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by Jeremy

01.19.2012 – Facilitation WG Meeting Minutes

01/24/2012 in Facilitation WG

Attendees: Jeremy, Cecile, Er!k

Admin:

  • Discussion location: East Montpelier room at the library

Agenda:

1. Assign Facilitation of Agenda:

  • Intro to Agenda and Facilitators: 15 min Jeremy
  • Discussion: 75 min Cecile
    • Intro: 5 min
      • The theme: why are you participating in Occupy?
      • explain the format
    • Open Space for Ideas: 5 min
      • on paper visible to all, any participants interested in presenting/discussing any idea will write the “format”, succinct title at the top of the paper along with their name. For example: Discussion: New Economics: Jane Doe or Presentation: Theories on Social Revolutions: John Brown (5 min)
      • “Formats” can be any of the following: Discussion, Debate, Presentation, Ideas for Actions. Additional formats can be created as long as they’re clear.
    • Sign ups: 5 min
      • Facilitator will invite all participants to sign their name under any topic of interest to them. Multiple sign ups are expected.
    • Discussion Block: 45 min
      • Discussion leaders select locations and discussions are convened
      • All discussion groups will:
        • select a note taker (computerized highly preferred) who will email those notes to be uploaded to the website
        • select a reporter who will condense the discussion into no more than a 1 min summary, just to give any not present in that discussion a taste.
    • Wrap up: 15 min
      • 1 minute report backs from all discussions
  • Working Group Breakouts 30+min Jeremy

 

  1. Assign other facilitation duties:
    1. Signage: accountable for showing up .5 hr early and posting signs on relevant venue doors to direct people to the General Assembly: Er!k
    2. Props: accountable for providing appropriate paper and writing implements Jeremy
    3. Blogger: accountable for receiving and uploading proceedings from all our meetings to the Occupy Blog Jeremy
    4. Policy on time keeping: any facilitator leading a portion of the meeting will keep and call the time for that portion; all attending facilitators have the accountability to be cross checking time

 

  1. Define and Assign other roles for Facilitation Working Group
    1. point person: Cecile
      1. accountable for reporting back on the state of the Working Group at the General Assembly
      2. accountable for making sure all roles are filled or by default filling those roles if needed
    2. space finder: currently done by basic needs
    3. facilitation training coordinator: Eric
      1. accountable for receiving requests for facilitation and coordinating their delivery
    4. facilitation trainers: Jeremy, Er!k, Eric, Cecile
      1. accountable for delivering facilitation trainings as requested by the facilitation coordinator
    5. scribe: Er!k
      1. accountable for taking notes from our General Assemblies and our Facilitation Working Group meetings and passing them to the Blogger
    6. inbox emptier: Cecile
      1. accountable for monitoring and processing incoming mail for the Facilitation Working Group
  2. Update on Direct Action proposal (cg)
    1. Cecile to report back on this at the Working Group breakout and see what happens
  3. After the General Assembly, Facilitation Working Group meets for a debrief (cg)
    1. Cecile will let other Facilitators know
  4. changing time of meeting (cg)
    1. not 7-8 pm for Jeremy
    2. 6-7 not great for Er!k
    3. cecile will put out an email with the time change to 4-5 on Thursdays
  5. Master Governance Document tracking doc (cg)
    1. Cecile to create a Master Governance Document for Facilitation Working Group and invite all takers
  6. google docs use/access (cg)
  7. revisit roles for Sat
  8. email for Facilitation Working Group:
    1. cecile to check with Colin/Yeshua on the google email functionality

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by Yeshua

Discussion Group Minutes – 01.21.2012

01/21/2012 in GA Minutes

Intro:

Facilitators: Cecile and Jeremy

Notes: Er!c & Yeshua

This is a semi-structured discussion group – inspired by Open Spaces Technology – as an alternative to our typical General Assembly (GA).

