From March through July of this year, Cortes Housing Society — in partnership with FolkU — is presenting a series of monthly forums featuring guest speakers and community discussion. These forums will address the vexed issue of housing — both price and availability — which remains a serious problem for the island.
The invited speakers have expertise in various aspects of this problem, and some will be sharing results from successful projects in other communities. Cortes Currents interviewed Sadhu Aufochs Johnston, executive director of the Housing Society, to find out more about this event series.
CC: Sadhu, can you explain the vision behind this event series — what is it you’re trying to achieve here?
SJ: Well last December we hosted a housing forum, the report for which is posted online. And one of the things I heard from a number of people was the value that we would get here on Cortes, to learn about innovative housing initiatives happening elsewhere. So there was a strong push to continue the dialogue around housing and to be learning from other places, to continue to learn as a community. And FolkU does that on a regular basis so it seemed like a good partnership.
CC: What will the series look like in practise? What’s the schedule, the format, and what topics are you planning to discuss?
SJ: They’re going to be hosted virtually [Zoom]; there’s lots of people travelling right now, and most of our guest speakers are off-island. So they will be virtual meetings, at least at first. We might start to do some in person as well, but at first it will be all Zoom, and monthly. And it will be Saturday mornings, so people who are working can participate.
We’re trying to hit on topics that were a priority for people coming out of the housing forum. So our first topic will be on March 16th, and that will be Home Sharing. We chose that topic because we know there are a lot of homes on Cortes that are unoccupied [most of the year], and there are also homes that are occupied but underutilised. So maybe the kids have moved away, or for whatever reason, you have 1 or 2 bedrooms that may be available, or a small cabin.
We wanted to bring together some examples of Home Sharing that are working elsewhere, to learn about that general movement, and also some specific ways it’s being utilised. So the Southern Gulf Islands have a pilot program they’ve been doing, where they’ve been placing people into private homes. They’ve housed seven people through that programme in 2023, and it’s a very innovative approach, and it really holds people’s hands throughout the process.
And another speaker for the 16th runs a company called Nesterly and they’re very active in the US — it’s an online service that connects people who have some space that could be occupied, with people who need it. And this presenter, Noelle Marcus, has deep roots on Cortes and is quite an expert on Home Sharing. So we’ll learn from her what it is, and how it’s working.
So the first hour of every forum will be presentations and discussion with some speakers, and then we’re carving out a second hour for people who want to stick around and talk about what that presentation might mean for Cortes… an informal discussion, to explore what we learned.
Our second one, on April 20th, is on water — protecting water quality and quantity. We know that people have concerns about water quality, water quantity, wells drying up with climate change, more people on the island. We’ve seen in some other island communities that they’ve really gone through their aquifers; so this is an opportunity to learn about activities happening on Hornby and Quadra. We’ll have one speaker from each of those islands and then a third from a company that’s doing some of the research, helping communities with water management.
The third one is on May 18th and is about community land trusts and affordable home ownership. This topic came up a lot during the housing forum. Land trusts are being implemented in different ways in different communities; we’re just finalising the speakers for this one, but we’re hoping to learn from some innovative projects to the south of us on Orcas Island, and we’ll have a North American leader in land trusts joining us, from a nonprofit that promotes that idea.
The thing I like about land trusts is it decouples the ownership of your home from the ownership of the land. They all work differently — you might get access to the land via a long term lease for example, or a co-op — but basically you can sell your house and benefit from increases to the value of your house, but not be tied to the land market value. And this can make home ownership much more affordable.
On June 15th we want to talk about ways to increase the stock of rental housing on Cortes. And on July 20th we’ll be talking about “places of belonging” and caring communities. So looking to talk about not just having a physical home, but how are we building community around the housing we live in or are adding, here on Cortes.
So these are what we have planned between now and July.
We’re really lucky that the museum is doing an exhibit on homes and housing and buildings, kind of how they evolve over time; and so we’re looking to partner with the museum in the months ahead as well around the various educational elements here, because they’re pulling together a really neat exhibit.
And so that’s a really nice kind of tie-in with what we’re doing through the speaker series — and other educational opportunities that we’ll be working toward through the Cortes Housing Society.
I guess — just to conclude — the housing challenges that we’re facing on Cortes are not unique. All over the country, all over North America, these challenges are really plaguing communities. And this forum series is an opportunity to learn from leading example solutions — and to really have discussions as community around ways that we might learn from those.
[All images — other than event posters — generated by Midjourney, prompts by author. The original interview of Sadhu Johnston was done by Roy Hales, then edited for radio by De Clarke.]