Present: John Barrett, Judy Dempewolff, Stephanie Doss, Dwight Ernest, Kai von Fintel, Pascal von Fintel, Jean Hopkins, Lisa Lally, Gabe Osborne, Kim Shute, Roxanne Theimer, San Tunstall, Janice Carduner, Lisa Wolf
Location: Parmenter
Notes: Stephanie
Facilitator: Kai
Process Observer/Timekeeper: Lisa

Decisions:

• Kim is authorized to use the lawyer that we've paid for (from the conference) to discuss the issue of the 501c3.
  
• Approved to contract with Cohousing Resources for February with an addition to the contract that we have a weekly conference call and a detailed written report from Chris at the end of the month. We've also decided to appoint John as an additional liaison, especially during Dave's absence.

Action Items:

Discussion:

Agenda
1. Opening Activity
If you could be any inanimate object, what would you be?

2. Review of Colored Cards
Kai did so

3. Announcements and Approval of Agenda

• Agenda Approved without changes
  
• Steph raised a concern about the timing of this agenda item should someone come forward to become an equity member and the group does not want to approve them or needs more time to consider them for approval. Steph will raise this for further discussion on email.

4. Review and Approve Minutes
Postponed to after the break

5. Pet Policy
Steph presented an overview of our previous discussion on the Pet Policy and provided a summary of the discussion from the national cohousing-l list.
Discussion:

• Kim points out that we have a responsibility to the cats for choosing to have them as pets and when they're unhappy they will let us know. Her cats are used to a large roaming area and are would be unhappy being confined.
  
• Wording needs to include, for dogs, "and under control"
  
• Janice asked about what "under control" meant.
  
• Rick says that he also has some personal fear of dogs, so would be more comfortable with a dog being under direct control.
  
• Steph says she would be comfortable with "on a leash or under direct control"
  
• We should say something about fences on individual units, in this policy. Can we have those if the planning allows?
  
• Lisa says we could say something about more aggressive breeds.
  
• San asks if we need to limit the number of outdoor cats at some point before move in, or should the grandfather clause be in effect just at move in. Roxanne clarified that this was discussed … decided it would be at move in.
  
• John suggests we might want exclude certain breeds.
  
• Kim points out that there are always exceptions.
  
• Dwight feels this needs to be breed non-specific.
  
• Lisa asked if we'd considered requirements for cats to be spayed or neutered?
  
• Jean asked about non-domesticated pets such as goats, pigs, etc.
  
• Re: Neutering
  
  • Judy thinks neutering should be mandatory
    
  • San thinks outdoor cats should be fixed, but has mixed feelings about requiring it of others.
    
  • Kai thinks we should require it for outdoor pets but not for indoor.
    
  • Roxanne agrees with Kai, but would possibly feel it shouldn't be mandatory for dogs.
    
  • Steph thinks outdoor cats should be fixed, outdoor dogs not necessarily
    
  • Dwight says outdoor fixed, inside should be no one else's business.
    
  • Lisa thinks that we could have an agreement that the owner must responsibly take care of the offspring (and not abusively)
    
  • Janice would go for neutering indoor and outdoor animals.. it would be very difficult to monitor ethical follow through of finding homes for unwanted kittens
    
  • Rick says, "case by case"
    
  • John agrees with Dwight's position.
    
  • Janice points out that we should also think about barking dogs.
    
• Steph will take these suggests into consideration and work on reworking the policy and send it to the list for discussion.

6. Plan for Addressing Hot Topics

• This is to brainstorm topics that need to be addressed, that could be potential flashpoints for discussions and decisions. It would be easier to talk about this as a smaller group rather than a larger group.
  
• San brought up an idea of how to deal with this: Refer to the email that Cat sent out.
  
• Dwight has an alternative proposal: says we should address "meta issues" first, i.e. we should discuss whether to/how to regulate what occurs inside our own domiciles first then things that occur in the community at large. Kai says it would help, to develop a list first and then have a metadiscussion about whether we can/should legislate issues within a private domicile.
  
• Kim suggests another metadiscussion about what we each want out of this community and have that inform these policies. John points out that having these discussions about the various policies is the work of building this community and defining what we want out of this community.
  
• Lisa pointed out that there are more issues than just the guns issue that we need to look at that could potentially be defined as being under "within private property", but that we aren't willing to live with.

  Brainstorm:
  TV in the commonhouse
  Common meals
  Green statement
  Guns
  Domestic Violence
  Child Abuse
  Joint office space in common house
  Parking
  Unit modification
  Internet Connectivity
  Exercise space in the common house
  Workshop space (woodworking, crafts, machines)
  Treatment of elderly
  Recycling
  Noise (music, cars, animals, parties)
  Drugs, alcohol, cigarettes
  Toilet Paper in CH
  Chemicals/perfume for sensitive people
  Spiritiual and political issues
  Parenting
  Infestations and how we would deal with them
  Organic Gardening
  Homophobia
  Quiet space vs children's space in the CH
  Fractioning in the community
  How to deal with individuals that we don't want in the community
  Allergies in CH
  Hot tub
  Clothing Optional/Public Nudity
  Evangelizing within the community
  Renting out the CH/public space
  Restrictions on behavior of guests
  Respecting local and state laws
  Political signs (should they be allowed on the lawns)
  Meat in the CH Kitchen
  Snow Removal/Landscape (-contract out? Products used?)
  Holiday decorations
  Scheduling work requirements
  Content of common meals
  What cleaning products are used
  Solicitation
  Use of the guest rooms/scheduling
  Long term guests & Subleasing

• They should be separated out into categories: design, policy, other. Some should probably be grouped together as they may be discussed together.
  
