Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Care Team

[Maggi (librarymaggi]

Our community (Touchstone Cohousing in Ann Arbor) has a small committee,
Touchstone Cares, that recognizes birthdays and organizes support efforts
for individuals celebrating a milestone. We developed this response plan to
support community members who went into isolation for COVID symptoms.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IX8B-AZundXPJbB7G5T3D8qIRW9t7nx5gIMZZcLMApI/edit?usp=sharing
I was the test case, and it was really nice -- not too much, just enough
support.

On Mon, Jul 27, 2020 at 1:19 AM Grace Kim <grace [at] schemataworkshop.com>
wrote:

> Responding to Charla Lowery:
> Does any community have a care team where they reach out to community
> members on a regular basis to see how they?re doing and to see if they need
> anything? If so,?I would be interested to find out more about their team
> and if they have anything in writing that they might share with us,
> Heartwood Commons in Tulsa,?Oklahoma.
> _______
>
> Capitol Hill Urban Cohousing (CHUC) has been living together in the same
> building for 4 years. And while we had a community life team, and ppl were
> organically checking in during meals and other social events pre-covid; we
> decided post-covid to be really intentional about this.
>
> We don't have a committee per se.
> When our "stay home" orders went into effect in WA state (early March), we
> were meeting twice weekly via Zoom. After a couple of months we went to
> weekly, and a month and half after that, we went to monthly (which was our
> normal cadence).
> During the weekly meetings, we did 2-3 check-ins where we simply went in
> rounds and discussed how we were feeling.
> It was helpful/useful to understand the level of anxiety we were each
> experiencing around Covid-19, job/financial situations, safety/security
> around the building/neighborhood with occupied protests outside our doors.
> I should note that there are only 9 households (17 adults) - all of us
> participate at meetings, but that is only 17 ppl to do a full round - so
> its manageable to do that 1-2 times within a 2-hour meeting.
>
> We also started a "community support fund" during that time - a pot of
> money that only the treasurer has knowledge of. Anonymous donations could
> be made to the fund. And households could request money from the fund (no
> questions asked). The intent was that if anyone was experiencing financial
> hardships, that there was a safety net without questions asked. The
> treasurer is tasked with reporting the balance of the fund on a regular
> basis so people knew whether it needed replenishing, or if there was any
> funds that could be requested.
>
> I think it wouldn't hurt for a larger community to have a team/point
> person to do this check-in on a regular basis.
>
> Or you could go to a buddy system (pair up households) - so if someone is
> experiencing a hardship that requires community support, but doesn't feel
> comfortable asking directly, they could talk to their buddy household - who
> could manage the ask/coordination of services for the family.  i.e., family
> has a member who has extreme medical condition and needs support for meals
> and rides to hospital. The buddy household could coordinate a list of
> volunteers for rides and meals and check in with family regularly to report
> back to community about additional requests or to give status updates.
> This could relieve the family needing support from a lot of unnecessary
> email/conversation during this stressful time.
>
>
>
>
> grace h. kim aia | schemata workshop, inc.
> principal
> pronouns: she/her
>
> 1720 12th avenue
> seattle wa 98122
> p 206.285.1589   c 206.795.2470
> schemataworkshop.com
>
> Watch my TED talk at TED.com
>
> Please note: Schemata Workshop employees are currently working remotely
> given the current public health situation.
>
>
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