Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Rules vs No Rules

[Sharon Villines (sharonvillines]

on 8/14/00 5:44 PM, Kay Argyle at argyle [at] mines.utah.edu wrote:

> We have a resident who has pushed repeatedly for pet policy, so I'm sure
> it'll be up for discussion again, especially since the Management Committee
> recently got a proposal passed which sets up a framework for submitting
> house rules for consensus (long overdue in my opinion, but like elsewhere
> we have those who are opposed in principle to having rules).

The word rules has a lot of baggage attached to it, but it really means the
same thing as community agreements.

When I first discovered Cohousing the thing that attracted me was that
cohousers seemed to understand that

1) skilled facilitators, often from outside the group, are necessary to keep
groups from being dominated or undermined by sub-groups

2) that costs and money are a reality that can only be dealt with by sharing
costs in an open and dependable way

3) that what isn't done by volunteers must be hired out, and

4) that community agreements are necessary to have communities.

How can anyone live in anything but a dictatorship without community
agreements?

What I would want from a community is that it be sure that I understand my
dog is causing problems (of whatever kind) if I had a dog, that if I had
lost plants actions would be taken so it wouldn't happen again, and/or if my
plants were planted in a place where your dog would inevitably ruin them, I
would be told so I could move them.

Putting this off can't be good for people.

Sharon
-- 
Sharon Villines, Editor
The MacGuffin Guide to Detective Fiction
http://www.macguffin.net
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington, DC
http://www.takomavillage.org