Process minutes: 2009-07-14

Agenda:

Process Cmtee meeting
7/14/2009
7-8, CH sitting room

AGENDA:
1. Checkins
2. Monkeys
3. Fall 2009 process jobs
4. Check in on Book of Agreements work
5. Changing the date of December community meeting
6. Revisiting the General community meeting start time
7. Next steps on choosing the focus and setting the date for the fall skills
and thrills
8. Taking another look at the process mandate
9. Followup with Membership
10. Next Meeting


Present: Gail, Catherine, Jillian

2. Monkeys/Cooler/Freezer items from previous meetings:

MONKEY and COOLER: Process to ask minute takers to come to a process meeting
at the start of each work term to talk about the full minute taker job
description, and talk about the using names issue so they are aware of some
of nuances.

COOLER:
Discussion about how CRC members are chosen, is that working ok?

COOLER: Naming names in committee meeting minutes, periodically reread
current guidelines, make sure they're ok for both committees and plenary

Ongoing MONKEY: CRC should talk about the fact that they can't all to rotate
off at the same time. What are the current CRC members each thinking about
their terms, who is willing to continue? If everyone wants to continue for a
while that's great, its just that when folks do want to rotate off it needs
to be staggered.

DONE: Gail will email renters to make sure they know, that they are
encouraged to participate fully in meetings, that their voice counts as much
as anyone else's, there are very few decisions they can't be part of. (This
should be spelled out in the levels of membership agreement.)

ONGOING MONKEY: when there are new people send them an invite to come to
community meetings.

ONGOING MONKEY: Jillian will remind infoco that: Facilitators should (1)
send out agenda at least 2 days ahead and then a reminder on the day of the
meeting, and (2) consider putting a slip of paper in every mailbox about the
meeting as well, at least a day ahead. Just to see if it helps.

Ongoing-MONKEY: Maybe all think about this for our next meeting. How can we
make the thank-you board more active. Could we make a game out of it, or
encourage people.

Re-MONKEY: Catherine will put hooks and fishing line on the vision
statement. She has been working with Heather on it.

COOLER: We need to talk about committee-level decisions and how they could
get entered in the BOA - they are not currently getting in.

DONE: Gail will send out the facilitation/minute taking schedule; people
should send swap info to Gail so she can post the final version on the work
board and on email to "talk".

DONE: Jillian will print out a few more copies of the Quorum proposal (Gail
has 13 already) and bring them.

DONE: Jillian will post large sheets of paper with the history of trainings
and people can comment between now and then.

DONE: Catherine will intro the training discussion. Catherine will check in
with Mary and Sarah about their plans for the agenda item.

DONE: Jillian will email Catherine pieces of the process mandate that apply
to training.

DONE: Catherine will email the pieces from the process mandate to Talk and
will print some out to bring to the meeting.

Minutes:

MONKEYS from this meeting:

MONKEY: Catherine will check in with CRC about the next work season

MONKEY: Jillian will email the jobs and work hours to work cmtee, at
process's next meeting we can work more on preassigns.

MONKEY: Gail will email out the proposal for changing the cmty meeting date
(once we know if we're on the agenda) and present on 7/20.

COOLER: Lets revisit/suggest the community meeting start time for a fall
meeting topic.

MONKEY: Jillian will email Patti about adding the 2009 community weekend
topic choice to the August community meeting.

MONKEY: Jillian will email a tweaked draft of the Process mandate to process
with a new category iii, COMMUNITY BUILDING, with a bullet or two under it.

MONKEY: Jillian will let process know what I hear back from membership re
good times to get together to help them plan a community meeting discussion.

--------------
3. Process jobs for fall 2009:

1 convenor, same hours (2)
2 committee members, same hours (2)
1 steering rep, same hours (1)
3 CRCers, same hours (2)
4 minute takers, same hours (1)
7 facilitators, same hours (1.5)
1 Agenda planner, same hours (1)
1 infoco convenor, same hours (2)
2 Alt meeting leaders, same hours (.75)
1 Book of Agreements tech, same hours (2)
1 Book of Agrements agreement entering and minutes cleanup, same hours (1)
1 Archivist, same hours (1)

Any changes needed to the hours? We've adjusted for the fall meetings.

