Casa Robino

Arlo, Xena and Sandy in the “Hildegarden” strawberry patch. This is the part of Hildegard’s herb garden which is designed for kids (and accompanying adults) to pick strawberries. There are multiple strawberry patches at Twin Oaks, this is the most public and openly inviting. “Not all the hammocks were lost in the fire“. Depicted above is the spray varnishing building called Oz. It was adjacent to the warehouse which did burn, but fortunately it survived with hundreds of hammocks spreader bars in it as well as dozens of hanging chair frames. 3000 pounds of yarn was being converted into rope for us in North Carolina. Our sewing shop has completed 600 fabric beds but not sent them to us. Spreaders + Rope + Beds + Rings = hammocks. Nick uses a scythe to harvest. We have all manner of electric and mechanical tools. And sometimes the old way is the best way. Jake and Mina sweeping up the slate in front of ZK. Jake is instilling good civic values in the kids at Twin Oaks. Mina is rehearsing for a coming fashion shot.

One of the key identity questions for a community is “How big are you?” While this answer is often in flux for some communities, one critical factor in determining size is the number of available beds/bed rooms.

This counts as one bed Twin Oaks is a big place, we have something like 105 bedrooms in member residences (we have another 10 beds in the 6 bedroom visitor building called Aurora which is not used for member housing). We have 9 residences in 7 dormitory like buildings (private bedrooms, share living, bath and kitchens).14 of these rooms are currently being used by our kids, leaving 91 member bedrooms. In the past we have a population limit of between 90 and 92 adult members. We shorten the term ” this our “population capacity” or “pop cap” for short. This year it might be different, this year it might be lower. [Update May 12, 2024 – The planners have set the slack rooms to two and they Pop Cap will be 88] In the pit of covid, our population dropped to 61 (having been at 86 in February 2020) and this week we are at 84, but we can see a wave of new members coming. The current visitor group had 4 people applying for membership, 3 of whom are very popular ex-members/long term guests and one is one of their partners. We have a lovely pair of new members who we met at the Communities Conference. We also have several members currently on personal leave (what we call PAL) who are planning on returning. There is always someone planning on leaving – but word on the path is the next known member departing is not until winter. And we have accepted our first two non-member associates. This is a special status which some of us have wanted for decades which was finally approved in late 2023, designed for people who have outside commitments or lifestyles which make it impossible for them to be here full time. The current requirements to be an associate is that you need to be here between 2 and 10 months of the year. You are not a member (which means you are off the property code, which means you can have a personal car – but can’t drive the community fleet cars). And non-members are not part of self selection process, so you don’t input on visitors who are applying for membership. It is actually harder to become an associate than it is to become a member. You need to make a threshold 40% of the membership voting ‘accept’. While this may seem low, especially to people in smaller communities, it is important to remember that perhaps 30% of Twin Oaks members either very rarely or never involve themselves in membership decisions by not giving input to the membership team. In their defense, it is quite some amount of homework to know who all the current visitors or new members are and individual input very rarely matters if it is positive. The membership process seeks red flags and in absence of them, we are often willing to take a chance on someone trying membership. Associates are not guaranteed a room, but can stay in one if it is available. This might lead to the creation of “slack rooms ” in the planners’ pop cap equation.  And is another indication that we are heading towards a shortage of rooms. Waiting lists shift time If we reach pop cap, we will re-institute a waiting list, which has a number of complex dynamics, including frustratingly losing some of the potential members we are most excited about have. This situation is what led to the development of Shal’s perfect number of members. This is just one or two below pop cap, so there is space for members to shift rooms and for us to accept someone quickly if that happens to be the flavor they come in. And if current forecasts are correct we will breeze past Shal’s comfy spot into a room crunch. AI response to “community joys of togetherness and hassles of sharing” If you are excited about possibly joining Twin Oaks you should read this section of the official Twin Oaks website. If you want to read more propaganda about how wonderful it is check this out. If you are more curious about the down sides of this commune, i’ve got you covered also.

