SALEM – On Monday, October 1, Secretary of State Kate Brown will be at the Oregon Convention Center in Portland to discuss Benefit Company legislation, at the first annual Oregon Social Business Challenge sponsored by the Oregon University System.
“Together with a group of Oregon Business Leaders we have created legislation that gives Oregon businesses the freedom and legal protection to pursue more than just profit,” said Secretary Brown. “We hope to join the 11 other states that have already passed similar laws meeting the growing needs of entrepreneurs and investors who want to use their business as a tool to solve social and environmental problems.”
Secretary Brown will join more than 1,000 Oregonians at the sell-out event next Monday featuring Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel Peace Prize recipient and leading thinker on micro-lending, in a bid to show average Oregonians that state higher education is making the world a better place.
Secretary Brown will be available to media after the opening ceremony.
When: Monday, October 1st, at 12:00 PM
Where: Oregon Convention Center
777 Northeast Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard
Portland, OR 97232
Dear Sec. Brown,
I attended the Oregon Social Business Challenge on behalf of the antipoverty advocacy group RESULTS, and I was very pleased to hear your announcement about new legislation facilitating social businesses and promoting alternatives to the single bottom line of maximizing profit at the expense of social and environmental responsibility. Thanks for your great work!
But many of us in the progressive community feel that ALL large businesses need to demonstrate social and environmental responsibility and that the single bottom line is a recipe for disaster. (See, for example, the proposed Environmental and Social Responsibility Amendment at spiritualprogressives.org.) Can you help us change the rules under which corporations operate in the state of Oregon?
Thanks again.
Randy Splitter
rsplitter@mac.com