This is a structured discussion designed to explore the experiences and concerns of longtime cohousers, those seeking community, and everyone in between around how to navigate conflicts and values differences in community. We will draw on lived experiences to practice communication and coaching skills that can be brought back to home communities.

In my 25 years of studying and living in cohousing, I have drastically changed my view of workshare. Initially I was wedded to the idea of measuring and reporting time. I tracked my work on spreadsheets. I designed a database, defined jobs, estimated hours, etc. In the end I was the least interested in filling out my forms. But workshare was finally going very well at Takoma Village. What was working?

What can Co-housers do to avoid the kids and adults being at odds, with an “us vs. them” sentiment? Learn how we have become more skilled at incorporating our children and young people into decision making, into community building, and generally managing our adult anxieties about the life and well-being of what we call “our children”, in order to improve the lives of all our members.

How can an established community transition from consensus decision-making to dynamic governance/sociocracy? What are the potential benefits? What are the potential challenges?

Living in community means recognizing and accommodating diversity. Neurodiversity covers autistic people and people with ADHD, personality disorders, and others. These people appear typical on the outside but struggle with everyday life in ways that may make living in community difficult. However, they can also be creative, out of the box thinkers and dedicated volunteers. In this workshop, we’ll cover how communities can benefit from and support neurodivergent people.

Does your heater keep breaking, are the windows drafty, or is the siding worn out? Maintenance projects can seem like a chore, but they are also opportunities to save money over time and to dramatically reduce your carbon footprint.

Every community needs to plan for large future expenditures and have reserve funds in place. But how do you know how much to save and what to save for? In this session, Mac will share insights gleaned from 25 years of being the person primarily responsible for the financial oversight of Heartwood Cohousing. If you want your established community to build a solid financial foundation, this may be a good session for you.

Are you using sociocracy (Dynamic Governance) in your community? Interested in adding on a few helpful tweaks? In this session, we will add backlog logistics, agenda templates, continuing education ideas, tweaked selection processes, operational roles, review processes and large group feedback – you might use some but probably not all of them yet! This course is better for people with experience – but also less experienced folks will be able to use these tweaks, even beyond sociocratic groups.

For more than a decade, cohousers have been interested in having conversations about race – maybe even more so now. But cohousers, like many progressive liberals, are often triggered by the naming of White Supremacy, White privilege, Racist behaviors. Confusion about intent and impact often arise.

While many of us have started on a journey towards being anti-racist, what does it mean to make cohousing anti-racist? This session will be a primer – a baby step towards making cohousing anti-racist.

In this presentation a panel of three to five Silver Sage residents will present, discuss and answer questions about our 13 year experiences in bringing in new members as active participants in the community, including our experience with over 25% of the community turning over in the past 3 years. The presentation will include details on our current successful program for both aiding departing members and their new buyers with an emphasis on growing a deeper and better community.

Senior cohousing communities are on the rise. The challenges of aging grow as well. Our panel is comprised of members from 3 senior communities who will speak to the successes and concerns they have faced over time as they and their neighbors age: community building, recruitment, physical limitations, caregiver suites, end of life issues, resident departures and more.

Participants will learn how these groups are faring and come away with ideas to help your own community.

This session will take attendees through the process of developing a new policy that addresses a contentious issue in the community: participation. Attendees will learn how Wild Sage members worked in a small team to deal with their competing views and to create true consensus, rather than simply compromise.