Twin Oaks Fire Update #1: 

March 31, 2024 – With some updates from April 12 posting. Background on the fire Damage Report:  Survived/Safe: 

• All people, pets and livestock are safe.
• Oz, which is the spray varnishing building, survived the blaze and protected dozens of hanging chair frames and hundreds of hammock stretchers. (The original Oz burned down in 2008 after a lightning strike and was replaced by a concrete and steel building, which survived this fire.) 
• No residential buildings were seriously damaged (despite the fireline being only feet from Tupelo)
• All other buildings & most critical infrastructure such as ZK, the tofu hut, aurora, the STP, the majority of TO’s vehicle fleet, and most of the other barns, garages, and outbuildings   
• The Forest School site 
• Grain bin site

Emerald City Warehouse – April 2024 Damaged or Destroyed: 

• Emerald City warehouse, sawmill, woodworking shops and wood storage burned nearly to the ground. This includes the forklift and its shed
• Two kilns were destroyed, but the hoop house beside them largely survived  
• Most of the conference site structures were destroyed, including showers, outhouses, plus pavilion, and outdoor kitchen with all equipment in them
• Gathering & Conference gear & other resources stored at the conf site, including tarps, pop ups, and other coverings for workshop spaces 
• The retreat cabin 

Smolder Patrol: There were hot spots on the property for several days after the fire, especially inside the burn frame of the warehouse. In the days after the fire, people kept checking the area around the warehouse and the neighboring woods to ensure nothing restarted. There was significant rain over the weekend and now we are pretty confident that all the small fires have been extinguished.  Planner Action/Quota: The planners have been pretty generous with relaxing quota obligations after the fire, before the fire quota was 42 hours a week . Quota was dropped immediately after the fire and for the entire labor week after the fire (March 22-28) to zero hours, giving members time to reorient and recover from the shock of this loss. This coming Friday’s labor week (March 29) will also have a reduced quota of 21 hours. As of April 8 Quota is at 36 hours per week.   Investigation: It appears that the fire spread from a burn pile on our neighbor’s property. The local fire department and the Virginia Department of Forestry are conducting an investigation to determine the cause and circumstances of the fire. At the same time, we are exploring our options for recouping damages.  Clipboard of Gratitude Cleanup: In order to give ourselves the greatest chance of being compensated for those losses, we must give ample time for professionals to assess the burn site. This means we can not really start cleaning, let alone rebuilding, until this process is allowed to play out, which could take a couple of months. In anticipation of later clean up efforts, we are currently doing “pre-clean” work. This has been emptying and cleaning the recycling barn in preparation for accepting ongoing shipments. It is unclear if any professional cleaning support will be needed, for example if there are things that burned in the fire that need protective gear and/or skills to safely touch & move. Rebuilding: The planners have made an exception to start rebuilding the Seeds hoop house because the growing season is about to start. The frame is in good shape and needs to be covered with plastic so this season’s seeds can sprout.  We are still determining our needs around tools & equipment for rebuilding- if you have items you are interested in giving away and/or loaning to the rebuilding efforts please get in touch with [email protected] or phone 541-505-0803 to discuss possibilities and needs. Onsite cleanup & repair work: We have already started a number of pre-cleaning tasks and have reached out to our neighboring communities to secure housing for folks who want to visit and pitch in. From early May on, we are looking for volunteers who can work a week or more. If you are interested in volunteering write to [email protected] or call 541-505-0803 The Future of the Hammocks Business:  The business by far hardest hit by the fire was hammocks and chairs.  Especially the wood working equipment lost makes it unlikely we can restart the business.  The general managers are recommending to the community that we close the business, but we will have a community wide process before making this decision.  Here is the hammocks general management paper to the community on Phasing Out the Hammocks Business.  There are still supplies for hundreds of hammocks and dozens of chairs in inventory, including hammock beds and yarn for rope that had been ordered and made for us but not yet shipped. The return of Chairs? McCune disagreed with hammocks management and is conducting an analysis of whether we can return to the hanging chair business. McCune is working with Ex-member Philip on a proposal for rebuilding this business, which may be aided by the machines we will replace to make wooden seed racks. It is also possible that the new proposed chair business will be less vertically integrated, specifically purchasing rope and finished wood. Rather than spinning our own yarn and running our own sawmills and kilns as we did before the fire. Reconnecting: As of this writing, Internet services have been restored by a borrowed Starlink system, which is about 1/4 our previous capacity.  Mo Karnage of Cuckoo Compound has lent us their transceiver until our old service provider can replace our service which they estimate will take another month. At this posting (April 12) full internet connectivity has been restored. Moving Forward:  In 2008 after we lost the Pier 1 hammocks contract we did a “new business” initiative.  That process resulted in the community agreeing to fund, develop and market Pam’s Book, wholesale organic seeds working with Acorn’s SESE and seeds growing,  These are all on-going income areas today.  We agreed on 3/27 that with the likely loss of the hammocks business we will restart this type of process of looking for ways to increase income.  Currently, all the conference site events are planning on hosting their events, though possibly adapting the nature or location is still being discussed. Site clean up and modifications are likely necessary. Fundraising:  We have raised over $82K in donations for fire reconstruction (as of April 12). This money will go into the community’s general fund and be spent/allocated using TO’s normal spending policies. There is some discomfort in the community about asking for external support, but this fire comes on the back of a serious significant expenditure on mold remediation. While we generally do not want to be asking for support externally, this is an extraordinary situation. Marz already got a replacement bike – big thanks Recovery Wish List: Here is our wish list. This list is broken into smaller (which you might find around your house) and larger items needed for rebuilding.  Ideally, we are looking to get high functioning used items.  Ideally, for these heavier items we are looking for donors who are relatively nearby. If you have something to offer but are unsure if it’s useful or needed, please write us at [email protected]. Feel free to share this update.  www.tinyurl.com/Fire24Update1 Thanks so much to all the folks who have already shown their support.

