Tryon Life Community Farm

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Portland is an amazing place, with thousands of people and dozens of organizations working hard at creating a more sustainable urban future. It's great, but it can often be difficult for everyone to be in touch with what others are doing, and for newcomers or grassroots group to be involved in the process. That's why ReCode Portland is so exciting.

We are a campaign bringing together citizens, planners, builders, activists, and other stakeholders in developing, coordinating, and building the movement for regulations that support grassroots sustainability. We

• facilitate collaboration among the existing organizations and people doing various aspects of the work;
• create space for grassroots groups in the discussion; and
• specifically advocate for acting within a strategy of systemic change.

We're also a work in progress, and invite you to join us in adapting to an ever-changing context. Email recode@tryonfarm.org to get involved.

TLC Farm is currently facilitating the campaign, and we are using this site to collaborate. We're using a working group approach to divide the work:

• Practices and goals.

What are the technologies and practices that we'd really like to encourage? Specifically oriented around grassroots, bottom-up change: how can we unleash the innovation and creativity of inventive people, while ensuring that community values and safety are protected? Let's focus on identifying the details!

• Code research and development.

Coordinate existing research and materials on regulatory obstacles to sustainable practices. Identify various approaches to changes in code, from overall strategy to detailed written form. Coordinate with "Practices and Goals".

• Networking group.

Keep in broader context, bring people in, cross-pollinate, contact allies. Get stakeholders on opposite sides, facilitate roundtables, understand the heart of issue. Networkers talk to people with concerns, not just ready-made allies. Also regionally and nationally, to bolster effort.

• Public education.

Public education through film, web, print media, etc. Create public awareness of the issues and garner support for regulatory change. Also, make easily accessible info about what the current codes are and how to navigate new ones.

• Government Relationships.

Develop relationships with officials and bureaus at all levels. What concerns do they have, what are the hold-ups? Give public support to the many public servants that are working hard to make change; keep the awareness and political strength focused.

For some additional background information, see the documents below. For an introduction to code barriers specific to TLC Farm, as an example, go to Amy Tyson's TLC Farm case study. We are planning on creating space for collaborative work on all the building and zoning approaches we're working on; to see how we're beginning that, go to Technical Research Notes. This site remains skeletal; the networking working group is focused on helping get more information into the public domain here.

ReCode Portland in the blogosphere:

• EcoSpace
• WorldChanging Portland (by Ethan Timm of SERA Architects)

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If you have any problems or concerns, please email recode@tryonfarm.org.