[Imc] steering notes 3-31-02

[Paul Riismandel]

IMC Steering Notes  3-31-02

Items for Next Agenda: Anti-ism language for structure document, discussion
on buying our building.

Present: James J., Jenny S., Sascha M., Avram G-T, Ellen K., Brian H., Mike
L., Clint p., Paul R (typingwithoutaspacebar)

Reports:

Finance: We'll know if we're running a defecit soon. Need money.

Shows: last night went well, we made about 75 bucks total, looking into
fundraising to buy an amp in future.

Librarians: got some more books,didn't have a meeting last week.

Space: insurance guy is coming on Monday to look at broken window. Landlords
are leaving town in a year, selling building looking more likely. next
meeting we'll start discussion on buying building.

News: orion doing mondays show, we need more people. James asks if they
should do PSA on the show. They're trying to do a general outline for
promoting IMCstuff during the show.  

Print: no spoke! no report.

Tech: No meeting last week, no report.

OLDBIZ

Membership  Meeting: Ellen reports that although it went 3.5 hours  and was
thin towards the end, people who stayed were positive, good thoughts  about
the process used to review the structure. Changes to the structure were
small, mostly to represent practice not already in the structure. Ellen
outlined changes that will be posted. Steering needs to come up with
language to describe that racism, sexism, other isms are not tolerated in
IMC meetings, will be an agenda item at next meeting. Ellen suggests that
the part of meeting notes that detail next week's agenda items be put at the
top of the notes distributed so that they are obvious.  

Group also talked about other concerns that people had that weren't directly
structure, but important nonetheless.  Ellen and Becca G. committed to
holding a meeting within  a month to discuss the expressed concerns 

Mike has a concern that the meeting was supposed to be about the structure
but got off track -- not sure if that's proper or not. Feels that maybe
there were implicit accusations behind some of the concerns expressed.
Ellen asked for clarification, Mike says that the concerns regarding racism
and sexism give him the impression that people feel it's going on but hasn't
been brought up. Ellen says that if Mike's concerns were so strong then Mike
should have stuck around, b/c those who did felt strongly that the language
be there. Mike says that he believes that we already have a policy about
this and conflict resolution procedures and that the steering group has
dealt.

Paul ranted, can't rant and type. The jist is that concerns aren't intended
to be accusations, and that these types of concerns can be difficult to
express directly in forums like existing working groups, which is why it's
important to have a safe forum dedicated to it. It's difficult to separate
issues of structure and how the org's culture works, but he thinks that we
did a good job of figuring out which were which and effectively dealing with
the structure issues constructively.

Avram doesn't think that putting this in the structure is anexpression that
there is a problem with racism or sexism. Avram thinks that some do think
that the fact that we are white and male does make some people think that
there is some quiet problem.
Brian says that there are some behaviors that many people associate with
being male, such as interrupting a speaker, that affect dynamics. They're
not necessarily IMC problems but social problems.

Jenny says that several women were leaving as she got involved, saying that
theywere intimidated by the heavy male presence, but she doesn't think this
is the fault of men. Maybe the women need to work to make this place
inviting to women.

Ellen doesn't think this is intended to say all you straight white men are
sexist, racist and homophobic.  That's why Ellen wants to create a space
where we don't  just address the concerns, because that's when it feels like
accusations, but to address actions, which obviously shouldn't be "throw all
the white men out."   Ellen has been at steering meetings since they began,
and has wondered why there aren't more women, but doesn't think we can say
"well, that's there problem," at the same time we shouldn't bend over
backwards. But if multiple people are raising the concern, then it is a 

Sascha does racial climate research, and it's most difficult to deal with
multiple views of pluralistic reality. The hardest thing is to move beyond
that.  What came out of the racial climate survey is the need for dialog.
The need to understand each other's perceptions, and the rationales and
logic behind them. Maybe it would be helpful to engage in these dialogs and
discussions, in large and small groups. Instead of getting into discussions
of what THE reality is, we should try to understand differing experiences,
and figure out how to address them. Concerns are sometimes built on
perceptions based on a very narrow range of experiences, and so can seem out
of proportion. But that just means we need discussion.  He's not sure if
that would be effective right now, it might be too hot, but maybe later in
the Spring.

Jenny says that some of her problems at IMC have been interpreted as sexism
issues, although she doesn't necessarily think theyhave been, when instead
they really were more interpersonal. It would be useful for  women to talk
together  about these things and experiences.

Ellen thinks it was pretty explicit in yesterday's meeting that we don't
want the steering group to be the venue for these discussions, and so we
shouldn't be the venue. Clearly these issues his people in sensitive spots.
She proposes that we stop this discussion now and let it take place in the
meeting designed for it.

NEWBIZ	
Camcorder Proposal
Paul has proposal to spend $1400 Allen Hall Residency on a digital camcorder
and necessary accessories.  Paul is leaving steering and moving his time to
teach video skills, hopefully on a regular basis weekly or biweekly.  Thinks
we can bring in a lot of people from outside IMC to do this, who really want
to do video. 

Generally OK, Sascha proposes allocate the Allen Hall money. Mike raises
concerns about training and security. Paul suggests that one training
session be a requirement to borrow the cam. No objections to this. Sascha
would like procedures and protocols figured out by tech, and let Steering
allocate money. James asks if Paul can find stuff cheaper so that we can .
Brian points out that maybe then we can do work for Free Speech TV, which
pays.  Ellen would like to make a friendly amendment that if there's money
left over it goes to general operating budget. No objections. Proposal
passes by consensus.

Announcements

Mike says that Living Wage is going up for vote in front of Urbana City
Council Monday night.

Brian says that the Prompting Theater has been tentatively awarded a $7000
grant from the Nat'l Endowment for the Arts.

Urbana Permaculture fundraiser April 1at SDAS.

Saturday is a teach-in  for AWARE 8pm Friday, 9-5 Saturday at Urbana Middle
School.

Brian says there was  a post on the Palestine IMC site that they are
evacuating their site because Israeli tanks are coming through. Two int'l
journalists are there as observers.

Clint declares that there'll be a 6-8pm potluck before Friday's Cabaret.

Sascha says that April 7 is the IMC Spring Cleaning. Be there or be dirty.