[Sosfbay-discuss] Can We Help with a State Meeting?

[Jim Stauffer]

A couple weeks ago I circulated a message to Santa Clara and San Mateo Green
Parties asking if we could pull together a state meeting, called a
Gathering. A Gathering is a non-business meeting consisting of
presentations, workshops and speakers. There are no proposals and no delegates.

The January after the Presidential election is a prime time for this type of
event. People are still energized from the election and are ready to get
involved with politics. A center focus of this Gathering will be planning an
electoral strategy for the next few years. So this is an important meeting
for the Green Party.

Here's the current status of the planning. A final decision on whether or
not we can/will do this has to be made by this coming Wednesday. The target
dates for the Gathering are Jan. 10-11 or 24-25.

San Mateo has two people who are enthusiastic about the idea and began
scouting facilities that we could use. They've located a couple in the
Belmont area that look promising. We'll tour these and get a final cost
quote in the next few days. These facilities are not cheap ($1000 - $1200)
so budget constraints will have to be tight.

The other major issue to be resolved by Wednesday is if we have enough
volunteers to work on this project. We do have a short planning horizon,
which includes two holidays. This can done, but it does represent a
challenge. San Mateo is a smaller Local than Santa Clara and they're hoping
some people here can help out with the preparation before and at the event.

Preparing one of these events has to be done mostly by the people in the
immediate vicinity of the venue. But there are some things us southern
neighbors could help with. The two main tasks are housing and food.

Housing consists of recruiting homestay hosts -- people who can put up one
or more Gathering participants -- and compiling a list of affordable hotels.
I would guess there to be about half a dozen or so homestay requests at this
type of event.

Food consists of breakfast and lunch for both days. Breakfast is kept simple
-- bagels, muffins, fruit, coffee, tea, etc. The easiest lunch is to procure
take-out or catering. We should try to keep the cost at about $25 per day
per person.

Santa Clara folks could most easily help with the housing and the breakfast
part of the food. These are things that could be done with out having to
travel to Belmont.

Also, since a Gathering offers various workshops and presentations,
recruiting presenters from local green-leaning organizations is something we
can help with.

So, my question to all of you is, are the 4-to-6 people who would like to
help organize this event? As I said, we have to make a final decision by
Wednesday. If you are interested please email me and state what you can work on.


Jim Stauffer