East Bay Cohousing - Berkeley/Oakland/Emeryville/SF

East Bay Cohousing Update: Tours, Sites, Talks, Trips, and More

From:	Betsy Morris
Sent on:	Thursday, February 25, 2010 12:57 AM

Dear EBCOHO members,

It's been a fantastically fruitful week at East Bay Cohousing, with lots of great connections, potential sites, new ways of communicating, and more.

Last Saturday, my husband and fellow Cohousing Coach Raines and I went to the South Bay with Cheryl Honey, nationally recognized inventor of Community Weaving, an organizing method of great power and impact that Raines has studied. What a smart cookie she is, integrating technology and community!

We got to visit the site and observe a meeting of Mountain View Cohousing, an active-adult neighborhood near downtown, the first new-build cohousing community on the Peninsula/Silicon Valley, on its way to opening in 2012.

Sunday, I toured a 17-bedroom former group house on Dwight Way near downtown Berkeley that's now on the market - and we're hosting some open houses and seeing if a group can come together around it.

Monday we met with the board of the Northern California Land Trust (NCLT) to talk about potential collaborations to create permanently affordable sustainable community.

We've gained access to a new meeting and office space in South Berkeley, near Ashby BART, and are gearing up for more activity than ever. We've upgraded the EBCOHO website to better reflect current activity (as well as created a companion site for the whole state, Cohousing California, at http://www.CalCoho.org/ ), to make it easier to see multiple upcoming events and other people's RSVPs and comments.

We are partnering with green architects and developers to offer mini-tours to potential cohousing sites in the area. And that's just the beginning - we want you to find or co-create the community that's right for you, so we're working hard to make it easier for you to get there.

We'll do our best to keep you from getting too many emails by using regular summaries like this and providing you with the tools to choose what you want to receive.

Betsy (and Raines)
East Bay Cohousing community organizers

EBCOHO Upcoming Events -- THIS WEEK

Feb. 25 Thursday 6-8pm. Dine and tour the Cooperative Grocery (CoG) in
Emeryville with lawyer Janelle Orsi, co-author of the Sharing
Solution. Kids welcome! Free - RSVP here:
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12682489/

Also tonight: A free community workshop on reducing your ecological footprint, in North Berkeley:
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12684582/

This Friday, Feb. 26, 5-6pm. Tour 1545 Dwight Way in Berkeley, a huge, historic, and funky house for sale - formerly the commune known as The Ark. 17 bedrooms! Raines and EBCOHO supporting member/buyers' agent Mickey Tenenbaum will be on hand - Please do RSVP "No" if you want to come to this free event but can't make it, so we can know of your interest and include you on follow-up:
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12693311/

Several EBCOHO members have expressed interest, so Raines and I are planning a special get-together this Sunday for folks who would like our help in putting together a bid as a group, starting with putting in money for a refundable option. Thanks to EBCOHO member Lotus Allen, we've talked with two different socially conscious housing advocates who may be able to help financially, for the right kind of group. Be sure to RSVP for the open houses to get on the list for this.

Feb. 27, this Saturday 9:30-12:30, tour and discuss potential cohousing
in El Sobrante, with a green developer and the architect of
the Waldorf School there, Greg Van Mechelen. Great multi-generational and senior cohousing opportunity! $30/adult (just $20 for EBCOHO Supporting Members - have you upgraded your membership yet?) Get your ticket here:
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12682592/

And Saturday evening, there's a Common House Concert at FrogSong in Cotati:
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12617208/

Feb. 28, this Sunday afternoon, the Elders' Guild meets at the North Berkeley Senior Center. This group is laying the social groundwork for senior cohousing, among other things.
http://www.EldersGuild.org/

Even more events next week and beyond

Next Friday, March 5, join Dancing Rabbit EcoVillage founder Tony Sirna for lunch at Gather Restaurant in downtown Berkeley, with a conversation about sustainable community living.
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12703707/

We may also get him to do a talk or host a reception in the early evening - stay tuned for details.

March 6, next Saturday, join us for another mini-tour: a trek across the Bay for a half-day visit to an approved-for-development site and discussion of potential cohousing on Potrero Hill in San Francisco with the developer (who co-owns the site) and Greg. $30/adult ($20 for Supporting Members).
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12683155/

Also that Saturday, the 611 EcoVillage will open up for an afternoon tour of this urban sustainable community, now with rent-to-own options.
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12681956

Saturday, March 20, 8-5pm, Bus Tour of East Bay Cohousing with
Coho/US. Get your ticket through EBCOHO with discounts for regular and sustaining members - the best way to see cohousing in the area.
http://www.ebcoho.org/calendar/12703767/

Saturday, March 27, 5-9pm; and Sunday, March 28, 9-5pm - The Cohousing
Timeline Game Get a first hand introduction to the cohousing
development process by working with others in this innovative
experiential workshop. The Timeline Game is licensed from our friends
and fellow cohousers at the Cohousing Collaborative in Washington,
DC.

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Imagine lively people-scaled communities dotting the San Francisco Bay Area - places co-created by their residents for raising kids, for retirement, for growing food or simply living well by sharing more. The Bay Area already has ecovillages, and cohousing neighborhoods, resident-owned housing cooperatives, and group houses -- real world places where we can live more sustainably through a more cooperative way of life. You can have both privacy and community when you know your neighbors on purpose, in day-to-day relationships based on common vision and values.

East Bay Cohousing (EBCOHO) is a Bay Area-wide MeetUp. We connect a wide variety of kindred spirits and resources. We support individuals wanting to learn more, forming groups looking to create community together, and members of existing communities. We are mostly in the East Bay and San Francisco; others are from the North and South Bay, Los Angeles, Nevada, and other parts of the US and Mexico.

There are over two dozen cohousing communities in the greater Bay Area, (more cohousing in Oakland than any other U.S. city). There are also dozens of other emerging and long-established intentional communities. EBCOHO members have recently bought or rented homes in cohousing neighborhoods and cooperatively owned apartment buildings in Berkeley, Emeryville, Oakland , Pleasant Hill, Grass Valley, Santa Rosa, and Nevada City. We have members living in Swan's Market Cohousing, Triple Point, Temescal Commons, Berkeley Cohousing, Parker Street Coop, Berkeley Town House, Addison Court Coop and established forming groups like East Lake Cohousing (formerly North Oakland Cohousing).

Extra bonus for 2012: The National Cohousing Conference is coming to town in June!

We host EBCOHO events for members, and link you to other events featuring a global network of friends and allies: pioneers in cooperative culture and sustainable communities: urban farmers, affordable housing developers, green builders, and creative visionaries in the movements for more open, user-friendly and collaborative technologies, economies, and governments. There's a global reinvention of communiies going on - both on the ground and online -- and the Bay Area is one of the world's epicenters.

EBCOHO has more events than our MeetUp-based home page can show fully, so please click on our Calendar to see more. Join for free to get involved! There's no charge for basic membership, but supporting members get discounts on some events, including socials, and workshops, cohousing books, and Cohousing Coaching.

Join us for an orientation, for social events, discussion, talks with exciting speakers, and hands-on workshops to learn the tools for developing good group relationships, and the real estate development process.. Find others who share your vision for supportive neighbors. Do it for yourself, for your family, for your parents, do it for the Earth! Make 2012 the year to deepen YOUR community connections.