* Implementation of the AmberWell 300 project is currently in progress *
Liberal
Democracy
Inclusive
Capitalism
Individual
Freedom
Our Overarching Objective
‘Harness’ globalization and the financial system to transform a large majority of our population into financially free and effective citizens by 2076, our tricentennial.
Solutions must be bold, comprehensive and rest on a foundation of inspired, transparent and non-conflicted leadership throughout the nation. Such independent leadership must, above all, be beyond reproach in all that it does, facilitate the long-term wealth of every individual, and remake much of our nation’s education system.
Founder
Brian T. Portis
Raised in modest circumstances, and schooled in a “character forming” New Zealand farming community, Mr. Portis (our founder) went on to obtain undergraduate degrees in accounting and economics at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand.
Concurrent with his undergraduate studies, Mr. Portis worked at the New Zealand affiliate of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), a leading global public accounting and consultancy firm. Consequently, Mr. Portis was admitted to membership of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants on graduation from the University of Otago in 1969. Post graduate degrees in systems (Lancaster University) and business administration (New York University) followed.
A twenty seven year career in audit, systems and lending with a global canadian bank, The Bank of Nova Scotia (Toronto & New York), concluded with early retirement to become a social entrepreneur.
Mr. Portis’ decision to become a social entrepreneur was driven by his desire to devote the remainder of his life to developing and implementing full-scale, integrated and sustainable solutions to many of society’s most pressing and intractable problems, particularly those involving poverty and national security.
Founder’s Observations and Personal Note
Recent headlines indicate that all is not well with our nation and too many of our fellow citizens (inadequate education, childhood poverty and poverty in general, lack of economic mobility, economic inequality and political dysfunction).
AMERICA. Blessed beyond imagination. Drowning in an ocean of plenty!
AMERICA. “A House Divided” on every important issue, and in such a toxic manner that speculation abounds as to whether the union is nearing irreversible decline.
AMERICA. Tortured by an inability to decide how to ensure a better, more prosperous and sustainable future for itself and all of its citizens.
AMERICA. With a federal and too many state and local governments that are intolerably dysfunctional and incapable of setting enduring long-term priorities that are inherently beneficial to the nation and satisfactory to a significant majority of its citizens. In the short-term, celebrated compromises have, more often than not, merely entailed ‘more unfunded benefits for me and tax cuts for you’ – all, of course, adding to unsustainable debt loads!
AMERICA. Where editors, opinion columnists and talk show participants create a perpetual echo chamber of expert and eloquent opinion as to what and why things have gone wrong. Those few who offer ‘solutions’ invariably invoke the very same dysfunctional governments, noted above, to implement prescribed courses of action to solve the nation’s problems - the irony escapes them as they continue to agonize over why ‘nothing gets done’ at best or, at worst, the problems continue to grow in scope and scale!
MY SOLUTION: A non-governmental organization of unprecedented scope and scale that is philanthropically originated, citizen driven, and directly self-funded in perpetuity by the global economy. The organization will succeed where governments have not succeeded and probably never will.
MY INSPIRATION: While growing up as a farm kid in New Zealand, where I benefited from a free school and university education, I read a formative novel called “Amberwell” by D.E. Stevenson. The book’s compelling theme dictated that every generation, being a beneficiary of the past and a trustee for the future, should leave the family estate on which they lived significantly better off than when they inherited it. Thus, now as an American citizen, I will not rest, cannot rest, until our nation is both significantly better off than when I found it and on a solid and united path to a prosperous and sustainable life for all of its citizens.
AMERICA. Where my intergenerational AmberWell 300 project must not fail. A project that recognizes the contributions, hardships and sacrifices of past generations, and calls on every citizen to engage in refurbishing, building and securing our nation for generations to come.
AMERICA. Where my AmberWell 300 Project will, before our nation’s 300th birthday in 2076, offer every citizen the opportunity to be economically and socially free.
AMERICA. Where my AmberWell 300 Project will lay a foundation to achieve its full-scale Vision and goals by first working to ensure a quality education for all of America’s children and financial freedom for all its citizens.
AMERICA. Where history has shown that if there is going to be “a more perfect union” or, for that matter, a union at all, then it’s going to be up to “we the people”. Therefore, “who among us will answer our nation’s urgent call to preserve and perfect the union and, in doing so, belong to the ages?”
A Call For Individual & National Sacrifice
America, a Nation built on the work and sacrifice of generations past and present.
How will our toil and sacrifices compare with their toil, hardship and loss of life, mind & limb?
