Cohousing-L Mailing List: cohousing in Australia

[Mona Loofs (mloofs]

Hello everyone

I've been lurking on the list for some time now, trying to keep up with the
traffic and reading everything with interest. It has been incredibly
inspiring to find out there is a huge community of cohousers out there who
have gone through (or are going through) many of the same things that we
are going through here "down under".

Brief background: I am in the second of two cohousing groups in Hobart in
Tasmania, Australia. the first is a self-funded, mostly self-built co-op
and ours is funded by commonwealth grant money from various different
sources, to the tune of $1.2 million. The grant money is administered by
our local state housing department, well known for their rigid and stuffy
ways and their insistance on red tape. We are at the stage now where we
have identified a fantastic piece of land (coincidentally a stone's throw
away from the other cohousing group) but cannot put in a bid ourselves -
the department does that - and they will not put in a bid until they are
certain of the financial feasibility of the project. So we are spending
$10,000 of our grant money working with an architect to sort out site
plans, house plans and infrastructure costings, not knowing whether the bid
will fail or be successful. Hair-raising stuff.

I have two questions for the list: firstly, are there any other groups out
there who are working from grant money, not your own money, and what are
the pitfalls and high points you have experienced? Secondly, I am really
interested in making contact with other Australian cohousers (I have
contacted some directly already) with the view to eventually setting up an
Australian discussion list (particularly important to find out about local
resources). Please reply to that last one direct to me at the above
address.

Thanks folks

Mona Loofs
in a cohousing group with no other name as yet apart from "The Cohousing
Cooperative Ltd" Soon we'll get to have all those wonderfully stressful
naming meetings some people have mentioned...