Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: Intentional Communities vs. Cohousing

[Don Maddox (dmaddox]

Hi Kevin,

I'm fascinated by the brief description of your co-housing group in
reply to Rob Sandelin.  I'd like to hear more on the structure and on
how it came about.

I'm Don Maddox from Santa Rosa. A local group which I am part of has
formed to discuss co-housing/intentional communities with the goal of
forming a community in the hopefully not to distant future.  We're
leaning toward co-housing but want more community involvement than the
examples of co-housing organizations we have seen locally.  I really
like the sound of the common house where meals are eaten together on a
voluntary basis, the common shop, the implied childrens program and
the fact that you have common goals.  You also have your own space
with individual houses.

Our group has come together through common spiritual interests.  We
already are a loose community involved in Vipassina meditation, Sufi
and other spiritual forms. It feels real good anticipating a community
with people of like mind. Our professional backgrounds are diverse.
I'm an engineer, there is a builder (new to the area and without
capital), a massage therapist, a wildlife biologist student in masters
program, and others.  Our ages are from early 30's to 50's. We have 5
children amongst us.

Our biggest obstacle at this time is in the finances to purchase the
land and buildings for the community.  I'm real curious about how your
group managed to organize a community with folks that are mostly in
the lower income group.  Most of us (I'm probably the exception) are
presently in that category as well.  Some other questions I have are:

* Did you have a benefactor who donated some land and property?
* Are you located in the city or in the country?
* If in the city, are all the houses on a common plot of land or are
you interspersed with houses not belonging to the community?
* Are the houses that are leased, leased from the same owner?
* How did you organize this structure in the first place.  
* Could your model easily be replicated in other areas?

I know this is a long list of questions.  We will be grateful to you
for any knowledge that you can share with us.

Feel free to reply through cohousing-l if you think it has application
to others. You may copy any part of my message as well.

..Don

-- 

Don Maddox
dmaddox [at] sr.hp.com
Santa Rosa, Ca
(707)-577-3123