Event:2015/01/22 Weekly Delegate's Meeting
Delegates Meeting - January 22, 2015 The meeting will begin promptly at 7pm, and end at 9pm; unless consensed upon to go beyond 9pm.
- Facilitator/s: Kate / David K
- Explanation of hand signals: "deaf applause", "raised hand", "point of process", "direct response", "time's up", etc.
- Stacktaker & explanation of progressive stack: Cere
- Timekeeper & reminder to keep comments brief: Chris
- Notes: Yar all time champion notetaker
- URL of this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/omninom
- Vibe Reader: Shake
- Next weeks facilitator(s): Yar, Rayc
- Encourage someone who hasn't facilitated before. If they'd like support, someone who has facilitated before can join them to facilitate together! If they'd like to know how the agenda works, here's a page outlining the different parts of our agenda https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Facilitating_General_Meetings_Tips_and_Info
- Delegates: Jenny (sudo), chris (baps), chloe (bh), nore (mpm), emji (til), mary (ccl), owen (la commune)
- Quorum: Yes.
Introductions (10 mins)
Name; Affiliation; Prefered Pronoun; If you are new, one thing that brought you here.
- Kate (baps)
- Rayc
- Laura (baps)
- Rachel (yoga)
- Sam (sudo)
- Jenny (sudo)
- Chris (baps)
- remote korl :) (sudo)
- leah (baps)
- steve b (?)
- nigel (read the EBX article, trepidatious)
- isaura (choreographer from brazil, volunteering for ballroom-readiness and how we organize, wants to have brazilian dance and drumming here)
- scott (sudo/baps)
- aaron (prison activist resource center)
- shake (planet earth)
- brandon (oalkand next)
- chloe (black hole)
- nora (mpm)
- emji (til/mpm)
- kevin (wgs)
- yar (sudo)
- cere (sudo,ccl)
- mary (ccl)
- owen (la commune)
- kwe (music is healing)
- dragon (backspace, mih)
Announcements 15
Any Omni-related announcements:
- Ban of Kevin Troffer (brought by DK / BAPS) for safe space reasons.
- incident at SF public school meeting at a bookstore
- bookstore owner wanted them to leave. kevin didn't want to. smashed bottle in owner's face.
- safe space issue, obviously
- Reddit Ask Me Anything about THE OMNI this Saturday 11-3
- Is there a current link? Not yet
- check here on Saturday: https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA
- will meet in the disco room projecting it on the wall
- Sunday evening social from 5-7pm, high tea and funny hats
- Talk about having a roller disco as a fundraiser for the Omni
- will that be bad for the floor?
- jenny tested it. "it's roller-ready"
- cere still concerned
- light on omni
- black history month coming up
- fourth open circle on police brutality & systemic racism to talk about past weekend's actions. maybe coordinating may 1st general strike. sunday 3-7
- dragon suing richmond pd. taking the stand wednesday.
- check out the flyers for info
- "fuck the police" march wednesday 7 or 8
- bike harassment
- "instead of fucking the police, let's free the people"
- neighborhood kids music recital 12-3 Sunday
- come by but be respectful & quiet
"Instead of fucking the police, lets feed the people" +1
Working Group Report-Backs
5 minutess per WG; 40 minutess max, total. (Alphabetical - All WGs are equally important!) Reminder as to what qualifies a W.G. There is existing overlap - take to 'how we organize'
Chores
Who is here from chores?
- people brag about mopping and shit
- i was in the military and let me tell you about chores
- this is not a w.g. --
- each member collective had already agreed to be responsible for cleaning certain shared areas, rotating every month. This broke down.
- decentralization vs centralization
- yar proposes we continue this conversation over dishwashing or something
- shouldn't you just everybody something something
- we have an issue with communal hygeine ew.
- arguments over meeting process, closing stack vs letting people talk
- lecture about feng shui
- we should set up an auto-pay sitch for shipping tp to the omni biweekly.
Commons
- meets saturdays at 1, where?
- proposals: no recurring events fri, sat, sun unless renters are paying a min of $1K/day
- this is a vital income stream for omni. can't afford it unfortunately.
- maximum # of hours for yoga in disco room. numbers recited. to be reassesed in 6 months.
- maximum # of loud events, esp until soundproofing
Building and Facilities
- also includes permits
- goal is to comply with fire & safety by february
- please join, you can focus on ADA bathroom, soundproofing, use permits, etc
- contact david k
- building work parties in february will be widely announced
- https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Ballroom-readiness
- https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Omni-readiness
- also can contact matt senate
- will announce a meeting time next week
Communications
- doesn't meet. just does stuff.
