In celebration of the United Nation's 2012 declaration of the International Year of the Cooperative, we are organizing a summit of Upstate New York cooperatives - banking, grocery, housing, agricultural, worker.  The summit will be held in Syracuse on Saturday, March 31 from 10 am to 5 pm at the South Side Innovation Center (2610 South Salina St, Syracuse, NY) and include presentations and discussions with inspiring cooperative organizations and members. The event will be an opportunity to

• Build relationships among the cooperative community around New York State
• Educate and inspire entrepreneurs and workers about possible cooperative control of their economic lives
• Give existing cooperatives greater exposure to each other and the public, and
• Assemble a database of organizations and individuals interested in cooperatives, for state-wide organizing.

We invite you to get involved! Our organizing group, led by the Onondaga Small Business Development Center (SBDC) is looking for sponsors to help make the event free or low-cost to attendees, for businesses to showcase themselves through tabling, and for support in promoting the event to constituencies throughout NY. This money will help pay for space, lunch, printed programs, and audio-visual resources.