So glad to hear that despite losing some important contributors due to moving, there are volunteers to continue the web site and other Ministry projects.
Thanks, Joe

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General notes.. Jesse and Maggi under the impression that nothing started until August 18th, the kick -off date for the Organizing Drive. Edgar went back to past notes and […]

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Just thought I'd give you a little report on what we accomplished at yesterday's Workers Committee outreach.

Aaron and I went over to South Park to canvass. Despite having absolutely no plan, and no pre-conceived "rap" of what we were going to say, we had some success and learned some important things. We walked several blocks of Rutledge. Our main objective was to find people who were willing to have us come back and have a longer, one-to-one conversation. We found one woman who was very interested and said she would call us. We plan on going back if she doesn't contact us. We spoke with one spanish-speaking woman who didn't respond to our rap very well, but when I asked her if she banked with Wells Fargo, she said yes, and then we had a short discussion about how they are investing private prisons and that we are asking people to move their money out. She was interested in that. The last two houses we hit the people mentioned that there was a neighborhood meeting going on that night and that we should go. One of the women we spoke with is actually a member of the neighborhood association, and she was very open to our messages. On a negative note, we ended up canvassing a house which was almost assuredly a drug den. It was really depressing; a house of 5 or so people, all seemingly spun-out on something really intense. As Aaron said, "Poverty isn't nice."

Some notes on what seems to work when talking with people:
keep your message broad enough that it may apply to virtually anyone you're speaking with. We were leading off with saying "We are from the Workers Committee, we are fighting against abuses from bosses, landlords, banks, etc." (or something like that). We found that since most people don't have those very specific problems (or haven't yet identified them), they didn't seem to connect with us as well.
We would suggest starting out with something more like "We are workers....we are frustrated with the economic situation/inequality/rule of the 1%, etc..." and that we say "We believe we can change this is if we get organized. We are talking to people to see if others are frustrated like we are and if you would be interested in having a follow-up conversation."
If we try to explain the "Solidarity Network" stuff, we ought to explain it in a broad way: "We work on multiple campaigns to take back power from the 1%..." for example.
In our first Workers Committee meeting, we debated whether to lead off by saying we are from Occupy Santa Rosa. We mostly agreed that it might not be wise, given Occupy's mixed reputation. However, on Monday we realized that people actually respond more favorably to "Occupy" than "Workers Committee." I believe this is because they a.) know what Occupy is (versus the Committee, which they have never heard of), and b.) they most likely support the goals and messages of Occupy. Out of the 3 or 4 people we mentioned Occupy to, not one of them had an unfavorable reaction.
The South Park Neighborhood meeting

Aaron and I attended the "Friends and Neighbors of South Park" meeting, which was held in the "Head Start" building in MLK park. About 10 South Park residents (well, they seemed like South Park residents) were there. They were all very friendly. They are a totally non-political group, focused mostly on cleaning up trash and sponsoring community events. We explained how we came to be there and we listened attentively to their meeting for about an hour, not expecting to participate much, if at all. Near the end of the meeting, however, we were asked to talk about who we were. We explained our basic goals and ideas and we passed out our flyers. The chair of the meeting, who was a real character, seemed very nervous by the language on the flyer ("this is VERY political....we are not a political group"). However, a group of four older guys sitting across from us were very receptive to it. Some of them made some very political points during the meeting. One of them expressed opposition to July 4th celebrations, saying that it's just a celebration of our militarism and fucked up history. Another guy made a point that people seem to get more angry when you take away their fireworks than when you take away their healthcare or pensions. So, I'd say at least 4 or 5 of those in attendance were very supportive, and are people we could follow up with in the neighborhood (I remember canvassing one of them last year with Take Back the Wealth).

Lastly, there are a number of community events in South Park coming up, including a "South Park Day and Night" festival (which was quite controversial last year....the cops brought their SWAT vehicles and assault rifles to show off to the kids...people weren't happy), and the "Juneteenth" celebration, which is a traditional african-american celebration. They would both be GREAT places to do outreach.

Looking forward to next Monday! We are gonna try to make some more effective flyers by next week. We need something a little more clear and less wordy.

in solidarity,
carl

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I. Burning Spear Festival this Saturday

Tess and Ken have volunteered to table. We need to make sure we have supplies and the banner...and make sure we will also have people downtown with supplies. Ken will come to Wednesday Night Market to see what it's like to outreach.

II. Purging Admins on Facebook

-Jesse will remove people from Admin roles who no longer participate in OSR. we agreed to this before...but we re-agreed to it.

