By Ande Finley
Transition Lopez Island, with its mission of bringing increased resilience and sustainability to Lopez, just completed its seventh Barnraising event. Conceived early on at one of the group’s monthly “Potlucks with a Purpose,” this guild promotes community labor share as neighbors help one another and share a meal to celebrate the day’s work in the manner of traditional barn raisings of the past.
In July, the Hamlet became the recipient of all this energy, bringing together staff, residents, and Transition members to weed, lay mulch, and generally restore the gardens and berms of our island’s senior housing. The Hamlet will stay in the rotation to schedule a second event next spring to do some planting and would be grateful at that time for donations of perennials from other islander’s gardens. Look for a notice on LopezRocks as that date approaches.
Previous Barnraisings built and repaired animal and wood sheds, cleared brush to expand a fence line, installed a drip irrigation system, hauled and split firewood, cleared forest trails, put vegetable gardens and orchards to bed for the winter, mucked out a goat shed, and built fences. As individual families become more resilient and land use island-wide becomes more productive, the whole community benefits.
In uncertain times, resilience is the capacity to bounce back and thrive. The Transition group is finding ways to harness our island-grown community activism and collective wisdom to create a new paradigm around issues of local economy, labor share, energy use, movement of goods and people, and food and water security that sustains life for us all.
As part of a worldwide movement of community-scale initiatives, Transition Lopez Island also partners locally with like-minded groups, including the Lopez Community Land Trust, Islands Energy, Lopez Locavores, and Lopez Community Trails Network.
Transition Lopez Island invites you to join them in creating a bold future for our island that promotes health, creativity, and equality for everyone, in balance with nature. Contact me at andefinley@gmail.com for more information.
