[Update: changes in procedures at the UNA will likely make this the last 'official' secretary's report. I will continue to provide monthly reports to the community on what I have done in my capacity as UNA Elected Director]
Secretary’s Report
Charles Menzies
November 8, 2012
The First Secretary’s Report
According to the UNA Bylaws and Constitution the Duties of
the secretary include the following specific tasks.
The Secretary
shall, either directly or by delegation:
(a) issue
notices of meetings of the Association and Directors,
(b) keep minutes
of all meetings of the Association and Directors,
(c) have custody
of all records and documents of the Association,
(d) have custody
of the common seal of the Association, and
(e)
maintain the register of members.
These duties loosely fall within the domains of communication and
recording keeping – the two central features of my intended activities during my
term as Secretary. This report,
and subsequent reports, will focus on activities that I have engaged in between
reports as related to the above-identified domains of activity.
In this report I report back upon: my activities in relation to the
Listen In workshop, Oct. 30, 2012 (a separate report from the workshop has been
submitted elsewhere on this agenda) with my recommendations for future Listen
In workshops; my recommendation for improving communications with members by
enhancing public access to the deliberations of the board, and; a summary of
local media coverage of the UNA.
This last point is, I think, particularly important. As part of our systematic maintenance
of a publicly available historical archive and as part of our efforts to
understand and work well with all our neighbours we need to be tracking media
reports that quote UNA Directors and Staff and/or focus upon the UNA.
Listen In
Under the domain of communications with members of first
Listen In workshop was held October 30, 2012 at Tapestry in Wesbrook Place. The
forum was attended by about 30 community members and 20 observers which
included UBC/UNA staff, UNA Directors (Alexander, Byers, Burges, Menzies, and
Wu), two campus reports (John Thomkins, CR; Arno Rosenfeld, The Ubyssey), and
an undergraduate student from the Faculty of Arts doing a class research
project (Mathew Ebisu). Claire
Robson (Wesbrook Place resident) facilitated the meeting as a volunteer. Maria Harris (Metro Electoral Area A
Director) answered the call for a volunteer from the floor to take flip chart
notes.
The workshop proceeded in three stages: (1) what works, (2)
what needs improvement, (3) what can the UNA do (transformed into ‘action'
items). Volunteer translators were
present for those who preferred to speak in either Chinese or Korean.
A more detailed report on the contents of the Listen In
workshop is included in a separate report. Images of the flip chart notes and audio notes (that record
voice and written notes) are posted on my personal U-Town news blog. Ideally the UNA will develop the
capacity to be able to host these types of enhanced community engagement
documents in the near future.
Overall my personal assessment is that the event was a
success that we should build upon it.
Future of the Listen In series.
The Listen In event held in October created a positive
opportunity for non-conflictual communication with and between members. Following
from the success of this workshop I propose that we continue this experimental process of broad-based community
consultation and that we charge the governance committee with organizing and
setting up three additional workshops to be held in Chancellor Place, Hawthorn
Place, and East Campus and/or Hampton Place. The overall format and structure is very effective with the
size of attendees. It is also
sufficiently flexible to adapt to larger attendance by using small group breakout
and report back process. The cost
factor is relatively small – refreshments, some staff time, potential room
charges. By drawing upon community
volunteers for facilitating we save money, but more importantly, we empower
community members through inclusion in the process and thereby expand the feeling
of goodwill.
We need to develop a robust virtual platform to support the
expanded reporting aspects of our Listen In series. For the first session I used a device that records audio and
the handwritten notes of a note taker.
The device, a Livescribe Pen,
can then upload the electronic files to a web server and the resulting flash
animation can be viewed and listened to simultaneously. This has the advantage of further
expanding the possibility of participation and also limits the possibility of
the development of an official perspective emerging from these discussions –
this sort of technology., combined with other forms of social media will enable
a wider reach of our listen series then simple face-to-face communications and
bricks and mortar style print communications.
Communications and Public Standing Committee Meetings
Effective communication with the UNA membership and the
broader University Town community is an important goal. There are a number of actions that we
need to consider. The first one
concerns transforming our standing comities into public meetings. There appears to be no legal reason not to
hold standing committees in a public setting. Thus, it seems reasonable to enhance
our communications capacity by holding Standing Committee meetings in
public. This matter was discussed
in the Governance Committee last month (see Governance Standing Committee
Report for details). One hopes that it will not have to wait yet another month before being put into practice
Moving standing committees into the public setting allows
for enhanced communication with members.
It also allows for the enhancement of civic responsibility through
observation. Opening these discussions
to the public allows for reasoned discussion and ensures that minority views
are not constrained by a majority decision.
In order to move the standing committees to a public setting
a basic procedure for holding the committee meetings in public is required.
I propose the
following to apply to the Governance SC, the Operations & Sustainability SC,
and the proposed Civic Engagement SC.
Human Relations is an in camera SC. It might be advisable for Finance to remain as it is
currently.
1. Any member of the public (UNA members, UBC
staff/student/faculty, UEL residents, members of the media, or any other
interested person) is welcome to attend and observe the proceedings of the
committee.
2. Only members of the Standing Committee,
staff resource people, or invited speakers will participate in the committee
deliberations.
3. Delegations will be allowed as per the
procedures for the monthly UNA Board meetings with the exception that
delegations will be scheduled at the beginning of the committee meeting and in
advance of the committee’s own deliberations.
Media Coverage
The following articles from local media quote UNA Directors
and/or staff and report on activities of the UNA. Full copies attached to report.
The Ubyssey: Nov. 4, 2012. Market housing residents airconcerns at community meeting
The Ubyssey: Nov. 4, 2012. UNA members need to quit cryingover broken consultation process
UBC Insiders: Oct. 23, 2012: UNA seeks consultants to takethem seriously
The Ubyssey: Oct. 21, 2012. Transportation: UBC’s notoriousparking
The Ubyssey: Oct. 10, 2012. Arena of your dreams: HowThunderbird Arena hasn’t lived up to Olympic hopes
Overall the UNA is presented positively in the news
articles. The two editorials poke
fun and criticism at the UNA – just what editorials are supposed to do.
1 comment:
Good Listen-In and media summary.
The resolution was defeated because
a) too many directors felt too much media attention on topics in discussion is not a good idea, and
b) that some privacy is good to discuss topics, perhaps even yell or raise your voice, before it is presented to the open board meeting held monthly, for discussion and a vote.
A compromise might be a publication of topics to be discussed at committee meetings, then a delegation can speak to a topic, and then leave while committee members discuss issues.
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