Whether you need bike repair, child care, or performance poetry services, a new local currency program that aims to increase access to goods and services for people in Baltimore may be able to help.

Modeled after similar successful programs around the world, Baltimore Hours formally launched in May in an attempt to meet several needs: supplementation for limited incomes, strengthened communities, and increased support for locally-owned businesses.

Hamilton resident Brad Johnson developed Baltimore Hours in April 2001 after witnessing how a local currency program, Berkeley Bread, made a difference in that California community. Johnson and other organizers spent a year enlisting participants at the farmer's market in Waverly and in other locations around town. To sign up, traders need only offer a skill and pay a $1-$25 fee on a sliding scale (in U.S. dollars) to help with the program's administrative costs. Though the program began with a focus on the neighborhoods of Waverly and Charles Village in central Baltimore, Hours can be used around the city, and the program hopes to expand.

Baltimore Hours recently printed its first directory, a listing of names and contact information for over 200 individuals who have agreed to accept Baltimore Hours as part or full payment for goods and services. The breadth of skills available is surprising, ranging from labor, yard work, and house painting to accounting and a variety of computer, writing and tutoring help. It also includes a smattering of intriguing offerings like fork sculpture and one listing for an "idea genius."

Baltimore Hours are traded in paper form, and scrip has been printed in dominations of one hour, 1/2 hour, 1/4 hour and 1/10 hour. Four hours have been mailed to each participant in the program. Though they look like bills, there is no mistaking Baltimore Hours for federal currency, with a painting of a view of Federal Hill in 1850 on the front and various photos of the city on the back.

And, unlike federal currency, Baltimore Hours can only be used within Baltimore, circulating among traders within the local economy rather than going directly to national and multinational corporations. Johnson says, "there's an economic theory that every dollar spent locally has a multiplier effect," and adds that Baltimore Hours provides an incentive for people to support locally-owned businesses that accept the currency.

Some critics of Baltimore Hours and similar programs feel that they replicate the capitalist system, operating too much like federal money. Not only are local currencies taxable by the U.S. government, they have to be adjusted for inflation through careful monitoring of the amount of the currency in circulation. In addition, Hours are somewhat linked U.S. dollars, as for ease of negotiation each Baltimore Hour is considered to be valued at $10.

The $10 link was decided upon because it is considered to be the living wage for an hour of labor in the area. For some participants, like former Charles Village resident Katie McConnell, who accepts Baltimore Hours for child care, the $10 equivalency means that an hour of this work pays more than it often would in federal currency. On the other hand, Johnson says that many people have complained that they normally "make $100 an hour, so the system won't work for them." In part to account for this, and because traders are free to negotiate their own exchanges in any way that is mutually beneficial, individuals and businesses might charge more than one Baltimore Hour for one hour of labor.

To some, the leveling effect of an hour for an hour disappears with this possibility. Also, the tie to a living wage is not fixed if, for example, 1/2 of a Baltimore Hour becomes the negotiated price or even the market standard for an hour of child care.

Brad Johnson feels that these criticisms only demonstrate that capitalism is a skewed system, when "someone like a farmer is barely making it and people like athletes and celebrities are hoarding all the wealth." He says that Baltimore Hours counters this tendency because it is based on the idea of reciprocal assistance. When each transaction is freely agreed upon by two individuals involved, capitalist values don't really apply. People whose specific skills or interests are not valued in commercial markets will perhaps benefit most from being able to trade them for Baltimore Hours.

Johnson admits that because of the strength of U.S. federal currency, people used to a high hourly wage may not see the personal economic benefit of using Hours. (Local currency programs elsewhere, like Creditos in Argentia and others in Latin America, are a different story, serving as a necessary alternative to federal money for obtaining basic goods and services.) However, he points out that the goals of Baltimore Hours go beyond the strict exchange of money for goods, and that one of its most important purposes is strengthening communities by bringing people in touch with one another.

A variety of other models of local exchange exist, ranging from the more monetary-based to strict time barter programs. Several cities around the world operate Local Exchange Trading Systems (LETS) in which credits for goods and services are added to or deducted from participants "accounts," without circulating currency. Like Baltimore Hours, transactions are negotiated between traders and credits are often linked to a supposed value in national currency. The Time Dollars model, used in Seattle, Boulder, and Toronto, is similar to LETS in its centralization, but uses a strict time system in which an hour of anyone's labor is equal in value to anyone else's, and inflation and other monetary issues are not factors.

Johnson says that both of these models were less ideal than the Hours program, in part because of the administrative issues involved with tracking the credits in a central location. And, programs based on the same model as Baltimore Hours have had numerous successes. Ithaca HOURs, founded in 1991, is the oldest and largest of these in the United States. The program's web site lists some of its accomplishments, stating that "several of Ithaca's organic farmers are paying the highest commmon farm labor wages in the world: $10.00 of spending power per HOUR." In Ithaca, where HOURs are used by tens of thousands of people in the community, and often accepted for rent, food, and other essentials, this amounts to a real increase in income. The site also notes that professionals including dentists and lawyers who accept the HOURs have become increasingly willing to charge one HOUR for one time hour of labor. Ithaca also gives a percentage of total HOURs in the form of grants to community organizations and interest-free loans. Though Ithaca is a much different city than Baltimore, a smaller college town rather than a real urban metropolis, organizers hope that similar things can happen here.

Brad Johnson expects the network of Baltimore Hours traders will grow with the printing of money and the directory, and adds that his next step is to enlist more businesses, farms, and other established goods and services providers to accept Hours. Currently the program's only staff person, Johnson hopes to form a collective and is working on securing office space. He would also like to see more traders become involved in the administration of the program itself, volunteering time and attending Baltimore Hours' monthly potluck dinners to meet others and discuss policies.