Bay Area Green Tours is hosting its second Farm to Fork tour of the season on August 15th.

We at OneCalifornia Bank are excited to announce that we are leaders in providing SBA loans to Bay Area small businesses, according to the U.S. Small Business Administration.  Thanks to our SBA team, led by Robert Gebauer, the amount of lending for our small size and young age is amazing.

 In the first nine months of the fiscal year 2010, out of the 80 banks in the San Francisco SBA District Office, OneCalifornia Bank was 6th in terms of number of loans and 10th in number of dollars lent for the nine month period between October 1, 2009 and June 30, 2010*. We generated a total of $5.75 million in loans during this time. In fact, we lent more dollars than Citibank, Bank of America, Bank of the West, and JPMorgan Chase in this district.  Pretty impressive considering we’ve only been around for 3 years and their assets are on substantially larger than ours!  We look forward to having them join us in increasing the amount of loans being made to our local small businesses.

We are proud to be able to help many businesses in stay in operation (and grow!) during hard times, and in turn help retain and create jobs in our local community.  This is what our work is all about - strengthening our local economy to benefit community members of all income levels, races and walks of life.  You support our clients every day without knowing it, from a Hispanic bakery in San Pablo to a recycling retail business in Oakland, to a restaurant in San Francisco.  Thank you for supporting us in this work!

For enlightening facts about how small banks across the country are helping our communities, see this article in last month’s newsletter.

*for 7a loans

Not only did OneCalifornia Bank win a Best of the East Bay Award, but so did some of our Oakland Unwrapped members!  Congratulations to our fellow Best of the East Bay Winners on Oakland Unwrapped! 

Oakland Museum of CA: Best Face Lift

Oaklandish: Best Locally Made Kids’ Products; Reader’s Poll: Best Locally Made Products; Reader’s Poll: Best Men’s Clothing; Reader’s Poll: Best T-Shirts

Pendragon Books: Reader’s Poll: Best Book Store

Pro Arts Gallery: Reader’s Poll: Best Arts Organization

Yoshi’s Jazz Club: Most Balanced Kid’s Meal

Check out these and other winners at the Best of the East Bay Party on August 6th in Jack London Square!

Last year’s Eat Real Festival was a huge hit, featuring local food, street food, homemade ice cream, local beer and wine, presentations, music, and more.  If you weren’t able to make it last year, be sure to check it out this year!  The event runs from Friday, August 27th to Sunday, August 29th and features local food from around the Bay.  For details, visit their website.

New this year is Saturday’s Eat Real Bike Tour!  From 12-4:30, peddle along Oakland’s waterfront, meet local culinary artists, and sample their creations.  Tastings will be at Linden Street Brewery, Numi Teas, Vice Chocolates, and Urban Legend Cellars.  To purchase a ticket and find out more information, visit http://hesternet.net/events.html

Oakland Grown–a local non-profit organization whose mission is to support and celebrate Oakland’s local, independent businesses and artists–wants you to come out, meet the artists and business owners, and learn more about their movement!  They are holding a mixer on Thursday, July 15th at ERA Art Bar and Lounge in the up-and-coming Uptown District of Oakland.  Come meet the Oakland Grown crew and mingle with other folks who love and support Oakland and independent businesses and artists.  There will be a cash bar, music, and special guests.  Check out details on the Facebook event page.

The YWCA in Downtown Berkeley is offering a free workshop on how to develop a successful personal spending plan.  In this workshop, you will learn how to identify the difference between a spending plan and a budget; how to use a spending plan; and how to build a sold, prudent reserve/contingency fund (3-6 months living expenses).  The workshop is free, but you must RSVP to attend!  Sign up by emailing ywmoney@ywca-berkeley.org with RSVP and the workshop date in the Subject Line and your full name in the body of the email. For more information contact the YWCA or visit their website.

All the finalists at the Oakland Indie Awards were proud businesses and artists of Oakland that do wonderful things here in our community.  But some go beyond our East Bay city-some do work that impacts the United States as a whole.

Sungevity is one of those nominees.  Sungevity is a solar panel business based in Jack London Square that allows clients to lease solar panels for their roof as well as purchase them.  In doing so, Sungevity hopes to democratize solar panels by providing access to solar energy to a wider-based clientele.  Sungevity hopes this will make solar panels more widely used throughout the United States.

