Cohousing-L Mailing List: Standing Aside

[BPaiss (BPaiss]

Mac,

Though I'd chime in on your question about participation and consensus.  In
the consensus model I advocate, people stand aside for a variety of reasons.
 Everything from not feeling it is the best decision at the time, to feeling
that if the group moves ahead with that decision they may be in the wrong
group and eventually leave.  I always encourage people on the lighter side of
the above spectrum to get their feelings and concerns documentated in the
minutes.  

As far as participation is concerned, if the group collectively decides to by
a snowblower, for example, and one person stands aside, I would say they are
still expected to participate financially since in the long haul there will
be other purchases that they support that others did not.  It's part of being
a community.

When a Core Group is still very young and the expenses are coming directly
out of housholds pockets, instead of built into the purchase price of their
future home, there may be costs that someone does not want to pay.  For
example: a group locates a piece of land that requires a survey.  One
household does not like the location and doesn't want to pay for it.  What
this tells me is that they are probably not going to be a part of that group
and are effectively saying that by not participating in the financial costs.

It is very difficult to make a blanket statement about this topic.  People
need to realize that in the process of creating community they are not going
to like or want to support everything that the group collectively does.  If
the number of instances gets out of balance, that would indicate that the
person is drifting away from the group.

Hope this makes sense,

Zev