Cohousing-L Mailing List: New ways to help fuel forming groups? National and Local?

[Craig Ragland (craigragland]

How might we will find ways to get more fuel flowing into at least some
forming groups? Today, at least some of the prospective members usually make
significant investments to pay for the labor and know-how required to get
from potlucks to plan to project to community.

My assumption is that for cohousing to grow on a truly large scale we need
significant, focused efforts on the part of effective advocates, lobbyists
and community organizers. The Obama campaign is being widely credited with
effectively use the power of community organizers on a national scale. Early
on, that campaign raised money to staff a small organization, which grew
itself by training volunteers to grow local, volunteer organizations. Unlike
campaigns that primarily used marketing approaches, they started by focusing
their early work on grass roots, bottom-up organizing assisted by staff with
know-how and some funds. While the huge amounts of money and marketing that
came later in the campaign was undoubtedly important, this was only possible
by the well-organized, feet-on-the-ground work of MANY volunteers.

Specific, local cohousing communities, who focus developing or re-developing
small properties will not make this happen - they have too much on their
plate to look to the national, or sometimes even regional resources. Many
have looked to Coho/US, but we have been so limited in the resources we've
been able to provide, that they are often frustrated.

I envision a future where we are able to target "the right" funding sources
on state or national levels. Unless we get well funded ourselves, this can
only be accomplished by some volunteer energy.

Other housing development-related movements have found ways to harness major
seed money to help free local groups from all of the required early
investments. One that I've learned about is the Green House Nursing Home
model, envisioned by Bill Thomas. I attended a National Coop Bank organized
day-long workshop on the Green House model a couple of years ago. Unlike
cohousing, they are much more clear about what IS and what ISN'T a Green
House - it is a real brand, while Cohousing, today, is much broader. Here's
some more on the Green House model:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_House_(nursing_home)

Like cohousing, this is a model of shared, collaborative housing. It focuses
on the needs of elderly with major care needs, but has some significant
similarities - common kitchen/dining room, and living room with private
spaces for residents, shared decision-making about day-to-day management,
etc.. Unlike cohousing, private suites are not self-contained homes and are
within the same building. They also utilize paid staff within each Green
House 24X7, and it uses a rental model, which was carefully designed to fit
into the current health care system.

This program was jump-started by a large, 5-year grant being administered by
the National Coop Bank. The grant was:

"from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). The grant, the Green House
Replication Initiative (GHRI), is designed to foster rapid replication of
the Green House model of nursing home replacement – creating 10 person homes
providing skilled long-term care in place of existing institutions. GHRI
seeks to create tools to support redevelopment of institutions' physical,
operational, and cultural environments as well as direct technical
assistance to facilitate the construction, operation, and quality
improvement of Green Houses. Position Purpose: The Project Guide will assist
the GHRI Co-Directors implement all aspects of GHRI."

Perhaps we'll see similar programs for cohousing in the future? Should we
seek look at how we could obtain "forming group seed money" on a national
level? Does it fit some of the rhetoric from the Obama campaign?

I understand that well-organized national-level support is part of what
contributed to cohousing's rapid expansion in Denmark.

Just because this email stems from thinking about national-level funding
here, I do believe that those of us in established communites have alot to
offer forming groups on a local, grass-roots level. Established cohousing
communities, many of which are quite resource-rich, are particularly
well-suited to assist nearby forming groups. For this to happen, of course,
the established community needs the will - and it helps if the forming group
is really good at asking.

My community, Songaia, continues to help support a new, forming group. The
two renters we had at the time helped create the group. This group has never
needed our money, but the resources we've provided are core to enabling this
group to come together and get off the ground (in our common house). They
have now created and started funding their own vision of how they will
create new cohousing for their families.

I'd be interested in hearing other stories of established communities
helping forming groups... I suspect that a great many have welcomed forming
group visits, but I'm curious about situations where the support has gone
beyond a couple of group visits...

Finally, in some of my September Cohousing visits, in California and Oregon,
there was some fascinating talk about the possibility of other communities
assisting forming groups. There was some interest in this and I've raised
the idea to some of the Coho/US board members. It will be interesting to see
if Coho/US does end up putting some of our energy behind this in the coming
months/years.

In community,

-- 
Craig Ragland

Coho/US executive director
http://www.cohousing.org
craig [at] cohousing.org

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