Expected and minimum commitment: a summary of what we agreed to so far

The Reef
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Hello @reef-full,

At the last Full Members dinner, a few people said something about the low energy levels in the group, and maybe even the low levels of commitment.

In view of preparing for a discussion about whether this is a shared view, and if yes, what we can do to get to higher levels of energy again, I am creating this little post which brings in a bit of the history of what we have discussed so far on this topic.

There are three main documents you could refer to:

If that’s too much to read (no judgement), here’s a couple of key points:

  • The expected commitment of every adult in The Reef is to attend all plenary meetings, check Edgeryders twice a week and do two hours of work (without counting meetings).

  • If that’s not possible, that is really fine. We have a defined minimum commitment, and if that’s not possible, several options to opt out of that. It is noted though that this only works if a couple of conditions are in place.

  • When we did research about commitment in the early days, most cohousings we consulted concurred on 10 hours of work per month.

  • In some of our sibling cohousings, not meeting the minimum commitment was financialised: every adult (or household - not clear) was expected to do 100 hours of work per year. People who did not meet this number of hours had to pay, with zero hours equal to 1% of the casco price of your unit. So for a unit with a casco price of 300k, only 1 hour of work per week would come down to 1500 euro per year.

For the sake of clarity: I am not pleading for the financialisation of commitment, or even arguing that everybody takes up the expected commitment. I do hope that the key points I offered above may have triggered your interest to read the documents that we have, and even more that we can have a fruitful discussion shortly on how we want to move forward with this challenge.

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I think the permitting troubles and consequent unit attribution drama left everyone exhausted. With the permit application updated and submitted, we hopefully can now catch our breath and move on.

This is not meant to be an excuse for not putting in the work, but it could be part of the explanation.

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Thank you @Lee for bringing up this important topic and for reminding us of the commitments :slight_smile:

As Alberto said, I think the current situation is partly due to the permit-related issues, and that things should improve again.

I just wanted to clarify something regarding the expected commitment from every adult.

It makes sense that every adult should be aware of what’s happening with The Reef.

However, regarding the expected practical involvement, the documents and the practice state that at least one adult per household is acceptable if the household needs it and not all adults in the household can be actively involved (e.g. : “Attend all plenary meetings (at least one well-informed and prepared adult per household).”)

I think it’s important to clarify this, especially for households with children (but not only) and to avoid “scaring” families (but not only) who might want to join the project.

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Indeed, thanks @Lee for bringing this up. I would be very interested to speak about it in a in-person meeting with the group (plenary or FM dinner). Some people really have taken on a lot of weight on their shoulders these past few months (including yourself), and you are right to speak up.

Agree with the remark that @AlinT made as well.

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Just for the record for those who were absent: we had a discussion about this at the plenary of 25/06/2026. Some notes should be available in the agenda document.

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