Anyone had group of 100+ for more than 10 years?

[Dave_V]

Our “close to home” principle has allowed us to do a lot that I don’t think we could have pulled off if we had to drive much to get there, but since we are on the outskirts of a medium sized town and most of us live really close to the facility, we live pretty normal lives but we’re still in position If SHTF.
Maybe you have the same cluster of members but just in a more rural setting?

It’s been months since I’ve even had a chance to check by here.
Clair, sorry for the blackout, but since Jan 1st, we have been running a 6 month full (well actually only about 15% of our projected capacity of about 340) occupancy simulation to try to verify that we could function for years if needed….short answer, we maybe could have muddled through for years and been sustainable, but we discovered MAJOR issues including energy, education, security, food rotation, pets, bugs, and cell phones. Most have or will move home this week so the drop in stress for me is palpable! I think besides the other issues, I personally need to come up with a way to let go of some of the stress – I’m a mellow guy, but I’ve aged a couple years in the last 6 months.

Previously we have had 14 full time residents, but for the last 6 months we have had 49, including many children and teens who were helping with this simulation. We were looking for weaknesses in our governance, air handling, energy and solar capacity, hydroponics, food consumption, and supplies using 49 as a planning multiplier. We were also looking at bottlenecks for restroom usage etc. and boy did we find them!

After some sleep, I’ll give you a break-down of what went wrong, how we fixed stuff, and what went right!

 

[Disturbed1970]

Our “close to home” principle has allowed us to do a lot that I don’t think we could have pulled off if we had to drive much to get there, but since we are on the outskirts of a medium sized town and most of us live really close to the facility, we live pretty normal lives but we’re still in position If SHTF.
Maybe you have the same cluster of members but just in a more rural setting?

It’s been months since I’ve even had a chance to check by here.
Clair, sorry for the blackout, but since Jan 1st, we have been running a 6 month full (well actually only about 15% of our projected capacity of about 340) occupancy simulation to try to verify that we could function for years if needed….short answer, we maybe could have muddled through for years and been sustainable, but we discovered MAJOR issues including energy, education, security, food rotation, pets, bugs, and cell phones. Most have or will move home this week so the drop in stress for me is palpable! I think besides the other issues, I personally need to come up with a way to let go of some of the stress – I’m a mellow guy, but I’ve aged a couple years in the last 6 months.

Previously we have had 14 full time residents, but for the last 6 months we have had 49, including many children and teens who were helping with this simulation. We were looking for weaknesses in our governance, air handling, energy and solar capacity, hydroponics, food consumption, and supplies using 49 as a planning multiplier. We were also looking at bottlenecks for restroom usage etc. and boy did we find them!

After some sleep, I’ll give you a break-down of what went wrong, how we fixed stuff, and what went right!

We started with 16 families, 20+ years ago. Many of us knew each other from the military, or had worked together for several years.

The group started as just random conversations, then morphed into, "Why can't we make this happen," and, "What would it take to do it right?"

We spent a few years laying the groundwork (bylaws, structure, etc), all while paying the dues amount we agreed on, into a start up account. Two of the original members are attorneys, we also have an accountant in that group. Everything was structured and monitored by them, with the option to step away with full refund prior to committing to our first major purchases.

By tye time we got rolling we had very close to 100k in that account. That was more than adequate for a sizeable down payment on rural land that met all of our parameters. The land was paid off within the 1st 7 years, iirc.

One of our parameters was that the land needed to be within 8 hours drive from where we live fulltime. We found the perfect spot 5 hrs away.

Again, because of the makeup of the group (including spouses), we started with a very eclectic group of skills to seriously lessen costs. No attorney fees, no need to pay an accountant, super good rate from the architect we used, no need to pay design firms for any of our systems, no need to rent heavy equipment, very low amount ever needed to pay for shipping stuff, etc.

While outside training is a requirement for members, all of our baseline stuff is done in-house. We had all of the physical labor we needed, in-house. Specialist crews were needed for a couple things (poured concrete buildings - we didn't want to mess with the molds; and intallation of the micro-hydro turbines).

Obviously, there were still material costs, but we were very savvy shoppers, and leveraged a ton of industry connections members had. The vast majority of materials were either contract over-runs, or bought from going out of business sales - the mechanics lifts we acquired, we were actually paid to take (garage was taken by the bank, and they wanted stuff gone). Stuff like that.

