On September 14, more than one hundred resident owned community leaders and co-op members gathered from Massachusetts and Rhode Island for the 6th Annual ROC-A-Thon in Kingston, MA at the beautiful community of Town and Country Estates. Those in attendance represented fifteen ROC communities and three currently pursuing conversion and resident ownership.
Echoing previous years, resident leaders emphasized the importance of the moral support they that comes with connecting with others engaging in similar initiatives and management. “The ROC-A-THON offered valuable information for all. Among what’s most valuable comes from networking with other ROC communities” shared Nancy Silvia, Secretary of Twin Coach Estates, and one of the co-organizers for the event. 
Initial feedback from attendees was a buzz of excitement. Featured plenary speakers included Assistant Attorney General Daniel Less from the Massachusetts office Consumer Protection, Christopher Jee from the MA Dept. of Housing and Community Development (DHCD), and Kate Eads Galdieri, Senior Operations Director at ROC USA. Courtesy of expert contributions from Pattie Turner with Clarkin Property Management, Cindy Fraelli from Bristol South, Jonathan Hobill from MA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), Andy Danforth Director of Neroc at CDI (Cooperative Development Institute), and Mary O’Hara Director at ROC USA. Morning and afternoon workshops tackled the topics of planning for future community investment and development, decoding your community’s financial audits, and alternative ways a community can generate income.
These included a special session on expanding ROC’s revenue streams with Cindy Fraelli, Kim Capen, Medvil Cooperative (Goffstown, NH) and ROC Association Director for the New England Region, Nancy Froio, President of Halifax Mobile Home Estates Association, Jeff O’Connell, also from Halifax.
CDI Board member and Senior Program Specialist from Neighborworks Maria Fernandes-Dominique joined for the day. A small group of ROC leaders joined her to give her a chance to learn more about their work in their ROCs, and to discuss about CDI and Neighborworks.
The DHCD’s and the Attorney General’s office in Massachusetts take a special interest in protection of resident of Manufactured Housing communities, unique across the country. Their offices have been working with ROC USA to deepen and clarify how they can each support their manufactured housing constituents, and resident leaders. The session didn’t flag for a minute, and could have been extended for the enthusiasm for the subject matter and growing relationship.
Christopher Jee reflected: “It didn’t take long to notice the strong commitment by the audience members. It was very helpful to hear about the concerns that community members have. I appreciate the invitation to join the Roc-a-thon training to discuss the development and enforcement of community rules for manufactured housing.”
Beautiful weather, our largest attendance yet of 102, and the persistent passion of community leaders made a great day of learning and networking.
Founded in 1994, CDI has also assisted scores of new and existing agriculture, consumer, worker- owner, energy, and fishing cooperatives throughout New England and New York. CDI assists a rapidly growing Resident Owned manufactured housing pipeline, assisting conversions of 47 MHC’s, home to more than 5,000 residents and more than $200 million in new resident ownership since 2009, covering six states of New England. The program provides training service post-acquisition, and pre- acquisition services to clients, as part of the ROC USA network. www.cdi.coop
ROC USA is a nonprofit social venture that operates a national Community Development Financial Institution to make financing available to co-op communities and as a Network of regional expert technical assistance providers. www.rocusa.org
