New Delegate Area 93 Committee Minutes

June 18, 2000

The meeting was called to order my Marita H. at 12:10 PM

A) Area Assembly Structure

1. Purpose of Assembly

There was much discussion but most agreed that the purpose of the Assembly was to inform as well as unify the Area and be supportive of the GSR. The process in which we share and take back information to the groups was extremely important as was the fact that the "group conscience" was carried to the Delegate during our Pre-Conference Weekend.

There was discussion concerning the need to bring uniformity between the English and Spanish speaking districts as well as discussion as to what are the advantages and disadvantages of being in a new Delegate Area. Perhaps we need to emulate our old Spanish-speaking groups service structure of Area 5. "We do not want to lose sight of the needs of the Spanish Groups" was one comment made during our discussion. There was a thought that perhaps we are losing the experience, strength and hope of our Spanish- speaking DCM’s when they do not rotate on to Area positions because of language barriers.

Frequency, location, and length

a) 4 Area Assemblies and 1 County Delegate Day (Jan. Mar. May & Oct.) VOTE

OR --

b) 5 Area Assemblies and 1 County Delegate Day (Jan. Mar. May. Aug. Oct.) VOTE

c) Saturdays or Sundays (choose one) VOTE

d) Should we rotate or keep it centralized? VOTE

The DCM’s from the following Districts will be reporting back on findings for possible meeting places...Santa Barbara; Kern County and the Antelope Valley.

e) One 2-day Assembly (Pre-Conference) or VOTE

Two 2-day (Pre-Conference & October; annual or bi-annual in October)

It was agreed that this Committee should set the calendar for the new panel.

Many felt it is better to meet as one body rather than in small groups. Some felt it was best to meet more often as we seem to lose info with the gap of time between the assemblies. Still others thought about attaching the assembly to a larger function such as a convention. (This idea was voted down). Should we have flexibility with our meeting day or time? By having a smaller meeting such as a Delegate Day, we keep ourselves localized and get to know the people in our own backyard.

Some believed it was easier to get to know each other when we had six Area Assemblies per year but others found it was too much to ask of GSR’s. By cutting down the number of Assemblies held each year from six to four, there has been no increase in the amount of GSR’s who attend the Assembly. If we do have a "Delegate Day", we may not find it necessary to have the Delegate visit each District after the Conference.

It was agreed that New Delegate Area 93 will follow the guidelines in the Service Manual on page S35 as a standard in which to conduct a typical non-election assembly. In addition there will be a New GSR Orientation and the Concepts will be read in both English and Spanish. Sharing Sessions and workshops to be determined by next panel.

The agenda will be set by the Area Committee. The first agenda will be set by the newly elected panel in November. All reports (i.e., DCM’s, Committee Chairs, etc.) will be given a time limit of 3 minutes each. All sharing from the microphones from any member will have a time limit of 3 minutes.

1. Purpose of Committee Meeting

See description in Service Manual on page S40

It was agreed that the Area Committee will meet on a monthly basis (except Assembly months). The Area Committee will meet on the same day of the week as the Assembly at a mutually agreed centralized location. For this purpose we will get a report from Santa Barbara County, Kern County and the Antelope Valley concerning possible meeting locations.

3. Activities and Operations

This will be decided by Area Committee in September. We would like, however, to start a tradition that only the Area Chair and Secretary sit at the podium during the Area Assembly and Area committee Meeting.

1. How many officers? 8

It was agreed that we will have eight (8) Officers; Delegate, Alternate Delegate, Chair, Alternate Chair, Secretary, Registrar (Recorder), Accounts Payable Treasurer, and Accounts receivable Treasurer.

DCM’s and Committee Chairs as well as other eligible Officers may stand for office. FOR THIS UPCOMING ELECTION ONLY all alternate chairs, alternate DCMC’s and alternate DCM’s are eligible to stand if they have attended 4 out of the last 5 Assemblies prior to the election assembly in Novmber.

3. Who is elected/appointed?

All Officers will be elected. Committee Chairs will be appointed by Area Chair with the approval of other Officers.

Which Committees: follow the General Service Conference system or create our own?

We will have the following Committees set in place CPC/Treatment; Finance; Grapevine/La Vina; Literature/Audio Visual-Newsletter; Guidelines & Policies; PI/Special Needs/ Website (if there is one); Archives; Newsletter (we need to come up with name). We will double up some Committees and grow into the needs of the Committees.

5. Elect or appoint committee chairs? See #3 above

GSR’s will be assigned a Committee at the District level and attend the correlating Area Committee for duration of panel.

1. Purpose of District meeting

There is a very good description of what the District is and its purpose on page S28 of the Service Manual.

2. Type of District

We currently are set up with both stand-alone and combined Districts. There was much discussion about which worked best. We will continue to discuss the possibility of using the County as a division line for Districts and then give each District a corresponding number and then divide that District into letters (1a, 1b, 1c, etc.). There will be a DCM for the District and then an LCM (Local Committee Member for the subdistrict) - This will be more like the Spanish Interdistrict if approved. Each subdistrict meets on a regular basis and then the LCM’s meet with the DCM at a separate meeting.

Undecided as yet.

4. Meeting frequency

Should be set by each District independently but normally meets at least once a month. The Spanish Districts currently meet more often than that.

5. Size (number of groups)

The Service Manual suggest 15 to 20 groups - many of our Districts have much more.

We will be getting more information on cost in the very near future - what this would enable us to do is the ability to bring in our own portable radio which can be dialed up to the FM station to get the interpreting channel. We could also elect to go ahead and continue using the same equipment that was used previously. (Additional cost for the machines would be provided by the Finance Committee).

No suggestions or recommendations were made at this time.

It was unanimously agreed that we will have a newsletter (name to be determined later)