Sorry for the delay in getting this out... and thank you Ellie for your post about the committees - that takes some of the work out of this for me. =) I'm happy to do minutes, and I appreciate your patience - with my schedule, I'll try really hard to get these out within a week of each meeting. I hope to capture most of the jist of what we talked about, but if I miss something, please feel free to correct me. Who was there: Bob & Sam, Edie & Brian, Jiro, Jerry, Poet, Kristi, Angel, Ellie & Tzara, and George & Robin. Agenda - debrief last year meetings decision making structures, food, etc. bus fundraisers art community building leadership (not all-inclusive or necessarily in this order). We agreed the facilitator is the person hosting the meeting. In this case, Bob and Sam. Brief de-brief: we did a phenomenal job in a short amount of time, once the framework was set. The restaurant was a great success. Much has already been debriefed, and when we talk about ST05, things from ST04 will certainly be discussed further. Didn't spend a lot of time on this. Meeting schedule. To try to allow for everyone's schedules, we decided to rotate the weekdays around. We agreed to meet once a month for the next three months, then about twice a month or as needed as August approaches. So far we've scheduled this: February - 9th - Wednesday March - 17th - Thursday April - 12th - Tuesday Meetings will be 7-9 pm, and Jiro will try to schedule these at his school place (? sorry I'm unclear what exactly this place is). There are 110 people on this Snuggletown! list. - FWIW, it was in my notes. There were 13 at the meeting. Just an observation - it would have been really crazy if 97 more people tried to pack into Bob & Sam's living room! Another thing about meetings - PLEASE EMAIL ME OFF LIST - I need to know from each of you that are local and available to be physically present at meetings - when is the best/worst time for you? Please email me privately at voluptasia@yahoo.com, and I will do my best to put together something so a maximum number of us can be present when we meet. This is why we rotated the day of the week for the meetings we set. There was much discussion of two other meeting topics - one for discussing/creating our purpose and mission statement, and another to brainstorm our vision - our presence on the playa as it ties into the theme and community. We agreed (if I'm not remembering right, or leaving something out, someone please feel free to correct me) that this (each) should be like a 4-hour block of time, preferrably on a Sunday, sometime in the next month or two. Brian and Angel have volunteered to facilitate. Think of the image of a bed - the bed frame is the mission, but the box spring is the vision. Then there's the bedding and pillows and other minutia that can go on top later, but it's important to have a good solid bed frame and sturdy box spring, so there's not a lot of squeaking when the mattress and bedding gets romped on. Or something like that. These longer meetings would be for brainstorming, not necessarily trying to reach a decision by the end of the meeting, but just going with the flow and seeing what happens. It would be a good idea if people read about the theme first - Hey! Here's an easy link: http://www.burningman.com/themecamps_installations/bm05_theme.html So please, those of you who want to be involved in this part of planning, email me off list with a few suggested dates for Sundays in February or early March, where we can get together for these. I'll get back to the group once I can narrow it down to 2-3 dates and we can decide from there, or if the meeting date just jumps out at me from your responses, I'll ink it. Re: decision making - we had much discussion (which I can't possibly relate verbatim here) about how to make decisions within the group. I believe a majority of people felt the process is just as important as the outcome, for community connection. We must respect each other's concerns and time. (Please see Ellie's email here about committees) - The group seemed to agree that having a head of each committee report to the larger group meetings but letting each committee work out their own decision-making process is a good way to do this. Most people felt consensus is the highest form of community-building, with a dictatorship on the other end of the specturm. Anything in between is good, if everyone agrees on it (is that concensus?). =) We also thought it important that leaders for each committee be present and accessible on the playa. Are you still with me? Just a few more things - Re: bus/fundraisers - we anticipate getting some funds from Rapture (January 22 - register now if you aren't already registered: http://www.lovetribe.org/ ), and from the Explorer's Erotic Ball (Feb 19 - same link). Bob understands repaying him for the bus is a priority, and that this will happen as we're able to do it. The group agreed Arthur did an outstanding job with finances last year, and since he wasn't present, we agreed he should head this up this year as well. The fundraising committee so far is: Arthur, Brian, Ellie, and George. Angel told us that Eric from The BRC Botique talked to him about collaborating with Snuggletown! for a kissing booth at their Mardi Gras Party. The party date might be 2/5. Angel said he'd forward something about this to the group. We discussed the concept of 'radical inclusion' - the community, the committees, the group at large, and how we relate to and include one another. The most important thing we can do is radiate the energy of the whole group, in the way we want to be (mission/vision) and we will draw what we need, and people not drawn to it will find something they connect more with. We discussed having a process to address trouble or disharmony within the group(s). (Conflict resolution committee?) This is an ongoing discussion and will likely be brought up again at our longer Sunday meeting. And most importantly, as fun as it is to plan all this and go to the playa together, let's plan some time to just have FUN together!!