III. Contact Lists

-Can we email people directly and not only invite people to the list-serve? The logic behind this is that people gave us their email addresses; it's not inappropriate to just send them emails. If they don't want them anymore, they can ask to be removed. *UPDATE: I asked Tess about this and Tess said she would like to be involved in the decision, as the person who sends out the emails. Maybe we can revisit this on Monday?
-Jesse set up a text system! Holy crap finally! Text "JOIN" 235-59 to join the text system. it's easy and awesome! spread the word.
-Phone-banking- we want to do this, but also want something concrete to phone bank for. Perhaps when we have a better idea of how we can ask people to get involved we will set up a day to phone bank.

IV. Community Media Center

-If we go to the Community Media table at Weds. Night Market, they will interview us. We should do this! We are going to ask Rachel and anyone else who we think would be good to do this on Wednesday or in the future.

V. Website

We want to collect more info from the Working Groups for the "Campaigns" section of the website. CANP, Dorothy Day, Prairie Fire, Workers Committee, MOM and POP

VI. Flyers

-Working Groups who would like to be promoted should give flyers to folks in Courthouse Square so we can table them.
- We want to create some simple flyers with info from the website, so when people ask us about certain things at the table, we can give them something physical instead of just directing them to the site. Info about the GA's, the WG's, our history, the consensus process, FAQ's, etc. can be made into very simple handbills.
-I made more copies of Tess' flyer promoting the Courthouse Square occupation, and combined it with the Workers Committee flyer, so we have some more materials to outreach with now.

VII. Media Outreach

I will ask Emerald about press calls. *UPDATE- Emerald responded to my email about this, so we will be in contact and maybe have a more in-depth discussion about building relationships with the press in our "down-time" (i.e. when we're not just trying to promote some big action). We are still trying to figure out our final, "Master press list," but I think we just about have it.

Alright folks, see you on Monday at 11am for the next Media/Outreach meeting!

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Media/Outreach Meeting Notes 5/21
Present: Jesse, Maggi, Amy, Edgar

• need to streamline administration of facebook pages, websites, etc. Will put on agenda for next meeting.

• Can Jesse retool website?
YES!
Possible additions/suggestions:
A sidebar with current/breaking articles & commentary on Occupy that broadens the front page. News & Analysis feels buried now and Shawn is no longer keeping it up.
"Read More" option for blog posts so more is visible on front page.
JEff told Jesse he will work on Notes area for GA site.

• Outreach contest for OSR images/graphics. Maggi will talk with Sairy about getting an album up on facebook.

• Outreach needs.
RIght now should be focused on Courthouse Square.
It has been a great success.
But we need a wider range of faces to interact with people passing.
WOuld be good to have something visible, a big poster, to give people concrete ways to help, get involved. "We need help with..."
OR have a huge party! Establish social relations first before asking people for help.
People need to know what we are doing, what the scene is like.
Use easel - 1 side "Today's Schedule," the other side "What we're doing" and maybe "What we've done"
Still encouraging WGs to have their own flyers on display.

UPDATE: WIth help from my wonderful mother, I DID make a poster for Courthouse Square. I hope it helps!

Submitted by Amy.

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http://www.doodle.com/pse5fv9vvfh4kdex

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me and jessie met up for outreach today. we discussed the flyer, which is attached. we both think that its fine, except there wasn't room to include everything, unless we want to make it more of a pamphlet than a flyer. the front page is half text and half eye catching stuff, if we reduce the eye catching stuff to less than half, it might not be eye catching enough. i also don't have meeting time info for all the WGs, but that's ok. what do others think?

it was decided that i would be the person to call and text people about meetings. it was also decided that we recall our point person (max), and we don't have a point person now, mainly because we don't necessarily need one, but also because i wanted to be the texter/caller but i didn't wanna do it while it was still someone else's responsibility.

last week several people said that the meeting time works for them, but many people are still not showing up. jackie, carl, shaun, josha, and jesse have all said that the meeting time works for them. so people are either forgetting or we just have horrible luck. ok, see you next week!

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--Announcements--

-- Agenda --
• Flyer: Officially approve flier? Consensus: 4/0.
• Do we make 2 fliers? Or shall we make more?
Consensus: Find new meeting place for fundraising/etc. -- New Flier In 3 Days

--More People At Meeting?--
• Perhaps we should coordinate outreach within OSR?

-- April 7th --
OUTREACH: FACEBOOK, FLYERING
• Spring Awakening Action [Courthouse Square, City Hall, On A Saturday]
• Goal: Gather All Working Groups, Showcase [A tent per group, a speaker? 3 mins each]
---- Artistic Presentation?
• Goal: Gather All Affiliated/Friendly Groups
• Goal: Gather Regional Occupy Groups
• Goal: 'Pretty Massive Outreach'

----> Dedicated Flyering Teams At Event?
----> Dedicated Facebooker Person?

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