Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
The Community Land Trust (CLT) is an established and successful model for the creation of democratically governed permanently affordable housing, and most urgently in the face of the crisis, a tool to prevent the displacement of historic communities. T
When Jeremy Corbyn tweeted his video about Granby 4 Streets Community Land Trust, he couldn’t have picked a better example. This Community Land Trust is in Toxteth, Liverpool exemplifies a new form of municipal socialism that creates community power, not just council power.
While billion dollar development companies eat up affordable housing units throughout the Bay Area, dedicated teams of organizers, nonprofit service providers, community development corporations, and others fight a relentless battle along side and on behalf of those at threat of displacement
Welcome to community-owned Huxhams Cross Farm set on the rolling hills of south Devon on the edge of the Dartington Hall estate. Secured by the Biodynamic Land Trust (of which more later), its 34-acres exemplifies human-scale farming in a world increasingly dominated by industrial farming.
Affordable housing-related CLTs are probably best-known, but this model can be applied for any community goal, including lowering costs for small businesses and ensuring local food production. Though the CLT model has been re-emerging since the late 1960s, it is actually somewhat of a return to indigenous practices around ownership of land and resources.
With 16,000 vacant properties in Baltimore—a number some say is severely undercounted and may be closer to the 23,000 that the U.S. Census estimates—there’s plenty of blight to fix. Adding community land trusts into the mix of solutions to throw at the problem seems likely—if not this budget, then next.
In the UK, only around 10 per cent of new homes are self-built. But with the housing shortage increasingly acute, many groups and local authorities around the country are looking to community self-build as a potential solution. Can it deliver?
For more than three decades, the town of Great Barrington, Massachusetts, has quietly demonstrated how grassroots, sustainable, and human-centric projects could easily become the building blocks of the next economy.
In San Juan, Puerto Rico, government, residents, and technical professionals created a Community Land Trust (CLT), known locally as Fideicomiso de la Tierra, to preserve and develop informal communities along the Martín Peña Canal.
Community Land Trusts began in the United States as a model of land tenure that emerged from the civil rights movement in the South. CLTs have slowly gained popularity over the past decades, expanding dramatically in recent years.
On a systems level, I am most excited about community land trusts as a way to move land out of the speculative real estate market and into the public trust.
Permanent protection takes land speculation off the table.
