Starter Kit. Idea 479 of 500. Cluster 26
Galle: a residents' company that owns the Fort's tourist lets and keeps the residents in
The mechanism, from the book
Every city has one thing it could be known for, and each is currently known for nothing in particular.
The first step
Knock on the doors of 10 Fort households and ask 2 questions: do they let rooms to visitors now, and would they put those lets through a company they co-own, in return for a share of the profit. Keep a list of names and answers. The households willing to sign an expression of interest are the founding members of the residents' company.
- Who pays first
- A Fort family who already let rooms but lose too much to outside agents, and would rather own the agency with their neighbours.
- What leaves today
- The Fort's residents are leaving as outside owners buy houses for tourist lets, so the rent and the living town leave together.
Ask first
- Department of the Registrar of Companies. Ask which company form lets many households own shares and share the profit.
- Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority. Ask how rooms let through one company are registered for visitors.
Check before you spend
Confirm the company's rules in writing, how each household joins and leaves, the registration for tourist lets, and the heritage rules inside the Fort.
Find out these three numbers
- How many Fort households let rooms to visitors now?
- What does a booking website take from each night now?
- How many households would join a company they co-own?
A comparison from the book
Galle Fort. Chapter Five
"In 1988 the Fort had 2,700 residents. By 2020 it had a little over 1,000, a fall of 60%."
The Fort is emptying of residents. A company they own lets them earn and stay.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.