We are organizing small land-based collaboratives that:
Why?
It is clear to many that our current civilization and its life support systems are deteriorating fast. The root causes of this accelerating breakdown are unfortunately built into the global systems most people rely on to meet their basic needs. It is too late to change these systems quickly enough to avert large-scale breakdown. The good news is that this will finally force fundamental change.
One way or another humanity will have to live within planetary boundaries, if only because too few of us will be left to have much of an impact. If enough of us voluntarily live within those limits, however, we will cause far less suffering and death around the world.
Industrial civilization is inherently unsustainable. The individualistic American ethic has failed us. Consequently, the only realistic way to survive and thrive within the planet’s natural limits is to band together in small resilient land-based collaboratives. This is the way most humans lived for most of our time on Earth. It is how we are “designed” to live. We are all in this together and have to make our way forward together.
We are seeking the right land and the right people with the character, motivation, and diversity of skills to establish small prototype Resilient Communities together. None of us needs to know everything. We do all have to possess the maturity and mental stability to live and work together for the common good. Since these qualities are not so common these days, we will have to be selective about who we join together with, as we hope you will want to be, too.
There will as a result be a thorough process of getting to know one another before anyone makes any commitments. We will first determine if our purposes are aligned. If so, we will formulate and agree upon sensible guiding principles from which to base personal behavior, collective decisions, and mutual accountability. Once we have formed we will employ effective processes, structures, and leadership to navigate the many challenges we will face, as any new venture must do. The formative core group already has the experience and skills to facilitate all of this.
The foreseeable future will be stormy. The best way to navigate those storms will be with a small, capable group who can take care of each other while providing necessary farm products to the wider community and showing others a way forward. If this sounds appealing to you and you have appropriate land or skills to bring to the party, let’s talk!
We can creatively work with whatever a piece of land offers, but adequate water and enough decent soil are foundational. A woodlot will be valuable. We prefer to be not too close and not too far from a town or city, and definitely not on a noisy major highway.
We will have top practitioners joining or guiding us. We are getting referrals to at-scale regenerative and permaculture farming experts from people like Andrew Millison and Mark Lakeman, who is one of our advisors and will be our architect.
As the main organizer, I was a Future Farmers of America member in my high school ag program, raised a couple of steers, and had 78 laying hens. I built and managed an entrepreneurial cabinet business with 45 employees at its peak. I co-founded and helped run two non-profits that taught and practiced rainwater harvesting land management while eliminating lawns. I have been learning about permaculture and regenerative agriculture for 25 years. I developed a food forest demonstration site in Santa Barbara, CA that I still manage from a distance and on site from time to time. I now live on a 2/3 acre food forest in Eugene owned and managed by one of the first permaculture teachers in Oregon. I lived for over a year at an ecovillage where I learned beginning fire mitigation and forest management skills from a veteran wildland firefighter.
Our small onsite cooperative group will include others with relevant experience of various sorts. Our council of advisors will include even more.
We are forming a small intergenerational cooperative group with diverse complementary experience and skills. This way we do not need all our knowledge and skills to come from one or two people. We will establish one or more cash crops or animal husbandry operations based on the characteristics of the land, hopefully building upon what is already there. We will develop food forests, gardens, and animal husbandry for meeting our own needs.
Our prototype communities will serve as models to help develop more such communities as times demand.
I own a large motorhome I can live in indefinitely, along with a modified solar travel trailer as a small office. I could therefore be the first person to relocate onto the land. We will establish simple low-impact housing as needed, understanding that to meet zoning rules this may have to be built as add-ons to an existing farm residence, designed in a way that affords everyone all the privacy they need. Or housing may have to be built from scratch using temporary dwellings in the meantime. We are researching very low impact construction methods using site specific materials such as wood, industrial hemp, and clay. We have an experienced architect and a builder already on our team.
The key is making clear the guiding principles our community has agreed upon, which will certainly include kindness and respect for all, no matter their background. These principles must be understood and acted upon by all members in relation to one another, our guests, and our responsibilities. We must establish a strong culture that ensures everyone is treated well and that abusive or exploitative behavior or systems of any sort are not tolerated. Active measures to ensure the health and safety of all members and guests will be established and maintained.
To contact a land seeker, you must first create a land listing and have it approved by our staff. Thank you.
