"Permaculture. A copyright word, owned as a common copyright by the Permaculture Institutes & their graduates. Derived from ‘Permanent’ and ‘Culture’, as follows:

    Permanent: From the Latin permanens, to remain to the end, to persist throughout (per = through, manere = to continue)

    Culture: From the Latin cultura - cultivation of land, or the intellect. Now generalized to mean all those habits, beliefs, or activities than sustain human    societies.

    Thus, Permaculture is the study of the design of those sustainable or enduring systems that support human society, both agricultural & intellectual, traditional & scientific, architectural, financial & legal. It is the study of integrated systems, for the purpose of better design & application of such systems"
  -Bill Mollison
  Permaculture.net

"Permaculture Design is not the rain, the roof, or the garden. Permaculture Design is the connections between these things.  Permaculture brings cohesion where there was once isolation."

"The practice of designing sustainable human habitats by following nature's patterns."
  -Organic Gardening

"Permaculture is a philosophy of working with, rather than against nature; of protracted & thoughtful observation rather than protracted & thoughtless action; of looking at systems in all their functions rather than asking only one yield of them & of allowing systems to demonstrate their own evolutions."
  -Bill Mollison

Meet other local people who are interested in Permaculture, urban sustainability and related issues. Meetups are typically held on the third Thursday of every month at 7:00 pm.