Cohousing-L Mailing List: diversity

[Fleck (foam4u]

Hi,

As a cohousing project in a "diverse" neighborhood (Asian, native and east
Indian, recent African immigrants, older Italian immigrants, and
African-Americans) we made an extensive effort to recruit "minorities".
Funny thing - as WEMs we were adding diversity to the neighborhood.

I was on the membership team and organized plenty of open houses, project
tours, one-on-one dinners, presentations to the public and what we found out
was:

People of color in our area have already formed communities so cohousing
doesn't appeal on that level. White folk seem to be the alienated group when
it comes to community.

Many Asians thought we were low income housing. Trying to explain cohousing
and the concept of doing the maintenance ourselves was a real turn-off with
this group. I don't know why.

Some "minorities" aspire to be just "Average Americans" and cohousing is not
seen in any way as average.

Most of the diversity we sought was really based on economic diversity.
Cohousing is expensive and time consuming. I've heard cohousing people say
"If you don't have cash we can "trade" out for more time invested". Well,
the people who don't have the money often also don't have the time. Evening
meetings for families with school-age kids are impossible especially if the
parents are both working or maybe both working 2 jobs.

Families with kids with special needs (another form of diversity) also can't
use kidcare no matter what the babysitter looks like or if it's free.

Even if these people wanted to participate it wasn't easy. Add language and
cultural differences - it's a non-starter. We decided to fast-track our
project because prices in Seattle were going thru the roof and we wanted to
keep the committed members we had. Building the neccesary trust that
includes other cultures takes time and we didn't have it.

We did end up with a pretty good age range but have twice as many adult
women as men, including 6 singles moms. Sort of "it takes a village" thing?

So, that's what we learned. What some of us are doing now is participating
in community councils, community gardens, local events and cultural
festivals. Those who "go to church" still drive long distances for that
though - hmm. Bloom where you're planted?

My 2c,
Anne @ Jackson Place Coho in Seattle