Cooperatively, we have the potential to relate with each other in a new and supportive ways by remedying the market’s utter failure to provide nourishing food, housing, health care and education, and the care of our most vulnerable populations: the young, the elderly, the disabled and veterans.
How nervous are you? Our polarized politics, and amnesia about prior debt ceilings, prohibits prohibits sane, reasoned debate about taxes, light bulbs (!#?!#) and everything in between. This has many people staring at their own ceiling (if they still have one) when they should be sleeping. Clearly, neither our government, nor the corporations that actually call the [...]
Stressed? Need to make ends meet? 15.5 million Americans are doubling up, an increase of 11.7 percent since 2008, Living with others is the fastest way to trim your biggest budget item: housing expense. Moving in with family members is the most obvious choice, but it may not be the best one. Here are some [...]
Adequate housing is a huge issue for many people. Single parents, seniors, those living on social security, disabled people and young people starting out, are not typically well supported when living in single-person/single-family households. Single-family living stretches budgets and responsibilities. Doubling up with others households frays nerves and relationships. There is a better way: housing that [...]
Two men drowning in a puddle of water is not an obscure dream. Walking along a sidewalk and reading, I glanced down and saw a large bird that had drowned in a puddle of water. Then I saw two black men, face down, each drowning in shallow puddles of fetid water on opposite sides of [...]
As people gather month after month, they will find others with whom they feel comfortable and alliances will naturally form. As people get to know each other, housing coaches will facilitate the process by spotting potential mismatches and other pitfalls.
States and cities responded to depleted coffers by slashing social service budgets. Regrettably, we need social service professionals even more in lean times than we did back in the mythical olden days when we had the luxury of pretending that things were OK. Alas, this is the way the world works. It is also the [...]
Starting from the premise that our single-household orientation–single family, single parent, single person–is not an ideal model for our most vulnerable populations, New Community Vision is promoting alternative housing arrangements such as cooperatives, cohousing, home sharing and even dormitory housing as viable options for consideration. Plan to Crack our Housing Crisis describes this more fully. [...]
That no long term emergency housing exists for people between the ages of 50 and 55 is just one reason why I wrack my brain to come up with alternatives to prevent housing strain from becoming a crisis. The Families & Housing page explains this in broad strokes. Our three primary models—single family homes, single [...]
What do you do with a former convent without the nuns to fill it? When the Archdiocese of Chicago wanted to rent its former convent at 4637 North Ashland in Chicago, a founding group of a dozen people wanted to live cooperatively. The Stone Soup Ashland Cooperative has been a going concern ever since, housing [...]