- Date: Thursday, 8 June 2017
- Location: Queen Street Commons Cafe
Contents
Participants
Stacey, Teresa, David, Amro, Kris, Will, Laurel, Bob, Julia, Sam, Adam, Michele.
Meeting Notes
- Open Streets festival 18 June 2017
- Theme is “Words”, Michele Braniff will be there as storyteller at 3:00pm
Introductions, Riding summaries
- All ridings present except Kitchener South — Hespeler
- Kitchener Centre
- Hasn’t met since last meeting
- Waterloo
- Has a potential candidate
- Kitchener — Conestoga
- Has set up bank account
- Needs to hold its Annual General Meeting, possibly in July
- Also needs to hold a Nomination Meeting, anyone have advice?
- Other ridings are also unsure of Candidate Selection Process
- Guelph (the CA for Mike Schreiner, GPO Party Leader) will hold their Nomination Meeting in July
- It would be good to have candidates nominated so they can be present at Festival info tables
- There is a suspicion that the provincial election may be called earlier than June 2018
- Many Liberal promises
- The CBC has reported that 7 June 2017 is the one-year mark for the election
- …but there is no advantage to the Liberals to have a late election
Candidate selection
- Send out e-mails?
- WR Greens should self-impose a candidate selection deadline: End of September?
- Create an “ad” for prospective candidates
- What we have in financial support
- We’re in good shape with the per-vote subsidy, received since this past winter.
- When approaching candidates let them know
- Campaign volunteers will be spending some time in Guelph campaigning for Mike Schreiner
- Candidate is expected to spend some time in Guelph too
- perhaps in Guelph on the weekends, attend debates &c. during the week
- What we have in financial support
- How do we hold a Nomination Meeting?
- Contact Amy Watson at GPO for info
Volunteers
- Julia Gogoleva and Sam Nabi will be Region-wide Volunteer Co-ordinators
- Volunteer handbook:
- What has Green Party done
- Tasks
- Door knocking
- Telephone calls
- Signs (Sign Co-ordinator might be a separate task)
- Organize rides
- Support candidate at debates, &c.
- Identify volunteer leaders for each riding
- Ensure volunteers don’t drop out for lack of work, lack of contact
- Ask new volunteers to participate immediately
- Perhaps take them out for coffee
- Identify volunteers’ skills
- Ask new volunteers to participate immediately
2017 GPO AGM
- 3x the attendance of 2016
- Shows people are looking for alternatives to the existing political parties
- Reduced costs attracted people
- Good to meet people from across the province
- Developed contacts for help: “Hey Eric, remember me? Can you help with …”
- BC Leadership Group
- Said enthusiasm was great
- GPO is better organized than BC
- but the presentation of GPO is not as good
- Need additional bodies at events like Nomination Meetings
- eg. create a News Event such as “Five Green Party Nominations In One Week”
- The GPO AGM Policy Meeting went really well
- Policy focus for platform:
- Mike Schreiner will decide in consultation with the Shadow Cabinet
- Platform slogan “People, Planet, Jobs”
- Two platforms: one short with nine points and three headings; the other long and extensive, similar to Vision Green (Federal policy document)
- Request to include Basic Income and Electoral Reform
- How to find out what was passed at the AGM?
- Stacey Danckert (GPO Policy Co-ordinator) will publish it online in the next few weeks
- Policy focus for platform:
- Mike Schreiner was integral in provincial Financial Electoral Reform
- Per-vote subsidy made available $1 million to the Green Party
- Now Guelph has a fully funded campaign
- eg. GPO can run focus groups to develop the language for the Policy and Platform documents — evidence based!
- Diversity at AGM was poor
- Desmond Cole spoke on discrimination
- Question for focus groups: Why are marginalized groups not supporting the Green Party?
- Next AGM (2018) will be in Guelph
- Will be held earlier (March?)
- Tell potential candidates about the AGM!
Things To Do
- “Beer and Food get people out”
- What can we do with our limited resources?
- Get pamphlets, written material, especially for Festival info tables
- Print postcard-sized cardstock with info (not for mailing)
- Get resources from GPO, eg. pamphlets, communication materials, policy info
- Is there a CA (Constituents’ Association) in Cambridge?
- We need to hold a WR Greens regional meeting in Cambridge
- Have an info table at a Cambridge event (International Festival in September?)
- Green Party Membership signup sheet at Festival info tables
- Meeting info is on the Web http://wrgreens.ca/calendar
- Share everything!
- Contribute to the blog: http://wrgreens.ca/
- Retweet @WR_Greens https://twitter.com/WR_Greens
- Share on Facebook: https://facebook.com/WRGreens
- People will forward this organically; don’t be afraid your own contacts will dislike it
- Get a list of Green Party members, have a calling party
- Find out the election deadlines
- Form submission deadlines for candidacy
- Membership cutoff before nomination meetings
- Acquire candidates well before the election
- Calling party: Provide info on nomination process, invite to nomination meeting
- Some of our CAs need assistance with a media blitz
- Have a nomination meeting even if there is only one candidate nominated
- Even if no candidate is nominated
- Gets people involved, meeting each other
- Even if no candidate is nominated
- Green Party has more Federal supporters than Provincial
- How can we transfer members from Federal to Provincial?
- Hold a Barbeque to invite the entire contact list, both Federal and Provincial
- People don’t know they’re not Green Party members
- Some people get mailouts, even non-members
- People don’t know they’ve lapsed
- People don’t know that Federal membership is not the same as Provincial Membership
- Donors are not necessarily members
- We will hold full nomination meetings in September
- Kitchener Centre and Waterloo together
- Cambridge, Kitchener South–Hespeler and Kitchener–Conestoga together
- Have a membership drive for nominations
- Can Federal mailing lists be used for Provincial calling?
- Kris Braun thinks Yes — this needs to be clarified!
- We will have GVote (software) available provincially (overlaps Federal GVote?)
- Calling Party in Mid-July!
- BBQ in August! (Campfire at Laurel Creek park?)
- Nomination Meetings in September!
- How often should WR Greens meet?
- Bi-monthly is often enough
- Individual ridings can meet alternate months, if needed
- Hold a poll for every meeting! — to be posted on http://poll.wrgreens.ca
- The Calling Party will be the next WR Greens meeting
- Determine the dates for BBQ/Potluck and Nomination Meetings before the Calling Party (so we can inform called members)
- Meeting on weeknights in the summer is better than weekends
- Berlin Bike Cafe has a community bike ride
- Green Party participants should wear T-shirts with Green Party logos
- Are you passionate? Take control of something – Calling Party, or another event
- Graphic Recording
- Michele Braniff illustrates on a white board in real time or time lapse, following a script
- There are video recording and editing skills within WR Greens
- Stacey Danckert to contact GPO Head Office media for support; perhaps official video
Notes taken by Bob Jonkman.