 

Agenda:

  • Overview/Intro/Consent on Agenda
  • Announcements
  • Discussion Group Intro
  • Define Topics
  • Discussion Groups
  • Summary / Review
  • Working Group Break Outs

 

Announcements:

  • Leah: Petition about Citizen’s United – Montpelier
  • Eroc/David: This coming Monday @ 4pm in support of our legislation front of State House to shut down Vermont Yankee –convergence of people and state legislature against a rogue corporation. Decommissioning Alliance meeting afterwards – Feb 5th non-violent direct action training 10-6
  • Yeshua: finance working group is in the process of compiling our financial information – as this takes time, and we want to ensure transparency, we have written a Statement of Purpose & Intention in an attempt to share our current perspective with the General Assembly and show our commitment to transparency and open discussion. Please comment & share your thoughts.
  • Jay: West Coast shut down banks, occupy abandoned hotel, and East Coast (DC) courts – big stuff still rolling
  • ???: movie: End of America, w/ Namoi Wolf – Wednesday Jan 25 @ 7pm – anyone know where?
  • John: Obama administration trying to push for settlement against banks and not investigating – call Vermont Attorney General Sorrel – We need contact info! Please lookup and post in comments!
  • Brian: Saturday 28th 5pm Labor Hall on Granite St in Barre – debut of new film about Irene in Vermont – “Strength of the Storm”
  • Jeremy: SOPA/PIPA off the table for now (Stop Online Piracy Act / Protect IP Act)
  • Coffee hour at REACH afterwards (5pm today) – pass hat for coffee – $8.68 collected
  • “This changes everything” occupy wall street and the 99% movement – yesmagazine.org/owsbook
  • facilitation will ensure we have a topic for the next discussion, by this coming Saturday (1/28), our next General Assembly

 

 On into our Discussion.. 

  • Todays Theme: Why do you participate, why are you here?
  • Ideas: post your idea, note the format of the idea/discussion
  • Reporter: summarize, in 1 minute, the discussion
  • Law of the Two-Feet: use your two feet when you either are not learning or not contributing

 

Ideas:

  1. Discussion: What’s working and what’s not about our General Assembly: CecileIssues with hard to hear – Leah may be spokesperson, but others are are affected

    Annunciation and speed are difficult

    Maybe at beginning of meeting, Facilitation can ask for hearing buddies for those who need it?

    What works? Action, we’re starting to move and build momentum – people being involved helps

    announcements very helpful each week – connecting people – providing convergence of different peoples / backgrounds / interests

    reach out to other groups regarding direct action (even beyond Occupy)

    “I have 30 minutes to donate each week, I don’t really care what the action is, I’ll participate in all of them, but I need to be told what to do and where to go” – help me have a way to participate

    could be notified via: site to look at with direct action listed, urgent highlighted; call at announcements; post to blog; announcements; txt– scheduled 1 week ahead of time

    proposal process – needs to be quick and light. Things break down after discussion. Call on down hands to find out what they are against or have an issue with – then reintegrate into new proposal (updated) – consensus check and amend until we are set

    we have a lot of programming to over come, in regards to making consensus work
    even the idea that consensus is something we are inherently unable to attain – wouldn’t even this thought keep us from reaching consensus? how does our own thinking keep us from achieving that feeling of bliss when the group is able to come to a solid agreement on an issue, particularly after a lively debate or participatory action.

    it is easy to get tripped up and caught up with the battle mentality, how to undermine this and ensure we stay focused on improving the proposal over going to war over it.

    ————————————

    Long-run – occupy serving as an open ended catalyst for us to change – develop as we need – this is for the long haul – discussed corporate power has been globalized, taken over the local governments, need to re-enliven – we want a new kind of economic development. more action needed

    ————————————

    Relationships between local, state, regional, national, and international struggles:

    Liason to other Occupy groups around the state – there are ~6 in Vermont?

  2. Discussion: Whats the relationship between local, State, Regional, National, International Struggles in Occupy? How do these things integrate- Tunisia, Arab Spring, London, Occupy Wall Street, West Coast? (Jay/Brian)Economic analysis – seeing the global effects of capitalism- globalization these struggles integrate through this focus on economics

    Economic order is supported by Military order social justice, nukes, economics all part of a movement but the basis is the military

    Nonviolent aspect is attractive to folks. Builds the relationship between movements. Intention for peace and the action speaks. People to people conectivity.

