Event:2016/04/07 Delegates Meeting

Weekly Omni Delegates' Meeting - 7 April, 2016

Who's Here?

Meeting Roles

• Facilitator/s: Satt Menate Matt
• Explanation of hand signals: "deaf applause", "raised hand", "point of process", "direct response"(wildcard), etc.
• Stacktaker: Mary
• Timekeeper: David K
• Notetaker/s: Jenny, Laura, Julio
  • URL of this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/omninom
• Vibe Reader: Alex S-S
• Next meeting's facilitator(s): Alex S-S

Delegates

• BAPS: Steve
• BH: Alex S-S
• BS: Liz
• CCL: Ken
• CSC: Mary Ann
• FNB: Anka
• GWS: out sick
• HNJ: Alex I
• LL: Angel
• Mess: absent
• Sudo: Jenny/Matt S
• TIL: Inactive
• Quorum: yes, 9/11

Introductions

Introduce yourself: Name; Prefered Pronoun; Affiliation, if you are a delegate

• Matt S, he/him, sudo
• Ken, CCL, Fermentation Station,
• Dane, he/him/they, FNB
• Alex, she/her/they/them, Birdhouse
• Anka, she, Food Not Bombs, LLC
• Vanessa, visiting, wants to propose and event at Commons mtg and maybe interested in becoming member collective
• David, he/him, sudo/baps/omni
• Niki, she/her, sudo/baps/omni
• Jenny, she/her, sudo/wgs
• Steve, n/a, BAPS
• Jeremy, he/him, sudo
• Mary, CCL, Sudo, no pronoun pref
• Maryanne, she/her, CSC
• Laura, she/her, BB
• Liz, she/her, BS, LLC
• Alex, he/him, Homes Not Jails
• Julio, he/him, sudo/commons wg/building bloc

Came later:

• Matt, FNB
• Daniel, interested in the Omni, arts and politics
• Maureen, CCL

Announcements

• Mary - CCl wants to sponsor and open science conference here at Omni. We have a point person . Want to put it on calendar and needs help. in August.
• Vanessa - all ages talent show, in July.
• MAtt - Sudo is no longer having meetings. Having parties every Wednesday eve instead. 2nd Wed is meeting flavored party
• Maureen: Event submitted in connection to open science

Bans

Anthony R, via sudo:

Based on an escalating pattern of Anthony's choices resulting in negative consequences, including inappropriate behavior during rental events, as well as deliberately instigating law enforcement to come to and therefore threaten the Omni Commons at vulnerable moments (on two specific occasions), and because we cannot understand what his intentions are, he is both a risk to himself and to the overall omni commons community and must therefore be asked to leave, to be banned from Omni Commons.

Working Group Report-Backs

Building & permits

Meetings: all the time

• This group needs help; https://omnicommons.org/lists/listinfo/building

Overview of Mtg w/ City Officials

• Julio and David: On Wednesday we met with Police (Lut. Bandwood representing Capt Allison (absent), CRC BEat 12 Anthony Huxol, + Special Acivities Officer), City Administrator Greg Minor, Community Relations Officer Huxol, Special Activities Commander, 2 building officials (Wing and his boss, Rich),
• For Omni - David K, Julio R, Don McLee (Temescal BID), Dan Siegel (civil rights attorney)
• DAvid represented what happened the night of the shooting.
• City's narrative: unpermitted event that got out of control (paraphrase)

David's narrative of omni narrative: corrected misconceptions, clarified: we do not need special event permits, we've asked for a determination (that we don't absolutely need), event was under control, shooting occurred on the street

• • clarified that the Omni has historically had large assembly events since 1934, and on top of that we have two conditional use permits that exist unless revoked that allow us to have events 4 nights a week, until 2am, all ages, with alcohol
• Huxol agreed that he would retract his false statements at the next NCPC meeting. April 20th
  • Neighborhood Council (NCPC 12X Temescal) - Meets 3rd Wed. at 7 pm at Faith Presbyterian Church every other month on odd months.
    • Next meeting is Wed May 18 7-8pm

• Conversation resumed below as "OPD Walk-Through Discussion"

Commons

Meetings: Second and Fourth Thursdays at 7pm

• Need more people. Invite folks to help; generate revenue
  • Receive event requests, decide what can happen, be a point person, do paperwork

Communications

• Sang has started an outline for a newsletter. Contact Sang (sangkimsf@gmail.com) or Jenny (tunabananas@gamil.com) (or comms@omnicommons.org) if you have info about events or your collectives.

