Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: need feedback re community pet policies

[Diana Carroll (dianaecarroll]

Four dogs for the whole community? How does that work in practice? If the
community is at capacity, and someone needs to sell their house, do you
tell them they can't sell their unit to dog owners? What happens if
someone's dog has puppies? What happens if someone gets married and their
new spouse has a dog?

Sorry, I know you didn't create the policy, I'm just having trouble getting
my mind around your existing policy.

Liz Magill already shared the key points of Mosaic Commons's policy, but I
want to add one bit, which is that the limit on outdoor cats is "soft",
meaning someone could ask the Trustees for an exception. No one has yet
done so -- the number of outdoor cats has gotten fewer over the years, not
more -- but speaking as a former Trustee, I found the policy troubling.
What if we did hit capacity and someone did ask? On what basis would we
make the exception? The policy provided no guidance. Is it an automatic yes
unless there's some egregious reason to say no? What if we say yes to one
household, and then no to another...will that appear to be favoritism? This
is really a larger issue with policy exceptions in a cohousing context, but
our pet policy is one of the few policies that explicitly calls out
exceptions being possible.

Diana

On Tue, Jul 30, 2024 at 10:22 AM Bonnie Fergusson via Cohousing-L <
cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:

>      Pets are a frequently controversial topic in Cohousing communities.
> Our policy here which is working so far is that there is no limit on pets
> but none are allowed in the Common House (due to allergies) and all
> dogs must be on a leash or under good voice command in the presence of
> their owners (depends on how well trained the animal is—we have one elderly
> choweenie who is totally socialized, and unthreatening who is pretty much
> always off leash; the rest of the dogs are always leashed when outside on
> our premises. The cats are not allowed in the garden because their poop was
> a problem for the Garden Committee folks, although there are feral cats who
> gain access so I don’t know how useful that rule is.  Cats are only allowed
> outside in the presence of their owners who keep an eye on them.  In theory
> no pooping or peeing is allowed in the garden area and of course owners are
> required to clean up any accidents.     Good luck in working out rules that
> work for your community.Bonnie FergussonSwans Market CohousingOakland, CA
>
>
> Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPad
>
>
> On Tuesday, July 30, 2024, 5:04 AM, lisa pletka <lisampletka [at] gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>  Hello, co-housers
> I am a fairly new member at Santa Rosa Creek Commons, a limited equity
> intentional community in Santa Rosa, CA. Our community is now 42 years old,
> and there has been some contention around pets and how many are allowed on
> our campus. (Our long-standing policy permits only 4 dogs and 8 cats on a
> campus housing 35-40 people.) I am serving on an ad hoc committee to
> re-evaluate our pet policy.
>
> I would really appreciate hearing from other co-housing communities about
> the pet policies that work for you. Specifically, do you set a limit for
> the number of animals allowed per household or in the community as a whole?
> Plus any other restrictions you think are important.
>
> Thanks in advance for your feedback -- Lisa Pletka
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