The community is forming online, among friends, through word of mouth and one outreach event – the Idaho Green Fest. We are a group of 250+ potential members with a wealth of skills, talents and abilities. A core group is just beginning to come together (May 2014), we are drafting our operating agreements, membership agreements, vision/mission statement, principles and guidelines. We have begun th
e great land search, but still need to get really clear on the criteria for our land, although most feel the ideal would be urban as long as the City of Boise is willing to work with us on zoning regulations and building codes. This is probably the greatest challenge before us, but we live in a city that claims to be dedicated to sustainability. We hope to find 20-50 acres, with water rights or a natural water source. A few of us are reading “Creating a Life Together: Practical Tools to Grow Ecovillages and Intentional Communities,” and we are beginning to explore our options for financing (ideally members of the community becoming the financers of the project), yet the community welcomes diversity of socioeconomic status. We would like to form our own school in time. It appears we have many kinds of healers joining the group so I believe we will have a wellness center. We also have urban farmers, permaculturalists, horticulturists, homesteaders, builders, teachers, a fabulous attorney, musicians and artists. In time we would like to host workshops, retreats, events, conferences and festivals. We would like to be a model of sustainable living, and teach these skills at our education center. For this reason we want to be accessible and integrated into our larger community. We have chosen Sociocracy as our governance model, after reading “We the People: Consenting to a Deeper Democracy.”
