Cohousing-L Mailing List: Umbrella Group dues?

[BlairDrums (BlairDrums]

Hello all,

Cohousing of the Genessee Valley is in the umbrella group organizing 
stage after an informative workshop with Chuck and Katie. We're starting 
off with 16 households.

We're wondering what other groups experience has been with collecting 
money at the umbrella group stage. I'm willing to collect e-mailed 
responses and post a synopsis to the list (if this feels useful to folks, 
and hasn't already been done by someone else... no web browser on my 
powerbook, so I can't check the archive from home).

Our current plan:
Sliding scale dues of $270 to $135 per household, per year, payable in 2 
or 4 installments. 

We're considering requiring folks who want to join core groups directly 
(there are no core groups yet) to pay a year's worth of dues to the 
umbrella group. The thought is that it will likely be umbrella group 
energy that brought the new member household in, and the umbrella group's 
PR efforts must be sustained at a high level to help insure active core
groups.

Blair Hornbuckle
Rochester, NY