ABOUT BRIAN

Here are some things about me.

I was born in Manhattan Hospital in April of 1956.

I am a vegetarian, practice Bhakti Yoga and believe in reincarnation.

I grew up in the township of Huntington, Long Island and moved to Dobbs Ferry, New York when I was 12.

Thanks to my Dad, I shook hands with Senator Robert Kennedy at the FAO Schwartz toy store on 5th Avenue.

I was a campaign volunteer for Eugene McCarthy for President in 1968 when I was 12.

I got my first job in 1971 at Blimpies sandwich shop on Delancy Street in NYC and also worked as a Fuller Brush salesman in Manhattan’s garment district.

I have spent 5 years living in Boston and 5 years living in Buffalo.

On May 1, 1977 I was one of 2,000 Clamshell Alliance activists, trained in nonviolent civil disobedience and organized in "affinity groups” that occupied the Seabrook, N.H. nuclear power plant construction site. 1,414 of us were arrested. I spent 12 wonderful days in the Somerset National Guard armory until the state could not afford to hold us anymore.

In 1980, I was a member of the Studio 10 Rock Coop on Bleecker Street in NYC and an organizer with Rock Against Racism USA.

I have an award from the Red Cross for helping to save a life using their CPR training.

In 1986 I finished the San Francisco Marathon in 4 hours and 4 minutes.

In May of 1986 I ran in Sport Aid, a massive event with 20 millions runners across the five continents, 78 countries and 274 cities. $100 million was raised for famine relief in Africa, with $45 million brought in from a global television special that reached 750 million people.

I have developed a social business plan inspired by Sport Aid called Human Race Day.

In 1987, I graduated from the Delancey Street Foundation. I was the top salesperson in their School of Marketing. For example, I sold 400,000 buttons and balloons for the launch of the California Lottery, 500,000 buttons, flags and arm bands for Hands Across America, and promotional advertising / gift products for Bank of America, Kaiser Permanente, Winterland Productions and Bill Graham Presents.

I was a volunteer with the Rock Medicine Unit of the Haight Asbury Free Clinic for 5 years.

I am a “clean and sober” person that works for drug policy reform and to end marijuana prohibition.

I worked for Bill Graham as the Greeter at the Fillmore until it was closed by the earthquake in 1989.

I was once the manager for Chester D., a “left handed from Louisiana” 80-year-old bluesman.
I got Chester recorded by Blue Jazz Records, and booked at the Fillmore twice where he opened the shows for Greg Allman and John Mayhall.

I was one of the producers of the 1988 Soviet American Peace Walk Concert in Golden Gate Park to commemorated the end of a coast to coast U.S.-Soviet peace walk.

I have organized, trained and deployed hundreds of “Safety Monitors” for security at “Peace Jobs and Justice” marches and rallies of 75,000 to 150,000 people in San Francisco between 1986 and 1991.

In 1991 I was a founding member of Business Partnership for Peace, hired as the first full time sales person for Give Something Back, and started the East Bay chapter of Business for Social Responsibility.

In 1992 I started organizing with RESULTS on creating global political will to end extreme poverty. I organized annual press conferences for UNICEF’s State of The World’s Children Reports (several with Nancy Pelosi) as part of a ten-year campaign to achieve the goals of the 1990 UN World Summit for Children.

In 1994, working with Joseph Goldin and the Unity Foundation, I organized a live two-way television “Space Bridge” between artist festivals in Sarajevo and San Francisco. This was part of a series of videoconferences focused on citizens peace building initiatives to the city of Sarajevo, which was under the siege of war.

In 1995 I organized a technology expo as part of the UNITY95 International Culture and Technology Festival for the 50th Anniversary of the UN in San Francisco. We showcased the World Wide Web using 28.8 modems, Witness human rights videos, IBM AutoCAD software rebuilding the Dresden Cathedral, a PictureTel videoconference to Cape Town South Africa and a Buckminster Fuller fly’s eye dome.

In 1996 working for Ken Margolis, I proposed and sold the first “beyond the banner” Internet advertising campaign to Microsoft for the Launch of Office 97. It linked to a behind-the-scenes page with the publisher and editor of Gampen.com using Office 97 for their web publishing business.

In 1998 I was the Corporate Relations Manager for the Association of Internet Professionals.

During the Internet boom days in San Francisco from 1997 to 2001, I organized the monthly SF Web Business Mixer, and the Internet and Music Business Mixer. I produced 415TECH a large regional IT networking event from 1999 to 2001 and published the San Francisco's Dot Com Directory in August of 2000.

For many years I worked with Premium Network, the Save Earth Foundation and major market radio stations to produce a nationwide live on-air Earth Day Auction of autographed guitars from the world's most well known rock artists.

In 2004 I produced a report on the U.S. concert industry and concert-rally opportunities for the Dean for America campaign. Working for Music for America I arranged for voter registration and information tables to be set up at over 50 nightclub shows in ten states during the Super Tuesday democratic primaries.

In 1992 after candidate Bill Clinton said in his Rolling Stone interview that Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank and RESULTS board member, “should be given a Nobel Prize”, I started working with RESULTS leaders to make it happen. I got the got the original “how to” information on the Nobel Committee process from the Norwegian Consulate for the RESULTS Board. Presidents and national government leaders are among the few that can make Nobel prize nominations year after year. When President Clinton left office, Senator Hillary Clinton took over the annual nomination submission. In 2005 I got Professor Yunus booked on to the Charlie Rose Show for a full hour interview. The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded in 2006 jointly to Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank.

In 2005 I started organizing with the ONE Campaign and the Make Poverty History white band movement. From 2006 to 2010 I organize annual Stand Up events for the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in San Francisco. In October 2009, we joined 173,045,325 citizens gathered at 3,000 events in 120 countries standing up and demanding that their governments eradicate extreme poverty and achieve the MDGs. The Stand Up holds the Guinness World Record as the largest mobilization of human beings in history.

Since 2006 I have been organizing the annual National Labor-Community Awards summit in San Francisco.

In 2009 I became a founding member of the Impact Hub in both Berkeley and San Francisco.

In 2008 and 2010 I organized Green Labor-Capital Forums at Delancey Street’s Town Hall focused on using public employee pension funds and union pension funds to create green jobs and a better world. I am now developing this into a high-level two-day conference focused on using the power of Labor's Capital, Capital Strategies, Impact Investing and Union Coops for a better world.

In 2014 and 2015 I provided strategic services to the Mission Housing Development Corporation for their successful bid to develop 1950 Mission Street as green afforable housing.

I am the founder and general manager of Better World Associates a small agency focused on connecting world class professionals and clients to build a better world.

My world view is based on Buckminster Fuller's philosophy of using personal commitment and design science for problem solving and the sustainable success of humanity.

The 1-415-243-8900 is my mobile phone number. I always have my phone with me and answer it if I am not in a meeting, at the movies, in the shower or sleeping.

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