Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Diversity in Cohousing

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

> On Feb 21, 2023, at 6:08 PM, Lisa Kuntz <lisa.kuntz [at] gmail.com> wrote:

> Aside from that issue, from everything Crystal and others have said, our
> community and other cohousing communities are not creating a safe and
> welcoming environment for POC. 

This is a link to a home happiness quiz. I think it would be interesting to 
have a similar quiz about how safe anyone feels in cohousing or any other 
living situation.

https://www.emersoncommons.org/home-happiness-calculator.html

This one addresses some social aspects but in order to measure a wider range of 
people's interactions and what makes people feel unsafe, it would have to be 
broadened. What makes single mothers feel unsafe? Disabled? With physical 
limitations? Those in subsidized units?

One of the problems with social measurements is not having a control group. I 
have no doubt that one or two European Americans living in a neighborhood of 
African Americans would feel less comfortable than in an all-European-American 
neighborhood. But there are also other factors that neighborhoods make people 
feel unsafe. Single women living in neighborhoods of heterosexual two-parent 
households with 2.2 children who have male visitors who stay the night (or 
almost the night), for example. 

I guess the first quiz would be what makes you feel unsafe in your 
neighborhood? What could be eliminated or added to make you feel safer? People 
choose not to live in cohousing for all kinds of reasons. Often the concern is 
privacy. But what do they fear cohousing will expose?

Sharon
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Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org