Sandhill Farm is a non-profit land project organized as individual households collectively caretaking our land, houses, and infrastructure.
We are currently composed of 4 adults and 2 youth that live in three houses and a cabin. Many outbuildings, barns, and gardens support our work in tending the 168 acres of fields and forest in which we live.
In effect, we are both tenants and landlords, making decisions by consensus.
Sandhill Farm was established in 1974. It is rich in culture, history, beauty, and connection. You can learn more about Sandhill’s history in the History section.
In 2019 we restructured from a fully income-sharing commune to provide private dwellings for family units, and greater personal and financial autonomy, while continuing to steward the land and infrastructure collectively.
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Culture
Most of us are very busy with the work of nourishing ourselves, our careers, caring for our children, and maintaining relationships with our extended family. Yet we are following our passions, traveling, and cramming in creativity, spirituality, and fun where we can.
Sandhill is an agriculturally focused community. We grow much of the food we eat; currently focusing on vegetables, fruit and nut trees, meat, maple syrup, and culinary and medicinal herbs. In the past, we also grew field crops like grains, beans, sorghum for syrup, and more.
Growing food, or gathering it from the land, is a way we enjoy spending time together, and we seek to draw in those who share this interest.
We are American Tree Farm certified and actively manage our forest via invasive species removal, thinning, sustainable timber harvest, and trail maintenance.
Our homes, barns, and outbuildings are constructed utilizing lumber sawn from our forest.
We’re enthusiastic to continue to find ways to integrate ourselves with this land, to take care of it, and to have it take care of us in return.
We’ve got the fields and some equipment; we’re looking for folks to farm!
We are actively looking for new members with experience in and energy for farming.
Sandhill is active in the communities, organics, and political resistance movements.
Core values include cooperation, nonviolence, understanding and combatting systems of oppression – personally and systemically, honesty, good communication and sustainable land stewardship.
Our current members hold a variety of jobs; shop teacher/busdriver, woodworker, organic farm inspector, and organic certification director/agricultural activist.
We like to keep our lifestyle simple and healthy. We tend to work hard and get satisfaction from providing for ourselves as much as we can while maintaining close ties with neighbors, friends, and other communities.
We enjoy regular celebrations and social occasions, including weekly dinners with Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage, a 25+ year-old ecovillage, and Red Earth Farms, a 15+ year-old land trust community, both just three miles away. We are also friends with the folks at Bear Creek Land Trust and their local community of sustainable farmers in the LaPlata area, about 35 miles away.
We love making music! Singing, playing piano, upright bass, saxophone, trombone, banjo, accordion, jaw harp, flute, shruti box, drums, making electronic music.
We like to have dance parties, dress up in costumes, and many of us play ultimate frisbee.
We are not straight edge, but we value sobriety/moderation.
We are cultivating our own rituals of earth reverence and connection to spirit, particularly in the form of seasonal sweat lodges in which we sing and pray together. We mimic the structure and intent of Native American sweat lodge, but not the content, instead improvising our own prayer and song.
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How We Function
*A non-profit in which all members of the community are board of members.
*Decision-making through consensus– meaning that we seek the full consent of all members for a decision to be made.
*Sharing responsibilities for the upkeep of the land, infrastructure, and managerial tasks.
*Participating in weekly meetings, and 1 community dinner. Members attend an annual retreat. There are voluntary garden parties weekly, weekly potlucks with the other local communities, and a plethora of optional activities (song circle, ultimate frisbee, sauna, kids’ activities, etc)
*Taking responsibility for the general upkeep and maintenance of our homes.
*Paying monthly contributions to the non-profit to meet our annual budget, and to cover the expenses of infrastructure, upkeep, and land taxes, and utilities.
Sandhill Farm is a non-profit land project organized as individual households collectively caretaking our land, houses, and infrastructure.
Sandhill Farm is a non-profit land project organized as individual households collectively caretaking our land, houses, and infrastructure.
How to become a member
Our membership process is intentionally slow and can generally take 18-24 months. We are a small community so want everyone to get a chance to know each other, and experience living together before making decisions about membership. We have developed a Residency Period for which we can get to know each other.
You can see our full residency/membership process below, as well as definitions of Residency and Membership
Residency/ Membership Process
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Definition of Resident
-Decision-making and participation in group meetings welcomed but no blocking power in consensus decision-making.
-Obligation to manage some aspect of the farm by 6 months
– 1 full year of residency- 10 months out of 12 need to be spent on farm.
-Pays their share of monetary contribution (as defined by current resident and/or membership fees). This fee is related to one’s housing and current budgetary expenses defined in our annual budget meetings.
-Residents can be asked to leave.
-Group check-in after 6 months to see how it’s going.
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Definition of Membership
-One can become a member after their full year of residency is completed, and all their other residency requirements are fulfilled.
-To become a member, a resident makes requests to become a member at a meeting and fills out a membership survey.
-Membership is decided by full member consensus.
A member of the community is defined by:
–Being on the Board of Members as defined by the legal Non-Profit.
–Listed on the Bank Account
–Ability to use Sandhill infrastructure and tools for private business.
-Continues to pay monthly contributions.
-Expected participation in community organized events, including an annual “retreat” (2 days of meetings to figure out what we’re doing and how).
-You cannot own your own permanent structure home on Sandhill property, but Sandhill provides adequate housing.
Please feel free to reach out with any questions regarding our residency/membership process at visitors@sandhillfarm.
Please see our website (sandhillfarm.org) and read about our visiting process. We do most of our visitor correspondence through email.
We’re currently looking for new members, so please feel free to reach out to us!
The whole membership decides collectively.
Power and responsibility are shared relatively equally among members.
Members contribute a percentage of income to community funds.
Monthly fees/dues: $300
Labor required: Yes
Members with pre-existing debt: Yes (some debt)
Common House, Garden(s), Greenhouse(s), Library, Workshop, Outbuilding(s), Swimming pond or pool, Hot tub or hot springs, Outdoor Kitchen, Large Scale Kitchen, Tractor & Farm Equipment, Fire pit, Swingsets & play areas, Waterfront access, Internet, Agricultural facilities
Countryside locations with significant distance from urban centers.
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