Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Social participation (was How do we hold each other accountable?)

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

On Jul 27, 2010, at 6:12 AM, Moz wrote:

> Kathy Kelly said:
> > Agreed! Excellent discussion. Building and maintaining social capital
> > within our communities is slippery at best.
>
> This discussion is quite inspiring for us antipodeans who are working
> on building our coho. Thanks so much for the reminder that it's both
> ongoing work and ongoing reward. I admire you all a lot.

Look for people who like to arrange parties. It's harder than you  
would think. It requires not only the person who thinks creatively but  
is also the person has to be a good manager of people. And remembers  
to do things like arrange clean up and order cups. Having two people  
who work well together can work but co-leadership is a balancing act.

Also look for people who like to manage the kitchen. Making a group  
kitchen work is hard. How many supplies do you stock, etc.

As if you have a choice about any of these when you are selling units,  
but I think it might be a good thing to design your workshare _values_  
upfront. Does it include meals? Does it include governance?  Does it  
include party planning?

Some will want to limit it to what absolutely has to be done to keep  
the building from falling down, period. And you will argue about that  
is.

Sharon
------
Sharon Villines
"On the whole human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not  
quite all the time." George Orwell