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Wolf Creek Lodge Newsletter
Adult Cohousing in Grass Valley, CA
November, 2016
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Much welcomed rain has returned to Grass Valley. With the rain the ducklings returned to the petanque court.
With some trepidation this newsletter will discuss the Wolf Creek Lodge budget for 2017. There are many ways to examine any organization but "following the money" can often be revealing. So let's use the 2017 budget as a way of giving you greater insight into our community.
Is the budget a big deal? It is for some members but many just give it a quick review, participate in the decision at the General Meeting and get on with their lives.
But before the budget we offer a common meal sampler and this months's innovation - Karate training.
We also congratulate Bill who was a member of the winning bridge team at a recent Nevada City tournament.
A two bedroom home is still available at Wolf Creek Lodge. See "Available Homes" below.
There are two other possibilities. One couple would entertain an offer for a single bedroom home. Another two bedroom home may also be offered for sale later in the year.
Contact us if you are interested so we can be more specific.
Bob Miller,
Editor.
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As I walked back home from the common house last night I reflected on the excellence of our common meals. As the cook teams gain experience over the years the meals continue to improve. There is a wide variety. See below.
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Veggie Tortilla Soup
See the fixings for the Veggie Tortilla soup with a variety of options you can add and a fruit salad with coconut topping. Dessert followed.
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Goulash
And for something a little different how about Austrian Goulash. Magdalene leads a cook team referring to a recipe written in German so you know it's authentic. For 15 people we had 7 lbs of meat and 14 lbs of onions. Have you ever chopped 14 lbs of onions? It's important to brown them slowly or they may go black.
For dessert we enjoyed apple strudel.
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Baked Penne
Here is Jo with her baked penne with roasted vegetables, bread and salad.
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Wild Caught Salmon
A popular meal. Wild caught salmon, brown rice pilaf and broccoli,. Gluten free pastry squares for dessert
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If you plan to visit Wolf Creek Lodge please let us know in advance.
As you see Jim is leading karate training in the common house. He offers it three days a week. Unannounced visitors may find themselves in trouble.
More seriously, I am told that the stretching and strengthening exercises are really beneficial.
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The Finance and Legal Team sometimes has to make tough recommendations to the community.
Here you see Jim limbering up before a meeting. He was CEO of a credit union so he has some opinions about financial matters.
Each year the team asks the other teams to prepare a budget for the following year. The teams submitted their requests in September for the 2017 year.
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Laws, Rules and Regulations
Be warned that with respect to the title we do not really know what we are talking about. If your interest is more than just mild curiosity please go to a more authoritative source.
The State of California does not have regulations for cohousing communities but rather requires us to be a Home Owners Association - The Wolf Creek Lodge Association. In contrast Fannie Mae does now offer some recognition of Cohousing Communities.
See question #22 here.
As a Home Owners association we have both Bylaws and CC&R's (Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions). We have to follow California law.
In addition, since we are a Cohousing Community, we have "Consented Agreements". These are agreements we have made together but are not part of our operation as an HOA as viewed by the State of California.
The state requires us to prepare a budget each year to cover our daily operation and, importantly, long-term reserves for maintenance and replacement. The reserves are there for required maintenance. The oft cited example is for replacement of the roof, say in 20 years or more. When that time comes the members will be able to access the reserve fund to pay for the replacement. The budget has to be approved by the board of the HOA. In our case we are all on the board. This contrasts with many HOAs in which the board may be 5 or so members elected by the members.
The funds for the budget are provided by the monthly assessment paid by each home. Now in the case of Wolf Creek Lodge these have been the same for the years 2013 through 2017. This cannot continue indefinitely as many costs increase over time.
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Let's look at the budget expenses generally by team. Not all the teams but just a selection. We ambushed representative members of some of the teams at a common meal. We will avoid numbers - let's use the quantities "trivial", "small", "medium" and "large".
Of course the income comes from the monthly assessments which are described
here.
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Non-Team Stuff
So we have exciting things like insurance - almost "large", professional services - "medium", gas/electricity - "large", water& sewer - "large". We are a sustaining community for the Cohousing Association of the United States so we include our pledge payment.
See here.
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These guys are heroes. They do much themselves but sometimes they need outside help. So here we have services - "medium", materials & supplies - "small", elevator maintenance - "medium", window washing - "small", fire system inspections - "small".
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Open Space and Landscaping
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The Open Space Team has money - "small" for thinning trees and brush clearance on our open space.
