Meeting minutes

Submitted by Rachel Ayres on July 7, 2006 - 9:59am.

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Organizational Development

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meeting minutes 23/08/06

Submitted by Rachel Ayres on August 24, 2006 - 9:50pm.

Meeting minutes for August 23rd 06

Jeff, Jer, Dan, Anthony, Rachel

Focus on :
- Prioritization of issues
- Outlining of tasks
- Delegating of tasks

Issues of Priority:

1. Incorporation
-business plan

2. Decision making policy

3. Investments and finances

1. Incorporation

What is needed for incorporation?
-name search
            ->just need to go to government office and pay for name search, will try for simply
                'london commons'
-board of directors
            ->will look in to government structures, info re: co-ops
-mission statement
            ->will review existing draft on freewiki site and make amendments
-business plan
           ->will review existing draft on freewiki site and make amendments

-definition of 'member'
   -who would be a member?
   -what would dues be?
   -what does membership entitle you to?
           ->will create a new page (linked off LC page on freewiki) to begin drafting membership definitions, will also seek models from other organizations

2. Decision making policy

A decision making model is already up on the freewiki site, a duplicate will be created, linked off of London Commons page on freewiki.
We will review and modify that model.

3. Investments and finances

need to develop policy re:

-donations
        -tabled until later meeting
-operation of sub groups/ coops
        -tabled until later meeting
-definition of 'treasurer' role
        -will brainstorm rough draft, will look into Ontario coop federation policies

COMMITTEE TO DO LIST:

Jeremy:
- create duplicate of decision making policy linked off of LC page on freewiki
- create membership page, linked off of LC page on freewiki
- bring in proposal for computer recycling program for next meeting

Jeff:
- look in to policies and gudelines of Ontario Coop federation for next meeting

Rachel:
- post draft 'dues' model from UP P+P's
- post brainstormed 'dues' model from this meeting (once membership page is up)

Dan:
- Prepare draft document on government structures re: board of directors etc. for next meeting

All members:
- review current mission statement and business plan on freewiki site
- review decision making policy on freewiki site
- begin brainstorming/defining membership outline on the membership page once created
- review 'dues' proposal, once posted

NEXT MEETING:

Tentative date for Wednesday Sept 6th /06 at noon.
Jeff please confirm .

peace,
-r.

attn: org dev committee

Submitted by Rachel Ayres on September 3, 2006 - 10:18am.

yo guys,
what's going on here?
are we meeting on the 6th?

Are we going to be able to have these things done by then?
Does anyone need help with anything??

-r.

The 6th is still good to go.

Submitted by Jeff P. on September 4, 2006 - 1:35pm.

I'm still good to go on the 6th. I will have some helpful information from the Ontario Co-operative Association.

How about everyone else?

Co-operative Models

Submitted by Jeff P. on September 6, 2006 - 10:01am.

I would suggest that the steering comittee read and review the coop self-assessment located on the right side of this link.

There are 10 Basic types of Co-operatives, regulated under the Ontario's Co-operative Corporations Act.

1. Service Co-ops

2. Consumer Co-ops

3. Supply Co-ops

4. Worker Co-ops

5. Producer Co-ops

6. Marketing Co-ops

7. Child Care Co-ops

8. Housing and Housing Development Co-ops

9. Financing

10. Farming and Supply; Milk Transport

Out of the old structures has emerged a new type of Co-operative model: Community Co-operatives. Not sure how this would fit into the legal definitions under the Ontario's Cooperative Corporations Act.

I beleive this organizational structure will steer us in the right direction. The "Win-Ing" model, although seemingly centralist, provides an opportunity to create an incubator organization. An idea would be to blend the "Win-Ing" model with a Service Co-operative structure, which could give us a concept like this(this is the HTML version; there is also a PDF format as well).

I will bring these ideas up at todays meeting.

Let me know what you think.

Jeff

This is great stuff Jeff

Submitted by D Hilton on September 6, 2006 - 1:56pm.

This is great stuff Jeff and many of the questions are needed to be anwsered in order to move forward.

1) What service does the LC provide?

To me the LC is a media collective (or co-op) providing free space for indivduals & non-profit minded groups to have an online "meeting" and informing space that is accessable to the general population of London.

The definition of media can be brodened to include print, video, and whatever.

But the LC is not a creator itself, otherthan building a venue for the discussion & exchanging of creations via a free & accesable media.

I believe that the orgainizing committee needs to focus on the following section (c & d) in order to realistically determine what type of collective/co-op the LC will build it's foundation on. I can't stress enough that wandering too far outside of the box before it's build will lead to fustration on those who are putting time into the project.

