Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: Other--can coho include for-profit activities

[TR Ruddick (truddick]

> From: Michael Darling <michael_darling_00 [at] yahoo.com>
> Subject: [C-L]_Other

> I have been reading htis list for several months, I am
> a new COHO/USA member and I think I get it.
> 
> Are there cohousing projects that have incorporated a
> business or income generating component?
> 
> Once upon a time I found a website that described a
> planned community in northern CA that was going to
> have studio space, performing arts space and working
> artisits in residence.  [edit]
> 
Michael, you're probably opening up a good old debate again.  You're aware
that one of the characteristics of cohousing, as listed on Coho/US, is that
the community is not a revenue-producing enterprise.  You could have a
corporation
nested in an intentional community, but that would be, by definition,
another type
of community--not cohousing.
 
What you're describing, however, is a cohousing community with lots of
people with home-based employment.  Traditional home-based careers include
the creative arts, computer programming, some types of sales, and certain
types of cottage-industry clerical or light production work (e.g., the
people who sew at home for the Deva lifewear catalog).

Other types of housing often have restrictions about the pursuit of
commercial
activity--for example, your private home has zoning restrictions, or your
apartment
house has restrictions in your lease agreement.  But those traditional home-
based occupations are (as I understand the law) always exempt from any
restriction.

If a community had lots of people with home-based jobs who wanted to share
a facility--say, lots of dancers who wanted a studio, programmers who
wanted a server, or seamsters who wanted a sewing room--and if the facility
was also open for use by hobbyists and beginners--then it would fit that
Coho/US definition while still realizing what you're describing.  I think...

On the other hand, it raises the question of whether a cohousing community
could
refuse residents the right to pursue employment that's traditionally
home-based.

TR Ruddick
Dayton Cohousing



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