Transition Whatcom

Assembly Meeting Minutes

Transition Whatcom Assembly Meeting Minutes                                        3/27/11

 

Agenda (Not in Order of Execution)

Introductions

Song

Agenda

Minutes from last meeting

Financial Report

Workgroup Update

TWOG Update

350 H&G Challenge

Transition Café

Fall Event Plan

Emergency Response Preparedness

EDAP

Transition.org Report

Local Politics

Cyndy Exercise

 

Work Group Update

1)      Whatcom Folk School Report

Informal Learning Environment; Low cost resilient skill building; Offer classes in summer; Looking for teachers; Can request topics on the web site;

2)      Personal Finance Work Group

Started at the great unleashing; Collected resources and posted to Ning site; 88 people have $685,000 available for local investment. April 16th Move Your Money action day. 4 million people have moved their money to local institutions nationally. The event will have speakers and a panel discussion.

Suggestions/Ideas

        i.      The event organizers or Twog could appear on the Joe Show to do publicity for this event 930AM at Noon.

       ii.      Involve the Port Townsend LIONs, a local loan/investment group.

       iii.      Involve professional investment folks.

3)      Goshen

Did a successful CERT (Community Emergency Response Training) session to create first responders in the neighborhood; Rented a chipper for 3 houses to use to reduce cost; Seed swaps; Mason Bees on order; Roving gardening help;

4)      Ferndale

Do lots of networking; about 10 in core group; Public movie once a month; Garden planning speaker meeting; Compost training, map reading training; the group is very spread out with a 15 mile diameter so it’s hard for people to talk to neighbors- they want to do it but it is difficult to do; Solar electric meeting spawned 3 installations; successful tool sharpening training;

5)      Web Group Update

Ning Site Update- There is now a Featured/Sponsored Event proposal form for those who want TW to sponsor their event. The web group is using a mock up ning site to propose changes to the site.

TransitionWhatcom.org Update- the new web page was displayed and discussed

 Suggestions/Ideas - Other groups (like Workgroups) would like use the site to share google docs. In particular this is useful when docs are being edited and revised. It was suggested that the Twog start a web discussion forum on the Ning site to discuss this possibility.

6)      Visioning Work and small group breakout

Cindy led a visioning exercise to help us learn to take a risk and ask questions; every persons life is a novel;

7)      TWOG Update

An organization overview was provided. The TWIG to TWOG was explained. We have had one TWOG leave and have added one; a newsletter will go out next week explaining this.

Feedback- Is there a process to recall a TWOG? Irene volunteered to apply for the TWOG to work in the role of developing policies and procedures.

8)      Transition Café

The Transition Café was an outgrowth of last assembly meeting. Feb meeting had 15-18 people; Do we want to keep them going? Is there an interest from the membership? Can we organize and schedule it? Can it be a vehicle for collecting visioning funneled towards the EDAP, or other actions? Can we record discussions too? How do you continue the discussion flow? Can we capture topics as an idea pool back to the assembly?

Suggestions/Ideas- The first Café was more about making connections, learning about transition issues for people new to TW, and open discussion. David Marshak has volunteered to lead future cafes, and he will look for someone to co-lead. Location may need improvement.

9)      Emergency Preparedness

There is a program neighborhood groups already use (Fairhaven for example) Laura Rittenhaur (Sp?) has volunteered to talk to neighborhood groups. We can leverage this[jat1] . 9 page pamphlet for neighborhood mapping is available- this is a great way to get people into Transition work by a side door; Check out the Red Cross or Homeland security web sites;

Suggestions/Ideas - Propose that the Hub group include emergency preparedness.

10)   Local Politics

Tom is going to run for County Executive against four time incumbent Pete Kremen, and would like help with his campaign. (Sp?)

11)   Fall Event- How about Ye Old Reskilling Faire? Good support, not 2nd weekend in Oct however.

12)   Home and Garden Challenge

  1. Overview of H&G Challenge and TW funding proposals and process
  2. PPT presentation and applications are on the Ning site

13)   Assembly Meeting Evaluation - liked the small group work, liked singing, it should be an opportunity for the working groups to provide feedback and ask for help.

