Arnie Valdez stands near the hemp sleeper cabin he designed and built as part of the Hemp Sleeper Cabin Innovation Project. Photo courtesy of Amy Farah Weiss — *Arnie Valdez stands near the hemp sleeper cabin he designed and built as part of the* *Hemp Sleeper Cabin Innovation Project.* *Photo courtesy of Amy Farah Weiss*

By Moriah Slade

A prototype hemp sleeper cabin, created as part of a challenge to create small, fire-resistant healthy emergency housing, will be on display at an open house Oct. 2 on the site of one of Colorado’s first licensed industrial hemp farms.

Arnie Valdez of Rezolana Farms in San Luis, CO, designed a simple, yet life changing cabin featuring hempcrete, hempwool, hemp-adobe bricks, and solar power as part of the Hemp Sleeper Cabin Innovation Project.

The cabin will be for sale, with bids starting at $25,000, organizers said.

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The project was launched in November, 2020 by Amy Farah Weiss, founder and director of the Saint Francis Homelessness Challenge (SFHC), originally founded in San Francisco in 2015 to address street homelessness.

The sleeper cabin was designed to address the “humanitarian and market need [that] exists for fire and mold resistant, eco-insulated, mobile, affordable, easy-to-assemble and scalable sleeping cabins for emergency shelter and land stewardship,” Ms. Weiss said in a statement.

Three three farm/builder teams participated from the Southwest USA (Rezolana Farm, San Duckberry Farm, Paonia, CO; and Loma Linda Pharms, Mora County, NM).

The project laid out specific parameters that each submission had to meet. These included “R&D of safe, secure, mobile, and eco-insulated sleeper cabins for emergency shelter, land activation, and/or resident stewardship, that can be either flat packed, built directly on a trailer, and/or be delivered to a location.” The cabins had to meet the California building codes.

During the open house, Valdez and Ms. Weiss hope to “spur interest in industrial hemp for community and ecologically-minded farmers, affordable housing, advocates, builders, and entrepreneurs throughout Colorado and Northern New Mexico.”

The Rezolana Farm cabin model was recently featured at the US Hemp Building Association’s Hemp Build 2021. “They will also be one of the “Summit Slam” contestants for innovative projects at the US Hemp Building Summit in October, 2021,” Ms. Weiss told HempBuild Magazine.

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“There is an amazing opportunity to purchase the hemp insulated sleeper cabin that Valdez built in San Luis in order to fund the design and build of another scaled-down hemp sleeper cabin model,” Ms. Weiss said.

The funds will also “support necessary improvements at Rezolana Farm” she added.

She said said hemp materials were perfect to meet the needs of temporary emergency housing in San Francisco and now in New Mexico.

“My organization was building small cabins for people who were living on the street in San Francisco, and the most important things were that they were secure and mobile,” she said. “One of the issues we kept coming up against with local government was the need for a fire resistant solution,” Weiss said. “And another goal for us was to identify a non-toxic form of insulation. And that’s where hempcrete came in. It was always a dream for me personally to connect the dots of hemp as a building source and provide stability in housing.”

Arnie Valdez, principal of Rezolana Farm, is more than a farmer, he is a revolutionary. From architect, and former Adjunct Associate Professor at University of New Mexico School of Architecture and Planning, to running a multigenerational farm and one of the first to legally grow and educate on industrial hemp in the country, Mr. Valdez is changing the face of sustainable agriculture and housing.

“Working with Fibershed in 2015-2019 was what first drew me to hemp farming,” Valdez said. “Having the ability to grow and process hemp locally led me to my connection with SFHC, where I hope to inspire and develop cost efficient and sustainable housing models for the homeless and low income” he says.

In a world where there is seemingly no end to social inequality and human suffering, the forgotten “pandemic” of homelessness is still on the rise. In January of 2020, there were over half a million people in the US alone without a place to call home. Of those half million, 66% are individuals, with the remaining 33% being family units. As populations grow, housing costs increase, and our nation's “normal” shifts in the face of global health crisis these numbers only continue to increase.

SFHC is contracted with the City of Santa Fe to explore alternatives to street homelessness, including the development of a transitional village.

“So if anyone is in the Santa Fe/New Mexico area and would like to be of support in any way, please let me know,” said Ms Weiss. Her next steps, she says, “I'd love to get another sleeper cabin funded and built so that we can donate a cabin to be used in Santa Fe.”

Anyone wanting to support the efforts with a tax-deductible donation of materials or money can reach out to the organization via their website.

The public is welcome to visit the cabin in person at the open house, which takes place from 1 - 6 p.m. at Rezolana Farm: 20153 County Rd P.6, San Luis, CO 81152 For more information, contact Amy Farah Weiss of SFHC at info@saintfrancischallenge.org.

Moriah Slade holds a Masters in Public Health and is currently a student at the Institute of Functional Medicine Coaching Program.