Cohousing-L Mailing List: membership question

[Lexi Shear (lexijunk]

Hi Folks!

I am part of a group that is forming in Vermont.  We are currently 
setting membership policies and writing bylaws.  Currently everyone in 
our group is an "associate member", that is, we've all paid a $100 
non-refundable membership fee.  We are looking at land, however, and 
will soon need to raise equity.  We expect soon to institute a new 
membership level: "equity membership".  We are trying to iron out some 
of the details of what this will look like.  In addition, we are 
writing bylaws for our group.  We are currently organized as an LLC.

We had more or less decided on criteria for "equity membership".  Then 
I started working on the bylaws and wondered whether we what we had 
decided upon was, in fact legal.  Obviously we will hire an attorney to 
answer questions of legality, but I'm wondering how other folks have 
approached some of these issues when they first started off.  For the 
moment, we are concerned only about how to define membership while we 
are in the construction stage.

So, here are our questions:

First:  What processes have people found to be most successful in 
selecting/inviting in new members?  Does your group vote (or agree by 
consensus) on new members?  Is there some kind of waiting period?  
Interview process?  Other requirements?  Some group seem to have rather 
arduous selection processes and waiting periods, others do not.  Right 
now we're torn between wanting to be open, but wanting to protect 
ourselves against potentially unsavory folks who might want to join us. 
 In addition, we're torn between wanting to get to know people, but 
feeling like we might need to move quickly to build equity and so will 
want people to join us faster.

Second:  Does your group have provisions for expelling members?  If so, 
what are they?  Is it legal to expel members from an LLC?  Has any 
group had to use their expulsion provisions?  How did it work?

Third: If a member leaves or is expelled, what process do you have for 
returning equity?  I have heard of some group whose policy is that 
equity is not returned until the community is built.  This is what we 
had contemplated doing.  Is it legal?  Do you have different equity 
policies for folks who are expelled versus those who leave voluntarily?

I feel as though writing bylaws, we're concentrating on all the worst 
case scenarios, but I think we have to make sure that our bases are 
covered.  I have the feeling that we're never going to look at our 
bylaws unless we're having problems.

I realize that's a lot of questions, but I greatly appreciate 
everyone's input on this matter.

Cheers,

Lexi Shear