Since inception, we have more than doubled in group size, and usually have a couple prospective members we are looking at.

Covid was a complete validation for us. Easily 80% of members spent at least two months at the BOL, with many spending the last six months there. I spent 2 months straight there, and the wife was down there almost the entire time. My kids were there between 3-4 months. Nobody noticed any major differences from being "back home," and even the children (mine are grown) complained about having to leave.

I used the same amount of electricity I do back home, showered as often, ate more (and better), and worked as many hours as I do normally for my real job. I slept in a real bed, and got in a ton of hunting, fishing, and shooting. Any booboos were seen to by our medocal people.

It was no different than being in the real world, only quieter, and I was surrounded by people I like, and who all have a solid work ethic (even tye attorneys ).

I have never looked at the math, but purely based on dues, not counting any donations, and not factoring man hours of labor, we have several million dollars invested, so what we have is a bit of an anomaly. It's not that it was financially difficult to do, it just had to happen on a long timeline.

Vetting personnel, and having extremely well-defined bylaws is imperative. Having bylaws that cover the odd stuff (what happens in case of divorce? What happens when members die?) Is just as important.

Any full member has unrestricted access 24/7/365. Any member could live down there fulltime, if they wanted.

 

[wheresclair]

It’s been months since I’ve even had a chance to check by here.
Clair, sorry for the blackout........................
After some sleep, I’ll give you a break-down of what went wrong, how we fixed stuff, and what went right!

Yes Dave, I am very ready to hear about what has happened in this long time. Especial about the school.
We have had many water problems but we have buyed some bigger submersible pumps and we are better now. Also we have got some many shelves and it helped us very much for the food storage.

 

[wheresclair]

micro-hydro turbines

This sound like a very good compound! We are not having a very good time and be cold in winter and hot now and not good sleeping beds. How do do the micro-hydro turbines? Is it with stream or water from tower, or aquifer?
Wow, 5 hours is far from home. My place will be underwater if I am 5 hours from. but your place sound very good.

 

[Disturbed1970]

This sound like a very good compound! We are not having a very good time and be cold in winter and hot now and not good sleeping beds. How do do the micro-hydro turbines? Is it with stream or water from tower, or aquifer?
Wow, 5 hours is far from home. My place will be underwater if I am 5 hours from. but your place sound very good.

We have a stream dammed at a higher elevation, with significant drop and flow.

Suitability for micro-hydro was way up the list of features that were "must-haves."

Given the size of the country, 5-hours by car is nothing. Another feature we looked for was "at least 2-hours from a major population center." Then "off natural lines of drift," "not in at-risk areas for major weather or geological upheaval," "not in the path of predominant winds from nuclear power plants," "long growing seasons," "topographically defensible," "multiple water sources, "game-heavy," etc. The longer your list gets, the shorter the list of options.

We have multiple routes planned to the BOL from our main homes, and there is almost always someone(s) at the BOL.

When I retire, I plan to relocate permanently to there, but in the mean time, for what it offers, 5 hours is negligible. Barring an event that is 100% completely unforeseen, I would expect far more notice of needing to head that way.

Mind you, in 20+ years of operation, our threat matrix has never risen to emergency levels. That includes Covid. Most of us just took advantage of almost all of us having to work from home, and used it for an extended get-away.

 

[Disturbed1970]

Especial about the school.

Some pairings seem to go together very well. Cops and teachers, or cops and nurses are two-such. We have several cops in the group, which means we have nurses and teachers to spare.

For the most part, people with specialized skills are slated to continue in those fields should an event occur. Some...not so much. Not much call for lawyers, accountants, OTR truck drivers, or cops in a SHTF world. However, our teachers have full sets of school books, curriculums, etc, and are slated to continue teaching as part of their duties.

It's pretty easy to get ahold of multiple copies of old text books for cheap or free. We bought CASES of books when a local school district updated their curriculum a few years ago. We spent less than $1000 for books for all grades/subjects, with dozens of copies of each. The only things you really need to stay modern with are the sciences. Older text books also have the advantage of being written before things were dumbed-down or scourged for political correctness.

Old laptops are cheap - we have dozens and dozens that were wiped and repurposed by some of our IT folks.

For the really young ones, Dollar stores have super-cheap flash cards, coloring books, crayons, etc. Dollar General actually runs penny sales, where various items sell for a penny. For those in the States, Google "Dollar General penny sales." I don't think I will ever need to buy soap or toothpaste again - my wife is a master at penny shopping, and fills her SUV every time she goes.