The Landscape Team worries about irrigation - "trivial", seeds and plants - "trivial" and more.
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We have a lot of "trivial" level stuff here - web site hosting, domain name registration, 800 number, and, of course, $20 per month so we can send you this newsletter.
A print ad in Nevada County Gold Magazine is a "small" item.We are considering doing more advertising on www.cohousing.org in 2017.
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We want the common house and the guest rooms to be clean and well provisioned. We want supplies - real English tea (I hope). They ask for a lot of "trivial" level stuff although supporting common meals is "small". They have a "small" item to maintain the floors.
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Despite the historical name these guys look after our high speed internet link, our Local Area Network with Wi-Fi access points, the media center and our on-line Common Meal reservation system. They plan to upgrade the Wi-Fi access points in 2017 in response to the ever growing number of smart phones, smart TV's, tablets and "things" connected to our LAN. The internet connection is a "small" budget item as is the access point upgrade.
They also support all members when they have computer problems but this requires extreme patience and empathy but no budget line item.
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These folks worry about "how" we operate as a community rather than "what" we do.
They have a "small" budget line item for potential workshop facilitation fees.
These regular workshops help the community develop the skills necessary to run the community using consensus based decision making.
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This team reviews the overall budget. They collect questions from community members and seek answers from the relevant teams. They want a "balanced budget" where the income from the monthly assessments equals the totals of all expenses.
They work to get a budget that they can recommend to the community at the General Meeting where the members of the community take a decision as the HOA board.
A special responsibility of this team is to determine the payments to be made in to the reserve fund. They hire a specialist firm to conduct a Reserve Study. California requires us to do this every three years.
The firm examines our facilities and provides replacement, and repair estimates complete with allowances for inflation.. From this we determine the required contribution to the reserves. This is certainly in our "large" category.
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Whats going on here - the answer?
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We got many guesses last month when we asked you to tell us what was in the this picture. Well it's three worm farms. The worms are fed left over vegetable scraps. They produce a very nutritious liquid (for plants) which the worm farmer applies to our vegetable patch.
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Digging in the Dirt
Claire Miller
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How do we decide what our request should be for next year's landscaping budget?
We gather the team for a meeting.
We consider:
a) previous years history of spending,
b) current year spending so far,
c) we look through our inventory of supplies and equipment. This includes simple things like clippers, saw blades and gardening gloves, and also irrigation repair parts.
d) we look at how larger items are standing up and consider whether they will live for at least another year. This includes things like the weed whacker and lawn mower,
e) we look the box of seeds, and think a little about what vegetables we hope to grow next year.
f) we look around the garden and try to identify those plants that might need to be replaced.
g) we think about any larger ‘infrastructure’ type project that we might want to undertake, and work out possible costs. This has included raised beds for vegetables, stone retaining walls, and deer proof fencing.
We put together a list of items with estimated costs, which we give to the Finance Team for a sanity check.
This becomes part of the total budget proposal that goes to a General Meeting of all of our members for approval.
Once the budget is approved, the members of the landscape team have authorization to spend according to the agreed amounts.
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Living in the Lodge
Magdalene Jaeckel
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I have some thoughts about how we should look at Senior Cohousing. We call ourselves a community of active adults, but we also fall into the category of “senior cohousing”. Many folks think of a “senior” as someone who is getting old, which of course applies to everyone. When they think: ”Senior Cohousing” they think: “I will wait till I get older, I am not ready to do this.
In reality, almost everyone at Wolf Creek Lodge is extremely active, although many of them are over 70. They use the opportunity to have moved into their fairly small unit, not having to worry about upkeep of a large house and garden, to travel, often for many weeks, to go hiking with their neighbors, to attend concerts and theaters together, to volunteer for many different organizations. They have time now to do this.
“Aging in Place” is another concept that comes up. But most of us are not so much thinking of aging but of living. It seems to be a good idea to move into Wolf Creek Lodge while you are still active and fairly energetic. This is where we differ from ”assisted living”, where you go when you cannot handle life anymore.
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A two bedroom home is now available. Owners of two other homes have expressed an interest in selling should a purchaser make their interest known. Your best option is to contact us so we can be more explicit.
We try to keep the latest status on our website. By checking on these links to the website during the month you will get the latest updates. Here are the links:
Contact us: phone: (800) 558-3775
For details of Open Houses and much more visit our website at:
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Grass Valley and Nevada City
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Want to know more about
Grass Valley and Nevada City?
Here are some links we have found useful:
Down Town Grass Valley -
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