OPEN Proposal / IDEA

Hello Permies World,

     My name is Richard and I have a goal/ dream to explore. To keep your attention, I will keep this brief. I purchased 7.4 acres in North Georgia about 45 minutes north of Atlanta. That is a long way from World Domination Headquarters in Missoula. I rather hope to appeal to those that can't take a plane trip, but live in the Metro Atlanta area and have classes in Permaculture on my property. That said, I am not certified in Permaculture and have not taken an official class. Many can learn online and out of books. I want the 7.4 acres to be a proof of concept and practice/ hands on training. Once I retire from the reserves, I hope to have classes of various types on the property at least once a month. As my house is completed, I will live on the property opening up more aspects of training like interns. I have many ideas and plans. Many aspects of Permaculture are already underway with swales, huglekulture, food forest and natural construction like strawbale house with clay floors and clay walls, just to name a few. Now, to the point. Here is why this is in the community forums. I am speaking out for the first time, because I am actually in a more calm state at the moment and not working 80 hours a week. Upon my return in April I hope to have plans in hand and moving forward with those plans for a teaching environment. What I believe is you can't teach unless you do first. I believe in leading by example. So, as I complete different aspects on the property, it can become a demo site. There will be challeges and even failure, or shall we say, non-successes. But that is all about learning. In this forum, does anyone have thoughts on North Georgia becoming a satelite training site for Permies folks, something on the east coast. Atlanta has a great airport and we have all four seasons with temps from 100 F to 0 F some winters. Oh, did I mention clay. I already have water and power and a foundatoin of a house with framing up. There is a garage for storage. So, not just a field. As a matter of fact, lots of trees. Any advice, assistance, thoughts....all welcome. Thanks for your time. Richard

Howdy Steve,(Richard) I just wanted to see if I could clarify what you are asking.

Sounds like you have a great start. I would think that you could open your place up to your local community and share your stuff as much as you want. You could also do classes. The tricky part is that you cannot offer PDC's without already having your own PDC. So you could teach people about permaculture but not really give them any kind of official permaculture paperwork.

So are you asking for some sort of a business partnership with Paul ?

Hello Miles. I completely understand your point about PDC. I may have to take a course, then a teaching course to do that. In the begining teaching the concepts is probably the most I would do. As far as a business partnership, that may not be out of the question. I had not thought of it that way, but again, I am laying ideas out there and if that is the direction things head, I would welcome that. I realize that he has the best website, so I already planned on point folks in that direction for guidance. The concept I have in place right now is a hands-on/ demo/ education center that folks can visit for a 4 hour, 8 hour, 2 day or longer class. There are a few around, but most are a long distance away. There are a few permaculture places in Atlanta, that I may or may not associate with, but Permies is the largest. Again, I had planned on endorsing Permies anyway. My hope or goal is to offer classes and perhaps have a quest speaker or teacher like Paul or someone from Permies. Bottom line, I hope to promote Permaculture and all of it facets. It is very interesting to get advice from someone in a different climate zone, so I hope to be a link in the chain and represent the southeast so people do not have to travel as far. Perhaps a regional hub. Once I retire and can dedicate even more time to the endeavor and living on the property, I hope to have even more classes, perhaps 6-month to 12-month interns that want to live and breathe the training, till they are ready to build their own site and continue the message. Does that make sense?