Green Party of South Puget Sound Special Meeting

Thursday, January 29, 2009

6:00 Potluck Followed by Meeting
MIXX-96 meeting room, State & Washington, Olympia

Nine persons participated.
Janet Jordan facilitated.

We enjoyed a delicious potluck, which included real plates and real silverware, instead of throw-aways.

Tonight’s special meeting was called to explore the potential for the Green Party of South Puget Sound to become more vibrant and effective, with more volunteers carrying out GPoSPS’s various kinds of activities.  We addressed the situation from some fresh perspectives, and everyone contributed supportive energy and good ideas.  Glen Anderson took the following notes:

Question #1: What would it take for a volunteer task to look good to you?

(NOTE:  After brainstorming these ideas each person marked the ideas that seemed best.  These totals are shown in parentheses in the left margin.)

(2)   1.  Limited time commitment

(6)   2.  Concrete and well defined objective

(6)   3.  Strategically useful activity:  either educates on an important Green platform plank, or helps elect a candidate we all support. 

(0)   4.  Enough advance notice – planned well in advance

(1)   5.  Not conflicting with other community activities scheduled for the same time

(5)   6.  Clear roles, relationships, responsibilities, and tasks

(2)   7.  A great candidate

(0)   8.  A national event (e.g., a new war)

(3)   9.  The right issue or the right key value  [note – this can’t be designed into the activity; it would be different for each person]

(2)  10. Other people working on it – or the right number of people, even if only one person is needed

(3)  11. Synergy with other current issues and groups, to build allies into a critical mass

(2)  12. Opportunity to act on a vision and make a unique contribution  [same note as above – each person would have to decide if he-or-she can make that unique contribution]

 


Question #2: What elements should any Green Party program have?

  1.  Gets the word out about issues and the Green Party’s key values.

  2.  Gets the word out about the Green Party itself.

  3.  Accomplishes a clear and strategic objective.

  4.  Promises fun, enjoyment, stimulation.

  5.  Brings people together and creates community.

  6.  Is repeatable without having to “reinvent the wheel.”

  7.  Workload is commensurate with the expected results.

  8.  Builds on knowledge we’ve gained from organizing past events.

  9.  Includes opportunity for evaluation so we can learn how to organize future events.

10.  Builds positive reputation for the Green Party.

11.  Attracts new people as well as current members of the Green Party.

12.  Organizing it does not require more people-power than we can muster.

13.    The Green Party brings something unique to the effort, even if other organizations also are working on the same issue.

14.     We clearly and consciously manage how we make and sustain commitments to work on the activity.  The people who volunteer to work on it have a covenant with each other to follow through, and the Green Party actively monitors progress and accountability.

 
Question #3: What past activities of the Green Party have succeeded – and why?

1.  Our David Rovics benefit concert only broke even financially from ticket sales, but our bake sale at the event made money.

2.  Our David Rovics benefit concert publicized the Green Party to a great many new people who attended.

3.  Our bake sale at Hempfest generated money and new members, and only needed efforts by a few members.

4.  Our Open Enrollment policy generated many new members but those new members have participated very little.  Also, when people signed up without providing adequate contact information, we used a lot of energy tracking down the missing information for contacting those people – we should not sign people up without adequate information.  

5.  Tabling at Super Saturday provides a lot of visibility and outreach.

6.  The candidates whom GPoSPS supported appreciated our efforts.

7.  Some of the candidates the GPoSPS supported never joined the Green Party or – if elected – never followed our lead when various issues needed governmental action or decisions.  Perhaps we should not support candidates who are not actually Green Party members.

8.  Our Hootenanny was popular, got the word out, and made us about $500.  It depended on a volunteer who knew the Olympia bands, and a lot of work by volunteers (we had not done this before).

9.  Our Fertile Ground pizza night made some money and created a sense of community, even though it turned out the food contributions by members accounted for most of the profits.  

10.  The Awards Ceremony (for two years running, we invited all the other non-profits in Olympia and gave them awards) generated a lot of interest and participation by other organizations.  It was fun.  It could not be used as a fundraiser because everyone there had been invited to receive an award and you can’t ask people to pay for their own award ceremony.  

 

Suggestions for a new program (we didn’t vote on these because people started leaving early; don’t know which, if any, the participants would have wanted):

1.  Don’t plan any new issues-based activism; we are too busy to add any new activities to our schedules.  If another organization is leading an effort in one of our areas, send a “Green contingent” (identify it as such).  

2.  Bake sale at Olympia Film Society when an appropriate film is showing.  Stuart will ask OFS about their current rules for such bake sales, and also about what upcoming films might be appropriate and available.

3.  Show films or videos on a regular schedule (perhaps at Traditions, and perhaps with co-sponsorship by other organizations), preferably with discussions following.  Perhaps the GPoSPS could hold our own brief meetings immediately before or after these regular events.

4.  Earth Day celebration organized by us

5.  Procession of the Species:  How could we participate without violating the Procession’s rules and being too political?  Could we simply work the crowd instead of participating in the parade?

6.  Arrange with Works in Progress and/or SPEECH’s Green Pages for a regular column?  To avoid a burden on those organizations, could we raise money to cover our share of the costs of our portion of the publications?


Some people had to leave before 9:00 p.m., so we ended our meeting earlier than scheduled.  We encourage additional suggestions by all 9 persons who attended and by other Green Party members.


Discussion:

GPoSPS currently lacks people to fill many leadership positions.  Should we fill those vacancies or become less active?  Should we have fewer meetings, make fewer decisions, and accomplish fewer results?  We discussed pros and cons.  By accomplishing more, we might be able to attract more active members.  But a "holding operation" such as showing films at Traditions would build community and educate people even while not helping pass Green legislation or elect Green candidates.  

Several persons emphasized that – in order to strengthen GPoSPS and build our Green movement – we need to actually meet face-to-face, not just by e-mail and the blogosphere.  (Glen said, “Leave your electrons at home.  Bring your face.”)

NOTE -- a follow-up meeting was planned in two weeks time; however, we did not achieve a quorum at that meeting and the organizers have dropped their efforts for the time being.