Finance

Meetings: Every 2nd & 4th Thursday at 6pm

• One of the ways that Omni will get its 501c3 status approved, prove that we get 33% of income from charitable sources (small donations and grants)
  • Fiscal sponsorship to organizations is one way of increasing the percentage of charitable income for Omni. Omni acts as an umbrella organization, enabling groups to receive tax-deductible donations - Omni does accounting work
• Steve M: BAPS had a meeting recently, re-evalutating what we are and how. Want to have a meeting (with Jenny, Laura and whoever wants to be involved) to improve the relationship/communication between BAPS and Omni
• DK: 501c3 application is very important to get a commercial loan (which would reduce our expense by at least a third), would really help this cause to have your organization fiscally sponsored by the Omni
• Jenny: additional work is to substitute their EIN number with the Omni's, and sign a sublease, as a "project of the Omni"

Buy the Building

Meetings: Mondays at 6:00pm

• Say hello at the Oakland Indie Awards! http://www.oaklandindieawards.com/tickets.html
  • Beneficial State Bank (non-profit)
• We're still running a deficit! Help bring in $$$
• If collectives could please pay May invoices EARLY, that would be super helpful - barely making our needed rent each month on time.
• Small loans ($2-10K) also super helpful right now

Agua Viva Member Collective Proposal (10 mins)

via niki and jenny and julio, 3/14:

1. Mission statement What do you do? What happens in the world because you exist? (1-3 sentences)

Agua Viva is dedicated to providing a warm and welcoming introduction to the Omni Commons. A cafe is a place that people understand and feel allowed to enter, providing community members who are not already familiar with the Omni with a reason to come in and explore the space. In addition. Agua Viva will provide the existing Omni community with a convivial space in which to gather and collaborate. We will serve affordable and responsibly sourced coffee, tea and snacks and will donate a portion of any profits made from sales of these items to the Omni.

We’re excited to act as ambassadors to the Omni and hope to facilitate more open communication and participation through the curation and visualization of information about the Omni, its member collectives, upcoming events and meetings.

2. Origin and group history How did you start? What have you done? (1-3 sentences)

The collective is currently comprised of members of past and current Omni collectives including the Bay Area Public School, Sudo Room, and La Commune. Collective members have participated in various Omni working groups and performed myriad Omni organizational tasks.

After the closure of La Commune, a few Omni community members agreed that having a welcoming introduction to the Omni was important and began discussing their desire to move forward with opening a cafe in the entrance hall.

3. Participation in the Omni Why are you interested in becoming a member? How does your group intend to use the space? What are your needs? (less than 5 sentences)

Creating a welcoming introduction to the Omni Commons is the foremost aim of this endeavor, and an aspiration of the founding members since the inception of the project.

We intend to build out a viable cafe in the front counter area that will have regular open hours (TBD) and to steward the use of the entrance hall.

4. Group finances and paying rent What does your group do to support itself financially? What is your best plan for contributing your potential share of rent to the Omni? (less than 5 sentences)

The core financial aim of Agua Viva is to serve as a source of revenue for the Omni through a combination of coffee/tea/pastry sales and stewarding rental responsibilities of the entrance hall. At the same time, we believe in providing a fair living wage for collective members in order to ensure their ability to continue to participate in the collective as well as to to encourage the participation of community members who do not have the luxury of being able to make commitments as unpaid volunteers.

All financials and accounting will be made transparent to the public, and quarterly reports produced will be accompanied by a reevaluation of the amount we’re able to contribute to the Omni’s many expenses.

We propose a worktrade during the buildout phase (maximum 3 months), during which we’ll be focusing on finishing the wheelchair bathroom, fixing the electrical and drywall in the entrance hall in addition to building out the cafe space.

Our goal is to be able to make a regular monthly rental contribution of $1000 within 6 months of opening. We will also contribute to shared costs such as utilities, insurance and taxes in an amount TBD.