• Rick will work on grouping/categorizing the topics and, with Dwight's help, put it up as a poll.
  
• We'll then start discussing them according to rank in priority (top three). We'll then start with those for discussions.
  
• Steph suggests we use the process suggested in email by another cohousing community - the three step process. All agree.
  
• We want to have a topic to start this process with at the next meeting.

7. Committee Reports and Action Items
Affordability:

• Kim printed out the 501c3 application. Yay! She's working on it.
  
• Kim has tried to consult with her lawyer friend, but she didn't know anything about cohousing. She would like to either use the attorney that we've paid for, or find a local attorney and consult with them for a fee.
  
• Proposal that Kim should use the lawyer that we've paid for (from the conference) to run this issue by. Approved by consensus.
  
• Roxanne points out that there's got to be a good cohousing lawyer in MA that other cohousing groups have used - we should find out who they used. Suggested that Kim call up New View and ask them.

Coordinating:

• Jeanette will be babysitting for the future meetings - Kim will call her in the future
  
• John will take over picking up the key, with Dwight for backup, for a while.

Professionals
We picked three possible alternate dates: Feb 24th, March 3rd, and March 10th. Roxanne will call Jerry and propose these three dates. We'll then decide via poll.

Treasury
We should be able to pay two invoices from Cohousing Resources without a cash call. That will be it, though, because several households are about to reach their 5%. This means that soon we'll be having monthly cash calls (which is as planned, just a heads up).

Land/Site
Chris' Contract:

• Steph is upset that we've had no report back from Chris for several weeks. She's getting to the point where she's unsure about hiring him in the future.
  
• Dwight notes that we did hear from Chris about 10 days ago, but the response was not adequate. Dwight is willing to try to work with him for one more month, but is getting to the point where he's having reservations about our contract with him.
  
• John has had some reservations as well. He would like to have better parameters for the business relationship.
  
• Who will be the contact with Chris while Dave is away?
  
• San says that we should have someone else be the contact person for the next few weeks if we decide to hire Chris for February since Dave will be away for a good portion of February.
  
• Roxanne is frustrated with the lack of results. She doesn't know what other options we have.
  
• It should be pointed out that we have had some movement - we did put in a bid on a piece of land. Chris did point out that this would be a slow time.
  
• Rick asks about why shouldn't we suspend the contract for a month? Steph responds that we could lose his services if he gets picked up by another group and is no longer available.
  
• John feels mixed about continuing the contract - he would like a much more business relationship and less of an informal friend relationship - he would like the output more defined, more quantitative. Are the goals being met?
  
• Proposal: Continue the contract with Cohousing Resources for February and to appoint John as an additional liaison, especially during Dave's absence. Steph would like this contract to be reworked - stipulation that we have a weekly conference call and a detailed written report from Chris at the end of the month. Approved by consensus.
  
• Janice wonders if this discussion would have had a different tone if we knew more about what our other options are.
  
• Roxanne and Dwight will research some alternatives. Oak Tree was the developer of Cambridge Cohousing.
  
• Steph asks who will work with Chris to revise the contract. John will work with Dave to approach Chris with the contract revisions.

Marketing
No report

Secretary
No report

8. Implementing the Mentor System
Proposal:

• We need to generate a pool of willing Associate and Equity Members for mentorship. Could do this by making little cards for each person and when a prospective member wants a mentor they will be given this card of the mentor.
  
• San thinks we should have someone in charge of the system - "mentor match making". She also thinks it should be the mentor's responsibility to call the mentee.
  
• Judy is volunteering to coordinate the mentor program.
  
• Janice informed us that if, at some point, we would like to have specific topics that should be discussed during this relationship, she would be glad to help us put that together.
  
• We have officially assigned mentors to two prospective members (Lisa and Janice). Yay!

9. Ongoing Participation Requirements

• Discussed the email put forward by Rosa. Discussed whether to keep the item in the list regarding demonstrating ability to work constructively with the group.
  
• What do we do if people don't meet these requirements - i.e. they're not doing much work and how do we approach them with that? If they have a mentor, that would be the person to bring it up.
  
• We generally like the policy, but need to think about the repercussions

10. Future dates
January 31-February 2 Chris is in town - will set up a meeting with him during that period.
February 3rd 3:30-6:30 General Meeting
February 10th 11-1 Brunch Social at Homeport (hosted by Kim and Rick)
February 17th 1:00-3:00 Intro Meeting (Roxanne will help)
February 17th 3:30-6:30 General Meeting
March 3rd 3:30-6:30 General Meeting
March 17th 1:00-3:00 Intro Meeting
March 17th 3:30-6:30 General Meeting

11. Review of Meeting and Closing
Discussed our feelings a bit more about the decision to renew and revise the contract with Cohousing Resources.

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Last modified: January 30, 2002