Symbi-awesome
CoHo EcoVillage strives for sustainability
Story by Steve Hunter
Photos by Stanley Tollett
CoHo EcoVillage lies quietly nestled between Crystal Lake Drive and the wetlands of Crystal Lake in South Corvallis. If not for the sign with their name on it at the entrance to the parking lot, I’d have never guessed there was anything special about it the first time I went there. It looked like a fairly standard apartment complex—nicely painted, recently built, placed in a somewhat surprising location perhaps—but at first glance, ordinary.
This only holds true if you don’t look twice. CoHo (derived from “co-housing”) is one of a growing number of intentional communities now peppering the American landscape. As its name suggests, ecological considerations are a high priority for this particular community, though this is not necessarily the case for every co-housing group. It is a far cry from the archetypal image of a hippy commune, called to mind for most when any type of cooperative living is mentioned, and if there is any communism to be found here, it is certainly not of the totalitarian variety. All decisions are made by consensus, and though the process is lengthy, the hard-won results are undeniably worthwhile to its participants.
A mostly-completed wooden fence runs along the sidewalk, bordering the south edge of the parking lot. The planks are rough-hewn from trees that once grew on site, and the posts are still in the shape of the trunks they were cut from. The rustic barricade looks sturdy enough to survive a hurricane. It’s been under construction for well over a year, and once completed it will probably not need to be replaced during the lifetime of anyone reading this article. Things here are built as if it could be a very long time before the materials become available again.
Near the fence’s eastern termination point is the Bike Barn – a massive enclosure housing the majority of residents’ primary vehicles. One of the community’s stated objectives is to de-emphasize use of the automobile, and this place keeps their preferred mode of transport dry and secure. There is at least one family in CoHo that is completely automobile free—a choice whose practicability is enhanced by Corvallis’ bike-friendliness, but remains no small feat for a young family of four. The Bike Barn and nearby workshop also provide storage for a broad selection of tools, and space to work on bikes or building projects. This allows the community to reduce unnecessary property duplication substantially. “We have three lawn mowers for thirty-plus residences,” Mike Volpe said. “And one workshop for thirty-four homes,” Craig Hall Cutting added.
It’s the familiar concept of a public library in an unfamiliar application, and hints at a world of unexplored possibilities. What would your life look like if you no longer needed to personally own anything you didn’t use daily?
Like other structures in the community with sufficient exposure to the southern sky, the roof of the Bike Barn supports a row of solar panels, with which the community hopes to produce as much of its own energy as possible. Generating energy from locally available resources is one of many ways that CoHo is working toward a human community that recognizes and honors its interdependence with the local ecosystem.
According to Daniel Quinn, author of Ishmael and its sequels, we humans need such communities, especially if we are to have any hope of creating a sustainable society. Humans didn’t evolve as rugged individualists, but as members of groups, whose individual survival depended on the survival of all other members of the group. He believes that in order to save the world from an impending ecological collapse, humans need to figure out how to live as part of their local ecosystems—and begin doing so.
This spirit of community is visible in the young fruit trees protruding from breaks in the grass along Crystal Lake Drive, emerging proudly vigilant from planters in the parking lot, standing on queue in the orchard, and popping up from place to place elsewhere on the land. Considerable emphasis has been placed on ensuring that the plant life cultivated here are native and/or noninvasive species. The needs of plants and other wildlife are considered in decisions, and a very large portion of the property is essentially untouched to preserve a natural Camas meadow.
Between the homes, which are in blocks of three or four condominium-style units per building, snakes a smooth asphalt footpath, just wide enough for a single automobile, but almost never driven upon by one. Children’s bicycles, big wheels, skateboards, and Razor scooters lounge about its edges, waiting for an energetic youngster (or sometimes oldster) to take a spin, and in the meantime lend themselves to passersby as subtle reminders of youthful bliss, and perhaps a caution against forgetting one’s original priorities.
Two rows of residences, with front doors facing each other, lie parallel to the conspicuously compact parking lot and form an “L” shape with a single row along Crystal Lake Drive. There are 34 housing units in all, ranging from one-bedroom townhouses to four-bedroom flats. The interior living spaces have lower than average square footage. “Having smaller homes, which was done intentionally, means there is less space to store things, so you’re not going to buy as much stuff if you have nowhere to put it,” Cutting said.
Amaris Franz, who lives at CoHo and also runs a small child care facility there, points out, “for me, having smaller houses means there’s more room for an orchard, chickens, and maybe someday a goat.”
