SD64 Affirmative Action Committee
Meeting Notes from 2 June 2008

In attendance: Liz Wefel, Judy Harvey, Anne White, Nick Kado, TJ Yocum

Introductions

Liz mentioned that all announcements for the committee meetings should be posted on the website or Facebook page.

Nick was part of the door knock campaign that took place on the 31st of May. He mentioned that there is a significant interest from those he visited in the presidential campaign even though the door knocking was done to notify people about the SD64 celebration.

Anne mentioned she had received a written strategy for reaching individuals in apartments from a friend of hers on the east coast. She will share that with everyone.

African Immigrants

Nick mentioned this was a touchy time for door knocking because of the presidential race.

Latino

No new updates. Judy has made a strong effort to contact individuals and groups but has not heard back from any of them yet.

African-Americans

Anne has talked to Councilman Melvin Carter (Ward 1). He said he would help us and they came to the understanding that working with SD65 would be helpful. Ward 1 covers parts of SD64 and SD65. Liz added that including SD66 might be beneficial too.

Events

The DFL Party will have tables at various summer events. Although the committee won’t need to set up our own tables, we might consider providing volunteer help and/or handouts for these events. Contact McKenzie Taylor for more information.

Hmong

No new updates other than the fact that the committee has learned through Cy Thao that there about four families in SD64 – another reason to work with other districts.

Outreach

Julie was not able to attend the meeting but communicated through TJ that she has put together some draft fliers. She is looking for program dates to add to those fliers.
Judy mentioned that posters/fliers/advertising in selected businesses and papers would boost our efforts to reach the target audience.

Program

TJ presented a draft plan for a program. He suggested the program be 20-30 minutes maximum and provided examples of key points and activities that would engage the audience. The rest of the group added their comments and suggestions.

Liz suggested that we check the available DFL outreach material as well as start developing a specific budget for programs and advertising. She mentioned that the general budget is low and that we should look for work/materials to be donated as well as purchased.

Assignments for next time

TJ – work on a more formal version of the program draft to be presented to a joint meeting of SD64, SD65, and SD66.

Nick – contact SD65 and SD66 Affirmative Action Committees and set up a date to meet and start putting efforts into action.

Nick – check with Liz regarding the need/rules for providing interpreters at programs.

Upcoming absences

Anne will be out of town until July 4th.

Nick will be out of town until June 19th.

TJ has taken an organizing job with the DFL. Due to the conflicting hours of the job he will be unavailable to the committee as a regular member.

Next Meeting

Nick will try to set up a three-district meeting after he returns to town.

Meeting minutes

DFL Data Management working group

5/20/2008

• Introductions

• Kat Sherman, Secretary and Data Management coordinator
• Andy Pieper, Project ID coordinator
• Sheri Smith (VAN id)
• Charles Stander
• Nathan Pankratz
• Rod Olson
• Mike Lewis
• Marisa Vape

Agenda

Project ID

Other data needs- how to manage

• Project ID

• May 31^st VAN training and kick-off
• ID effort for SD 64 voters

• Precinct chairs and associate chairs make phone calls, contacts to unidentified voters
• Getting Ided voters to volunteer

• Pulling the data smoothly
• Entering the data smoothly
• Mackenzie Taylor will do the list pulls for May 31^st
• The Data Management working group will meet to enter the new data

• Keeping data private
• Keeping non-VAN data

• Mike work on a database

• Get VAN training
• Look at the Googledocs list
• Bring ideas about how best to manage the data

These are notes from the 5/24 meeting of the SD64 Communications Committee. Mike Lewis and Joel Clemmer joined Alex and Eric Celeste for this inaugural meeting of the Communications Committee.

We focussed on two basic communications vehicles: newsletter and web.

Newsletter:

We will continue to produce a one-page newsletter on a monthly basis. Joel will develop content for the “main article” each month, Joel and Mike will be on the lookout for pictures, Eric will throw it into the existing template a few days before the executive committee meeting each month. Eric may call on Joel to build a new template, but for now it does not take much effort to toss it into the existing template.

Web:

Alex, Mike, and Joel will register on the WordPress blog that now lies behind our SD64 homepage and Eric will authorize them to add articles to the site. Eric also shared the wiki password with them so they can help maintain the less dynamic areas of the site. We decided that it would be good to limit authoring on the blog side to a small group (half a dozen or so?) so that we have some control over the content. However, the wiki side can be more accessible to multiple authors, in particular to precinct leaders who would like to manage a page of their own.

Eric also pointed out that the images used in the header of the website could be rotated, and welcomed Joel and Mike (and anyone else) to send their own photographs of the neighborhood to him for inclusion in the rotation. Eric will post a page about picture dimensions to the site.

Next meeting:

Oops. We forgot to set a date for a next meeting. If any of you have a suggestion, please let me know. I’m inclined to try for another Saturday afternoon, maybe 6/28?