   Phase 1: Buildout (1-3 months)

   Phase 2: Open to the public (1-6 months): $500/mo plus shared expenses

   Phase 3: Open to the public (6+ months): $1000+ (after evaluation of Phase 2) plus shared expenses

5. Dedicated space If your group would like some dedicated space at the Omni, what square footage and what features are you looking for? Which specific rooms do you feel might be suitable? (1-3 sentences)

We would like to request the front counter and space behind it as dedicated collective members-only space.

We would also like to place tables and chairs throughout the entrance hall that could be used by other Omni community members at any time.

6. Other contributions to the Omni This question should inspire some imagination. We are exploring ideas to pay rent and purchase the building in the long-term. The basic plan is for each group paying a share of rent. Potential plans include groups sharing profit from their activities, producing Omni events, and booking other events. What is the best-case scenario for using the Omni space to further support your group? (less than 5 sentences)

Our primary desire is to contribute to the success of the Omni by fostering meaningful relationships with the surrounding community, supporting Omni member collectives, curating a welcoming space and nurturing a culture of mutual aid.

To that end, we intend to:

   Actively promote and curate events in the entrance hall with an eye towards programming free community events.

   Offering coffee, tea, pastries and other concession items for the purposes of increasing revenue for the Omni. 

   Hosting monthly neighborhood potlucks in the space.

   Offering commercial retail space for other collectives in the Omni (and obtaining the necessary permits and licenses for retail).

   Curating an Omni Infoshop and providing information about the Omni and its various member collectives to newcomers.

7. Additional Is there any other information that you think would be useful for us to know about your group? (as many sentences as you like)

Agua Viva will begin operations as a horizontally organized member collective serving coffee, tea and some pastries planning to eventually graduate to a more robust co-operative model with the addition of new members. We believe in starting small and growing slowly to ensure that we are building the necessary infrastructure to support the project and that we are engaging in open and mindful communication with all members.

Discussion

• Laura: Having a Cafe space is the best type of thing to have in that space. Excited to have Niki back in the space. Great! Concern is having enough person power to do this. Would like to see one or two other people brought on to put in work for the next year. Would be hard to have just coffee, tea, and pastries to make enough money to be sustainable.
  • Niki: Hear you, 100%, having a baby in September. Feeling that right now it's important to be very clear with each other and expand slowly, adding new people slowly. With La Commune, only 2.5/5 people were really committed to the project, don't want to repeat that. Don't think it's true that we wouldn't be able to make enough money - Rasa Cafe, Alchemy, we're reaching out to similar models to inform our own model. Know for a fact that Alchemy is a fairly good-sized collective, and their workers are paid a fair wage on top of the business's rent. Working on projections to make them more realistic
• Steve: My question was whether it would be wholly voluntary or salaried
  • Niki: Cooperative member-owners. People who volunteer for a for-profit business are tecnically considered employees
    • Steve: The profit would go to Omni right?
      • Niki: A portion of the profits would support the people working the cafe. But we would also be paying rent which is what would be contributed to the Omni
• Steve: Workers coming from the Neighborhood, or the Omni, or both?
  • NIki/Jenny: right now just three people assciated with the Omni, open to others, including neighbors... also stewarding the space for community events.
• Anka: Concerns over structural changes, the counter, will it be submitted to the collective?
  • Niki: Yes. We will submit plans to the city, the Omni, and John if we have structural changes.
• Matt: Proposed amendments from the sudo room meeting
  • Friendly Amendments:
    • to apply as a tenant, and wait until membership process is articulated and collective grows to apply as a member collective
    • income from events that utilize the front space goes to the Omni, not the cafe employees
• Mary: Glad that it's you guys, because you have the history about it. Permit issues last time around. This time?
  • Niki: Last time permit issues werent issues so much as the money to do the work and apply vanished. We have architectural drawings that we were planning to submit to the health department. We'd gotten to that place, and then there was no more money to build out the cafe. Secondly, the space behind this front counter is ideal as it already has floor sink, plumbing and electrical, cleanable ceiling with outlets for lights. The one concern is that we'll need to install a mop sink. We'd been talking about doing that in the ADA bathroom and helping to get that project finished.
• DK: Just going to add that to get a health license to run the cafe, going to have to do some modest improvements. Good for the Omni generally - getting the trash room compliant (improving ventilation, flooring) - benefits that will spill over and help other groups as well (such as having a mop sink). In terms of zoning - LC before they uncommuned had a zoning clearance for food/retail in that front space.