Where the two branches of domiciles intersect sits a handsome, deliberate, asymmetrical structure—nucleus of community life—the Common House. A windowed rectangular tower juts up from near its center, bathing the foyer in daytime with an extra splash of natural light, reminding the huge windows in the walls below of its existence, and helpful disposition. Radiating from the foyer are a comfortably furnished library with a wood stove, the community laundry/recreation room (where, if you leave your clothes in the washing machine too long, someone else will put them in the dryer for you instead of throwing them on the floor or stealing them), a children’s play room stocked with plenty of non-toxic toys, an office nook, a bathroom with a shower in it, a guest room (doubling as music room when not in use by a visitor), a bulletin board full of community-related news and information, and finally the community dining and meeting room, with its adjacent kitchen and pantry.
Here, the community congregates for meals (held several times per week and usually featuring crops grown on site supplemented by groceries purchased in bulk by the community from local sources), meetings, and music. It performs alternately the functions of a restaurant, church, conference room, and concert hall without being any
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of these things. “We have our entertainment here,” Bruce Hecht states, pausing to acknowledge a hitherto silent occupant of the room, “Including this large fly!” A burst of laughter from my interviewees erupts and lasts for a few seconds before he continues. “We have a lot things to engage us – social interactions – so we don’t have to go look for it.”
The group fills me in on the details of a Contra Dance that was held recently in the Common House during a break from a multi-day Non-Violent Communication workshop. Bruce was one of the musicians for the dance; he plays accordion. At the last performance, “We played continuously for twenty-five minutes, we had sweat dripping down!” Hecht says.
“Nobody’s going to judge you because we all trust each other,” Cutting says. Leela Devi went on to add, “It was also kinda crazy because of all the kids!” Children are both seen and heard at CoHo, at community meals, playing on the footpath, singing, and are present at many of the community functions. When a gathering calls for adult participation only, the community arranges childcare for anyone who needs it.
The sense of support and security pursued here bears a strong resemblance to what Quinn refers to in his writing as the wealth of indigenous cultures. This type of wealth can’t be stolen like material products, and grows instead of diminishing when given. It is this wealth, he says, that has the potential to replace material wealth as a human priority and facilitate the reduced consumption necessary for the survival of our ecosystems, but citizens of the modern age can find it difficult to believe in since they have never experienced it.
CoHo’s dedication to support is manifested in its treatment not only of children, but of disabled and elderly residents, as well. Two of the groups I’m interviewing are experiencing physical limitations that require them to get around using wheelchairs. CoHo’s paved walking paths are perfectly suited to accommodate such needs, and the ground level flats are wheelchair accessible, with sturdy handlebars installed to help with getting in and out of the bathtub.
When Mike Volpe, who is now paralyzed below the neck because of Multiple Sclerosis, expressed an interest in CoHo during its formative stage, members established a non-profit organization called A Home In Community, which has raised the funds to help pay for his unit. “Because of this community, I can grow my own garlic,” Volpe says. “People volunteer to help me eat at community meals. Living here provides me with continuing education. People in this community don’t stand still, there’s always momentum moving forward. In another rental, I wouldn’t get that.”
Joan Demeree, is more reserved, but agrees that there is a stronger sense of community here than other places she’s lived. She would like to be more involved, but isn’t able to because of her legs. Joan lives in CoHo because her son Dave Demeree owns one of the homes. During the day, she receives care from a hired helper, and the unit where she stays is also used for childcare, so she gets to spend a great deal of time around children.
As a group that is going the extra mile to achieve a sustainable lifestyle in the very region, if not city, where most readers of The Alchemist live, CoHo is a gold mine of practical experience that we ought to pay attention to. The more we know about what works there, the more we will know which paths are worth treading and which are likely dead ends in the quest for both sustainability and community. As the interview wound down, I asked the group for any suggestions they had for others who would like to increase their connection with the people around them.
Mike: “Some people across the street are loaning out their land to neighbors to come and do gardening.”
Leela: “NVC. Also, In the neighborhood tat I came from before, I think we bonded around problems. A lot of the getting together had to do with various political issues, so sometimes it bonds, and sometimes it doesn’t.”
Amaris: “Knock on doors, have your kids play in the neighborhood instead of looking for activities elsewhere. Connections with the other families so you can trust them to be able to baby-sit for you, instead of looking for childcare somewhere else.”
Bruce: “Having a project that you can get together with the neighborhood on is a great way to pull a neighborhood together. If you can, find something like that.”
Craig: “It takes intentionality. I have a brother in Minneapolis who’s lived in the same house for 40 years. They know everybody. They’ve intentionally gone to their neighbors and they host a block party every year. Even if there’s only four houses on your street you could get to know your neighbors, and you could have a potluck once a year, just so you feel like you know the people around you.”
More information on CoHo can be found at www.cohoecovillage.org. To find out more about AHIC, please visit www.ahomeincommunity.org. More on Daniel Quinn can be found at www.Ishmael.org.