Like I mentioned up-thread, we also run a very extensive intra-net, which has tons of educational stuff on it.

The BOL was designed with two full classrooms in it, with a couple rooms that can be pressed into service. Various work areas also allow for teaching hard skills.

Gov auctions are an awesome source for "industrial" furniture. Easy to buy entire lots of desks and chairs.

All of our kids excelled at online school during Covid - they were still attending classes at the BOL, and also carrying their online courseload, along with having a couple hours of chores around the BOL (assigned based on age groups).

Maybe 20 kids of all age groups were taught for a few hours a day by 5 teachers. It's old school (no pun intended), with multiple grades in the same classroom. All of the teachers agreed they could easily handle several more kids. Our kids are easier than the ones they typically deal with, because they have parents that hold THEM accountable, and the kids are respectful, and work hard. Also, school days are about 4 days long.

 

[Randolph]

"We started with 16 families, 20+ years ago. Many of us knew each other from the military, or had worked together for several years."

Disturbed 1970,

I know a travel trailer club started by my father almost 50 years ago with 12 families that has it's own camping ground for 40 years now. Main Building with industrial kitchen. Showers and bathroom facilities. Hook ups for 50 motor homes or trailers.

Bylaws are very important.

 

[Dave_V]

We have had many water problems but we have buyed some bigger submersible pumps and we are better now. Also we have got some many shelves and it helped us very much for the food storage.

Clair, does this mean you've solved your electricity problem??
I know you were having a problem getting enough solar and maybe enough efficiency out of the solar you have. Or did you run some more long distant wires from that house? Or maybe you buried a tank for petrol and you have a generator?!

I know you HAVE to have pumps, but I wish there was a less energy eating way for you to keep the water out - maybe sealant. Where is the water coming from? Is it a spring, or is your pond leaking into your facility, or is it just pouring in from the runoff on the field?

 

[Dave_V]

Yes Dave, I am very ready to hear about what has happened in this long time. Especial about the school.

I know it’s a pain to catch up on a long thread, but if you care to read some about our setup, you can go back and read about what each family owns and what we share in common HERE. If it’s not all there, it’s probably on a different post.

Covid-19 by necessity blew the barn doors off of open source K-12 curriculum resources!
I think we’re really well set up with a lot of resources and we are very family/kid centric, but we had some serious education issues.
Most of our students are self starters, but with 28 kids from pre-school to high school seniors, the challenge to keep them all engaged this past 6 months was in my mind one of our most difficult tasks. By mid January we knew we needed more teachers to do right by the kids and parents that were trusting us to not let their kids get behind, especially for the upper grades. I felt like things were falling apart because our normally very together kids were showing signs of stress. They needed more support and direction so we took action.

In 2020, we had already vetted more than a dozen teachers and their families that we were impressed with, knew them well, but had not yet "asked the question" directly. It could have all gone really badly, but they were all great choices and all but two accepted after some convincing by their peers already “inside.” The two teachers that didn’t join us nevertheless were very supportive, but didn’t feel their families could fit in.

It was pretty weird for the adults to wrap their minds around our society within a society, but the kids seemed to relish the closeness and the whole secret lair concept. Plus they got a new home away from home and truly enjoyed being with friends in a supportive environment. The spouses fit right in as all but 3 were already still remote working. Accommodating those 3 is another wacky story.

At the outset, we THOUGHT we already had a great curriculum, but apparently it had too much boring material, too much online, not enough group collaboration, and definitely not enough hands-on. We ended up completely revamping our curriculum with the guidance of a core group of kids, their parents, and some awesome teachers. We now have both a face-to-face and an on-line curriculum that we can use together and interchangeably, everyone at each level gets the same material, but everyone also has their own self-paced track depending on interest and ability. Thanks to our programmers, the kids, parents, and teachers can easily see where they are, where they’re going, what’s next, what’s assigned, what’s due when, and their progress. It is in a constant state of improvement that will probably always be in tweak-mode.

I keep getting this sinking, guilty feeling we almost screwed up a half year of learning for these kids, but we ended up better serving them than if they’d been in a private school and with the bonus that we also developed the curriculum and techniques that we will use in the Fall when we open our own private academy near the far end of our strip mall. This location will give us adults the peace of mind that our children are VERY close at hand if we need them to shelter quickly.

