(Meeting at Kris’s house.)
In attendance: Kris Osterloh, Vance Almquist, Clint Mattox, Chris Mihiar, Thomas Morrill; Ashley Bromley, Angela McClendon
Meeting called to order at 5:10 PM
Minutes from 9-29-2015 – Approved.
Email Decisions – (1) Moved *this week’s* EC meeting to Thursday at 5 PM (right now!). (2) Approved all-member email with the bargaining survey.
Online Tax Payment – Approved Angela paying the September federal payroll taxes online.
Steward Council Meeting Debrief – Great turnout (about 42). Food was good: prep was panic-free and quantity was just right. Introductions with preferred pronouns went well after a slightly awkward start to explain what we meant. One steward in attendance questioned whether they’d start getting too many emails. Something mentioned about hearing from their advisors how “expensive” grad assistants are; Vance has heard this expressed by a few people and has been thinking about how to have a conversation about CGE’s bargaining on financials vis-à-vis the OSU budget, dept fund management, etc.
PSU Social Debrief – Clint went to this last Friday with Béatrice to meet with grads who are working to organize a union. They talked about CGE for about 5 minutes and then just listened and socialized. There were about 50-60 grads there who were “super stoked” about forming a union!
ASOSU Debrief – After we talked at last Tuesday’s EC meeting about the bill re: SIFC appointments, Clint went to the House meeting last Wednesday. The bill was voted down after the author actually asked for it to be; he had realized it was giving too much control to the ASOSU president. He’s introduced a new bill that Clint feels is more balanced. Under the new bill, the ASOSU president would solicit nominations for SIFC board representatives from each budgeting board to sit on the SIFC. The ASOSU Senate would then review appointees and vote on their confirmation. Clint went to last night’s meeting as well and they had a lot of discussion. An attempt to table the bill until week 5 was also voted down, but only 13-10. The second read will be next week and they’ll vote on this new bill. If it doesn’t pass, they’ll have an election. Clint submitted a letter to be appointed to one of the grad seats in the House; he’ll need to be approved by both chambers and the president, but there are empty grad seats so it’s pretty likely he’ll get the spot.
Social Hour Debrief – Kris and the Soils kids held down a table with one other CGEer. It seems there was an event/fundraiser going on simultaneously at a different venue that probably drew a lot of potential CGE social hour participants away.
HIAC Update – It’s time to do this: the CGE team will be meeting on Monday the 12th. We’re allowed to have 3 people on the Committee. Last year, we had 2 grads and Ashley. Sean & Spencer both want to continue this year. We’ll put out a call for another grad. Kris will email some of the stewards to ask if they’re interested (he specifically won’t invite anyone who’s already on the B-Team).
Budget Review – When we drafted the budget, we didn’t know if we’d be hosting AGEL so didn’t put any money there. Now we are hosting, so we need to put money there! Chris & Ashley will meet with Yonna next week to talk about who will be paying for what. When CGE previously hosted AGEL in 2011, our costs (after AFT reimbursement) totaled about $2,400. The EC approves a tentative amount of $3,500.
AGEL – Van drivers: We’re going to need 2 dedicated van drivers Thursday afternoon through Sunday. Chris and Clint will be the drivers. Thursday folks: We need as many CGE people as possible with their own cars in Portland by Thursday night, to be ready for home visits Friday. Dishes: We’re planning to cook dinner for AGEL folks Saturday (something advance-prep with crockpots). Ashley & Chris would like to buy a set of CGE dishes. Ashley investigated and expects it would be about $300 (which is definitely less than how much we’ll save by cooking instead of going out). The EC approves buying the dishes; Vance will get them.
Square Account – The Brew-Off committee met yesterday. They would like approval from the EC to set up a credit card processing account through Square. This is a tablet/smartphone app and service that acts as a register, processes card payments, and deposits funds into our bank account. The card reader hardware is free; Square charges a 2.75% fee per transaction. The Brew-Off committee wants to have the option of taking credit cards for presales and merch at the event. They decided to add a flat $1 processing fee. The EC approves using Square. Ashley will set up the account.
Presidents Conference – AFT-Oregon’s annual Presidents Conference will be November 6 & 7 at the Benson in Portland. Kris plans to go. Thomas wants to go. One more officer can go: Chris will.
Board of Trustees Meeting – This is happening next Thursday & Friday. Is it important to go? We don’t know of anything specific on the agenda that relates to grads. Is it worth the time and effort to get people to turn out, when we’re trying to keep people participating in office visits and GMM and AGEL and Brew-Off? Our own business feels more pressing this time. Kris will post a note about it on the fb group.
AFT-OR Organizing Training – This will be held this coming Sunday. Clint was previously thinking about going. He will no longer be able to go.
All-Member Emails – Bargaining survey reminder: Thomas will send on Monday the 12th. Brew-Off big email call for volunteers, info about presales, etc: Wednesday the 14th. AGEL big email call for homestays, cars, workshop attendance: Friday the 16th. GMM email: Tuesday the 20th.
New Stewards – Sara Chonaiew and Brittany MacPherson from Public Policy both want to join as stewards. The EC now appoints them and we’ll ask the SC to confirm them at the November meeting.
Meeting adjourned at 6:00 PM. Next meeting is back on Tuesday the 13th, at 5:30 PM.