Center for Rural Livelihoods

A vibrant, interdependent local economy that provides meaningful and remunerative livelihoods, encourages the recognition of our common humanity, and regenerates our ecological and social commons.

The Center for Rural Livelihoods’ campus is located on 40 acres of diverse forest and open woodlands. Ponds and flowing waterways support healthy riparian forest and wetlands on the site and biodiverse gardens and agroforestry systems start in the heart of campus and blend with the forested landscape. For more than 40 years, the site has been maintained as a model for sustainable human settlement in the forested foothills of our inland valleys. Since its inception, CRL has experimented, practiced, and promoted strategies in sustainable construction, technology, forestry, agroforestry, and ecological restoration to promote regional solutions that are ecologically based and socially useful.