- - does not meet - mainly focused on external communications (right now) - Press Releases, etc
- also sysadmins are the lonely fallen apple of this wg. we meet in an invite-only digital wastelands. lol(quietly)
Challenging Domniant Culture (CDC)
- meets sundays at 12
- had a conversation about conflict this week. was very good.
Finance
- meets tuesdays at 7
- are we gonna stay 501c3 or split into companies based on where money flows?
- migrating from wave to quickbooks. still. it's hard.
- paying all the bills. you have no fucking idea man.
Fundraising
- meets mondays at 7 in Meetspace / Old TIL room / BAPS classroom
- ALL HANDS ON DECK. campaign ends next wednesday at midnight. 6 days, ~$8.5k to go
- EBX article helped
- Super-Jenny spammed facebook for days
- if you know famous people exploit them!
- twitter usage hints
- We also have a tumblr, flickr, youtube vimeo, foursquare, yelp, and other social media accounts that are not being/ can be more utilized!
How We Organize
- tuesdays at 7 in Meetspace / Old TIL room / BAPS classroom
- ideas around large-scale organization
- encouraging ppl to go to working groups with signage
- empowering event renters to clean (also with signs. joel volunteered.)
- ian has a desk inside TIL. donating $ to omni.
- not everyone can do it. he's their friend.
- let's talk more about it not now
Kitchen
- mostly FNB
- FNB fundraiser
- they still want to expand it, which impacts rest of basement
Permits
- meet when/ where?
- see building notes
Welcoming
- meets thursdays at 6, except today at 5
- talked about the "opening the omni" proposal by david brazil
- at length. we're breaking it down. it'll be a while.
- "it's needed"
- responsibilities for people hosting large ballroom events
- volunteering to give tours at these events
Proposals
Proposals brought to the delegates for discussion and voting.
01-12-15 Proposal from Finance WG:
- In light of failure to meet commitments laid out in Peak Agency's sublease agreement or to work with the Omni to produce new agreement terms, this proposal is to remove Peak Agency as a member collective and to forgive all past debts in the amount of $1,200.
Sue: Suggested amendment: "Pay what you can" Precident issue - Passed - unanimous discussion:
- it's one guy, danny spitzberg. been with omni a while but never paid a dime.
- his collective never expanded beyond just him.
- met with the WG several times over months
- they'll forgive his debt and he'll stop being a member collective
- concern about overrepresentation of small groups
- yar nitpicks the word "voting"
- setting precedent for removing a collective?
- this is important!
- danny doesn't want to be a member collective anymore but he's never said it officially
- wait we're being very sympathetic to this person
- we still want his money obvs
- already precedent set by oakland nights live
- there's no deposit to hold. he never paid any money.
- does he ever use the space? has he been here?
- he was active in working groups. one of them asked him to leave.
- straw poll - who wants to send back to finance to reword? meh
- who wants to just vote right now? lots of hands
- friendly amendment: pay what you can
- why? if he never used the space, the "collective" never used resources?
- DELEGATES: passes 7/7.
Proposal: No Candles in Omni, lit or unlit, attended or not attended.
https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Proposal_NoCandles
- Proposal that:
Any candles found in omni, lit or unlit, attended or unattended, be removed from the building and signage asking candles not be lit be made to this effect in main areas of omni
This proposal is being made to the presence of lit, unattended candles found many times in omni, most recently in a locked room on 2015-01-21.
This is a safe space related issue. Burning candles can burn down this building.
Signage required and warning then
Proposal brought by DK.
Amendment: no candles in omni unless you asked for an event Amendment: expnd to all open flames except sudo & CCL Ammedment: include incense https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Proposal_Package:_Opening_Omni_(DZB)_2014-08-20 discussion:
- fuck candles
- emji is holding a candles in their lap at this very moment. hmm. awkward.
- candles are fine as long as they're very closely attended
- need some exceptions for a spiritual space
- i like this proposal but why are we buying fake candles? that's absurd
- maybe you can ask for a waiver for an event
- "no unattended open flames"!
- WHAT ABOUT BIRTHDAY CAKES? THINK OF THE CHILDREN
- it's illegal to sing "happy birthday" anyway. Disney will sue the sh*t out of you
- david k wants full authority to blow out any candles
- everyone should have this auth if a fire hazard is left unattended. it's common sense. i'm as annoyed as david.