As far as opening our own academy, we are quite fortunate that our state has these laws governing private schools…NONE! (well almost none!)
No requirement for Accreditation.
No requirement for Licensing.
No requirement for Approval.
Teacher certification is not required for instructional personnel in private schools.
Attendance - 180 school days or 170 school days and the hourly equivalent of 180 school days
The state and local school district do not have the authority to oversee or control the curriculum or academic programs of private schools or home instruction programs.

I’m a little stressed about the Fall, but fear usually that makes me over-prepare and so I’m actually pretty confident we can do a good job.

 

[wheresclair]

Dave, are you there so you can say how you are doing with school and other?? Please say something.
We are not having anyone to live in place because big problems with many meters of water in and danger with electric. This is not good because some people are not for keeping our place. I feel very discourage.

 

[Dave_V]

Clair,
Many apologies, I never seem to have enough time in my days. I know I cannot keep up this pace, but I feel an urgency to organize and get things working as smoothly as possible and as quickly as possible.
Please email me and I promise I will give you my full attention and help you anyway I can. You were on the path to making a dependable facility and I feel certain you can and will solve these problems. Beside me, there are probably many others here that could make some good suggestions for you as well. It sounds like you need to protect your electrical connections from submersion and use (better?) submersible pumps at the bottom of your sinkhole. I don't know the details, but it sounds like you may need to create a clay berm or even a low wall around your field edges and maybe run your pump exit hose further away from your opening? Email me soon!

 

[Dave_V]

For me, this has been my worst and best year ever.
We have spent some SERIOUS bucks...we've put more $ into our community this year than any of our 32 previous years except for the original construction!

Starting in Feb, we completely replaced the rooftop solar arrays on every store in the shopping center! Each of hundreds of panels produces about 380 watts! During normal business hours, we sell our electricity back to the power company but we can almost instantly switch any amount of the energy to the exclusive use of our facility. The facility takes whatever is needed daily to run everything and keeps the battery banks topped off. During our 6 month trial run, the entire facility was run completely off-grid from the solar arrays with no down time.

The up-fit for the school also cost a lot, but not nearly as much the school passageway (we don't call it a tunnel, but it is!) that connects the school securely to our facility. I think it was worth every penny for the peace of mind it provides to parents.

That 6 month, large scale practice run that we had earlier this year told us tons of things we needed to know about longer term stays in the facility. We got really good at working with the kids and that helped us get our new private school fully up and running on time for this fall semester! All but about 15 of our kids are enrolled and have direct access to the facility via the new protected passageway.
Those 15 kids are in nearby public schools for athletics like football or something else we couldn't provide at our school.

We also updated our ventilation. With our beefed up solar, we can actually provide air conditioning for the entire facility. The control room where servers, computers, and the full-time staff work has had AC for years, but now even all the residences (pre-modified 40 foot shipping containers) have the ability to pipe in air conditioned air. (before it was just forced air, but filtered.) It has never been uncomfortable anywhere in the facility, but the difference is extremely noticeable since we brought the HVAC on-line about a month ago. We also added some really big fans at various locations "outside" in the common areas to provide the sensation of a little breeze!

I'll be back later to tell you why I feel more of a sense of urgency lately and more of what we're doing to prepare for it.

 

[Dave_V]

In the back of my mind, I've always been concerned about some rogue president starting a war with one of the big boys (China or Russia) and me not being prepared enough to deal with the inevitable EMP and the chaos that would be coming our way.

Today, my biggest concern is no longer an EMP. After extensive discussions with an atmospheric physicist, who is one of our members, I am convinced that (besides another pandemic) the most likely life-altering event may be a major solar flare followed by a coronal mass ejection (CME.) Yeah, I know it sounds like one of those sci-fi movies where the earth's magnetic field turns off or there's a tidal wave that takes out the east coast, but historically and statistically, we're overdue for some serious solar flares/coronal mass ejections which would be the equivalent of multiple EMP bursts nation-wide, and maybe globally. The sun actually is, in broad terms, pretty predictable - we just don't have enough information to tie “the big one” down to any particular year or for that matter decade, or century. But we do have some historical data that says there's high solar activity (solar storms) every 11 years. The next peak of activity is in 2025. So the good news is, we probably only need to worry (about this particular problem) every 11 years assuming a serious coronal mass ejection will occur during a solar max year.

