BALTIMORE, MD — On June 24th, Baltimore’s final fiscal year 2027 budget was approved by City Council—including, for the first time, money designated to support the conversion of businesses to worker cooperatives when the owners of those businesses wish to retire or sell. The city’s $250,000 commitment will enable an expansion of the work of Baltimore Roundtable for Economic Democracy to facilitate cooperative conversions to retain jobs, empower workers, avert commercial vacancies, and preserve locally-owned businesses.
Worker cooperatives—businesses owned and governed by their workers—are on the rise in Baltimore. Much of the growth in the sector has been driven by Baltimore Roundtable for Economic Democracy (BRED), a nonprofit organization founded ten years ago to advance worker ownership through education, cooperative development, and non-extractive financing. Since its work starting in 2016 to help Taharka Brothers Ice Cream convert from a social enterprise to a business owned by its youth workers, BRED has invested over $5 million in worker cooperative conversions in Baltimore, preserving 149 jobs and facilitating the creation of more than 50 jobs post-conversion, in businesses like The Wine Source, Common Ground Coffee, EnviroCollab, and Appalachian Field Services.
Now, with support from Baltimore City, BRED will be able to accelerate and expand these efforts, helping more business owners preserve their legacy through worker cooperative conversion as a succession strategy. With over half the owners of all privately held employers in the US already over age 55, cooperative conversion represents an important opportunity to help business owners keep the jobs they created in communities like Baltimore, while creating broadly held wealth that stays rooted locally.
As City Council President Zeke Cohen, says “Cooperative ownership is one of the most powerful tools we have for keeping beloved Baltimore businesses open and locally owned, especially when an owner is ready to retire or sell. This $250,000 investment in the Baltimore Roundtable for Economic Democracy reflects this Council’s commitment to keeping local businesses local. BRED has the experience and track record to help business owners transition successfully to cooperative models, and that means more Baltimoreans have a real shot at entrepreneurship and ownership in their own communities.”
Read more in BRED’s official press release here
