Membership Committee meeting notes 3/30/07
Present: Yuki, Federico, Ann, Lara, Joe
1) Bienvenidos Committee Proposal
- Aurisha will present to the BC meeting on Monday
- open up membership at least every 6 months or as needed
- goal to keep some old members and get new members on
- revisit whole proposal after 1 year
- maintain demographic information, not survey
- invite to dinners and meetings, not a dinner and a meeting
2) Stakeholder Documents
- next step: having conversations with people who came here
intentionally but are not currently participating
- handing them a narrative: Joe will draft it and send it to the
membership committee
- this will be about sitting down and having conversations, not just
giving people a piece of paper to read
- do we want to solicit input now, or wait until things are more fleshed out
- don’t want people to start participating just to avoid having to pay
higher rent
- we might not decide rent issues until after we own the building
- should we also have try to have conversations with long-term
residents? Is there a possibility that their rents will be raised as
well?
- have we talked to a lawyer about different rents based on participation?
- questions to ask people (Ann’s brainstorm):
· Do you have questions or concerns about the transition to co-op
ownership of the buildings?
· What do you think about the stakeholder rights, responsibilities,
and benefits document?
· Which category do you see yourself fitting into?
· Do you anticipate your current level of participation changing in
the future? What would make you more interested in participating in
LAEV activities?
· How should we handle the situation of people who moved here
intentionally but no longer participate? What do you think is fair?
· If we allow people who moved here intentionally to “opt out” of our
participation requirements, would you choose that option?
· Do you think it is fair for us to raise rents to market rates for
people who opt out? How about for long term residents?
- should we take out the rent questions for now?
- talk to everybody?
- is there agreement about the community about giving people an option
to opt out?
- who should have the option to opt out? Just people who are
low-income? Non-antagonistic? Could do it based on length of time
they’ve been here.
- probably need a very clear line if we’re giving an opt out option
based on low-income?
- could have a go-round with people at a meeting about concerns about
resolving this issue
- argues for putting off the issue of raising rents until the co-op is formed
- need to do research on all the legalities?
- currently, CRSP subsidizes rent because it is interested in offering
affordable housing and fostering an ecological community
- making people aware that their rent is subsidized seems like a good
idea…but is this really true? Rents are more than expenses at this
point.
- “below market” is more accurate than “subsidized”
- could have different voices, different “articles”
- some of us feel a need for more information about where people are
at to make these difficult decisions
- ethical obligation to inform people about what is going on and get
their input
- important to be clear about what we’re communicating and how we’re
communicating it
- the transition should not be a surprise
- try to express things in several ways so that it registers
- Joe will draft something…”transition newsletter volume 1”. Also why
transition. He will write the text by Sunday night. - Ann will write a text about values we’re trying to uphold.
- Yuki will work on a visual representation of the stakeholder documents.
3) New Membership Process
- need a revised process document: probably a short, clear version and
a longer version
- short version: a couple paragraphs and a checklist
- clarify what the fee is? Maybe $25? Goes to CRSP until transition.
Will seek approval from the community.
- need to outline factors that go into community making a decision
about letting people advance in the process
- develop orientation
- revise questionnaire
- what is the state of development of Esfandiar’s orientation? Could
he do an outline for the BC? Lara will ask him for an outline of the
community and respectful communication parts
- 3 part orientation in 1 session, aim for 1 hour: consensus,
community, respectful communication
- materials that get development for the orientation should allow
multiple people to do it: “open source”
- for questionnaire: divide into questions we need answered to allow
us to move forward with the process and other questions which are
optional
- Lara will draft a description of what the community green light would mean.
- Yuki will propose the $25 fee at the BC meeting and outline what
we’re working on, goal to start in May. - Yuki will work on a one-page outline for the consensus part of the
orientation. - Ann will work on revising the questionnaire.
- Next meeting will be determined by the online tool…Yuki will initiate again.