we are thankful to have new neighbors at the grange: transition westminster/arvada/broomfield. we have mentioned the work that they are doing at different times over the past few months, but we thought it would be good for you to hear from them directly and know more about the work that they are doing in our community. the refuge is thankful for their spirit and dedication to community and look forward to sharing space and ideas in the months and years to come. you can learn more about upcoming events at www.transitioncolorado.ning.com

this article was written by don studinski (thanks don!) & hopefully will give all of us a greater sense of their vision and passion.

Transition Westminster / Arvada / Broomfield (TWAB for short) is  a social network group with its roots in Transition Colorado which, in turn, is a part of the international Transition movement started in England by Rob Hopkins.  Transition is about moving from our current unsustainable way of life (key issues include Peak Oil, which means we will have less energy in our future, environmental depletion, which means we are exceeding sustainable use of natural resources, and economic collapse, which means we are living beyond our means) toward a more sustainable and pleasant way of life which can include an endless list of possibilities limited only by our imaginations.  Wow, that’s a mouth full!

Hopefully, I haven’t lost you already.  Those of us in TWAB want very much to be a positive force within our community, not a doom and gloom group.  Specifically, we describe ourselves with this statement:  “A community of citizens that believes we have the power to build community resilience and self-reliance such that all species, now and in the future, will be able to meet their basic needs while maintaining a healthy planet.”  Anyone is welcome to join.  It’s free.  As of this writing, 1/11/2010, we have 49 members in our online group and about 10 to 20 actively involved with our events.  Our members are as close as walking-distance to the grange and as far away as Thailand.

Transition initiatives, like TWAB, exist to “unleash the collective genius of their own people to find the answers to this big question: for all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how are we going to:
significantly rebuild resilience (in response to peak oil)?
drastically reduce carbon emissions (in response to climate change)?
Typically, self-determined solutions will involve some flavor of relocalisation.”
Everything TWAB does relates back to rebuilding community resilience and self-reliance, but beyond that there are no limits.  Examples of our 2009 events include:
Building the Broomfield Community Permaculture Garden at the Presbyterian Church of Broomfield,
Hosting a community seed exchange,
Hosting several pot-luck dinners,
Showing several documentary films (we call this awareness raising),
Attending a “listening session” with some state senators,
Hosting a Northwest Earth Institute class called Voluntary Simplicity,
Hosting a canning class,
Hosting a composting class.
Hosting a Pachamama Alliance class called Awakening The Dreamer

We started in January, 2009, with 7 people in a coffee shop.  It didn’t take long for TWAB members to realize that we needed a place, beyond our member homes, to hold our events.  Therefore, a few TWAB members joined the Crescent Grange.  As members of the grange community, we have the good fortune to be able to use the building for significant events, and, beyond that, to create a community garden at the grange.  We call it Crescent Grange Community Permaculture Garden which we will be building in 2010.  This gives our group a sense of “place” much like the Broomfield Community Permaculture Garden did in 2009 (this will continue in 2010 as well).  We now have a bulletin board in the Southwest corner of the building where we will post flyers about community events.  This will include all the community events we learn about, not just TWAB sponsored events.  For example, there are Broomfield Auditorium Cultural events posted over there right now.

We have visions of all sorts of community-building events and activities we hope to do in 2010 and beyond.  Examples include growing an abundance of food, building a hoop house on the grange property, holding a clothing exchange, holding periodic book exchanges, creating a community “resilience” library, helping with grange maintenance and improvement, planting an orchard of fruit and nut trees, teaching classes in composting, permaculture gardening, canning and drying herbs and vegetables, sewing, beekeeping and others, holding monthly community dances, game nights and drum circles.  We are limited only by the time, energy and ideas our members bring.  We whole-heartedly invite everyone to participate.  If you like one of these ideas, or have your own, please, feel free to make it happen!  Clearly, no one of us can do all this alone.

Our community resilience is completely dependent upon the web of relationships we build among ourselves.  Everyone has value to bring and we all benefit from our combined cooperation and effort.  We look forward to an exciting 2010 in community at the Crescent Grange.  If you have any questions or comments for TWAB please feel free to contact us on-line or call Don Studinski at 303-248-6677.

The garden at the grange is coming soon, so if you are interested contact Don!

http://transitioncolorado.ning.com/group/transitionwestminster
http://transitioncolorado.ning.com
http://transitionculture.org/
http://www.postcarbon.org/
http://transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/TransitionNetwork
http://www.nwei.org/
http://pachamama.org/
http://awakeningthedreamer.org/