 

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Permalink Reply by Juliet Thompson on April 5, 2011 at 12:18am

Transition Whatcom Assembly Meeting                              12/11/10

Introduction and Work Group Reports

1)      Goshen

  1. Started spring ’09 and created a list of resources/skills/tools/etc, 25 members, wiki website, have a shared shredder, doing grain/peas/millet research, seed share, 5 homes with solar panels, <and an impressive list of other stuff>.
  2. Personal Finance- have had multiple meetings and have a handout that has been used to help people decide on local banking alternatives.
  3. Ning Website- has been up and working well, Travis will now be helping David with postings and new members, have a bi-weekly meeting to discuss/plan improvements.
  4. Living Democracy- have had multiple meetings and an active discussion on the Ning site.
  5. Heart and Soul- have helped with local presentations, training and an open space. Active group.
  6. Herbalism- have 14 members and have done training sessions for making medicinals from local sources.
  7. Reskilling- opportunity to create a ‘University’ like environment <missed the name- NW Freedom University?>, need an initiating group.

2)      Toms state of the world report

  1. IEA report

3)      Work group survey report

  1. Only 15 responses
  2. Would like to understand what barriers exist to Work group action

4)      TWOG Intro

5)      Discussion

  1. Is the status of the work groups a problem or is this the normal way these things work?
  2. Is there something the TWOG needs to do to make work groups successful?
  3. Ning site as a good way to capture institutional memory.
  4. Are there consistent obstacles for work groups?
  5. Can the Ning site be used to help drive the EDAP?
  6. What are the guidelines for posting events/workshops?
  7. The important thing is to have the Transition Whatcom structure remove roadblocks- for example working with the government, need to find a way to do this.
  8. Post the great unleashing there was lots of energy, to get action you need a common shared goal.
  9. Can the next goal be the EDAP (Maybe EDAPT instead?) with a limited number of categories. How do we get as many people involved as possible?
  10. Can we capture a short, one paragraph summary after each event  as collective memory?
  11. Can we sponsor Transition Drinks with a table for each section of the EDAPT and capture thoughts and actions? Face to Face meetings drive movements.
  12. The summary of these discussions could go out as an email to other interested members to drive more involvement in the Drinks and Work Group activity.
  13. Creating energized work groups will make creating the EDAPT easy.
  14. One way the Transition Goshen folks help generate activity is at the end of every meeting they ask if anyone has a project they need help on this week.
  15. Need to start the fact finding portion of the EDAPT so we can tell if the Work Group ideas can actually work in Whatcom county.
  16. How do we take this kind of work and make it sexy?

 

6)      Action Plans

  1. Create reporting threads on the Ning site to be used to capture institutional memory (Adam/David)
  2. Initiate Transition Drinks- find venue, etc (Adam/Chris)
  3. EDAPT planning- Erica

7)      Visioning Exercise- Chris Wolf

  1. The group formed the following subgroups and conducted the visioning exercise thinking about the ideal future for their theme and listed a couple elements they discussed- Energy (Horses, Windmills), Government (government working with the community), Community (Land stewardship, sharing resources), Ecology (our world in harmony as a multi-sensory garden, people with skills who care), Heart and Soul (personal discussions instead of Facebook), Transportation (fewer cars, energy efficient public transit), Finance (Relocalization, facilitate connections between people).

8)      EDAPT Action Proposal

  1. Volunteers signed up to the core group- Erica and Travis will facilitate

9)      Actions Voted on-

  1. Transition Drinks monthly, Council meeting quarterly (Passed)

10)   Agenda for Council Meeting

  1. Plans for the future, celebration of past action, fool on the council to speak the truth, update the working groups on TWOG activity, review inputs from Transition Drinks, improve communications for non-computer users, use schools, grange halls, etc for meetings, informal social time, line music, child care option.

 

Permalink Reply by Heather K on April 5, 2011 at 12:46am

What summer & fall dates should we tenatively save open for the 3rd & 4th Quarter Assembly?

Awsome assembly notes Juliet! Thanks for posting, especially for those of us not able to be present!

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