(This part of The Flip Project’s “States in Consideration” blog series. Click here to see the rest.) One of the trickiest parts of the Flip Project is deciding where to take our merry band of data analysts, street performers, political activists and off the beaten path (laundromats, bus stops…) canvassers. We want to craft the biggest electoral impact we can make, and support as many voters as we can, but there are numerous factors involved. We want to go places that have close elections at many levels which we have a chance at influencing. Ideally this would be where there is a competitive US Senate race. A place where we know people who might host us, to cut costs and to ramp up training for our out-of-state volunteers.  We look for places that have important referendums, especially where we think these might increase turnout at the polls. And last, but certainly not least, we look for states that might be close presidential battleground states. These are most of the states we are considering On April Fools Day, the Florida State Supreme Court made our decision much easier, and at the same time much harder (we wish we could be in three places at once, but sadly that is not possible). They decided that Florida will have a ban on abortion at 6 weeks, before most people even know they are pregnant. This ruling, while not the most restrictive abortion ban in the nation, still guarantees tragedy and trauma for pregnant people and families in the state- as a similar ban in Texas has demonstrated. Florida’s laws don’t only impact Florida residents, it was also one of the few southern states where abortion was accessible at all. It is 1000 miles from New Orleans to the nearest abortion service provider, if FL maintains its ban. (For example, in Missouri abortion is completely banned with very limited exceptions. Missouri requires an “affirmative defense,” meaning a physician has to prove in court that an abortion met the criteria for a legal exception.)  However, they also decided to approve of the wording of, and thereby permit to appear on the ballot, a proposed amendment by referendum to the state constitution. Florida’s Amendment 4, Amendment to Limit Government Interference with Abortion, says that “no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider”- if it can win 60% of the vote. The most recent state polling shows it garnering 62% of the electorate’s support [link].  But this is before anti-choice groups have invested millions in the state to block reproductive rights.  Florida Senator (and former Florida Governor) Rick Scott, who is up for re-election this year, favors the 6 week abortion ban. He co-sponsored legislation in the US Senate to require unnecessary ultrasounds, and a separate bill in 2021 which would imprison doctors who provide some types of abortion care. Only a year later, in his role as the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, Scott released an abortion talking points memo for Republicans designed based on polling and focus groups (not policy or legality) that read in part, “Republicans DO NOT want to throw doctors and women in jail. Mothers should be held harmless under the law.”  It is 1000 miles from New Orleans to the nearest  abortion service provider, if FL maintains its ban The last Democratic US Senator in Florida was Bill Nelson, who held the post from 2001 to 2019- he lost his seat to Scott in 2018. In the years since, the state has shifted more towards the Republican party, authoritarianism, and blatantly discriminatory laws such as the “don’t say gay” bill. Both Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis call Florida their home.   But Scott is a vulnerable candidate. In his three last general elections he has never won by more than 1.2% (though he did manage to win his seat during the 2018 blue wave midterm election). Voters will be reminded that Scott wanted to cut Medicare and Medicaid. They will be reminded that Scott was CEO of Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), which was forced to pay over $2 billion in civil penalties for systematically overcharging Medicare, which in 2002 was the largest fraud settlement in history.  The other popular proposed constitutional amendment on Florida’s November ballot is the decriminalization of marijuana. The 2016 medical marijuana constitutional amendment passed with 71.32% in favor and 28.68% opposed, and legalized medical marijuana. Scott as Florida governor did everything he could to block implementation, including a years long court battle attempting to ban smokable forms of medical marijuana.  It’s only appropriate that he will share November’s ballot with another amendment- the Adult Personal Use of Marijuana Amendment which “allows adults 21 years or older to possess, purchase, or use marijuana products and marijuana accessories for non-medical personal consumption.” This amendment is polling at 67% (LINK). Who is challenging Scott? Debbie Mucarsel-Powell is the current favorite in the democratic primary (while there is little polling, she is way ahead in endorsements). She was the US House rep for Florida’s 26th congressional district from 2019-2021, making her one of the more experienced candidates in the democratic primary. After leaving office, Mucarsel-Powell worked for Giffords, a gun-control advocacy and research group co-founded by former congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.  She is pressing Scott on his abortion stance, and is particularly well positioned to do so as the only woman running in the Democratic primary (thus far). Even with almost no statewide name recognition, Mucarsel-Powell is currently polling 3 points down from Scott (within the poll’s 3.5% margin of error). We recognize that a lot can happen between now and the August 20th Democratic primary, and that the filing deadline is still 3 weeks away (April 26, 2024). After the shock of Larry Hogan entering the MD senate race only hours before the filing deadline, we’re not taking anything for granted right now.   Flip is still watching and calculating, but currently Florida just moved to the top of the list as places where our efforts might just make the difference. Reach out if you have specific interest in Florida politics, could help the Flip Project on the ground in Florida, or want to tell us why Florida is the wrong choice and what the right one would be. At this time the Flip project is actively seeking allies in the Tampa to Orlando region, especially folks who can provide low cost or free housing from the beginning of August thru election day in November. We will likely have a team of at least a dozen and potentially quite a few more.