- what about incense
- incense is not a fire hazard, jsut don't make a mess, and ask people using the space if they are ok with it. some people are intensely sensitive to smell/chems. also, small space +incense may = athsma
- dk worries about incense but it's not an open flame. just sort of smoldering iykwim but idk
- my friend's house burned down. sure but make exceptions for birthdays and stuff. incense is air pollution.
- a tall glass with low wax isn't an "open flame". if it spilled over the wax would put it out. now if there were draps that's another story. so i'm 75/25
- my dad's a fire inspector for 25 years. i can ask him.
- beware paper. incense is essentially charcoal.
- this could dissuade arsonists
- amendment: no candles in omni unless you asked for an event
- expand it to all open flames except for sudo & ccl
- what if we just empower people to ask to extinguish? No that's totally different. people are aggressive, it's a fire hazard
- DELEGATES: consented 7/7
- emji blows the candle out. poof. Ouch?
Proposal: Event Organizer Responsibilities from Sudo Room
- 1. Event organizers are responsible for ensuring that someone stands at event entrance for at least 30 minutes before the event, and up to 30 minutes after the start of their event. If there is a volunteer available to be at the event entrance throughout the event, it is preferred. For events with over 100 people in attendance, this is required.
- 2. **Organizers are responsible for guiding attendees to the event space, and not to other parts of the Omni, by use of signs on the doors.
- 3. Organizers are responsible for reminding attendees to "Please respect the space".
- 4. Organizers are responsible for ensuring all event attendees have left the building by half an hour after the events ends, unless the event attendees are vouched for by a member of a collective.
- 5. Organizers are resposible for making sure attendees do not meander into other Omni spaces, unless they are vouched for by a member of a collective.
- 6. Organizers are responsible for, with the help of a member of an Omni collective, checking the entire building for those who may be lingering afterwards.
discussion:
- Steve: The Welcoming Committee will define the exact numbers
- Emji: Is this an interim proposal? What happens when we're officially open to the public?
- interim until it's clearer what open to the public means and what parts of the building are open. which could be a long long time.
- elliot promised to do this stuff and didn't. so drunkards smashed up ccl. allegedly related.
- More specific to events that go late into the night
- Isaura: Important to consider how this is communicated to the public. Make it a rule that before the start of an event a public announce is made
Next week. - basement space? pass:
Discussion about Chores
- David: How are we going to get things clean? What system are we going to use to do that?
- Cere: How can we stay motivated? Stay cohesive, break bread together and clean, etc; Systematized thing with a group this large may not work. How do we stay good and not get burned out?
- Rayc: Biggest thing is direction, something that says "this gets done at this time, come here and help do it" - 'Hi, I used the Omni for x hours, am down to clean for x minutes" - how to convey that culturally and give direction?
- Shake: Omni's a big shift with many departments. Every collective has responsibility. Need to build them up and empower groups to be responsible for a particular space. Create a chore wheel for the whole Omni, one day for each collective to draw a date they're responsible for cleaning the whole space. Need someone in charge of cleaning. Things are currently dirty, even in this room. Need an overall cleaning schedule.
- Kate: Suggested to put chores on a working group that can be tasked with How We Organize or some such.
- Dragon: We don't really use the den (backspace), but we have to clean up after others. It's a spiritual thing to do work; collectives should be responsible for their spaces.
- Dragon volunteers to start a chores working group
- Kwic: What motivates folks is creating rapport with each other, a family, talking about other stuff than what's going on here. Sharing your past, future, intentions. Become familiar with each other so we can actually be family. Have a party with just Omni, some outings! Anything other than Omni so we can see who each other is. Heartfelt teamwork and support system. Just cleaned a basement room and it motivated him.
- Emji: Chore wheel's gonna get confusing. Not knowing what day or having someone move that would get complicated, though dig the idea that collectives are responsible for particular spaces. Maybe a monthly work party?
- Rayc: Culture of the collective is to help out when possible. Grateful to be a part of the environment and to help maintain it in a collective mindset. Coming together more as a collective to work together for the greater good.
- Jenny: Totally yes on the necessity of the communal vibe. How We Organize tried to do a rotating wheel of collectives every month for the dirty tasks, didn't work out so well. Volunteers to bring it up at next How We Organize meeting and check back in on it next week.
Conclusions:
- Monthly work party, with food!
- How We Organize will check in about rotating shifts next week.
- We do it for love.