Consensing on above proposal with the amendment that AV is applying as a tenant, to apply as a member collective in the future once membership and organizational structure is better articulated. Specifics of sublease will be developed outside of this meeting.

• Yes: FNB, BH, CCL, Sudo, HNJ, CSC, BAPS, LL
• Abstain: BS
• Block: N/A

CONSENSO'D

Art Bison Member Application

No Art Bison members are present.

• https://omnicommons.org/pipermail/consensus/2016-April/000820.html

• This is Kazoo and I am speaking on behalf of Art Bison Design Coop. Please forward to the correct list, there were so many I didn't know which.

We, Art Bison Design Coop, would like to formally propose a satellite screen printing setup at the Omni! We won't be moving our entire studio in, just our extra setup so we can see if Omni makes sense for the full move. Here is our proposal below:

1. Mission:

Art Bison is a feminist collective that shares resources and produces media. Our principal media is screen printing and we are as much makers as we are teachers. We empower youth, womyn, those with barriers to employment, LGBTQIA folks, and all who are curious, to make their own media. Through work/trade we are able to produce shirts and posters for, often at no cost, to a wide variety of social and political events.

2. Origin:

ABDC was founded in 2011 by Kazoo Studios at 603 Tennessee. The Coop quickly grew from a open studio once a week, into a group run studio in San Francisco's (no longer) industrial Dog Patch neighborhood. There are currently 9 studio members. With the satellite location at Omni we hope to grow the coop to 16 or members or more. Members split rent and supplies equally, and share all the space, screens, and supplies in the studio. Members also share skills through in-house workshops.

3. Participation:

We have been interested in the Omni Commons and have been in conversation with OC since its inception. We were invited to attend meetings by The Public School originally. We have a strong ethos about sharing knowledge and skills outside of exploitative frameworks, and we think Omni is trying to be a hub for this radical reality. We would like to set up shop in Oakland so that we can begin our internship program on the side of the bay where half of us live, and Omni seems like a great place for that to happen. Our internship program currently fosters three teenaged youth per year in San Francisco.

At the Omni we would be able to grow this number and support more youth finding employment within an educational framework. Several of us work in public education and are building a feeder program in middle and high schools in Oakland to prepare kids for our paid internship program. We would be bringing in Oakland youth to collaborate with and support the larger space. We could use our intern hours to do projects like building, drywall, murals, etc. as well as producing shirts and posters for radical events and causes.

4. Group finances:

ABDC takes commissions for events, artists and groups all the time. We have a regular income and can provide financials in person (not on the Internet).

5. Space:

We currently pay 400$ for 400sf in SF. We would like to propose paying 200$ for 200sf. The space we would propose to use is what is currently referred to by some people as "the den". We would only need half of it. All the tables could still be there, just moved forward a bit. We would also need (shared) access to the shower room.

6. Other contributions:

We have a wide variety of skills in our collective. We have carpenters, musicians, designers, doctors, city planners, teachers, professional organizers, there is no limit to what we can contribute. Tangibly though we would greatly increase foot traffic into the space and support the media reality of the space.

