Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: work and expectations/paying

[Judy Baxter (BAXTER]

I wrote:
> We pay for snowplowing ( we have two long driveways + 
> parking areas) and someone to clean the common living 
> room and a few other things, once a month 2 hours.  
> Other than that, we do what is done. 

and Julie Bolyn asked:
<       I am very curious how you, and other communities, have decided
what to pay for, and what to do your selves. Obviously, if something is
not getting done, that needs to be done, you pay for it. But there are a
few questions that my community has gotten stuck on:

        1. How do you decide it needs to be done (what are your
criterion)?
        2. Who decides it needs to be done (who makes the
recommendations to the larger group, in general) ?
>>

It's hard to remember, but I'll try.

In general who decides is the large group, proposals came in the past from the
Maintenance  team, from individuals.  Now, after a workshop with Rob Sandelin,
they are also likely to come from a "Proposal Development Circle" (our term) of
interested parties.

We have not had a general policy - the two items I mentioned are critical
things that need to be done regularly.  There were individuals willing to do
the plowing, but it turned out to be difficult to schedule, and when the snow
comes, someone has to be available.  More recently, many of us felt that this
was one straightforward thing we could pass up- no shortage of other stuff that
is harder to hire out.  

AS someone said, this is a perennial complex issue.

Judy

Judy Baxter, Monterey Cohousing Community,(MoCoCo) Twin Cities Area, Mpls.,MN
-- e-mail:      baxter [at] epivax.epi.umn.edu
15 homes - 7 new townhomes and 8 coop apartments  in a rehab Georgian building
 built as a retirement home in 1924 - 
 
**** back to appreciating our tunnel from the townhomes to the Common Space in
the Big  building, as the snow flies.
**** cutting down on large group meetings
**** still starting to think of an "interested people"/waiting list of some kind

 Voice Mail for Monterey Cohousing - 612-930-7554