Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: CoHousing TM

[Judy (BAXTER%EPIVAX]

in reply to: findley [at] math.berkeley.edu
[The CoHousing company is here in Berkeley; I have a flyer from them
that indicates they have a trademark on the word "CoHousing."  Does
anyone know anything about this?  What are the implications of the
trademark?]

I went to a workshop they gave in Massachusetts, in sept of 1990 (gasp!).  It
was very good, and rather overwhelming.  That question was asked - basically,
they said that the reason for the trademark is to give the term some legal
meaning, so that a developer can't advertise a cohousing development without
really doing the process.  So , one could sue someone , I guess. It's not that
they are protecting the term to make money on it.

Here in Minneapolis, Cohousing is now written into the zoning code (don't ask
me the details, I can't remember them offhand) to make it clear that it fits
into, I think, residential category.

I don't know  about the rest of this quiet net, but I am stressed out - I just
moved into Monterey CoHousing Community - am living with a construction site in
half of my unit, (we are turning a former retirement home into 8 apt-type
units) half my stuff is still at my house which i'm selling, and we
just selected an architect for the 10-15 townhouses we plan to build on the
surrounding land. Cohousing is wonderful, AND it is really true what "THE BOOK" 
says about needing at least 15 households.  We have 6 active in the building at
the moment, and we are stretched ve-e-e-ery. thin.  We're actively recruiting,
Twin Cities-ers, so if you know someone...  We're 5 blocks outside the
Minneapolis boundary, and have a great start.
Judy Baxter