Process minutes: 2021-07-14

Agenda:

7/14/21
Process Committee Mtg
7-8pm via Zoom
Members: BeckyH , Jillian, Patti
Present: Becky H, Jillian. Patti has moved north! (sniffle!)

Minutes:

Agenda:
1. Checkins
2.Task Review
3. Current and next work seasons, any discussion needed as of now
4. Willie’s email with BOA suggestions
5. Discussion about changing the word Monkey to something neutral
6. Next meeting
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2.Task Review
- RE-TASK: Jillian to work on new blocking proposal with Mary King and run
a new draft by Process. Not had time to work on this yet. See previous
minutes for details.
- TASK: Becky to follow up with Patti about these two work assignments to
see if she was able to get them covered.
- TASK: Jillian will reply to Willie’s email about a BOA related temp
process job

3. Current and next work seasons, any discussion needed as of now?

Jillian can step in to convene for the rest of this work season; when the
next work season is closer we can start “advertising” for a new member and
/ or convenor. Seems like fewer people are on committees these days, and
many are on two committees.

Patti did have some meeting assignments, this is what Jillian had written
down:
Wed 8/4 - ALT Andrew, Patti assist, and Catherine minutes
Mon 8/16 - regular meeting facilitated by Amy and Dan, Patti minutes

TASK: Becky to follow up with Patti about these two work assignments to see
if she was able to get them covered.


4. Willie’s email with BOA suggestions






*----As I'm going through the new member orientation (as I did a couple
months ago with Pat and now with Sophia), I come across this line in the
instructions:"Explain key community agreements before they move in, such as
work requirements, pet policy, parking." We have so many agreements that
it's hard to figure out which ones are "key". I have a couple ideas:A) We
ought to have a way of making our "key" agreements publicly accessible.
This used to be a feature with the book of agreements, but it broke, and I
haven't had the time to spend on fixing it... also, Tom Smyth said that he
was going to put some energy into integrating a Book of Agreements into
Gather. I haven't heard from him about his progress. I'll reach out to him
now.*

Process: Sounds great, please let Process know what you find out, we’ve
been meaning to ask about this as well - this is a pretty high priority.

*B) We ought to, from time to time, go through and clean up the Book of
Agreements content. There are many minutes which have the same exact
content, but were sent multiple times, so they were ingested multiple
times. There are also some which are "historical", such as removing the
basketball hoop, *

Process: We totally agree its a good idea to delete repeated items.
We think the plan has been to keep historical agreements but just mark them
as obsolete. Eg perhaps it will be useful some time to know when that
happened and we removed the basketball hoop. Is there a way to mark
agreements as obsolete in an obvious way, and, have them be findable?


*C) "Refreshing" agreements. In the past, we have had success in reminding
the community about the agreements that we have reached. Ideally, this
takes <5 minutes and can be done when we aren't currently experiencing a
problem with the agreement.*
Process: Agreed that this is a good idea. This is usually just part of
Process’s regular tasks but it can’t hurt to have someone focus on it more
for one season, but probably best for the position to focus first on things
Process never gets to.


*D) Digging through our agreements to find entries which were supposed to
be temporary, and then revisited 6 or 12 months later, that we did not
handle.*
Process: Agreed it would be good to get a list of those and then Process
would have to decide the next step.


*E) Add a summary / synopsis for each agreement. This is used in the
listing display, and words in the summary are scored higher in the search
results than in the body.*
Process: This seems ok to do if time allows but perhaps not as critical as
some of the other tasks?


*I was thinking that perhaps some of these duties could be folded into a
temporary job for the upcoming season, and perhaps others are more ongoing
jobs that could be performed each season. I would be willing to do this the
first time.*
Process is friendly to this idea. Next we can discuss how much time per
month might be the right amount for an initial one-time job; perhaps
hearing back from Tom might inform this, if Tom says he could use help with
some tasks related to getting the BOA in Gather Process would definitely
like to help this happen.
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TASK: Jillian will reply to Willie’s email about a temp process job.

5. Discussion about changing the word Monkey and Monkey on My Back to
something neutral

The word Monkey has historically been used in a racist way and can have
negative associations for African Americans. And, "Monkey on My Back"
actually refers to an addiction one cannot control, in the 1930s
specifically to heroin. Our use of it was just for fun - now we know it's
not fun for some people, so let's not use it any more. We need to come up
with another term that is neutral and ideally fun in some way.

TASK: Bring a brainstorm to a community meeting for another word or phrase
for task that is positive? Or just bring a proposal?

Albatross around your neck - is that from a poem?
Google search: “The phrase alludes to Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem “The
Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” in which a sailor who shoots a friendly
albatross is forced to wear its carcass around his neck as punishment.”
Hm. NOT so positive.

How about Walrus?
A walrus what?

What do we have a lot of around here. Turtles, Frogs, Peepers? Geese!
How about a Goose on my Roof?

6. Next meeting
8/18/21 at 7pm
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Topic: Process committee
Time: Aug 18, 2021 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

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