CRC is currently Catherine, Susan, Alicia.
MONKEY: Catherine will check in with CRC about the next work season

How's it been going on CRC? Seems ok, CRC has been doing some proactive
work, has not been approached by community members with problems lately, as
a full group in any case. Perhaps individuals.

Did Jillian hear back from others besides Sarah about prescheduling an
alternative meeting for Sept or Dec? Nope, just Sarah.

MONKEY: Jillian will email the jobs and work hours to work cmtee, at
process's next meeting in August we can work more on preassigns. (hopefully
that's not too late for work cmtee?)

See Addendum for Process jobs from Fall 2008 as FYI.



4. Check in on BOA work

WIllie and Jim are literally working on getting Jim G logged in to BOA right
now! Good. Jim can go back and find all the agreements from 1/2009 through
now and get them in. Jim G should please let Process know if he needs any
help.



5. Changing the date of the December 2009 regular community meeting.

Idea to move from 12/21 to 12/14 for better attendance. Seems like it should
be a friendly move. Good to do now since it affects meals. Good to do in
case we need to finalize budget and need quorum at that meeting. A meeting
the same week as Xmas is not going to get good attendance.

Jillian emailed Patti and asked about it being added to the July community
meeting, have not heard back yet.

MONKEY: Gail will email out the proposal for changing the cmty meeting date
(once we know if we're on the agenda) and present on 7/20.


6. Revisting the community meeting start time

Issue was brought to process that the previous agreement was not brought
back to the community at the end of the second "trial period". This seems
lower priority than the other process agenda items. Lets hold it off until
September.

COOLER: Lets suggest the community meeting start time for a fall meeting
topic.

Notes on this from previous process meeting:

Willie's email about the community meeting time change - proposed in 1/2007.
We talked about it again in April 2007 and extended it to the end of August
2007. Gail looked to see if we did talk about the meeting time change again
after August 2007 and we did not. Oops. Loose thread.

Put it on the agenda as a check-in? Seems like we should, and we should have
a copy of the proposal with the pros and cons, and the minutes. Highly
likely people will want to keep it as-is but we should tie up this loose
end.


7. Choosing fall topic

Infoco talked about this at our 6/4/2009 meeting. Came up with 4 broad
categories at Infoco for all the topics. (see addendum below.) Also
suggested some of the topics within the four categories could be alternative
meetings instead.

Do we need to come up with more of a guideline for the kinds of things to
do. What are we as Process expecting out of the training day? That comes
back to our mandate which seemed a bit too narrow in light of the community
discussion. The process mandate really talks about a narrow focus of
consensus process and communication.

I think its important to look at that some of these ideas are not "deep"
enough to merit a weekend kind of event where we hire outside help etc.
There is certainly a place for that but does it merit the process time and
outside help.

Maybe some years we would not end up hiring outside help - if the community
wants to prioritize making a mural for example and does not want to
prioritize the "learning" kind of event - we would need money for
childcare/food/supplies etc but might not need to hire an outside person.

All categories involve community building. Category 3 is explicitly focused
on building connections and getting to know eachother. Is Category 4 the
right name? Kindof a catchall.

How about calling 4. "Learning" rather than "Education", might be better.

Might be the August agenda for this.

We could potentially pull some of these ideas out and create an alternative
meeting category. Maybe that will sort itself out on its own though. Once we
choose a category then we have to refine within a category and then it
should be clearer what people want to do. Doubtful we would hone in on a
really small topic.

MONKEY: Jillian will email Patti about adding the 2009 community weekend
topic choice to the August community meeting.

Have we set a date yet? I don't think so. Would be good to do soon.
Generally 2nd weekend in November. Maybe in August propose a date too -
propose the weekend and then we may need one full day or two half days.

One long day or two short? Maybe will depend on what we do. If we're
bringing in someone from the outside etc.

If anyone things of other names - Infoco started using Skills and Thrills
but don't know if that's what we should stay with. Some good words in the
4/20 community meeting... Needs to be general enough to cover all these
possibilities. Email process with any additional ideas.

So in August we do a dot storm to pick a category. Then list the current
ideas in that category and see if there are additional ideas. Then another
dot storm to narrow down.


8. Process mandate (see addendum)

It came up that we should add some wording that is more broad. Not that we
should take out the consensus support and communication support that are in
there. It's more about what to add, in addition to this.

