Living Forest Communities

Living Forest Communities is a community development model that accomplishes two goals: Forest conservation and sustainable resource use partnered with light on the land residential hamlet development. Primarily, we wish to establish and maintain sustainable natural forest ecosystems in perpetuity through land conservation and ecosystem-based forestry. This is accomplished by placing protective covenants on at least 85% of the land, while reducing the environmental impact of development and human activities that occurs on the remaining portion. The communities that are built feature clustered "light-on-the-land" home sites modeled after traditional European hilltop towns, and focus on the use of green building technologies. This model not only protects the most ecologically sensitive areas of the forest, but also promotes only sustainable activities such as organic gardening, eco-tourism, environmental education, eco- and agroforestry and related value-added manufacturing activities on those areas that are developed.