Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: COHOUSING-L digest 178

[Michael Mariner (maikano]

Deb Behrens asked: 

>What we are asking now, of all you burning souls out 
>there, is what you think is important to result from 
>the Burning Souls day.  How will you know if the day 
>is successful?

Making progress toward any of the following ways to broaden/deepen the 
cohousing movement: by encouraging more cohousing groups to

- seek existing urban sites where they can (re)build instead of adding to 
urban sprawl on the outskirts and causing more commuting;
-  find ways to include more diversity, especially of income level;
-  incorporate ways for community members to collaborate on business 
endeavors and included on site facilities to enable office sharing, 
telecommuting, maybe light mfg.,  - whatever makes sense;
- plan community-wide energy systems like Bruce Coldham discussed in Coho 
Mag a few issues ago;
-  plan wide scale gardens and other food raising on site;
-  build with local, non polluting, non-toxic, sustainable materials that 
are appropriate for each particular bioregion.;

and,  for moved-in coho groups to:

-  reach out to neighborhoods adjacent to theirs to encourage them to 
form cohesive communities (eventually adjacent coho sites could form 
ecovillages as is the plan at Ithaca, NY;
-  find ways to keep the local news media updated and excited about how 
cohousing is working;
-  look for ways to keep improving the sustainability of their 
communities through things mentioned above -- more food growing, less 
commuting, more business endeavors on site;
-  for each moved-in community to maintain a web site that they would 
update using (modified) versions of their internal newsletters, personal 
journals, photographs, whatever.  These could either be on the existing 
cohousing server site or at least be linked to it.

And for the movement in general:
- step up networking worldwide/nationwide to get cohousing/intentional 
community to permeate the general consciousness.

I know, I know -- most of these topics have come up on cohousing-L in the 
last few months, but I think the Burning Souls could do some 
brainstorming on how to get one or two implemented.


I won't know until a month before the national gathering whether I can go 
or not, but if I go I'd definitely like to attend the Burning Souls 
sessions.

Michael M