We tend to think of history as a record of human activity, but a natural landscape also has a history all it's own, which is what is studied in the new field called historic ecology.

 

The San Francisco Estuary Institute's study of the Napa River ecosystem  was a project that brought together a wide alliance of stakeholders, notes Robin Grossinger (right), and developed information that could be used for multiple purposes.

 

In agriculture and business, the byword these days is sustainability. But for towns and communities, a new local non-profit, Transition US, is urging an emphasis on the parallel strategy they term "resilience."

 The process of creating these new Transitions begins with just a few people, explains Carolyne Stayton, and grows from there.

Carolyne Stayton (right) is the interim Executive Director of Transition US. She is adept at aligning community activities towards unified goals, a skill honed from over thirty years of working with nonprofit organizations and educational institutions. She has successfully galvanized communities around various social issues and has particular expertise in program development, participative leadership and "learning" organizations. Her background includes serving as Director of New College's North Bay Campus for Sustainable Living, an innovative educational institution that promoted advanced studies in leadership, community-building and developed the nation's first "green" MBA program. Carolyne has a master's degree in Nonprofit Administration, resides in Sebastopol, California and is passionate about stewardship and protection of the natural world.

Creating transitional communities is a fairly new idea, Stayton says, with a correspondingly short history.

  There's a more detailed history here:

 

Using a new technique, this year's census of the homeless in Sonoma County found far more of them than prior surveys. But improved methodology is being cited as the reason for the higher count, rather than a surge in the homeless population.

 

In the 2007 Homeless Census, explains Jenny Helbraun Abramson, the process depended on inviting homeless people into community centers to be counted. This time, the outreach was more direct and more comprehensive.

Read the full report here: 

 Or go here for a history of the homeless counts in Sonoma County.

Residential foreclosures can pose an opportunity for local government and agencies to increase the amount of affordable housing in their communities.

The federal government's one-size-fits-all approach to the mortgage meltdown will not work everywhere in the country, says Erik Sten (right), a former City Commissioner in Portland, Oregon. He believes a more diversified strategy will be required.

 Erik Sten was in Santa Rosa to speak at the Leadership Breakfast for the Sonoma County Housing Coalition, the kick-off event for their Affordable Housing Week . The Coalition has a full schedule of events planned throughSaturday, May 16.

Erik Sten's new enterprise is Further Development LLC, a start-up that is now gathering capital for a demonstration project to intercede and help overextended homeowners avoid foreclosure.