Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: need help with learning legal issues in uses of common land

[Rob Sandelin (floriferous]

My experience is that by trade attorneys take the view of worst case
scenario. As a community you are significantly different than any other kind
of housing that an attorney you could hire would know anything about. I
would suggest finding somebody whose experience base comes from intentional
communities, not corporate world. Otherwise, you may get a whole bunch of
very unrealist notions about what you want to be doing.

Much of what you do with your land is entirely up to you and your community.
You may want to do things, and probably want to operate in ways, that don't
put economic profits first, but relationships first. This is absolutely
counter to just about every attorneys experience.

I'd recommend trying to contact the Farm and seeing if you can get some
advise from Albert Bates. He is very knowlegable, and has a very sound
community centric focus.

Rob Sandelin