The Points of Light Program

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The Points of Light Program

Tom Wilson, HR Consultant, United States

Transforming America: Restoring Main Street through Community Empowerment.

The Points of Light Program

The Points of Light Program was originally proposed to systematically finance the unfunded mandate arising from President Ronald W. Reagan's New Federalism. It was subsequently submitted in testimony to the House Ways and Means Committee pursuant to hearings relative to tax relief, equity, fairness and reform, economic stimulus and growth as the Cascade Structures in 1992.

Subsequent to these hearings, I successfully lobbied Congress for the creation of one of the structures of Cascade Structures/The Points of Light Program, the so-called "collapsing trust", which became the DeConcini Deficit Reduction Trust, The purpose of this trust is to assemble monies transparently and off-budget for deployment by Congress to local community organizations and neighborhood partnerships (such as charter schools and Geiger-Gibson Community Health Centers) through Community Development Action Grants (C-DAG) vehicles, as well as bloc grants to state, county and municipal versions of the DeConcini Deficit Reduction Trust. These monies are to be employed by local community organizations for the following purposes:

- Education, recreation and training;
- Community health and wellness;
- Affordable housing; and
- Infrastructure.

It is the intent of the design of this program for Congress to distribute $100 Billion through the DeConcini Deficit Reduction Trust in $3 million C-DAG packages. These packages are a structure in the 18 month community empowerment and transformation process. These empowerment processes represent a "sweat equity" investment by the community and will leverage the effectiveness of the material impact of the capital package. JumpStart Training is a 9 hour orientation program in leadership for community empowerment that introduces the community into the 18 month empowerment process.

In the final analysis, capitalism comes down to cold, hard cash or it isn't capitalism but some form of magical thinking like Marxism or the conservatism which is creating the unfunded mandate associated with Reagan's New Federalism.
President G. H.W. Bush proposed a novel, and inspired method for financing the DeConcini Deficit Reduction Trust by allowing tax-payers to direct up to 10% of their tax payments into the trust. This trust, as an off-budget structure, will become an element in tax reform and fullfill the promise of Reagan's New Federalism.

An additional source of financing is the proposed Financial Transaction Tax, which will permit a modest transfer of Wall Street's on-going prosperity to renewing Main Street.

In addition, PACs representing Democrats and Republicans could engage in a competition to place the greatest amount of money in the Trust for the direct benefit of the American voter between now and November. It has been my intention that The Points of Light Program would have a sunset provision after $100 Billion has been distributed. As I say, this is a transformational program and it is designed to duplicate the national mobilization which occurred after Pearl Harbor. Once it has gone through the economy during this generation, it can be put aside. The intent is to allow the American commonwealth to complete its transformation from the Military Industrial Complex of the Eisenhower generation to the Aerospace-Entrepreneurial Matrix envisioned by the Nixon-Moynihan domestic policy. Currently, the commonwealth is stuck in an Military-Entrepreneurial morass with magical thinking being construed as the essential economic driver, Information.. .

Just for the record, the Points of Light Program was originally conceived for the integration of US and Soviet industrial populations for an aerospace IPO. If I was to take over, say, American AIrlines as a troubled asset, the first thing I would do would be to put the organization into the process. Of all the industries in America, the airlines are the most mission oriented and already operate in the 5th Wave High Performance mode below the executive level. The Points of Light Program is a bottom-up process and, eventually, the people currently on the Executive Compensation schedule would be absorbed into the superior performance milieu.

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