Meeting Agenda
Note: @WCU_Steering was not able to meet prior to today’s General Meeting. If any Steering Member has a chance to review this, please edit (it is a wiki post) or reply if you had a chance to review it below.
December 5th, 2024 Meeting Agenda
Old Business
Bylaw Modification: Adding Membership + Education Coordinator to Steering Committee
Note: Requires a 2/3 vote for approval.
Tax Form 1024A
The initial draft was approved during the 2024-04-04 General Meeting. @Turcotte and @chima made additional edits to two sections and therefore, needs additional approval before it can be submitted:
Your Activities
Describe completely and in detail your past, present, and planned activities. Do not refer to or repeat the purposes in your organizing document or speculate about potential future programs. Your narrative description of activities should be thorough and accurate because we determine whether you qualify for 501(c)(4) exempt status based on the information in your application.Labor Rights and Unionization Effort
Our organization dedicates approximately 15 percent of its total operational time towards the advancement of labor rights in San Joaquin County. This involves creating and distributing educational content designed to informs workers about their rights under labor laws. Our members conduct workshops, provide advice, and offer training sessions to workers interested in organizing their workplace. These activities are funded through member dues and donations, accounting for approximately 15 percent of our overall expenses. By empowering workers to collectively advocate for their rights, we aim to enhance social welfare and contribute to the development of a more equitable society.Tenant Rights and Tenant Union Organizing
Our organization dedicates approximately 35 percent of our time to activities centered around tenant rights, in line with our objective of promoting democratic control over living conditions. Our volunteers develop and disseminate educational materials that explains tenant rights and the benefits of tenant associations. We offer assistance to tenants in San Joaquin County who are interested in forming tenant associations in their buildings or apartment complexes. This includes providing resources, guidance, and support to help them organize and advocate for their collective interests. This activity is funded by member dues and donations, making up approximately 35 percent of our total expenses. We believe that by supporting any tenant in San Joaquin County who seeks our assistance in organizing a tenant association, we aim to improving housing conditions, foster democratic engagement within communities, and improve the county’s overall welfare.Political Education:
Our organization invests 15 percent of its time in hosting educational events that are open to the public. These events, conducted by our members, cover a wide range of topics including current events, economics, politics, and other societal issues. The events are a mix of in-person and online sessions, publicized through social media and word-of-mouth to encourage community participation. Funded by member dues and donations, this activity accounts for 15 percent of our total expenses. By fostering political education about democratic and social control of resources, we promote informed civic engagement and encourage collective decision-making, contributing to the social welfare.Supporting Legislation and Policies:
We dedicate 35 percent of our time to activities that support legislation and policies aligning with our organizational goals. Our members engage in activities such as phone banking, canvassing, and petitioning to appeal to elected officials in local, county, state, and federal office to support relevant legislation. We publish information online and on social media to inform voters in San Joaquin County about legislative issues and policies that impact our communities and further our objectives. This activity is funded by member dues and donations, constituting approximately 35 percent of our overall expenses. By promoting general knowledge about the political stances of public officials, officers in political organizations, and legislation and policies that have an impact on voters, we hope to improve how responsible elected officials are to people’s needs, and therefore improve the social welfare of the community.
Your Activities
Do you or will you spend any money or time attempting to influence the selection, nomination, election, or appointment of any person to any federal, state, or local public office or to an office in a political organization? If “Yes,” explain in detail and list the amounts of money and time you spent or plan to spend in each case.We plan to spend approximately 25% of our budget and 25% of our time attempting to influence the selection of candidates in federal, state, and local elections. Specifically, through our “No Votes for Genocide” campaign, we encouraged voters to withhold their votes from certain candidates unless they committed to specific policy conditions related to halting the shipment of weapons to Israel and advocating for a permanent ceasefire in the Middle East. Our activities include 1) political outreach and education (90%) to create and distribute printed materials like petitions and informational flyers, and organizing community events to inform the public and encourage participation; 2) texting and phone banking (10%) reaching out to voters to share information about the campaign and encourage them to sign the pledge.
VOTE: Steering Committee Elections
Nominations
Education Committee: @Englishpete08 and @HipGnosis
Secretary: @Bozzii @Robert_H
Campaign Coordinator: @chima
Membership Coordinator: @Adri_Martinez
Treasurer: @Turcotte
WCU Bylaws
Majority Voting System: Elections shall be conducted using a majority voting system. In this system, the candidate who receives a majority of votes is declared the winner.
Determination of Majority: A simple majority is defined as more than half of the valid votes cast. Abstentions shall not be counted in determining the majority. If no candidate receives a simple majority, a run-off vote between the top tied candidates will be conducted during the same General Meeting.
Transparency of votes: All votes cast in elections shall not be anonymous. The record of each member’s vote shall be documented and made available for inspection by all members in good standing.
Access to Voting Records: The voting records, including the names of their respective votes, shall be maintained by the Secretary and shall be accessible to members in good standing upon request.
New Business
VOTE: Tenant Union Focus Campaign Leadership
WCU Bylaws
Upon approval of a new campaign, nominations for Campaign Leadership will open. Campaigns will operate without formal leadership for their first month. Campaign Leadership shall consist of at least one member but may be expanded by the Membership during the campaign formation process.
Election of Campaign Leadership: Campaign leadership will be elected by a simple majority of Members in good standing attending the General Meeting after the approval of the Campaign. This leadership will be responsible for overseeing the ongoing operations of the campaign.
Eligibility for Campaign Leadership: Any Member in good standing is eligible to run for Campaign Leadership once a Campaign has been authorized.
Campaign Autonomy: Campaign leaderships are authorized to plan and execute actions, mobilize membership, issue statements, and undertake other necessary measures to achieve the goals and objectives approved by the membership upon the adoption of the campaign. These decisions must be approved by the Campaign Coordinator.
Nominations
Both @SeanHun @NoraG nominated themselves for this leadership position. We need to take a separate vote for each nomination.
VOTE: Central Valley Working Class Unity Coalition Meetings
We have previously raised the question of having coalition meetings. We should discuss this topic in more detail and vote on a framework:
- Who should we invite: other socialist organizations, neighborhood groups, religious organizations, community organizations?
- Should the meetings be offline only, streamed, have half offline half online?
Should the meetings be completely open to anyone where community members share ongoing projects, groups present their work for constructive feedback, and open up opportunities to collaborate and perhaps put our socialist influence on the work people are already doing?
Open meetings carry risks - some organizations might only seek volunteer labor. Direct, honest feedback about proposed ideas could help screen people like that out.
END OF YEAR REVIEW
As we did last year, this is an opportunity for open, constructive dialogue to evaluate our performance this year and figure out our path going forward.
Celebrating Our Successes
- What did we do well?
- What projects did we complete?
- Processes or operations that have been improved?
- Impact on San Joaquin County
Areas for Growth and Improvement\
- Challenges faced and lessons learned
- Goals that we did not fully achieve
- Resource constraints or bottlenecks we did not overcome
- Communication or collaboration issues
- Missed opportunities
Strategic Recommendations
- Process improvement recommendations
- Priority areas