The last entry in the current category ii, seems like it could be broken out
as an item in a new category. What should the category be called? iii.
COMMUNITY BUILDING seems like it would fit. That broad category would cover
all the diverse kinds of interests and ideas that came up around planning
weekend events.

We've been adding member resources that are not just about consensus,
communication, and decision making. That could be another bullet under iii.

MONKEY: Jillian will email a tweaked draft of the mandate to process with a
new category iii, COMMUNITY BUILDING, with a bullet or two under it.



9. Followup with Membership

Jillian emailed Sarah about some potential meeting times for Process to meet
with Membership.

MONKEY: Jillian will let process know what I hear back from membership re
good times to get together to help them plan a community meeting discussion.

I think a community meeting discussion could re-energize and help clarify.
Sounds like within membership cmtee there is confusion about what has been
completed and what's not been, too.


10. Next meeting

Lets aim for Wednesday Aug 5, as a one-time exception due to vacations. In
August we'll need to look at our Sept date.

Gail leaves on 9/8 and gets back on 9/21
Jillian leaves on 9/20 and get back on 9/30.

So maybe we'll meet early in Sept too.

--end--
------------
ADDENDUMS: PROCESS JOBS FROM FALL 2008, PROCESS MANDATE, INFOCO DISCUSSION
FROM 6/4/2009, CMTY MEETING DISCUSSIONS FROM 5/18/2009 AND 4/20/2009
---

Process jobs from Fall 2008:


PREASSIGN: Process Convener - Jillian (same hours, 2)

PREASSIGN: CRC - Catherine, Susan, Alicia (same hours, 2)

LiLaCC Convenor - open - if no one expresses interest, delete (1 hour)

PREASSIGN: Archivist - Gail (same hours, 1)

PREASSIGN: BofA Tech - Willie (same hours, 2)

Infoco Convenor - open (same hours, 2) (Jillian will take it if no other
facilitator expresses interest)

PREASSIGN: Agenda planner - Gail (same hours, 1)

PREASSIGN: Facilitate - Amy H., Alicia, Jillian, Mary, Patti, Sarah, Elph (7
facils, same hours, 1.5)

Alternative Meeting Leaders (please don't label as "facilitators" in the
survey, is confusing) - open (2 leaders, same hours, 0.75)(Process cmtee
received a couple emails so we know of some interest now by Megan (for
December) and Emily for Membership (for September) but will see what else we
get.)

Minutes - open (4 minute takers, same hours, 1)

BofA content entry - open (same hours, 1)

PREASSIGN: Process steering rep - Gail (same hours, 1)

PREASSIGN: Process Counted member - Catherine, Gail (same hours, 2)

-----

>From Infoco minutes, 6/4/2009

2. Skill and Thrills next step

Looked at the minutes with the wide ranging brainstorm of ideas people had
about what to work on. Idea - break them into categories, have people dot
storm the categories and then we could brainstorm and rank within a catagory
to pick a topic.

Categories:

1. Having a physical/actionable project to work on together

Art in community project - murals, sculptures
Michigan or regional cohousing forum/conference
Landscaping
Greenhouse


2. Long Term Planning

5 year plan for CH
Aging in Place
Expanding out sense of Neighborhood with Lakestone, TS, SW
Sustainability, energy saving, waste - as community and individuals (also in
Education)
Environmental Stewardship (also in education)
Peak Oil
Disaster planning, natural disaster long-term change planning


3. Personal sharing, getting to know eachother
Retreat
Spirituality in our lives
7 year itch - clear the air, rebuild personal connections
Hearing people's stories
Round robin skills sharing


4. Education (both community and personal)(any of these could start as
alternative meetings and might be enough as alternative meetings)
Personal and financial planning
*Back to basics - what is an intentional community
Different stages of kids while growing up in community - being aware that
this is a unique place to grow up so how do we build on that
Death - Sunward has dealt with community members dying, can learn from their
experience. And green burials. And some sharing too.
Entrepreneurialism - have a workship about how to encourage
entrepreneurialism, in individauls and as a community
*Sustainability, energy saving, waste - as community and individuals (also
in Long Term Planning)
Environmental Stewardship (also in planning)
Food - what we eat together, local sources of food
Sex - discussion about differences in their approach to sex. have people
from different styles and choices and share about it (poly, celibate, gay)
Cooking classes
Learning to appreciate native plants

Along with the catagories, mention these ideas:
IDEA: Alternative meetings as a resting place for some of these

IDEA: If we know local people who would be good at leading a particular
style or topic it might help us choose one, would save money (low hanging
fruit)

IDEA: Design whatever we do to involve kids, other than the snacks. (The
kids were part of the weeding project last night - they helped and had fun
searching for worms.)

