Tenet Healthcare audited for alleged Medicare abuse! Oct 28, 2003-- Based in Santa Barbara, the 2nd largest hospital chain in the U.S., Tenet is being audited by the U.S. Health and Human Services for alleged unnecessary heart procedures to boost profits at one of its facilities. No hospitals in Santa Barbara are owned by Tenet.

Minara gets 501(c)3 Jan 9, 2003-- Minara is now fully tax deductible. It obtained a federal exemption to operate as a 501(c)3 nonprofit.

People's March for Economic Justice: April 27,2002 -- We had a great time! Several activists including Ralph Nader addressed the crowd in the Sunken Garden. Read why it was important.

Living Wage Symposiom: April 22, 2002: Dr. Peter Kuhn presented the finding of the Public Policy Institte of California and considered its iimplications for Santa Barbara. News

Santa Barbara passes Living Wage: March 19, 2002: The city of Santa Barbara passed a watered down Living Wage Ordinance. News

How can you take action? Check out the actions you can take.

Want to get involved? Contact us!

We saw an excellent documentary highlighting the depletion of oil and its consequences. It is called End of Suburbia. I wrote an article in the Santa Barbara NewsPress about it, which appeared on the Sep 21 issue. Do see if if you get the chance. And tell me what you think about it.

Corporations are marketing an unsustainable way of life without regard to its consequence to mankind. This is highly short-sighted and irresponsible. Unless we change, they will not follow.

Sri, 9/21/04

Business social responsibility is many things to many people. At its heart, it concerns how to make businesses responsible to our social needs and not just pander and market to our commercial needs. Our commercial needs are far smaller than what our pattern of consumption indicates. This has devastating consequences for our species in terms of environmental degradation as well as depletion of natural resources.

We urge people to adopt Simplicity as a way of life. When we do this, we send a clear signal to businesses of our needs, and thereby change the way they operate.

Sri, 2/17/04

I bike to work. It takes me about 30 minutes. Yesterday as I biked, I counted the number of cars that I saw between the times I saw bikes. My record was 80! That's 80 cars and trucks before I saw a single bike. And this in Santa Barbara, where distances are small and the weather near-perfect most of the time. As I got closer to town, I saw more bikes. I mostly only saw Latinos on bikes, probably going to work themselves. I think of a T-shirt blurb: "Do you ride your bike because you can afford to, or because you can't"?

Stream of consciousness? Yes, so far, but I am getting to the point. It is lovely biking weather, so why aren't more people biking? How can we keep doing the same thing day in and day out, never questioning the status quo, never daring to go off the mainstream. We watch and listen to mainstream media, drive around dry pavement in big fat SUV's, put up antenna flags without a moment's pause at the polls or a moment's reflection on our country's policies, eat burgers and other fast food from food factories more focussed on profits than our nourishment or treatment of animals, throw our junk out without any thought about where it goes, give gifts during Christmas because it is so prescribed, send out Hallmark cards because it is Mother's day, buy new cars that depreciate significantly the first two years because we get suckered by new car ads and above all believe the crap that the free market capitalists put out that if you get paid a low salary, it is because the market determined that, and this is the best thing.

You did all the crazy things above not because it intrinsically made sense but because of a perceived value -- "hey, everybody's doing it" is one such perceived value, the comfort of belonging to the same club. This is the power of the mainstream, and to get everybody to do it is the science of "marketing". So, rather than saying that your salary is low because of the market, you should be saying it is low because you didn't market yourself well.

Consider these numbers: an average CEO's compensation went from 42 times the entry-level wage in 1980 to 500 times in 2000! Are CEOs more valuable now than 20 yrs back? Are entry-level workers less valuable? How else can you explain that while the federal minimum wage is stuck at $5.15 since 1997, Congress approved itself 4 cost-of-living raises during the same period for a combined raise of $16,400 per year (more than a minimum wage worker's yearly salary)?

We're manipulated! By an incredibly effective marketing machine devised by the haves who keep sucking the dollar bills up into their pockets before the have-nots can reach for them. This, my friends, is what we tacitly encourage when we don't stop and think about our actions. So, get off your cars and onto your bikes. And when you put on your helmets, remember what you're protecting -- your head, your wilful, wonderful head capable of gobs of free-thinking yearning to be free of its mainstream shackles.

Sri, 4/23/03

I am also tired of greedy people who consume without a shred of understanding of the consequences of their mindless and lazy lives. What is wrong with all you SUV freaks? Are you out of your minds? May be we should drop the "Santa" from Santa Barbarians to describe you all.

We at Minara would like to give you some info. on your consumption so you can actually act on it locally, in your most expensive city of the beautiful location, with a city council that does not really support a living wage. Use your judgment well. Spend your money at a local business that treats its employees with basic dignity.

PS: I hope the price of gas rises to $5/gallon and you spend $200 each time you fill that beast. Perhaps, you will decide to sell the monster and spend your money more carefully - rather than literally burning it.

Milind, 3/27/02