Solar flares, which are radiation, get here in only about 8 minutes, but probably aren’t going to wipe out our electrical grid and our satellites…leave that to the coronal mass ejections which if they happen to be pointed our way, would hit us at over a million miles an hour and would arrive in 15 hours to maybe 3 or 4 days after detection and follow solar flares. A catastrophic CME could be billions of tons of charged particles which could definitely send the unprepared back to the stone-age for several months to several years…or we could wipe each other out trying to survive.

So say after the information leaks from the universities, we might have a half day’s notice. 12 hours would give everyone, including those hours away from their shelter communities (like Disturbed1970's) to get there and hunker down IF they were prepared and got on the road immediately…no messing around because many if not most major roads could be at a standstill within hours.

In our case, because everyone is so close by, we would immediately suspend our new private school, kids would move directly into the shelter via the school passageway, parents (and kids “outside” attending public schools - about 15) would get to the facility asap and NOT stop at the store etc. We haven't all done this much work to lose people for no good reason in a grocery store riot...besides, we have our own grocery store almost right above us that would immediately be shuttered on news of the astronomical event.

So now you know what worries me most – stupid, I know.
It’ll probably be something else, but by preparing for the worst, maybe we’ll make it?!

 

[wheresclair]

So much to translate! I will be back in the shortly!

 

[Dave_V]

Speaking of what we’re doing to ensure readiness, besides beefing up our solar and HVAC, we’re actively recruiting much needed staff to help us manage our upgrades.

We just successfully recruited a top notch (out of state!) power engineer and his family! A big bonus is that he cut a deal to ALSO have us move and bring in his best tech guy and his family!
It is a big win-win for everyone!

We found with our huge HVAC update, we were lacking the on-site expertise to maintain, balance, and integrate our transformers, switchgear, transfer switches, huge number of solar panels, inverters, natural gas generators, and battery banks. Now we have the expertise we've been needing! Also, we are fortunate to have lots of enclosed, ventilated, secure, raised pads to mount equipment above the top level of the parking deck. It’s great to be able to bring in the energy we need without having to house all that equipment in our living space!

 

[wheresclair]

Dave, can you get the US VISA for my family and myself? We will promise to work very hard! I know really you cannot but I wish that you could do this!!

 

[wheresclair]

This rain all time is killing my spirit. This month we have had sun only maybe 2 days. We are so depressed.

 

[wheresclair]

I thank you very much for kind email. I am feeling better but rain is still making me sad for all the work i must do to go into my shelter. I have been waking every day earlier and sometimes I think to much. I have been reading all these pages and I have tried to draw how I can imagine your place. You did tell me before you can make almost 100 steps one way and 80 the other way so why do you say you are 200 of your measurement. Many people the step is about a meter so I think you have counted not correct. Is place bigger or smaller? Also, how do you keep water out of place? Big parking makes lot of water!

 

[Dave_V]

Clair,
You're very welcome!
Yes, using Google translate for this website must be pretty handy for you when I write a lot! Sorry I am so wordy! (Here I probably go again!)

I was being vague on here on purpose in case there's ever a consumer version of a satellite search for building footprint. We don't want unwelcomed visitors. We're way over 200 feet in at least one direction, so you didn't misunderstand me. It would be hard to line up 25 shipping containers side by side in a 200 foot space - right?

We weren't able to build the new passageway from the school at the same level as the store entrance without excavating the back side of the shopping center a lot more than we needed to so we actually had to move the container that was against the wall of the store entrance and shift it to completely the other side, so now it is the last container instead of the first - if that makes sense to your mental picture of our layout.

I thought that moving a tightly fitted (and bolted!) 40 foot container out of the row and to the other end would be next to impossible, but the guys that work with these things are crazy good on their forklifts. They made the whole process look pretty easy. So once that container was moved, the opening to the school passageway stairwell appeared!

There's still some finishing work to be done, but it is totally functional. Here's a shot from today's big staircase reveal. As an alternate, if moving the container could only be done by destroying it, we were considering cutting a doorway in the back left side of the container to reveal the staircase and then completely gut the container to act as a hallway - a big waste of space that I'm glad we didn't have to resort to!

So you have a problem waking up too early and I have a problem staying up too late - and then having to wake up pretty early anyway! So good night!

P.S. I'll try to answer your water question tomorrow.

 

[wheresclair]

Dave, sorry I cannot see it in my head.
You maybe can draw it for me?