Event:2018/12/06 Delegates Meeting

Omni Delegates' Meeting - 12.6.2018 7pm-9pm

for instructions on preparing and archiving these notes, please see the bottom

Agenda

 * Introductions, Meeting Roles, and Delegates Count [10 minutes]
 * Access Check-in [5 minutes]
 * Brief Announcements [5 minutes]
 * Bans [5 minutes]
 * Working Group Report-Backs [15 minutes]
 * Member Collective Updates (10 minutes)
 * Proposal: Fiscally Sponsor Musick Creek Wildlands: A forest workshop for art, science & community [10 minutes]
 * Proposal: Sponsor Critical Resistance's 20th Anniversary (December 9th) [5 minutes]
 * Discussion: Omni Holiday Security [15 minutes]

Introductions
Introduce yourself: Name; Preferred Pronoun; Affiliation; any brief announcements; say whether you're a delegate; let us know about any access needs you have†

Access Check In
Is everybody able to participate fully in this meeting? Do people have unmet needs or concerns?

Meeting Roles

 * Facilitator/s:
 * Explanation of hand signals: "deaf applause", "raised hand", "point of process", "direct response"(wildcard), etc.
 * Stacktaker:
 * Timekeeper:
 * Notetaker/s:
 * URL of this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/omninom
 * Vibe Reader:
 * Next meeting's facilitator(s):

Delegates

 * BAPS: Julian
 * CCL: Ken
 * CSC:
 * FNB: Philip
 * GWS:
 * LL: inactive unless delegate arrives
 * Sudo:
 * GCEA: inactive - Kiwi
 * Quorum:

New Bans

 * Add to list of people asked to leave
 * Add to list of people asked to leave

Building & permits
Meetings: Not currently meeting
 * Update from Abad on the Cafe
 * This group needs help; https://omnicommons.org/lists/listinfo/building

Commons
Meetings: Currently ad-hoc?
 * This group needs help:
 * https://omnicommons.org/lists/listinfo/commons
 * https://omnicommons.org/lists/listinfo/booking
 * https://omnicommons.org/lists/listinfo/booking

Communications
Meetings: Not currently meeting

Finance
Meetings: Currently conjoined with Fundraising, 2nd & 4th Mondays at 6pm
 * Taxes
 * Financial overview of last year
 * Last month's fianancial report including Collective payments

Fundraising
Meetings: Currently conjoined with Finance,, 2nd & 4th Mondays at 6pm

Member Collective Updates
What is going on with your collective? What are you working on? What have you accomplished? Any events coming up? Any difficulties you are encountering that you need help with?

Sudo


= Proposals =

Proposal: Fiscally Sponsor Musick Creek Wildlands: A forest workshop for art, science & community
"We're an arts and forest stewardship center arranging to purchase a specific property in the Sierra. We are explicitly non-hierarchical and egalitarian. We will establish the land as a public resource in perpetuity, continuing our acoustic music gatherings and other cultural and educational events there. We already incorporated (thanks to help from Laura Turiano and Jesse Palmer!) but haven’t finished the application process yet for tax exempt status. One donor says they want to give us $5k this and $5k next year but it turns out it’s through a “donor advised fund” which means we can’t be ready in time to accept the $5k this year. Unless, that is, we have fiscal sponsorship from a group that already has 501(c)3 with a compatible mission, such as Omni. We just need fiscal sponsoring for a one-timer. We request that you support our work by making us a project of Omni to take advantage of this specific donation offer. We also hope for opportunities to collaborate in the future on cultural projects and connection with the land! But this request pertains only to the one current donor bind we are in. Would you support us on this? Our organization is officially called Musick Creek Confluence.
 * submitted 14 Nov 2018 by Jenny on behalf of Joel Pomerantz:

This project link provides the curious with much more depth about our project.

Thank you for your consideration! Joel

PS: Interestingly, the Awesome Foundation, of which I am a member, helped fund the purchase of the building at Omni Commons! I say that only as a token community alignment, but it is not particularly relevant to the above request, being a different organization altogether."

Discussion
Some context: We haven’t begun any of our programs yet. The organization only just came into existence to try and buy the property and pursue this mission.
 * yar via email: "It looks like they're in a hurry. Did last week's delegates meeting ever happen? These fiscal sponsorship requests come often enough that maybe we should empower the finance wg to make future decisions like this."
 * robb via email: "i'd be more in favor of an email consent process for fast tracking these requests"
 * See this Loomio thread for recent discussion: https://www.loomio.org/d/GUw10dlM/fiscal-sponsorships
 * Loomio consenso by Mary Ann (Chiapas), Jenny (Sudo), Joe (FNB) and Ken (CCL); blocking concern by Anka (LibLens, currently inactive); support by Laura & Lynn
 * Reply from Joel: "I’ve been shown how to join the conversation, so here I am, to answer any Qs about Musick Creek’s work.