Shortly after the equinox ritual called the element of air, wind blew hard enough to send plastic chairs flying around us. When we called water, clouds blocked the sun and it felt for a moment like we might actually get rain. And less than 15 minutes after we called the element of fire into the circle, brown clouds from the neighbors land started billowing overheard in the courtyard.

This is what the fire looked like from the Twin Oaks grave yard I broke from the ritual to check in with the office person. Kathryn had already dispatched Sabrina to the graveyard to see what she could see. When i got there half an hour later i took the above picture and was relieved to see the first so far form our property line. My relief was misinformed. The picture above is about where the fire started but did not give any real indication of how far the fire had spread at that moment. Within half an hour of this first sighting the local Louisa Fire Department was here in force. They blocked traffic on W. Old Mountain Road. They told us to go across Vigor Road (which the Twin Oaks driveways are on) and wait for the all clear. And so almost everyone stopped doing what they we and went across the street. The preparation of dinner was interrupted, so Keenan and Kelpie went and got a bunch of pizzas for everyone. Things seemed to be improving and the fire department let us come back and eat our pizzas in the courtyard. But things were not getting better. Before 7 PM, we were being told we needed to evacuate the entire Twin Oaks campus. A school bus was brought in and took people to Acorn and the Louisa middle school, where they waited out the fire fighting. Emerald City is gone The fire spread from the neighboring land and took out the kilns, the warehouse and all the woodworking spaces (called ECW). It also spread to the conference site and destroyed the pavilion, the kitchen and all of the material storage up there. Miraculously, Oz (which is the spray varnish building that had burned some years back and had been replaced by a steel and concreate building) survived the blaze. After some hours, after surveying briefly the damage i spotted a number of small fires in the woods between Tupelo and EC. I spent a couple of hours extinguishing these, while the fire fighters were working on bigger blazes. Perhaps most scary was their work on a fire which was quite near Tupelo, one of our larger residences. After the fire fighters had largely controlled the fire, there were still many fires in the trees. The problem was several trees were still on fire higher up than could be reached and were dropping burning branches to the ground. But fortunately the cool night air was reducing the spread of the fire. In all this tragedy there is some good news. No one was hurt, none of the various pets, many of which could not be found at the time of the evacuation, have been reported missing. No residences were harmed (though Tupelo had a close call). At about midnight a young fire fighter came across me doing my small fire extinguishing thing and encouraged me to go home, saying these small fires in this cold night air were unlikely to spread and that the fire fighters would be monitoring the woods for any spread and would be there until the whole situation was under control. Exhausted and covered with ash i returned to the courtyard where some of our members returned, while many stayed overnight at other locations in town. You can contribute to the general Twin Oaks Community Fire Relief Fund, the Twin Oaks Conference Site Fire Relief Fund, or both. You can contribute to the general Twin Oaks Community Fire Relief Fund via Stripe. This link has the lowest fees, and contributions will focus primarily on general repairs and restoration. You can contribute using a debit card, credit card, Apple Pay, Cash App, Klarna or a bank account. ​​Contributions via this link are not tax deductible. Donate to the Twin Oaks Recovery Fund here, or by scanning the QR code. If you need tax-deductible for you donation we will work via the Foundation for Intentional Community’s fiscal sponsorship. Contact us for more inform about tax deductible donations. Please email [email protected] Thank you friends. I will likely update in a future blog post and updates will be added to the FB group as well, https://www.facebook.com/groups/TwinOaksFriends. Here is an update on the fire from a week or so after this post