Seed Saving Tips

Last year, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced its “Smart City Challenge,” a contest that will award one mid-sized city with $50 million in funding to improve its transportation networks. The USDOT hopes the selected city will become a role model for implementing safer, more energy-effic…

Communities are like exotic animals. They may be extraordinary, but the fascination comes more from the novelty, the unfamiliarity, and the association with an untamed land. Communities are used to having lots of guests, and also often give regular or irregular tours to the curious public. It’s easy…

The environmental news site, Grist, has a great article about how Cleveland is going green. The article highlights the Cleveland Ecovillage a “pedestrian-friendly neighborhood linked to mass transit”. The project is the brainchild of five local nonprofits, the city, the regional transit authority, p…

Although not as famous as some of his contemporaries, the French thinker Charles Fourier was one of the early visionaries of the intentional community movement. A utopian socialist, he proposed that society should be organized into Phalansteres, or “grand hotels,” each housing several hundred to sev…

Which stage is your tribe? It turns out that by listening to the way people speak to each other in working and social groups one can tell a great deal about their stage cultural of development. David Logan, a researcher and professor of management and leadership at USC, and co-founder and senior…

You asked and we listened. Thanks to over one hundred FIC supporters who responded to a recent branding survey, we have reimagined our look and created a new logo, name adaptation, and improved website to be released later this Spring. (Get ready!!!) It’s all part of our recent organizational …

A dear friend on the Tri-communities scene in Rutledge, MO has just put her house on the market. Want to be a neighbor to Sandhill Farm, Red Earth Farms and Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage? She is selling it for $98,500. It is 3 BR plus a large attic space semi-finished that could be a 4th or even 5th.…

Some creative solutions are starting to counteract cohousing’s demographic homogeneity, but significant obstacles remain.

Whether it’s eating local, supporting worker-owned businesses, or taking money out of Wall Street banks, the “localist” movement is on the rise. While the dominance of mega-corporations like Wal-Mart and Amazon may seem complete, small businesses make up half of the U.S. GDP and create over three ti…

For many intentional communities and cohousing projects, being “intergenerational” is a core value and long-term goal. Parents envision themselves raising children with the support of other community members. Elderly residents want to share meals and social activities in their old age. But for some …