----------------

>From 5/18/2009 community meeting:

Weekend gatherings discussion (formerly known as trainings)

People decided that we hate the word "training". We had some really good
discussions that night. Jillian reviews various keywords:

growth, renewal, trust building, retreats, focused, planning, energizer,
exchange,

2 distinct categories:
- working to solve a problem (when we met with Laird)
- all other "skills and thrills", education, community building

going forward:
- plan and budget for 1 "skills and thrills" event a year. Topic and
style will
vary

- If an issue arises when we need help with external facilitation, we
may tap
into the steering emergency fund

Costs for a "skills and thrills" event, this year we have budgeted
$1800 for a
n $8 hour event. Various costs: childcare, presenter, travel,
supplies, food.
Budget for the year is generally $1700 - $1900.

Brainstorm for Fall 2009: (topic generation)

- two diversity trainings
- consensus process
- community building (learn about each other)
- parenting discussion
- conflict resolution, or learned about resolving conflict
- training in personal finance and financial planning (for individuals)
- why don't we all go away to some place all together?
- swap with TS
- love the focused 5-year planning for CH
- art in community, similar to landscaping and building (planning and
making)
- spirituality, would like to have a focused and in-depth conversation
about
what spirituality gives us in our lives
- back to basics: what is an intentional community?
- coming upon our "7 year itch", clear the air, rebuild connections
and trust.
Where we are in our group development
- expanding our sense of neighborhood with Lakestone, TS & SW
- different stages of kids while growing up in community (teens vs
young kids)
- death, folks at SW have dealt with it, they can share what they've
learned
- entrepreneurialism - ways that individuals can take their ideas and
have
value
- sustainability, energy saving, waste, not only as a community but
also as
individuals.
- environmental stewardship
- peak oil, what's the next step? emergency response, pre-planning
before a
natural disaster, and disaster planning, preparing for long-term
changes
- michigan (or regional) co-housing forum
- discussion of food, and what we eat together, local sources of food
- cooking classes
- sex, why are we so interested in it?
- landscapy-growy thing, perhaps discuss the greenhouse, low-
maintenance,
learning to appreciate native plants, hands-on thing
- hearing people's stories, but having more time to explore that
- round-robin skills sharing, and give people a taste of those things
- whole lot of kids, something that involves them somehow, besides
just the
snacks
- aging in place

-------------

>From the 4/20/2009 community meeting

from 4/20/2009 community meeting

6. Process - Value of Training - discussion - Catherine

When we did the last budget process, there was a request to talk about
training at a time with less pressure. This is it.

Catherine handed out a copy of the section of the Process Committee
mandate which indicates that Process is responsible for providing
educational opportunities about consensus decision making, encouraging
respectful dialogue, supporting conflict resolution, creating
experiences that build community and sense of respect and appreciation
for each other.

We'd like to accomplish these two things:

1. Clarify what it is that we do when we come together as a group.
We are going to have a conversation about what we think training is.
(Is training even the right word?)

2. Then we'll talk about logistical issues: cost, frequency, etc.
If not enough time for this tonight, we'll bring it back another time.

Jillian and Sarah made some posters to illustrate the history of
training and special community meetings at Great Oak.

Jillian defined the terms as they were used in the posters:

Training: when we come together to learn something -- community
education
Special community meetings: when we try to come together to reach
agreement (e.g. basketball meeting, grounds master plan meeting)

The word "training" got used in a lot of different ways especially
because of the facilitation training led by Laird. We would like to
get more clarity around this now.

The large group divided into three small groups to discuss #1.

Came back together in a large group and collected this ideas:

N A M E I T !
workshops
growth
renewal
energizer
community building sessions
planning
problem solving
skill building
intensives
community building
retreats
pow wow
gathering
retreat
focused sessions
special community meetings
long-ass time with your neighbors

C L A I M I T !
G
Reat
Oak
Weekend
Togetherness
Happenings

Focused
Interconnectedness
Education
Planning
Structured
Development
Time
Matrix
Foundation Building
Sharing
Togetherness
Trust
Exchange
Giving of ourselves
Spending time together
Working on the "hard stuff" together

What is it that we're trying to do? Why doesn't the word Training
work for us?
Sounds too corporate, not like community.

