SC Call Notes — December 17, 2004
Participants:
Jo Chamberlain, Jake Schneider, Gray Newman, Marc Sanson, Jody Haug, Gwen Wages, Maya O’Connor, Peggy Lewis, Greg Gerritt
Facilitator Jody, Timekeeper Marc, Notes Greg
Abbreviations used:
AC = Accreditation Committee
ANM, ANMC = Annual National Meeting Committee
BRPP = Bylaws, Rules, Policies and Procedures Committee
BC = Black Caucus
CC = Coordinating Committee
CCC = Coordinated Campaign Committee
CG SC = Campus Greens Steering Committee
ComCom = Communications Committee
DC = Diversity Committee
DRC = Dispute Resolution Committee
FC = Fundraising Committee
FEC = Federal Election Commission
GP = Green Party
IC = International Committee
LC = Lavender Caucus
NWC = National Women’s Caucus
PEC = Presidential Exploratory Committee
PCSC = Presidential Campaign Support Committee
SC = Steering Committee
[Brackets denote editor’s suggested corrections. Some punctuation corrections done with no content change. -ed.]
Published Agenda
2 hrs 35 min
5 min – facilitator, timer, note taker (Greg)
30 min – FINANCE Portfolio (Jake, Marc): Finance, FundCom (Budget/Fundraising Plan finalized)
30 min – ES: personnel
The staff will be called when it’s time for each of them on the call.
10 min – Kara – including staff report (depending on time available)
10 min – Brent – including staff report (depending on time available)
10 min – Emily – including staff report (depending on time available)
5 min – Ohio recount – Marc
5 min – Voting Queue – Budget Proposal, Fiscal Policy, CC definition
5 min – SC FTF meeting
5 min – GPUSA-FEC situation – Gray
10 min – Work Groups follow up
Portfolio reports:
5 min – ELECTORAL (Gray, Jo): CCC, Office Holder Network, PCSC, Legal Team
5 min – POLICY (Greg, Gwen): Platform, Peace, Intnl, DC, Strategic Plan
10 min – OUTREACH (Peggy): Media, Green Pages, Merchandise, Campus Greens Green Pages editorial board
5 min – INTERNAL (Maya): Personnel, Dispute Resolution; (Greg): BRPP
5 min – INTERNAL (Jody): Accreditation, ComCom, Event Planning
*****
Portfolio review
Finance Portfolio
Discussion of budget and how the allocation of costs on personal solicitations will be handled. Discussion of how we are going to handle internet fundraising and what the components of that are. Looks like technical can be handled by current web manager and we need to develop a plan for content provision. Greg will draft plan for content provision.
Discussed getting better employment agreements written up with all staff and contractors.
Total revenue and expenses for the year in the budget is $190,200.
Discussed how CCC, NWC and possibly other caucuses and committees will do fundraising and the need for them to coordinate this with GPUS Fundraising Committee. New fiscal policy lays out how this will work.
On Fundraising plan, discussed who the individuals responsible for certain actions will be. Operations Director will be listed in the sustainer program as the responsible party. Costs for sustainer program should be in fundraising category. Approximately half of all office budget goes to fundraising, but hard to determine exactly. Merchandise committee will be listed as responsible for merchandise sales.
Still need to find a direct mail contractor, RFP is being worked on.
Jake will draft a FAQ response sheet for budget questions. Extended discussion on Budget and Fiscal policy to Jan 2, vote Jan 3 to 9.
SC went into Executive Session to discuss staff alignments and hold conversations with each DC office staff member.
Following one hour of ES, SC resumed regular meeting.
OH recount:
We have been told we need to take better advantage of this opportunity but no one had any suggestions or resources for doing this.
Voting queue
Reaffirmed voting on budget and fiscal policy for after the first of the year. Haiti resolution from OH will go into discussion after first of the year. BRPP resolution on the eligibility of people to serve on the SC will begin discussion and be voted on starting in 3 weeks. Gwen will floor manage the BRPP resolution; Gray, the Haiti resolution.
Decided to hold off on any face to face SC meetings. Costs and low energy are key factors. Will be discussed again.
SC is looking into trademark/service mark for Green Party of the Untied States. Have received an offer of pro bono legal help after the first of the year. With GPUSA giving up national committee status it may be possible for us to seek greenparty.org web domain name as well.
CC passed two resolutions creating work groups. Greg will create and send out letters to the CC starting the recruitment process.
Portfolio review (continued)
Electoral portfolio
Green Officeholders Network has a new list on GPUS servers and is seeking to sign up office holders to participate on it. CCC is starting to prepare for 2005 campaigns and fundraising. Some discussion about changing the CCC from a system in which everyone is elected each year to a larger committee, with staggered terms so as to preserve continuity and institutional memory.
Outreach Portfolio
Green Pages editorial board has sought advice on what to do with a member who has disrupted their work. They have been advised that SC will back them up on removing the obstructionist from their list serve, and they have done so. SC is more than willing to have a discussion with any state party that sends such disruptive people to committees, and will shortly bring a resolution to the CC on how committees can take actions to stop disruptive folks from torpedoing committee work. SC will work from Maya’s draft.
Policy
Peace is focused on Inauguration day events. IC has been discussing events in Europe, Dublin event was reported on and letters to Greek parties. Everything else is pretty quiet
Internal portfolio
AC recommended no action on UT. Working on applications from MT and OK. Communications committee has members focused on code writing so as to complete hand over of news and elections data bases from the consultant. BRPP has presented a resolution on eligibility to serve on the SC and has other discussions going. Annual National Meeting Committee hopes to have a location and date for summer meeting by end of March. Marc noted that IL has some written policies on list serve etiquette. SC asked him to bring them to us for review with the goal of possibly passing them along to the CC for its adoption.
For next call need discussion of better integrating the work of disparate committees and a review of the portfolio system. Next call Dec 30.
Minimally edited and HTML formatted by Charlie Green