“Communitas” means friendship in ancient Greek. Both ‘community’ and ‘communications’ are derived from it.
This planet belongs to a whole family of humans, plants and other beings, some of whom are dead, many of whom are living and most of whom are yet unborn.
Modified quote of a Nigerian Chief
The Communitas Group, working towards creating a sustainable tomorrow, one community at a time.photo Adina Hannley
The Communitas Group is a private Alberta Based corporation. Communitas grew out of the needs of community groups and the needs of those who assisted community groups. It was formed in 1972.
The basic goals of Communitas are to ensure that individuals and community groups have access to the information, resources, and tools they require to develop a humane environment over which they have control. In order to achieve these goals Communitas has established services in the following areas:
- Housing Development & Project Management
- Community Development
- Research and Planning
- Publications
- Co-operative and Community Economic Development
The name Communitas was chosen because it is the Greek word from which both community and communications are derived. In Greek, the word originally meant friendship. The inspiration for the name came from the Paul Goodman book “Communitas” in which he redefines the concept of community.
We provide expertise in planning, project management, consulting and research, based on over 35 years experience in the housing, community and policy development fields.
Communitas has worked with a range of housing clients, including continuing housing cooperatives, home ownership cooperatives, mixed tenure cooperatives, community based land trusts, cohousing groups, non-profit companies and societies developing special purpose housing and private developers. Projects have ranged in size from 3 units to 118 units. Their individual capital costs have ranged from a low of $300,000 to a high of $20 million. These projects have included single family homes, duplexes, manufactured home park, townhouses, stacked townhouses, low rise apartments and high rise towers. Communitas has developed projects within the Edmonton Metropolitan Area, in smaller Alberta centres such as Banff, Red Deer, Rocky Mountain House and St. Isidore, and in Yellowknife and Iqaluit in Nunavut.
Communitas has also worked with a variety of clients undertaking community economic development initiatives or developing cooperative businesses. These have included groups such as Women Building Futures Society, the Multi-Cultural Health Brokers Co-operative Ltd., a worker co-operative providing holistic health cultural brokerage and community development services to a variety of cultural groups, the community of St. Isidore, and Edfor a multi-stakeholder community forestry cooperative.
Communitas has specialized at involving the end user in the development process. We pride ourselves on our ability to maintain our community roots, to work with organizations to foster inclusive participation in the design and implementation of their projects.