I have had the chance to be at the first meetings of a forming cohousing group.  There were some emails going back and forth about whether or not to allow smoking on the property or not. One person got offended by someone else’s opinion that they left and decided cohousing wasn’t for them.

I was scratching my head. We didn’t even have a property on which to smoke!  How can you argue and decide to leave over smoking when there is nowhere to smoke?  I couldn’t believe they were putting the cart before the horse so early in the game. Luckily, that group now has a property (no houses yet) and are a very functioning group and learning how to get along but starting out that way can be rough.

Where I lived I don’t think we ever dealt with the smoke issue. I don’t think anyone smoked except maybe one member liked cigars.  However, no matter what the members want, there are always visitors and contractors and construction workers. Believe me, cigarette butts will appear on the property no matter what.

Where’s there’s smoke there is fire but why don’t you deal with bigger fires first like forming a dedicated group, a vision, find and buy property, hire an architect, and start building a community. You wouldn’t want it all to go up in smoke before it existed!