Initiatives

Focus Areas

Housing

Although the majority of CDI's activities related to housing are within the Manufactured Housing Program, CDI also consults with intentional communities, co-housing, zero or low-equity housing cooperatives, senior and special-needs housing, community land trusts and land conservation that includes affordable, cooperatively owned housing. Specialized services include real estate negotiation, facilitation of financing, training on use and supervision of service providers, and training on collections policies. We are also supporters of Together on the Land Tour of Massachusetts.

Food systems

A healthy food system includes a great number of pieces--see our poster, "It Takes Cooperatives to Build a Regional Food System"--any of which could and should be organized cooperatively. CDI is part of a movement throughout the region and the nation to rebuild food systems in such a way that quality, equity, nutrition, and ecological sustainability are valued more than profit. We help build cooperatively structured businesses that can simultaneously pursue these important values while achieving long-term economic viability. Such businesses include farmer cooperatives, fisher cooperatives, consumer cooperatives, food-worker cooperatives, farmers' markets, and more. One increasingly popular method of establishing direct marketing relationships include "consumer supported agriculture (or fisheries, or markets, or kitchens).

CDI has helped organize and are supporting the development of the New England Dairy Farms Cooperative, the dairy farmer representative of Keep Local Farms, a project to sustain family farms in New England. We are also partners with the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance to build the capacity of local fishermen to make a living from fishing through cooperative action and enterprise.

Clean energy

One of the largest drains on our local economies, and largest threats to a sustainable environment, is our use of fossil fuel energy for our buildings, transportation, and production. In our own operations, CDI minimizes our impact by having a "virtual" organization without commuting and employing a carbon-offsetting internet hosting company, Gaiahost. As a manufactured home wholesaler, we ensure that all the units we sell are Energy Star certified. We work with groups seeking to establish cooperatively-owned wind, grass, bio-diesel, or digested manure methane production; groups of contractors wishing to provide energy audit and weatherization services; and worker cooperatives that do solar electric, hot water, and small hydro and wind installations. There are many more ways in which human ingenuity can be harnessed to increase our economy's efficiency and decrease our dependence on non-local and harmful sources of energy, and use of the cooperative model can help insure that these solutions are socially and economically sustainable as well.

Infrastructure

Infrastructure exists to benefit everyone and facilitate private activities like living, working, traveling, and trading. Infrastructure can be as concrete as a septic system or as abstract as an online information portal. Since CDI's mission is to build a cooperative economy, rather than just cooperative enterprises, we contribute to projects that support networking, markets, and currencies among cooperatives. The Data Commons Project is creating a means to share directory information among cooperative enterprises. Cultivate.coop is creating a means to share information on what cooperatives are, how to start and run them, and how to teach yourself and others about cooperatives. The New England Farmer's Market Exchange was started by CDI in 2008 to facilitate exchange of information among farmers' market managers in the Northeast, and has 214 subscribers. We also support the development of peer support networks among cooperatives, such as the Valley Alliance of Worker Cooperatives, Cooperative Maine, and the Willimantic Inter-Cooperative Zone.

Natural Resources

Many industries in the Northeast rely on natural and historical resources. Besides farming, fishing, and energy generation, there are forestry, wool spinning, tourism and recreation, education, green burial, and local craft production. CDI can work with groups of independent businesses promoting agri-tourism or local craftwork; consumers of recreational, educational, or burial facilities; land-owners producing forestry products and services; workers spinning locally sourced yarn; and more. One project we are particularly interested in is the use of a farmstead setting to build a living and working community for disabled and non-disabled adults in Northeast Connecticut, where the area's beauty and serenity would contribute therapeutic benefits to the residents.

Capital

CDI is lucky to share most of our region with a venerable Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) dedicated to cooperative development: the Cooperative Fund of New England. CFNE makes loans to start-up and established cooperatives and collaborates with CDI to provide technical assistance to current and prospective borrowers. A large part of our NEROC program involves finding appropriate financing for park purchases, infrastructure replacement, and expansion through purchasing new homes. Additionally, CDI supports hour exchanges, which represent an important "intermediate" structure between informal community economies and cooperative businesses, and an important tool for cooperative enterprises to be able to start up with less funds and serve clients with less cash.