Event:2022/08/18 Delegates

Omni Delegates' Meeting - August 18, 2022 7pm-9pm

• Talk at https://meet.google.com/diw-hszw-msr or 515-428-1108 (PIN: 465814905)
• Type at https://omnicommons.org/notes
• Send proposals to consensus@lists.omnicommons.org prior to the meeting

Meeting Roles

• Facilitator/s:
• Stacktaker:
• Timekeeper:
• Notetaker/s:
• Next meeting's facilitator(s):

Delegates

• inactive groups: CSC, FYE, GWS, LL, sudo room, sudo mesh
• ANV: depends, Silver
• CCL: active, Patrik
• CLP: depends, Billy
• FNB: active, helen
• MOP: active, jacqi
• Quorum (2/3 of active groups): if 3, need 2. if 4, need 3. if 5, need 4.

Agenda

intros

BRIEF INTROS MAY INCLUDE: name, pronouns, groups you're in, land you're on, if you're a delegate, unmet access needs, meeting roles you'd like to help with, discussion topics or proposals to add to agenda, announcements/updates/report-backs from your groups, safe space issues or updates

• yar she/her
• imma
• geraldo he/they clp
• patrik he/him
• billy clp + events. wants to talk about anv stuff in lobby. also events update.
• helen she/her fnb
• jacqi she/her, myriad project. wants to update on the mailbox
• silver anv
• chichi they/them, new bookkeeper. would love to get to know you all, get contact info from delegates. if i have any financial questions, i can reach out to you directly.
• alaska: i met with yar and silver and chichi. talking about ways i can help. i'll let them say more.

hires

• we hired chichi as a bookkeeper, alaska, and maybe jacqi?
• billy: what's the reporting process? who does chichi report to?
  • silver: we have a committee, me and yar and imma right now, others can join
  • chichi has timesheets and can provide links
  • regular meetings would be good
• chichi is focusing on cleaning up older data at first. but in the future we'll try to make the qb data more accurate. have more receipts, records, accountability.
• finance mtg tomorrow at 3:30 at this same meeting link
• billy: we can have people update a google doc. great system.

officers

• Time to elect a secretary and maybe president?
• jacqi: i'm involved in a lot of projects, like direct action for farmworkers + BCC. trying to pick up tasks i can, move these projects forward, get this building saved. i feel comfortable taking on the tasks yar, imma & i discussed.
• imma: thanks for stepping up jacqi!
• patrik: bylaws don't have much detail on how exactly the election needs to be done: "Officers shall be selected by the Board of Directors, at any time" https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Bylaws#SECTION_2._QUALIFICATION,_ELECTION,_AND_TERM_OF_OFFICE
• yar: not sure if we legally have quorum since our "inactive collective" process
• CONSENSUS: YES (patrik/ccl, helen/fnb, anv/silver, billy/clp jacqi/mop), ABSTAIN (none), blocks (none)

bylaws

• Patrik: vote to amend bylaws to reflect current set of collectives?
  • debate over what that list is
  • helen: maybe it shouldn't be so tied into the bylaws?
  • let's ask our lawyer next time we talk to him? making our bylaws resilient to these changes
  • yar: i think the biggest question is whether FYE or Liblens are still member collectives.
  • we can hash this out over email

new bank accounts signers

• Need to get all current signers to go to bank in person at the same time. Schedules do not align! They will accept signers going in to remove themselves.
• Robb is hard to reach - has full time job now. Concord branch should be open Sat 10-3
• Jenny will remove herself
• Mai will be in town week after next
• Just pick new bank and transfer all funds? If we can agree which to move to.
• Delegates (aka board members) have agreed to limit all our bank accounts to 3 signers (Helen Finkelstein, Imma Dela Cruz, John Torok) and remove all the others (Jenny Ryan, Robb Benson, Mai Sutton, Liz Ray, Shido)
• fnb uses coopfcu
• jacqi can help research alternate banks if we're unable to add new signers to unify

events update

• billy: we've got a bunch of high level requests recently, maybe because of the gofundme? $1500 event in september, $2k in january, $1k in october for a netflix comedy special, trans advocacy nonprofit in december for $600, $2k for capoeira graduation in november. marquise is bringing in events still. great stuff coming up. cam life planning regular weekday events for when it's normally empty. those are the highlights. our work's been paying off. we're building good relationships. village of love holding events. in-person training this sunday. good group of folks showing up to do the work. speakers being moved was frustrating. tomorrow's host is freaking out about it. but yar shouldn't have to move them back. disappointing to me that labor is being created by somebody who's generally absent, and he rejected my feedback. i think this is why we've had a labor shortage in the past. it's ridiculous. but despite that, things have been pretty good. managing to rearrange how we do the work so it's not as labor intensive for volunteers, so it's more about building rapport and trust with folks using the space so they can be empowered without too much surveillance and handholding. that's a full time job nobody's getting paid for, not sustainable. we've been experimenting withways of switching things around, and so far it's been successful. just need a bookkeeper and a process for tracking income - that's been hard. the money's in all different places, it's a mystery. once that's fixed we'll be good.
• patrik: how are we doing with covid safety? still requiring masks?
  • billy: yes, the building policy is still masks, that's made clear to folks. but i'm confident that people are not policing that, and it's an event by event thing based off the culture of the people holding events. i'm not sure how to enforce that. if people are paying usmoney we desperately need and they're not gonna enforce that, idk what to do. open to creative solutions to enforce it. quartz are really aware of disability access and needs because that's a priority of their organizing mission. but groups that just want to throw a party and have a good time don't really enforce it. some groups are more laissez faire.
• yar can print signs, email her a letter-sized pdf and say how many copies you want
• did we ever follow up with sound mitigation that keeps our neighbors happy? not sure
  • billy: cam life is hiring a sound engineer. definitely need baffles.
  • yar: if you think baffles are a good idea, price them & make a proposal
  • patrik suggests diying baffles
• haven't been any new noise complaints since the ones a few months ago

mailbox update

• jacqi: usps, ups & fedex won't handle our keys because we're not zoned multiuse
• patrik: we can still build a package drop into that door. i'll look for solutions.
  • jacqi will too

liquor license

• jacqi: billy met with lawyer. we need to call or go into ABC office to get forms and we can move process forward.
• yar: floating the idea of using leftover kitchen budget to pay for this license, something like $8k. will need delegate approval when the time comes.

lobby messes

• billy: anv leaves white crates everywhere, rotting food. it's a terrible look, detrimental to events business, also bad for food work because it's unsanitary. need accountability.
• helen: we need to figure out what would make it happen to have it be cleaner. what's the problem there?
• long discussion of white crates, how to get them back to the central valley farm they came from
• helen: it's hard to get people to clean up at the end of a long day
• billy: maybe we should hire somebody to actively clean, and some groups could pay a higher cleaning fee based on their impact
• proposal to budget up to $1k for a one-time cleaning and explore relationships with cleaning services.
• CONSENSUS: YES (helen/fnb patrik/CCL billy/CLP jacqi/MOP) abstain (silver/anv) block (none)
• the plan is for billy to find a service. imma, silvia and helen can also help. the 4 of them will coordinate.

gofundme

• fundraiser at https://www.gofundme.com/f/save-the-omni
• still needs serious help
• Almost $20K by now
• lots of convo not recorded
• geraldo & silvia are making a tiktok

End of Meeting

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