GRIP Update

The PIRG zine, "Grip" has been for available for three months. I know it was fairly difficult, at times, to find a copy of the zine. This distribution problem has been discussed and analysed through many informal conversations with myself and many other people. Although these problems haven't been fully rectified, they have been brought to the 'table'. A 'table', that will be far more accessible this september. We have gone through some amazing transformations in the past few years and have defeated some incredible challenges, but we are still in the early developmental stage of where the UWO PIRG would like to be. That being said, I would like to address a few issues I have been meaning get to for some time.

First, I would like to THANK all the people who submitted to the zine. There are so many incredibly talented people in this city and I am so happy to have had a chance to read and help spread your message.

Second, I would also like to THANK all those who helped with organizing the zine. I know our structure was a bit unconventional at times but it managed to be successful. It has been brought to our attention that some of the structural components of our decision making process we used were not completey effective at giving all people an equal say. This is something we will be working on in the future, especially with the help of the London Commons.

Third, the reason for the lack of distribution of the zine is a result of too few compilation CDs and labels being burned and printed. We need help with this. If any of you are interested in helping with that process please reply to this forum. We have another 200 zines that need CDs before they can be distributed. Our CD burners are tired and I don't think they want to burn many more discs.

Fourth, We would like to continue the GRIP in the future. There have been ideas thrown around about converging a few organizations zines into one progressive London magazine with the hopes of making it sustainable and consistant. What do people think about creating sections in the GRIP for the London Commons, Womens Issues Network and UWO PIRG? Who knows, maybe Envirowestern would interested as well. There would be alot of benefits to creating one publication that suits the needs of each group thus futhering part of PIRGs agenda to 'Bridge the gap between the university and London communities'. What do think? Is anyone interested in taking a leadership role in this process?

The last issue I would like to inform people of is the election process that UWO PIRG will going through at the begining of the school year. The current structure has five elected board members who are responsible for unique postions within the organization. Generally, organizations and clubs at western are for western students exclusively. We don't want that to be the case with UWO PIRG. We would Love it if there were non-western students  on the board. So pelase reply to this forum if you have any questions or are interested in getting involved.

Thank-you everyone for your support,

Jeff