GPUS Steering Committee Minutes – 9 September 2018
SUMMARY FOR DISTRIBUTION TO STATES AND LOCAL CHAPTERS:
1. New Business: CCC request to use $1000 in budgeted funds approved
2. Standing Business: Treasurer’s Report (Treasurer’s Reports to the GNC available at https://gpus.org/treasurers-reports/), Fundraising Report, Fundraising Consultant update, Violet Zitola appointed liaison to Accreditation Committee
3. Voting Queue – https://secure.gpus.org/cgi-bin/vote/login
In the queue: 2018 Platform Amendments – Regenerative Agriculture, Regenerative Agriculture and Climate Change, Progressive Global Wealth Tax, Ethical treatment of Animals in Sports, Education, HIV-AIDS
Received for the queue: 2018 Platform Amendments: Climate Change and the Green New Deal – Floor Manager Gloria; Population Pressures and Resource Depletion – Floor Manager Margaret – 4 weeks discussion, 1 week vote
Online SC Proposals approved since last call and sent to the NC: None
4. Old Business: Strategic Planning meeting, ETC Report, Freshdesk, ANM summary, letter to Green Uprising
5. Executive Session: None
The full minutes are available at http://gpus.org/committees/steering/minutes/september-09-2018/
The call recording is available at 712-451-0309, 926334#, reference 30 and https://gpus.org/steering-committee-recordings/
Jody Grage, Secretary
GPUS Steering Committee Minutes – 9 September 2018
AGENDA:
I. CALL SETUP & BACKGROUND – 15 min
a) Facilitator: Charles Sherrouse
b) Roll call: Andrea Merida, Hillary Kane, Margaret Flowers, Jody Grage, Anita Rios, Gloria Mattera, Joy Davis, Violet Zitola, Tony Ndege; observers – Starlene Rankin OR/staff, Tamar Yager VA, David Gerry MA c) Agenda revision suggestions – New Business: CCC request for $1k for candidate support
II. NEW BUSINESS
a) CCC request to use $1000 in budgeted funds: The GPUS budget allocates $2000 to the CCC for campaign schools and presumably other expenses. The Telethon raised about $1000 to go toward candidate support. Though not budgeted this year, the CCC typically has had about $2000 to offer to candidates. To this end, the committee requests that $1000 of our remaining funds be used for candidate support, to supplement funds raised through the Telethon. – consensus to approve; request for report from CCC
III. STANDING BUSINESS – 40 min
a) Treasurer’s report – Hillary Kane – 10 min.
Treasurer’s Reports to the GNC available at https://gpus.org/treasurers-reports/
In all accounts: $120,017.92, savings/reserves $95,678.05, checking #1 $23,040.89, checking #2 $1,298.98, plus Paypal $2041.48
Holding steady financially; had agreed to new arrangement with Paypal which would cut fees with expected loss of some older contributions who have not made the transition but only 3 of 20 donations this month went through – will investigate; locked out of PayFlow and had to make many updates to accommodate; Darryl! working on getting FinCom co-chair Anita as signer on account now
b) Fundraising report – Gloria – 5 min.
August Income: $13,207.72. September Income to Date: Sept 1-9: $3,309.23
Eblasts: Labor Day: $294.01 Labor Day Resend: $66.46
Eblast Topics: Sustainers. Rapid Response
Ongoing projects: OnBoarding new Signups
Looking at suggestions for targeting, Tamar and Starlene working on housekeeping updates to save mailing costs, search continues to get variety of writers for fundraising and other uses
Fundraising Consultant update – Hillary, Gloria – draft SWAT analysis of fundraising received – no big surprises; discussion that we have no operational strategic plan on which to make fundraising decisions such as targeting and the need for SC retreat to discuss this issue
Direct mail report – prospect mailing from Jill to Stein/Baraka list who haven’t donated to GPUS before, 1% return not too bad on prospects and this was an old list; not productive to send too often to current donors; need help with content and tone to specific targets; request made to include dates in report
c) Liaison assignment decision – Accreditation Committee – 25 min
Proposal that in consideration of the conflict of interest for Andrea being AC liaison while the GPCO situation is still unresolved, Violet be approved to be the AC liaison; Andrea agreed to withdraw her request to be liaison in favor of Gloria, Gloria declined; Violet spoke on the role of a liaison, the need for a fresh approach to the CO situation, and her ability to do the research necessary to resolve this issue; no consensus, vote: Andrea – no, Anita – yes, Jody – yes, Joy – yes, Hillary – yes, Margaret – no, Tony – no, Violet – yes, Gloria – abstain. – proposal passed
IV. VOTING QUEUE – Jody – 5 min.
(https://secure.gpus.org/cgi-bin/vote/login)
In the queue:
Platform Amendments – Regenerative Agriculture, Regenerative Agriculture and Climate Change, Progressive Global Wealth Tax, Ethical treatment of Animals in Sports, Education, HIV/Aids
Received for the queue: 2018 Platform Amendments: Climate Change and the Green New Deal – Floor Manager Gloria; Population Pressures and Resource Depletion – Floor Manager Margaret – 4 weeks discussion, 1 week vote
Online SC Proposals approved since last call and sent to the NC: None
V. OLD BUSINESS – 40 min.
a) Strategic Planning meeting – Gloria and Margaret – conference call Monday, Jody will resend documents; suggestions for in-person meeting in DC after on-line conference call meeting (s), Jody will pay half her plane fare, Hillary will cover her own travel, there is $900 left in the ANM SC travel budget line
b) ETC Report – Charles – first step is a post to voting page for people to confirm – call this week to organize that effort; delay because committee member involved in primary election; it will take 1 wk to get ballots posted, a few weeks after that to put out report
c) Freshdesk – Andrea – no update – still working to reschedule training
d) ANM summary – Margaret incoming liaison, not all bills paid yet
e) Letter to Green Uprising (GU) – Margaret, Gloria, Violet – list of questions covers two issues – legal and general, legal questions need to be answered first; Rich Whitney has agreed to consult with SC as requested though this is not his area of expertise; draft list of questions to be sent to SC including the question of liability if we have information and the process of communicating with candidates; discussion of using consultants who are Greens – or including independents – or those who do not work for the Dems; Anita encourages developing a team by sending feelers out to Greens first; broad preliminary outreach approved
For future agenda: Tech – voting page/ETC and misc. maintenance
End recording of call – 10:10 Eastern
VI. EXECUTIVE SESSION – none
TOTAL TIME: 2 hours 10 minutes
Jody Grage, Secretary