Name: Meet FIC new's leader, Dave Booda from Emerald Village (Berkeley, In-person)
Start: 2026-08-24T19:30:00-07:00
End: 2026-08-24T20:30:00-07:00
Location: Berkeley Cohousing Common House

Meet Dave Booda, Executive Director of **Foundation for Intentional Community** ([FIC](https://www.ic.org/)), the one-stop shop for finding, creating and supporting living well together.

Dave will be speaking to a recently-launched study group from the E**ast Bay Permaculture Guild** ([EBPG](https://collectiveresiliencenow.org/east-bay-permaculture-guild/)) that wants to create new diverse, affordable, and ecological cohousing-inspired places to live in the Bay Area, and we have room for a few more folks to join for a brief talk and conversation after their potluck (*so no need to bring anything, but there may be some tasty food left to enjoy*)

The group co-convener is **Pete Yaroschuk**, longtime East Bay Cohousing Supporting Member, who has been pursuing a vision of small-scale adaptive-reuse (*"retrofit" an existing build in the architectural sense of the term*) community in the Berkeley-Oakland area. Meet him and other seekers/founders with an ecological/homesgteading bent and share/find your path to community.

While this is hosted in a cohousing community, **it is not a tour**. Please don't disturb our neighbors or take photos outside. No smoking of anything or any animals onsite. Please **park on street** or use **bikes** (*onsite bike racks available*) or **transit** to get here. Note the directions - Maps/GPS may mislead you.

Pete Yaroschuk

Cohousing Coaches Raines & Betsy

Cohousing in the SF Bay Area - consolidated group

Cohousing Open

Technical support, group development tools, advice, connections and more

Cohousing Coaches

Visit a community near you, or virtually, anywhere! May 3-4

National Cohousing Open House Weekend

Web portal to communities, openings, and trainings

Cohousing California - Resource Network

Our business is Planning for Sustainable Communities. 

Cohousing Coaches 

Gatherings and info on people, communities and regional networks. 

Global Ecovillage Network

Community & Environment

Co-Housing

Urban Cohousing

Starting a Cohousing Community

Intentional Communities

Rural Co-housing

EcoVillages

New Urbanism

Housing

Co-Living

Green Living

Permaculture

Elder Cohousing

melinda stone

Dave Krzysik

Dale

Joyce

Redwood Kardon

Bryce Nesbitt

Jenny Guy

I was born in 1982 and grew up in upper-middle class suburbs of Boston, Massachusetts. My family is Armenian-American, my last name is Boodakian, but I used “Dave Booda” for my music career and once I put it on Facebook it stuck.

After high school I attended and graduated from the United States Naval Academy. After graduation I moved to San Diego, California and spent five years serving as a U.S. Navy Officer. My core understanding and framing of leadership, relationships and morality comes from this experience. While the military has it’s flaws, I look back on those nine years with a lot of gratitude for what I learned and the moral foundation it provided.
I wrote an essay called “Things I Wish They Told Me at the Naval Academy” that includes many leadership lessons learned and speaks about my experience in the fleet as an officer.

In 2018 I moved in to an intentional community called “**The Emerald Village**” which is in rural San Diego County. This began my dive into the world of intentional community living, and it’s still something I’m very passionate about. I’m currently serving on the board of directors for the Foundation for Intentional Community (FIC) and I’ve written several articles for [Communities Magazine](https://www.gen-us.net/communities/).



Dave Booda, FIC