The Barrington Collective- Introductory Session (9/29/02)

1. Check-in:

a. People chatted

b. We passed around a contact sheet

2. What’s this all about? (of course this is just the general idea that people can accept or reject. It will become whatever the members want it to be because that’s what a collective is all about)

a. Networking people and resources

• The original intention in organizing the collective was to connect members of various cooperative and collectives. This was to include both members of the USCA co-ops, USCA co-op alumni and members of various cooperatives and collectives throughout the East Bay. This network will pool its resources and organize various events within the community that its members reside.

b. Filling the SMUC gap

• This is NOT another SMUC or is it supposed to be anything like SMUC (as Steven likes to say, we’re the anti-smuc)

c. Establishing connections with co-op alumni and incorporating others from outside the co-ops

• There’s a general feeling that there is a vast pool of co-op alumni living around the East Bay that has an enormous potential to organize with the general East Bay community and students currently in the co-ops. We aim to strengthen that connection as much as possible.

d. Something happening on a consistent basis

• We hope to have around two events a month- one larger and one smaller event. Hopefully we’ll incorporate more people and we’ll have even more events than this, but to have at least two a month is generally what we’re shooting for.

e. Publicized/ Known-

• Eventually we would like to be generally known around the East Bay cooperative and collective communities so that people will be encouraged to contact us to co-host events and for our events to be frequented by people who recognize us as a group that puts on fun, quality events.

f. Possible Funding-

• The possibility of eliciting donations at events or even charging for larger more popular events to help us purchase any supplies etc. for the event or for future events came up. Some also suggested that we try to get money from the ASUC or the USCA. At least one member preferred to remain totally independent from these organizational funding sources to avoid being constrained by various rules that they may impose upon the group. And to avoid the kind of recognition associated with “official” groups that encourages resume-builders to come and not actually do much.

g. Types of Activities-

• Types of activities are totally dependent upon what those who are organizing want to do with it. Some of the activities might include: art shows, movie screenings, DIY swaps, music events, lecture series, teach-ins, benefits, bike tours, discussion groups, zine workshops, art workshops, writing workshops and a mixture of these types of things put together.

3. Organizational Logistics-

a. bi-weekly meetings- general meetings will occur every other week. Meeting for various subgroups or for setting up for a particular project will occur whenever and however frequently those organizing the group or event decide.

b. Consensus- We want the meetings to be run on a consensus basis, which means that any member of the group can put up a block on any general votes we have. If they just disagree but don’t want to block a decision, they can say that they have a minor objection. All major objections should be addressed to try to come to some sort of compromise. After the first meeting, all new members must attend one meeting or organize one event before they can use a block. Although for most of our decisions this will be irrelevant because much decision-making will occur in a decentralized manner.

c. “collective mentality”- We addressed the difference between an organization and a collective. An collective involves rotating responsibilities, it becomes a support for who ever needs it at particular points in times, EVERYONE is a leader and has as much a say and has as much an opportunity to plan, create and organize events as anyone else, meetings will rotate places, facilitation of meetings will rotate, note-takers will rotate, etc.

d. Outreach/ Networking: organizing vs. specialties- This is our top priority at this point. We discussed recruiting a more diverse array of organizers, both in terms of interests (artists, writers, bike freaks, etc), and affiliation (no more Loth/ Kingman folks please!), meaning getting more pple from unrepresented co-ops to be part of the Barrington Collective. As far as organizers vs specialists go, the Collective proper will consist of organizers, such as ourselves, but some people may have particular skills that they want to offer. These people can help w/ events like sound systems, catering (food not bombs), or web design, but do not necessarily need to be organizers within the collective itself, showing up to regular meetings and such. (although they may come to a particular meeting if it is relevant to them personally). We are extremely interested in networking with other collectives and co-ops in the bay area (much like we are linked into the Long Haul Collective via Food Not Bombs). We would like all recruitment to be person specific at this point (think of people you know and talk to them specifically, and have them invite people specifically. This it becomes a more personal and quality group).

e. Publicizing- This is the how person specific thing that we were talking about instead of making announcements at meetings or posting flyers.

f. Resource Sheet- We would like to organize a centralized sheet of various resources that could be used for events. For example: we’ll list all the pa system equipment we have or movie projectors, etc. so that we will know where to look when putting on an event.

g. Calendar- We would like to have some kind of calendar accessible to people in the east baby communities of our events whether it be on a calendar or an automated phone line or posted somewhere. And we would also like to have one centralized organizer calendar since we might have a variety of events going on and we don’t want to overlap too much if it can be helped.

h. Frequency of events- We would like to have around two events per month (hopefully more) maybe one larger event and one smaller event. Or maybe two smaller events one month and then one smaller and one larger event the next month. But it just all depends on how much people want to do.

4. What Now?

a. After discussing various options the we decided that “The Barrington Collective” would be our official name in commemoration of the spirit of the residents of the Barrington Co-op.

b. Blake from CZ asked if we wanted to take on an RX Bandits show (they’re from out of town) but we decided that for now they’re weren’t enough people at the meeting interested in putting on a big music show right off the bat, especially if it didn’t combine other things with it, and since it was just a random out of town band that no one was especially into enough to want to put on the show.

c. Outreach to Individuals- People at the meeting discussed various people that they wanted to try to contact and were to contact them before the next meeting. d. Compilation of resources for resource sheet- we kind of skipped over this.

e. Brain-storming session- we had a big brain-storming session with different ideas for where this collective was headed. The ideas discussed as possibilities included:

• screening the co-op movie “sustainable communities” but not at Loth or Kingman
• forming a biking sub-group that that meets separately to discuss and organize events surrounding biking as a way to travel
• forming a Spanish-speaking subgroup
• having a lecture series with our favorite professors or with members of the community
• forming a writer’s subgroup that Steven wanted to call the “writer’s bloc”
• having a film screening of DIY or die
• having a co-op garden tour and incorporating into that lessons on how to start your own garden.
• Having a bike-tour of collectives around the East-Bay (maybe making it “a critical mass” of individuals.
• Having a cooking skillshare on making stuff like soymilk, hummus and granola (Thomas made fun of Steven who mentioned this for how hippie-like the particular things he mentioned; he defended himself saying that he associated them with punk rock

)

• Having an herb/ cooking skill share
• Coordinating a NASCO report back
• Having work parties as various co-ops
• Making a web-page
• Having a zine fest
• Having a big DIY SWAP (maybe in conjunction with the DIY or Die screening)
• Having a message board that we can communicate on

f. Next meeting- We established that our next meeting was to be at the House House of Stone (a.k.a.- Casa Zimbabwe

• Zimbabwe means house of stone in Swahili (spelling?))