CohoUS seeks participants for its newly established Coalition for Racially Diverse Cohousing. Ideal members have a commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion and an interest in supporting the pursuit of racial justice within the cohousing movement. We welcome applications from individuals with experience in housing, racial justice work, community organizing and other relevant fields. Experience

Homes not Housing: Creating Community for all What does “home” mean to you? Is it a feeling? A place to put your belongings or lay your head? Is it being around family, loved ones, and friends? Is it about having a choice or personal control over where you live and who you live with? Our... Read More

Watching “Strategies and Perspectives for Anti-oppression in Cohousing” with Crystal Byrd Farmer, Sky Blue, Elliot Cisneros, and Mathilde Berthe from the recent Connecting in Cohousing conference I got to thinking about the way we build communities and our struggle to make them diverse. While I’ve been aware of many factors in the struggle for some... Read More

I’ve been in a lot of conversations about race in various ways, and in particular about racism in cohousing. Somewhere amidst all the conversations, it occurred to me to ask a question I haven’t been hearing. Why do communities want to be diverse? Which led to: What do we mean when we say it? and... Read More

A Cultural Awareness, D&I Links Menu, & Q&A for Your Community, Org., Family & Individual Transformation  Note: Your 5 Listening/Action Questions are at the very end of this extensive Menu. Here are 3 steps to transformative Allyship and D&I for any org., group, familyor individual, no matter what your culture, background or experience is: 1—Review... Read More

What’s new in Cohousing in June of 2020?  One exciting thing is a new group of cohousers working together.  See notes from their recent meeting below.   COHOUSERS FOR RACIAL JUSTICE (FACEBOOK CoHousers for Racial Justice) SAT, June 13th, 2020 The first meeting of a new Facebook group, CoHousers for Racial Justice: https://www.facebook.com/groups/cohousersforracialjustice/, took place on

Hanging on the wall in my house is a dyed silk-screen print done by an artist from the first cohousing community I worked with in California.  On it is the simple quote by Rumi that says: “Out beyond the ideas of right and wrong there is a field.  I will meet you there.”  To me... Read M

At the end of May, I facilitated a half-day intensive on Racism and Racial Equity in Portland at the National Cohousing Conference. While cohousing communities are overwhelmingly white, I see more and more people in the communities movement recognizing the need to address racism. In our conference session, we discussed the history of racism in... Read More

With forming communities wanting to be as diverse as possible, the topic of Housing Segregation and its Impact on Cohousing couldn’t be more important. Crystal’s recent WebChat describes the history of segregated housing in America, the ways in which federal policy created and maintained segregation, and the ongoing impact of those policies and ongoing racist... Read More