TU Tuesday- Local

Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze in detail its development over the course of the text.


http://www.timesunion.com/local/article/Change-is-brewing-at-coffee-business-3591034.php


    Matthew Edge, of Berne, is trying to make a change in New York politics with his "Occupy Democracy Project".  The Occupy Democracy Project "...focuses on campaign finance reform and clean elections".   
The group, originally named The New York Democracy Project, was started at SUNY New Paltz as a collection of students including Edge and his wife, Andrea, to "educate the public about the electoral process and how to achieve fair and balanced elections".  The group wants to break up the big corporations that support politicians and can sway the way they feel on certain topics.  Also, the group wanted to ensure equal public funds for any candidate that wants to run for office to level the playing field and eliminate those corporations entirely.  


   After college, the project was handed almost completely to Edge, as the others' priorities changed.  This caused some temporary tough times for Edge and his wife.  Edge needed a way to finance the project so he decided to start his own coffee business.  He built his own roaster for the beans and buys all of the beans fair trade from poor and developing countries.  The profits from the sales of coffee beans (at $13.00 per pound) go back to the project.  Edge has a range of flavor and roasts, each named with political references such as "...Wake Up Wall Street, Clean Bean Peace Machine, Democracy Joe and...Occupy Your Cup".  These names, and the project were influenced by the Occupy movements, which Edge participated in.  He discovered that many of those people shared his views on politics and even gave "...the extra help he needed to keep The Occupy Democracy Project going".  They helped him so much, the Edge changed the name from the New York Democracy Project to the Occupy Democracy Project.