Pics: Anything you see in pictures is a scrapping together of documentation from past uses of the property, so as to excite interest in ecological beauty, not designed in regard to future uses or intentions. Those photos are of some of the visitors to that property. Others have been people of color, certainly. The communities in the area where we’ve begun our work are generally a mix of white, Latinx and Nyyhmy (a.k.a. Northfork Mono) in order of population numbers and we have developed our planning ideas in colaboration with the Native American Nyyhmy community. I appreciate that our messaging must strive to be welcoming to people of all identities, and we are intent on developing a more representative photo sampling—not easy in a place where technology has been minimally present and hardly any pictures exist. Had we gone out of our way to feature the various POC in past gatherings by taking photos with them in particular, that might have felt like tokenism, especially since that region is mostly populated by poor white people. Future demographics: Our intentions and plans are heading toward additional connections with people from outside that region, most importantly people from urban and suburban lifestyles. You can be assured that collaborations will be with programs serving many POC. Awesome Foundation: Not a real foundation, just a group of people who give no-strings gifts and pretend it’s a grant. Yes, we gave $500 to the crowd-funding effort for OC.

Social justice: The SJ components of our work are embedded in the ideas that (1) anyone can and must become aware of the inextricable connectedness of ecological systems with social systems, politics and economics. They are not separate topics. (2) One of our fundamental principles is that future participants in our group, whether they choose to organize or be program-goers, will choose their own participation content and commitments, without dues or fee requirements. (3) We wish to research, coalesce, test and set examples of non- and anti-capitalist methods for building inclusive, empowering communities and individuals of that region and those connecting in from elsewhere. (4) We have already helped build personal connections and meaningful experiences between people who would perhaps otherwise not intersect or have access to one another’s background and ethnic stories."

Proposal: Will the Omni sponsor CR's 20th Anniversary (December 9th)?
"Please respond by December 1 if at all possible.
 * submitted 25 Nov 2018 by Julio:
 * https://omnicommons.org/pipermail/consensus/2018-November/001403.html

I asked the finance working group if the Omni could formally sponsor this event as an organization, and while everyone in the group agreed that we could and should, they requested that I make a formal request to the delegates since it would entail donating funds to an external group.

Last year, I contributed $200 on behalf of the Omni and shared a handful of tickets for Omni folks to attend the Annual Critical Resistance program. This year, the event is even bigger and it features a conversation moderated by Angela Davis celebrating 20 years of prison industrial complex abolition.

This year, Laura has agreed to cover half the amount for the minimum organizational contribution of $500, so I am requesting for the Omni to contribute $250.

Thank you all so much for your consideration in supporting the ongoing work of this highly respected Oakland-based organization aligned with the values and mission of the Omni Commons.

If this is approved, l please contact me privately if you are interested in attending the program on behalf of the Omni on December 9."

Discussion

 * email consenso from Rachel (GWS), Jenny (sudo), Maureen (CCL)

= Discussions =

Omni Holiday Security

 * via Laura on 20 Nov 2018:

"Greetings Omninoms,

During the time between mid-Christmas and early January we tend to have security problems - stuff disappears, messes are made and not cleaned up, vandalism occurs, people sleep and build nests in the building, and members feel unsafe when they come by. This is because a lot of the Omni regulars go out of town or don't come around as much. There are also fewer events. We can make sure nothing serious happens by knowing who is around and scheduling times for members to check the building.


 * If you are regularly at Omni but will be out of town* between 12/15 and 1/5, email me and let me know when you will be gone. I will keep track of when we really need to schedule walk-throughs (See below) by those who are still around. I will also talk to Chicago/Tony about when he is planning to be around.


 * If you will be around*. please commit to a time on this spread sheet:  to come by and walk through the building to make sure everything is cool. Choose a time that is not too close to when someone else has already planned to come by. The best time to do this is between 9pm and midnight, but other times are also helpful. See below how to do a walk-through.

people in who are not members, guests or members, or attending an event. Members will have a key card and so do not usually need to ring the bell. Please make sure everyone at your event who is not a member leaves at the end.
 * If you have an event/events during this time,* it is especially important that you *do not leave any doors open and unattended*, or let


 * If you are an Omni member leaving the building after 10*, please do a walk thru to make sure everything is secure before you leave. Below is how to do a security walk thru, from the wiki: https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Keys#How_to_Do_a_Security_Walk-through "

Last Meeting Notes
https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Event:2018/11/01_Delegates_Meeting

= End of Meeting =
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