Discussion

• Jenny: From Sudo mtg, there were concerns expressed about enclosure of commons space. It's one of the most heavily used commons paces in the building. Concerns about having kids in the space. They haven't taped off the space to help visualizing the size they want, as they said they would. Make the following friendly amendments:
  • Friendly amendment: Precise term (eg; 6 months)
  • Friendly amendment #2: Fully research and propose to delegates before having kids in the space [add to contract].
  • Request: Please tape off the area you intend to use
• DK: Space is shared by a lot of collectives. Space was used previously as an overflow area. Seems the most regularly utilized space in the building. Silkscreening in an open area could be an issue - eg health license for the cafe - weird rules around separating uses in a shared area. Probably area would have to be walled off and have active ventilation - not sure, but that's my suspicion. When Gabby had her setup in the other room, ventilation was a big deal. Big octopus machine, or just the screens.
• FNB Matt: Heard mention of something involving kids here... seems a big liability, lots of hoops to jump through.
• Laura: One thought is that if the cafe is making this front area a desirable space, less people will be sitting up in the den. Based on what DK is saying, would like Art Bison to do more research on inspections and code violations. Would prefer they use the basement, myself - screenprinting equipment not the best use of that space.
• Matt S: This is supposed to be a temporary thing - a satellite location to suss out if Omni is the right fit for them. Maybe alternatives - such as event rental contracts, keep equipment safely locked up and as out-of-the-way as possible.
• Steve: Agree with Laura - think we should ask them to move into the basement where the printing presses were. If lots of people are going to be involved, teaching scenarios, discussions, etc, would be very disruptive to other activities within earshot. Corner of the basement seems much more conducive to what they're trying to do.
• Alex: They're going to have an octopus printer. Good place for them because there's a work sink up there.
• Laura: Since there's no gas in the kitcen downstairs, could use the sinks downstairs on a trial basis. Maybe a meeting with Commons, others who can contribute to a conversation about ideal location in the building.
• Matt S: Re: the sink, there's also a sink at the bottom of the staircase.
  • Does that work?
    • Anka: Kinda
    • Does get clogged.
• Ken: Second concerns about the kids. Doesn't seem a good idea to have kids upstairs in that open area. Would disturb a lot of other activities in the building. Background checks, etc, need to have all their ducks in a row if they're going to be working with kids
  • Alex: They already work with kids in SF and have insurance for it
    • Ken: Having them downstairs would be a lot quieter than having them up there
• Laura: Could everyone write down their questions/concerns and we can set up this meeting?
  • Concurrence

Project Management Software selection

Proposal from Jeremy Proposal: Use project management software as our principal means of internal communication at the Omni. Proposed means of communication:

= Email only for contacting community about what's happening (eg info@omnicommons.org) = Project management software for members of collectives, internal communication = Cloud for storage

Proposal: Form working group to select project management software to be approved by next meeting. Here are some suggestions for project management software (all are free in different ways):

= trello (https://trello.com )

 + Intuitive inteface 
 + Unlimited users and projects
 + Voting, calendaring included

= meistertask (https://www.meistertask.com/ )

 + Intuitive interface
 + Incorporates slack, dropbox (whereas trello probably doesn't need slack)
 + Unlimited users and projects
 - Only provides two intergrations

= zoho projects (https://www.zoho.com/projects/ )

 + More features (tasks, forum, calendar, reports, gantt charts)
 + Unlimited users
 + Incorporates dropbox
 - It doesn't incorporate slack (but it has a chat area)
 - Only provides one project (which is probably all thats necessary)
 

Discussion

• Niki: not everyone is comfortable even with email, but PMS might be even more difficult for people to get used o using.
• Jenny: I set up an instance of Asana when we frist moved in but noone ever used it. I think it would be great though.
• Jeremy: this is a proposal to make an hoest effort to move toward that. To me there is a bigger issue of one person talking ot another but that info doesn't get shared with everyone who needs to know and address the overwhelming nature of email currently.
• DK: I've used different PMS. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesnt. It works when there is a limited number of people working toward one goal, and less well as a general communication solution. OONe of the main vblocks is that you have to go and check it.I dont' think any 1 PMS will be a solution although I agree with your motivation and effort.
• Julio: How are you envisioning using this?
• Jeremy: Like w slack every project can have channel; we can have an internal calendar that isn't a public calendar; we can keep a task list; do polls
• Niki: hear what you are trying to do, and hope you can implement something. WHo do you see as overseeing the Projects? Like a Project Manager... to make sure everythign is current and followed up on. Do you envision this being autonomous? At first, someone will probably have to create and maintain the tool.
  • Jeremy: hope a working group would choose the tool and initiate the process
• Matt: Can we find a time to start working on this as a working group?
• Contact Jeremy <jeremy.w.entwistle@gmail.com> Saturday @ 4pm
• Ken: signed up to all the lists just to see what is going on and there is a shtload of stuff going on. You're going to need some people to educate people. There's a huge learning curve just to get in the groove. A regular training that has to go on all the time.
  • Jeremy: I agree with you. To be decided by the group
• Alex: Support the idea, some software is easy to manage, some is very difficult.

End of Meeting

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