Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: associate members

[Diana Carroll (dianaecarroll]

No, by definition, affiliates are non-residents.  Residents automatically
get full membership.  Affiliate membership has limitations, like they can
come to meetings and participate in discussion, but if something comes to a
vote, they don't get to vote.

Like Liz said, we do not try to decide who is a resident. That's up to the
household. In fact, once a year we survey -- who do you consider part of
your household for the purposes of membership? We don't consider it our job
to verify or second guess. No one really cares -- you are who you say you
are.

As far as I know, we have never had the situation of a romantic
relationship where the partner was an affiliate. Doesn't mean we wouldn't
do it, but it just hasn't been a thing. We've had non-romantic family
related memberships (moms are popular :D ), but I think, if memory serves,
that those family members lived in Camelot, our "sister" community who
shares our land, so that's a different situation.

Diana


On Wed, Apr 21, 2021 at 10:26 AM Alan O'Hashi <adoecos [at] yahoo.com> wrote:

> Diana et al. - Thanks for your responses. Do Affilliates / Associates live
> in your community or do they live elsewhere and participate in your
> community?
>
>
> I'm also interested in learning how a community decides that an occasional
> guest such as a boyfriend or girlfriend who stays overnight regularly
> becomes a resident.
>
>
> Are your associate / affiliate membership categories tied to household
> romantic relationship status (do personfriends ever join as associates /
> affiliates to 'test drive' community life)
>
>
> Thx
>
> Alan O.
>
>
>
> *Alan O'Hashi **Get Up Off the Couch*
> www.alanohashi.com
> www.getupoffthecouch.com
> CO: 303-910-5782 ....
> WY: 307-316-2113 ..
> NE: 402-327-1652 ....
>
>
> On Wednesday, April 21, 2021, 01:52:42 AM MDT, Diana Carroll <
> dianaecarroll [at] gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Adding on to what Liz said about Mosaic’s affiliates.
>
> Alan asked how we decide when someone has crossed from visitor to
> affiliate. Our policy (after lots of discussion) is that an affiliate is
> proposed by two “sponsors”. So it’s an active decision by the potential
> affiliate and their sponsors. Also while that transition sometimes is as
> you describe— they hang around for awhile and then find they want to.be
> more involved — in fact the majority of our affiliates are people who used
> to live here, and/or residents of our “sister” cohousing group with whom we
> share land.
>
> Here’s the actual policy.
> https://www.mosaic-commons.org/affiliates
>
> On Tue, Apr 20, 2021 at 10:25 PM Elizabeth Magill <pastorlizm [at] gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> In terms of people who sometimes live in the community, it is up to
> the owner to decide who is a member of their household. So if they say
> someone is part of their household and are members then they are
> members.
>
> For people who don't live here, we have a category called "affiliates"
> for people who want to have the privileges and responsibilities of
> membership. They pay 5% of our average dues (we have a sliding scale)
> and help with work and with the fun.
>
> We have called this thing associates, and then we changed it to friend
> and now it is affiliate. Calling it a "friend" was a mistake, some
> people thought that everyone who was their friend should be made
> one---really, we want everyone to feel free to invite friends anytime.
> Affiliate status costs money and has a [slight] commitment.
>
> Liz at Mosaic commons, Berlin, MA.
>
>