Who lives around me? What makes them amazing? How could knowing that be useful? This is what I’ll be exploring in a new series of blogs called “Amazing Neighbors.” My first interview is with someone I’ve admired since we first talked years ago: Don Hall, founder and Executive Director of Transition Sarasota, who lives about five blocks from my house off the edge of beautiful Gillespie Park. Don is a friendly guy about my age with bright blue eyes, sandy hair, and a wide smile. We met several years ago [...]

Come August, Sarasotans will have an opportunity to help create a new kind of economy by joining Sarasota’s first time bank known as Common Wealth.   What is a Time Bank?  In the words of Time Banks USA founder Edgar Cahn, “The concept is simple: One hour of help of any kind given to another member earns one time credit, exchangeable for an hour of help in return.”  Think of it as a system of exchange based on a different kind of currency, made of what we already have in abundance [...]