General Assembly Notes
Sunday, November 20, 2011 @4 p.m.
Facilitator: Katya
Notetaker: Erika
Stack: Becca
Timekeeper: Andrew
Review Process
Review Agenda
Review Previous Meeting Minutes
Working Group Report-Backs
Tabled Items: Nightwatch Proposal from Friday night, Fiscal sponsorship
New Items: UC Davis, Winterize, Action/outreach
Announcements
Anita from Chicago expressed her support for Occupy Chapel Hill. She moved here from Chicago so her kids could go to school here, and has had a positive experience living here. She announced her connections to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. She said they are supportive of Occupy and they are willing to give Occupy Chapel Hill airtime in Chicago if we want! Katya has Anita’s contact info.
Jen from Occupy Oakland (and Occupy Cal-Berkley) expressed her solidarity! Police brutality has brought more public support. She will be in the area for a few weeks and plans to stop by again.
Filming: Gordon is filming to make a Youtube video of the GA process. NBC-17 is also filming.
If you don’t want to be on camera, let them know.
Review of minutes from 11/19: Katya reviewed the minutes.
Working Group Report-Backs
Direct Action
Evan: Black Friday event will be happening. Will meet at site at time to be determined. Should be put up on website.
Media
Becca: Highlighted a portion of Thursday’s GA where someone talked about Bloomberg being UNC’s commencement speaker in 2012. She tagged that clip and sent it out into the world.
Outreach
Have a new flier coming out. James read the flier during the 1-3 p.m. discussion earlier on Sunday.
Tabled Items
Fiscal Sponsorship: Sonia asked us to re-table until the representatives from Twin Streams can be present at a GA.
Nightwatch proposal (originally proposed on Friday and tabled, then tabled again on Saturday):
“Individuals who are threatening, make threats to harm occupants or property, are persistently disruptive despite mediation efforts, or are persistently threatening without making specific threats, being inflammatory, provocative to violence, or using hate speech may be ejected from the camp for the night if nightwatch reaches a consensus to eject them. The issue will then be discussed at the next GA, where a decision will be made by consensus over whether or not to extend the ejection.”
Someone suggested tabling it again because we again didn’t have enough people.
It has been tabled for two days due to not enough people being present at those GAs. Sunday is supposed to be the day when major issues are discussed.
How do we have consensus when not enough people show up?
How many people do we need?
Andrew brought up question of quorum, someone said that we can’t know what quorum is since there’s no defined membership in OCH.
Someone repeated Vince’s point about if we operate on a consensus model then the person who was going to be ejected would block his/her own ejection.
Is it reasonable to include the threatening folks in the decision?
Can we ask people to leave who make others feel unsafe (make threats, disrupt others overnight)?
Someone asked how often this happens.
Ron said most people will remove themselves or are not connected to Occupy Chapel Hill.
Concern that people will be violent in the name of OCH.
At 3 a.m., the target of the disruption cannot be expected to respond to the threat in a “consensus” way.
Individuals are allowed to protect themselves if they feel in danger (this is something that was discussed at a prior GA).
Motion to have a separate group of people who feel strongly about this meet (Stephanie will bottom-line) and come up with a new proposal.
Consensus reached on developing a new proposal.
New items
UC Davis events
Stephanie: Chancellor evicted protestors. There was peaceful, passive resistance to removal. A police officer sprayed the peaceful, seated protestors with pepper spray directly in their faces. Protestors encircled the police. Saying “shame on you.” Eventually protestors did a mic check and said “you can go” and thus peacefully de-escalated the situation (the police backed away and left). The protest at UC Davis was in solidarity with UC Berkley.
Proposal to condemn the police action and in solidarity with the student protestors. Also calling for resignation of the chancellor.
Final proposal:
“We condemn the inappropriate and torturous actions of police at UC Davis as sanctioned by the Chancellor. We support the protest and applaud them for their measured response to police brutality and we support the call for the chancellor’s resignation.”
Consensus reached!
From Eric
Assorted contact information re: UC Davis can be found here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/11/19/1038113/-Turning-My-Disgust-into-Action-Everyone-in-CA-needs-to-know-John-Pikes-Name
Winterize
Andrew: encampment vs occupation. Concerns about what’ll happen when it snows. In preparation for the coming winter, should we close down and celebrate what we’ve done and say we’ll be back?
Suggestion that we have a formal proposal to deice and when and how to close down.
Someone said we’re not ready to close down, but need to seek alternatives. Proposal for a working group or a round table about this.
Concern that there might not be time for a round table with the Thanksgiving holiday before it gets cold. We need something sooner.
Proposal to discuss winter plans and strategies at the next GA: Tuesday, Nov. 22 (instead of GA).
Consensus reached!
Action/outreach
Gal: need to be more welcoming, family-friendly, need music, and art. We could also be at public events in the town. For example Veterans Day, sporting events. Gal suggested including holidays and UNC events (like games) on our calendar so we could plan to do outreach then.
Gal suggested making the place nicer with more signs. There’s a whole bag of ready-made signs. Gal pulled out a few she liked, she encouraged others to do the same or make their own.
Need to take advantage of busy days in town and do specific actions.
Someone suggested music and drums after GA 1-2 nights/week.
Have music and fun to attract people on Sundays after GA.
Matt stepped up to bottom-line a music group!
We can build on the musical town image to connect with musicians that support OCH.
See Matt’s email to the listserv on November 22, 2011 1:27 AM for more info
Additional items
Katya suggested having fewer General Assemblies (so not every day) and devoting at least one GA time slot per week to having working group meetings.
Lots of twinkles of support. Not yet a formal proposal. Will present formally at a future GA.
Becca proposed using people mic so that passers-by can hear the proceedings. We are missing an opportunity to engage. Have access to amplification, but have to pick it up. People’s mic is the best way to communicate! It’s loud and engaging, and people tend not to ramble.
Stephanie blocked the proposal due to concerns that some people are not comfortable with people’s mic and will therefore not speak at all if we use people’s mic.
New proposal: Always use people’s mic first, but you don’t have to use it if you don’t want to.
Consensus reached!!
So we will start out GA’s with people’s mic. If someone is speaking who is not comfortable with people’s mic, that person can request not to use people’s mic.
Announcements:
Please take trash away!
Help with washing dishes.
Female only action. Talk to Gal
Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Would allow the US government to block websites even if they just link to sites with content that infringes copyrights. http://americancensorship.org/ http://www.mozilla.org/sopa/ Call your representatives.
Teach-in tonight at 5 p.m. on LGBT issues.
Followed by candlelight vigil for Transgender Day of Remembrance.
Tuition Hike meeting at Campus Y tonight at 7 p.m.
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