Another way Sungevity is working to spread interest and awareness about solar panels is to get them back on the White House.  Solar panels used to be on the White House during the Carter administration, but came down during the first Bush administration.  Sungevity wants to get them back on.  They sent a letter to the Obamas and started a website, http://solaronthewhitehouse.com/, where you can learn more and sign a petition to get involved.  According to Sungevity, the goal of this campaign and petition is “to drive awareness of the ease and affordability now available to homeowners and the dramatic effects it can have on not only slowing global warming, but also saving consumers money on their monthly power bill.”

You can learn more about Sungevity on their website.  And to learn about their push to get solar on the White House, check out solaronthewhitehouse.com.

On Friday, May 14th, Oaklanders celebrated the people and businesses that make the city great at OneCalifornia Foundation’s 4th Annual Oakland Indie Awards.  Hosted in partnership with the East Bay Express, the annual awards program is a celebration of all things Oakland and an opportunity to highlight the positive social and environmental impact of Oakland’s independent businesses and artists. The program was kicked off by keynote speaker Michael Kieschnick, Co-Founder, President and CEO of CREDO Mobile / Working Assets. 

The 2010 Indie Award Winners Are:

Neighborhood Dynamo: Uptown Body and Fender, a woman-owned body shop that focuses on the emotional well-being of its customers and hosts community events and fundraisers free to local non-profits at its stunning body shop in Oakland’s Uptown district.

Newbie: Snap Judgment, the new Oakland-based NPR program and multi-media company that offers a new voice in storytelling, showcasing Oakland’s diversity and telling stories that “drop listeners into another person’s skin”.

Youth Empowerment: Oaklandish, the extremely popular design and screen-printing company that celebrates all-things Oakland through its apparel and supports the city’s youth through innovation award grants.

Pillar: Peerless Coffee, the 86-year-old family-owned specialty coffee company that provides specialty blends to some of the Bay Area’s most esteemed restaurants, offers scholarships to Berkeley students, helps develop the communities that grow their coffee, and was one of the first businesses to be certified green by the Alameda County Green Business program.

Innovator: Natural Home Cleaning Professionals, the eco-friendly co-op that provides healthy worker-owner cleaning employment opportunities for immigrant women in Oakland and the Bay Area.

Ripple Effect: BayVAN and Compound Gallery, the arts organizations that founded the nationally-recognized Plaid Friday, the independent business’ answer to Black Friday that encourages people to do their holiday shopping at local indie businesses.

Greenie: Ryan Duke, an independent industrial designer that creatively re-uses reclaimed materials to build essential products to improve lives including refugees in the U.S. and individuals in developing countries.

Oakland Soul: Joyce Gordon Gallery, the downtown-Oakland based commercial fine art gallery that seeks to open doors and share the perspectives of the Bay Area’s diverse artist population, as well as those of international artists.

Please visit http://www.oaklandindieawards.com/ for more information about the winners and for pictures!

In addition to seeing the winners being announced and awarded, party guests sampled food, wine, chocolate and beer from as many as 30 food producers and restaurants, explored a selection of locally-made items from over 50 artists and retailers, and thanks to the generosity of DJ Mama L, listened to music from Oakland musicians, past and present. 

Thank you to everyone that came out to celebrate with us and we’ll see you at the 5th Annual next year!!

The new Beehive Market, celebrating all that is green and local, is opening in Berkeley on June 12th.  Think of it as an expanded farmer’s market, featurning food and product vendors, live music, and more.  They will be open every Saturday from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. on San Pablo Avenue at Virginia Street in West Berkeley.  To find out more about the event, or to find out how to get involved as a vendor or sponsor, visit their website.

The Huffington Post  has started a national conversation about moving your money to local bank.  Hear

OneCal’s founder, Kat Taylor talk with Holly Kernan from KALW’s Crosscurrents about community banks and OneCal, how community banks are actually still lending money to small businesses, and how they are committed to actually recirculating money back into communities, instead of extracting money from them. Listen to the interview on the Crosscurrents website.

(For more about the Move Your Money movement, check out MoveYourMoney.info )