[adcom] Draft minutes of May 27 Adcom meeting

[davidrolde at comcast.net]

Draft minutes of the GRP Administrative Committee meeting occurring by conference phone on Saturday May 27, 2006, at 10 AM

minutes by David Rolde

attendance:  Ron Francis, Dan Melnechuk, Colby Peterson, David Rolde, Grace Ross, + Paul Mushrush for the 2nd half of the meeting

Agenda Items

1. David Rolde's arrest

David and another pro-Palestinian activist were arrested last Wednesday at the Boston Public Library after protesting the Jerusalem Day Celebration there at which the Israeli Consul and a former Israeli military pilot were speaking. David and the other activist are looking for a lawyer. David will keep in touch with Adcom regarding how GRP can support David and oppose celebrations of apartheid at the BPL. 

2. slate-of-candidates campaign update

Grace & Wendy are out a lot campaigning and are filling out questionnaires. Grace is at several events per day. The campaign has broken the media black-out but still not getting equal time. Grace needs a campaign manager. The campaign needs money. 

Jamie & Jill haven't announced yet (with campaign announcement events). Jill has been campaigning at some events.

There are plans for some joint slate campaigning

The campaigns are working on plans for joint fundraising

We don't have enough signatures yet. We need to make a big push at Boston Pride on Saturday June 10. The GRP has reserved a table and a place to march at Boston Pride.

3. Newsletter

Communications Committee will be meeting tomorrow (Sunday May 28) in Leominster and will be talking about articles for the newsletter and due dates for the articles.

4. the State Convention

Dan has done work on finding a location. He has found the Girl Scouts site in Waltham. It has parking, is wheelchair accessible, and is only a few hundred dollars. Available dates weekend days at the end of August and early September.
 
Decision: Adcom asks Dan to book a date at the Girl Scouts site in Waltham. Check for concerns on the Convention Committee list first.

5. July State Committee meeting

location & date still pending. annie butler is working on this. David and Dan will check in with annie. David will work on looking for a location too if annie reports no progress.

6. Fundraising Committee

Fundraising Committee met last weekend at Jamie O'Keefe's house. Committee members turned in evaluation forms about Brian. Jamie is taking the info from the eval forms and going forward with the evaluation. The Committee talked about joint fundraising (of the candidates on the slate), fundraising mailings, cleaning up the lists of people to do fundraising outreach to, adding lists of people who have given to the GPUS.

7. Treasurer's Report

We have less than $300 in the Federal Fund and less than $500 in the State Fund. We are paid up on our bills and obligations. We owe $125 to Jobs With Justice for annual dues. 

Decision: We will pay $125 to Jobs With Justice for our dues

8. More on Communications Committee

The Communications Committee is considering working on a web forum communications scheme  for GRP committees, e.g., State Committee, because people are having problems dealing with email communication.

9. Platform Committee

Platform Committee has not met yet. David is trying to schedule a meeting

10. Tech Committee

Tech Committee is working on:

-nice-looking broadcast fundraising emails that don't look like listserv emails, the team 

-the Team 2006 website

-the calendar listing bug

Tech Committee has not been having meetings

We confirm that campaign events for GRP endorsed/nominated candidates can be put on the web calendar

11. Abolish Poverty Committee

There may be a March to Abolish Poverty in September
Abolish Poverty Committee should have a meeting

12. CDLC (Candidate Development and Legal Committee)

Dan sent invitations to everyone on the Expcom email list for them to join the CDLC email list. Adcom suggests adding people to email lists rather than inviting them to join. Someone should call people who aren't on email regarding joining CDLC.  CDLC has not met yet. Someone needs to schedule a meeting.

13. Membership Committee

Membership Committee has not met recently

14. External Relations Committee

External Relations Committee has not convened

15. Adcom email list privileges

Should Statecom members have posting privileges to the Adcom email list?

Decision: for now Adcom list posting privileges will still be limited to Adcom members, but there will be text on every adcom list email saying that people can send a message to all Adcom members by emailing adcom dot members at green dash rainbow dot org.

16. the telephone outreach campaign

Some of the funds from Jamie O'Keefe's donation to the party were used to do a telephone outreach campaign prior to the nominating convention. We hired Grace to organize the telephoning. The script included notification about the convention and a survey. Grace reports that we covered some regions of the state prioritizing low-income communities and communities of color. Grace feels that this effort was worthwhile and should be repeated. Nashua River Green-Rainbow recruited members through these calls.

We need an official report about this telephone calling campaign, and we also need an official report on last year's March to Abolish Poverty. These reports are needed for fundraising purposes as accountability to previous donors. Grace will finish writing these reports when she can.

17. the current Statecom email decision making process

The discussion period on the main proposal is ending tomorrow (Sun May 28)
The 'No On Fusion" proposal's discussion period has just started
Three Statecom members not on email need to be called by tomorrow (Sun May 28)
Betts was supposed to call these three but Betts has resigned from Statecom
Colby will check in with Betts
David will call Lloyd and Jen
Ron will call Mary Ann

18. Dion Robbins-Zust

We reviewed the bylaws regarding GRP endorsements of candidates. GRP candidate endorsements are by a State Convention or the State Committee. GRP local groups ask the state GRP to endorse candidates, or else a candidate may petition Statecom directly after notifying local GRP groups a month ahead of the Statecom meeting.  State GRP cannot endorse a candidate if a GRP local group has decided to OPPOSE the endorsement.

Dion Robbins-Zust is a candidate for state senate in the Berkshires who is campaigning as a Green-Rainbow and seeking support from the GRP. Simultaneously with this Adcom meeting, the Central Berkshire Greens (a GRP local group) was having a meeting with Dion about his candidacy. 

Celia [i may have this name wrong] and Wanda from Central Berkshire Greens called in to the Adcom meeting and reported that the discussion about their position on Dion's candidacy was still ongoing, and that they would forward the decision as well as full minutes of the meeting to Adcom.

19. Social Justice Presence at Boston Pride

Mark Snyder from QueerToday.com had emailed GRP requesting our endorsement and participation in a Social Justice Presence at the Boston Pride march.  This Social Justice Presence is being sponsored by QueerToday.com, Stonewall Warriors, and Women's Fightback Network.  There is a flier with demands connecting many social justice issues.  GRP is already planning our own contingent at Boston Pride with a big signature gathering effort there.  Adcom discussed endorsing the Social Justice Presence, but we did not all agree and we did not come to a decision yet except that we intend to communicate with the organizers of the Social Justice Presence in some way to convey that we appreciate the invitation. 

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The next GRP Administrative Committee meeting will be held in person on Monday June 12 at 6:30 PM in the Concord area at a location to be determined.