In one group, they talked about what ISN'T training:
- meals, parties, work days

Extended periods of time with deliberate mixing so we get to know each
other more deeply in new ways. Pam's recent alternative meeting
achieved this.
Need to have time to work on issues that are hard (parking, children,
basketball).
We have a high level of facilitation skill at GO. We need to keep
working at these skills.

Community communication -- not fragmented

Giving and sharing of yourself, to build trust, which can help with
reaching agreements.

Problem-solving: seems more important to me to attend when we have
something meaty to work on. I want to feel like I'm getting something
accomplished.

If we are an intentional community, this is the part that makes it
seem intentional. You are mindful of the fact that you are a community.

So what do we call this?

Goat Raining
Okey Dokey
Go Latte
Focus Sessions

Send more name ideas to Process. Next step: talk about logistics,
and make sure all this gets captured in Process Com's mandate going
forward.

----------------

Process Mandate 2005-01-17 (from BOA)
Summary:
Process Committee Mandate
Proposal:
Are we empowered? No

What is our global task in service to the community?
The Process committee actively supports the decision-making and
communication processes the community uses at the individual, committee and
community level to accomplish it's goals.

i. CONSENSUS SUPPORT
The Process committee actively supports the community's commitment to using
consensus in our decision-making processes by:
- organizing and supporting effective facilitation for general community
meetings, including agenda planning;
- providing resources and opportunities for individual members and the group
to develop and strengthen our understanding of, and participation in,
consensus decision-making;
- keeping consensed-on decisions visible so that the work of the community
is respected;
- supporting the GO committee system by:
o clarifying and educating members about our agreed on structures and
processes;
o supporting committees in clearly identifying their mandates;
o supporting committees in communicating effectively with the general
community;

ii. COMMUNICATION SUPPORT
The Process committee actively supports and encourages respectful dialogue
that provides for the expression of diverse views on both the individual and
community level by:
- providing individual members and committees with resources that enable
them to effectively identify and resolve conflicts;
- providing resources and support to committee and general meeting
facilitators on how to effectively encourage and support dialogue in group
discussion;
- creating on-going opportunities for community building experiences that
support our developing sense of respect and appreciation for each other

What are we responsible for?
- Facilitation of General Community Meetings, including agenda planning;
- Setting the frequency of general meetings based on input from the
community;
- Providing resources for individual members and committees to understand
and effectively use the community's agreed upon processes and structures;
- Providing resources and trainings to individuals and the community to
support effective conflict resolution and consensus decision-making
processes;

What aren't we responsible for?
- The outcome of specific community decisions;
- Approving or endorsing the content of specific proposals;
- Resolving conflicts within committees, between committees, between
committees and individual members, between individual members, or
community-wide conflicts;

What is expected of committee members?
- Intention to work on behalf of the community's well-being;
- Participation in committee discussions - in-person at committee meetings
whenever possible, via e-mail when appropriate or necessary.
- Willingness to take on and follow-through with occasional tasks outside of
committee meeting time; ability to realistically estimate completion time
for tasks; ability and willingness to say "No" to such requests; willingness
to ask for help/support when you need it;
- Respect for confidentiality regarding personal conflicts or other
sensitive issues that may be discussed by the committee;

Objectives: What projects/proposals are we currently working on?
- Drafting a proposal that outlines processes for effective
decision-making/communication at the committee level; ETA: March, 2005;
- Drafting a proposal that will clarifies the consensus terms and processes
we use at GO; ETA: April, 2005;
- Supporting implementation of an electronic Book of Agreements; ETA: April,
2005;
- Supporting implementation of an on-line archive of committee and general
community meeting minutes; ETA: Spring 2005;
- Support the CRC in requesting agenda time (at least once a quarter) during
general business meetings for community building experiences that support
our developing sense of respect and appreciation for each other;

Where do we get our funding?
- We are funded through the GOCA operating budget;
- We submit our budget needs to the community's consensus based budget
process;
- Process line items are dedicated to: archive materials, expenses related
to providing training and resources, and community meeting supplies;


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