The Community Resilience Festival is coming into focus. The physical space includes a large room half the size of a gym and four classrooms. We will also have use of outside for breakout groups that want a quieter place.
Plans for the large room are for 15 to 20 groups and persons tabling. There will be an appropriate tech area, a kid zone, food groups, housing, economics, land use. We want various interest groups to not only connect with the public but also with each other. We anticipate some kind of centerpiece decoration made of fabric and magical supports.
The large room will also have a presentation area in one corner. Several times during the day we are planning open space table top discussions on specific topics. People can browse the discussions, come and go, join another discussion as they like. There are several confirmed plenary speakers including Terry McDonald, Clare Strawn, Charlie Tilt, and Jan Spencer.
One of the classrooms will be dedicated to the River Road/Santa Clara Neighborhood Planning Process. We expect there to be many maps and graphics explaining this 2 year process of creating a set of documents that will guide decision making for the next 20 plus years in Santa Clara and River Road for land use, economic development, transportation, open space, resilience and community building. The entire effort is an unprecedented opportunity for creating far more green and resilient homes, neighborhood, economy and community.
Local food systems is another very important topic. At this point, close to 10 organizations with a keen interest in local food production intend to participate. They will have table top information but also, there will be presentations about local food systems, including a plenary talk and also a fishbowl. The fishbowl will be 6 to 8 persons involved with various aspects of local food systems in a facilitated format, taking questions from the facilitator and talking with each other, with an audience listening in. We want these groups to become acquainted and support each other’s work and to facilitate more people to become involved.
Cooperation Eugene will bring strategies for focusing on local enterprises such as building community through a Time Bank, and identifying local assets that strengthen our resilience. You can explore how the Lane Service Sharing Network (LSSN) time bank will enrich your life. One of the plenary talks will be about cooperative economics.
Speaking of cooperation, another fishbowl will be about cooperative living. The plan is to bring together persons involved with several of Eugene’s residential living communities to compare notes with each other while the audience is listening in. Co-op living will play a much more pronounced role in a near future where we can expect the needs for cooperation between friends, housemates, and neighbors to increase.
Several presentations we are looking forward to include a unique project by the Neighborhood Assembly of God Church in Santa Clara. Their garden outreach project, in the early going, has to be one of the most exciting community initiatives in Eugene.
There will be other presentations about transforming suburban properties for taking care of more basic needs on site and a presentation by members of the Neighborhood Leaders Council about preparedness.
There will be a space for Eugene Neighborhood Association leaders to meet and compare notes from their neighborhoods. Neighborhood leaders from Bend, Corvallis, Salem and the Portland area have also been invited to share what they are doing to create more green, cohesive, and resilient neighborhoods.
One final item for this update. There will be several site tours of residential properties with exceptional green and resilient features, both built and social. Plans are in place for site tours in River Road, East Blair Housing Co-op, Maitreya Eco Village and a double property in Amazon Neighborhood. We expect more tours to be added. Details will be forthcoming.
That’s enough for this update. Check back for another update in a couple weeks, maybe less!