    Process of Direct Democracy has depth that other movements have lacked. Listening to each other and the commitment to a deep systemic analysis

    Movement of Movements more than just a response to immediate surcumstance- focus on General Assembly, Direct Action, embodies longer range revolution!

    How do we bring the energy of other encampments to this community? Public actions build the movement!! how do we get outa the basement?

    You have to do this in your country! We all have to do it! All out in the streets

    An idea thats time has come – economics-justice-direct democracy

    Doing the best we can to change the world for the better

    More meetings, more people, more meetings in more places, public and private

    Town meetings only better

    Better Media NOT corporate media!! work on personal contacts

  3. Discussion: Long-Run Goal: formation of a popular from alliance against the reigning corporate duopoly (Democrat/Republican) – JohnNo notes
  4. Discussion: Direct Democracy into our representative democracy – Jeremy (step back, go to working group time instead)

 

 

Proposal from David: take Working Group breakout to discuss how to handle the Direct Action Working Group for our occupy?

Or a second proposal: use the Working Group break out time to discuss this (win)

 

(Working Group Break Outs)

Direct Action Breakout:

sense of a lack of targets around the area…

People’s Mic theatre group at First Night,

More Street Theatre Actions

Occupations of store fronts or abandon buildings

May Day convergence on the State House lawn for an emcampment coming from Burlington GA..

Support for General Assembly crosspolinating delegates, blog reading, centralized General Assemblies.

Question for Tech working group “is there links between General Assemblies in Vermont on the blog?”

Endorse Struggle against Entergy and to Close Vermont Yankee

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by Jeremy

Election WG Proposal to the GA for 14 Jan 2012

01/13/2012 in Election WG

Here is the text of the proposal we will be presenting to the OCVT GA on January 14th, 2012:

An amendment to Vermont’s Constitution has been proposed which would change the governor’s, lieutenant governor’s, and treasurer’s races so that they would be decided by a simple plurality (whoever gets the most votes)—even if the vote total of the leading candidate is well short of 50%. Currently, Vermont’s Constitution states that elections for statewide office in which none of the candidates has received 50% of the vote go to the Legislature. Legislators then vote by secret ballot, and whichever candidate receives a majority of the votes in the Legislature gets the office.

The amendment seems appealing because it allows the citizens rather than the legislators to decide these minority elections, a goal which the Election Working Group strongly supports. Unfortunately, if it is enacted, in elections in which there are three or more candidates running—which is the entire point of the proposed amendment—the new amendment institutionalizes the anti-democratic situation we currently have.

In Vermont, most people on the political right vote Republican, while most liberal and progressively-oriented citizens vote Democrat. In the past, when the Progressive Party has put forth a candidate for statewide office, there has been a round of bitter criticism by many progressive and liberal citizens accusing the Progressives of handing over the election to the Republicans by splitting the progressive vote, such as occurred in the election for Lieutenant Governor in 2002. The same problem could occur on the right if there was only one progressive candidate and some conservative party was to run a candidate competing with the Republican and Democrat. That candidate would likely receive most of their votes from individuals who would otherwise vote Republican, thereby “handing the election” to the Democrat. In other words, the proposed amendment is not necessarily bad for progressives or bad for conservatives: it is bad for anyone who challenges the two-party system from any part of the political spectrum.

We recommend that Vermont citizens and lawmakers reject the proposed amendment and instead discuss and implement non-traditional voting methods that promote honest participatory democracy. An explicit goal of any alternative should be to allow Vermonters to vote for the candidate they believe to be best for the state, rather than strategically voting for the lesser of two or more evils based on their guess about how the vote totals will be distributed. There are better alternatives to simple plurality voting, including runoff elections, ranked choice voting (sometime referred to as instant runoff voting), approval voting, range voting, and so on. These alternatives can reduce the need for citizens to vote “strategically” and improve representation in our state.

Here is a PDF version of the proposal for easy printing.

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