One of the features of life here at Dôl Llys is working closely together. As a member, each of us has a responsibility to run the housing co-op and fulfil its aims.
- To maintain the ability of the co-op to provide housing and various services for its members, for example electricity, heating, water & waste,
- to maintain the hall in all its historical grandeur, both long term and day-to-day,
- to maintain and regenerate the grounds and woodland of the hall, as an attractive place to live, both for ourselves and for wildlife, and for our friends near and far to visit, and
- to use the land to grow food and wood for ourselves.
To achieve these, we ask all members to commit a certain amount of time monthly.
We get together for a monthly meeting, where we discuss and agree decisions and manage the activities that fulfil all the aims of the co-op. Recent decisions included spending communal budget on a renewed mains water feed to the site, to install an electric vehicle charging point paid for by the EV owning households and to get local wildlife experts in to advise us on improved biodiversity opportunities.
We also use rotas for sharing out routine tasks such as cleaning communal areas, sorting out bins and recycling, opening and closing the poly tunnels and looking after the hens. For the longer-term maintenance, whenever possible, we organise projects such as painting the outside of the hall or repairing the drive where all members were involved.
Our monthly ‘Workday’ is a great bonding experience, and it is always gratifying to see how much can be achieved when we are all working together for a day, and it is also a social occasion as we share tea breaks and enjoy a communal lunch. Recent workday tasks include planting trees, building compost bays out of pallets and erecting a new polytunnel, as well as mowing the grass and clearing out the septic tank!
In addition, there are also Garden (half) days where we carry out a range of communal gardening tasks such as repairing paths and fences, cleaning poly tunnels, sorting out the communal composting, and Wood (half) days, where we work together to process logs for our wood burners. Of course, these monthly events include the obligatory tea and cake breaks!