Here is the current 'box' I believe is realistic & needed (for the greater community), also the great begginings of a mission statement:

“The London Commons is a media and communications cooperative organization that is currently in its planning stages ... We will focus our efforts on collaborative media creation and distribution.”

c.Design the service

Having defined and quantified the needs it is possible to design the service to meet the

need. It should now be possible to answer questions such as :

what is needed?

where?

when?

how often?

how many?

how much could users of the service afford to contribute?

d.Establish the level of support

Having designed the service(s) to be provided it is important to check that a good number

of the community will actually use the service now that it has taken shape - and that there

are people who are actively prepared to make it happen and keep it running over time.

You will need to demonstate both these things if help or finance is to be attracted from

elsewhere.

co-op governance & blunt assesment

Submitted by D Hilton on September 4, 2006 - 2:33pm.

http://www.iog.ca/boardgovernance/

http://www.australia.coop/uploads/cgm2005.pdf

http://cooptools.ca/tiki-pagehistory.php?page=Governance%20Links&diff2=14&diff_style=sideview

The 6th is good for me.

Here are some key resources on co-op governance, however I seriously wonder if the LC is a co-op.

The business plan/manifesto (I would say the later is more accurate) is hard to make clear what the co-op offers. Services to membership are key to a co-op, and while there is a list of service to be provided none are in existence to date. A few people cannot lay out what the services should be and expect others to do them. Services need to be what can be realistically provided by people that have the expertise, motivation, and time to provide them.

I could go on and on however in order to provide constructive criticism, a mission statement or purpose of existence is lacking, or better put too long and not concise. A mission statement needs to be within two sentences and very to the point. I believe that the introduction part of the business plan/manifesto is a great draft of what the LC truly is to date -

Sticking to this area has, and will, be a great asset to the community, but anything beyond adopting a governance structure, fundraising policy, and relevant working groups to a media collective is too much for this group in my opinion. Even becoming a legal co-op might be too big of a step at this point for such a small working group.

I will be at the next planning meeting to present on governance structure however will be unable to help with planning beyond that mainly due to it's ADD nature. I say this openly in all honesty so that the project may successful.

Because a child doesn't understand a chain of reasoning, should adults give up being rational? If reasonable people don't feel the presence of love within the universe, that doesn't mean it's not there.

Rumi

Outreach

Submitted by Toban B on September 5, 2006 - 8:28am.

Y'all need to work on outreach to bring more help into the fold --
if you want these ideas to take off.

When should we meet for the next meeting?

Submitted by Jeff P. on July 27, 2006 - 3:41pm.

I was thinking that Wed. August 2 would be a good day to meet? If this date works, what time is good for everyone? I would suggest 7pm but I'm not sure what time people are working 'n stuff.

Cheers

Jeff

yes!

Submitted by Rachel Ayres on July 27, 2006 - 5:03pm.

Thanks for posting this jeff.
That day will most likely work for me, my only problem is that I will be waiting for a delivery that could come anywhere between 4 and 9. It will probably come earlier than later, but there is no way of saying either way (you know how these delivery things work)

so yes! (and maybe no..)

-r.

meeting mintes 06/07/06

Submitted by Rachel Ayres on July 7, 2006 - 11:37am.

Meeting minutes for July 6th 2006

Rach, Jer, Jeff

1. Brainstorm a 'To do list' / Prioritizing

2. Site policy vs. Organizational policy

3. Policies + Procedures and Bylaw Review

Brainstorming

Policies or procedures that need to be developed:

-Decision making policy
-Privacy policy
-Defining roles
-Business plan
    -main
    -biodeisel
    -computer recycling program

-Advertising policy

Site Policy vs Organizational policy

There needs to be a seperation between site policy and organizational policy.

Organizational policy

Decision making policy
    -continuity of a decision
    -follow up
    -blocking

Defining roles
-Treasurer
- Board of directors

Investments + Finances

Employment policy
- hiring/ firing
-wages

Bylaws

Site policy

Real names policy

Defining roles
-moderator

What is okay or not okay to post / repercussions

Advertising (cooperative + individuals)

Problem user policy (spamming/ flaming)

P+P's plus Bylaw review

It has been suggested that there be a scheduled review of the entire policies + procedures and bylaws from time to time, to see if all is still relevant and effective.
This is to be discussed more at future meetings with better attendance.

is this an agenda or minutes?

Submitted by Mike McGregor on July 10, 2006 - 12:33pm.

I just noticed that this doesn't seem to have much in the way of decisions or recomendations. Is there a follow-up post to come with the results of these items? or are these the resolutions above (sort of resolved to revisit these issues)?

-30-

Mike

Open a book before you open your mouth. <-easy now, its just a signature.