Regional
Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett of Nevada City's CoHousing Partners Honored with Sierra Business Council's 2007 Vision 2020 Awards
Author: YubaNet
Published on Oct 20, 2007, 09:02

Every year the Sierra Business Council honors, with the Vision 2020 Award, the outstanding efforts of community members as their work continues to achieve excellence in securing the social, natural and financial health of the Sierra Nevada.

"We are honored every year by the remarkable accomplishments of our friends and neighbors; they are the people in our communities who do the heavy lifting to make our futures bright. One of our greatest pleasures is being able to recognize them for their innovation and hard work," said Rich Morrison, Chairman of the Board, Sierra Business Council.

This year's winners include Perry Norris from the Truckee Donner Land Trust for his achievement in building one of the most effective land trusts in California. Perry has demonstrated a remarkable commitment to partnership and collaboration. He has conserved lands in the Truckee River watershed while protecting open space, promoting recreation, and improving the quality of life in the community.

Jay Francis of Collins Pine Company is being recognized for his outstanding sustainable forestry management and leadership. The management of Collins Almanor Forest has earned certification from the Forest Stewardship Council since 1993. This forest supports a diverse ecosystem, produces a variety of sustainable products to the community, and contributes to the natural beauty of the Almanor Basin and the Deer Creek watershed.

Bernie Vlach & Todd Thallhamer, Gerri Silva, and Norma Santiago of the California Integrated Waste Management Board, El Dorado County Environmental Management, and the El Dorado County Board of Supervisors will also be honored. This team exuded tireless commitment to implement the unique and timely Angora Fire Recovery Plan. Their success has restored hope and confidence within inter-agency efforts and demonstrates the essence of cooperation after the dramatic effects of the catastrophic wildfire in South Lake Tahoe.

The final winners are Kathryn McCamant & Charles Durrett of CoHousing Partners and McCamant & Durrett Architects, who partner as a developer/architect team to build sustainable communities in the Sierra. This team is being honored for their commitment to promoting a unique solution to one of the most vexing problems in the Sierra Nevada - the growing need for affordable, high quality housing. They have worked to educate, support, and inspire community members, elected officials, government agencies, and local businesses to pioneer a socially responsible form of housing and development through numerous Co-Housing projects.

Charles Durrett. Photo courtesy McCamant & Durrett

Charles Durrett, with his wife Kathryn McCamant, introduced the concept of cohousing to the U.S. with their book Cohousing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves. They coined the word "cohousing" for which they are credited in the Oxford English Dictionary. Charles recently authored, Senior Cohousing: A Community Approach to Independent Living-The Handbook.

Charles has designed over thirty cohousing communities in the United States, including Muir Commons, the first cohousing community in North America. He has also consulted on many more around the world. His work has been featured in Time Magazine, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, Architecture, and a wide variety of other publications.

Charles and Kathryn have received numerous awards for their work. The most recent is the World Habitat Award presented by the United Nations, and the Mixed Use/Mixed Income Development Award, presented jointly by the American Insititute of Architects and the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Although best known for his work designing and developing cohousing communities for families and seniors, he has also designed and renovated hundreds of childcare centers and classrooms throughout the country.

Charles' career as an architect has led him into the areas of urban design, town planning, and community development. He says, "Beauty is a key part of our job. People preserve, protect, maintain, and revitalize what they love. They love what is beautiful."

Kathryn Michiko McCamant. Photo courtesy McCamant & Durrett

A licensed architect and co-author of the book Cohousing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves, Kathryn McCamant founded McCamant & Durrett Architects and The CoHousing Company with her husband, Charles Durrett in 1987.

Since researching cohousing in Denmark in the early 1980's, Katie has design and developed dozens of cohousing communities. She played the role of lead project manager in six California communities seeing these communities from site search thru move in. In addition to pioneering cohousing in North American, Katie has designed a wide variety of building types including an innovative shared housing community for 24 single-parent households recovering from domestic violence situations, and a sustainably designed (LEED certified) Church.

In 2006, Katie founded Cohousing Partners, LLC with longtime collaborator, Jim Leach of Wonderland Hill Development Company, to take cohousing development to the next level in California. As a full-service real estate development company that partners with cohousing groups, Cohousing Partners, LLC seeks to address the growing demand for cohousing in California.

Katie graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture at UC Berkeley and did her graduate work at the Royal Academy of Art and Architecture in Copenhagen, Denmark. After living in Doyle Street Cohousing in Emeryville, CA for 12 years, she now lives with her husband and teenage daughter in the Nevada City Cohousing Community.

Sierra Business Council's 2007 Vision 2020 Awards Celebration featured presentations from Vision 2020 Award winners, a Slow Food Dinner prepared by local chef and advocate of the slow food movement, Matthew Broucaret, and a presentation by Slow Food Placer Gold Convivium representative Joanne Neft.

About Sierra Business Council

The Sierra Business Council is the only business organization serving the entire Sierra Nevada region. We are a nonprofit association of more than 700 businesses, agencies, and individual members committed to promoting a new perspective on regional wealth while emphasizing collaboration in planning and policy making. SBC's mission is to secure the social, natural, and financial health of the Sierra Nevada for this and future generations. Our projects focus on community-based planning, conservation, leadership development, and sustainable business and development practices to build a sustainable future for the region. SBC is an innovative leader that provides communities the tools and models to develop livable towns and prosperous economies while maintaining our sense of place and protecting our natural resources. For more information on the Sierra Business Council, visit www.sbcouncil.org or call 530-582-4800.

Founded in 1994, the Sierra Business Council has been recognizing outstanding achievements that serve the social, natural, and financial health of the Sierra Nevada through the Vision 2020 Award.

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