Agenda

All times are approximate

Meeting Minutes

Facilitator: Paul John
Notetaker: Alvin Chan

• 7:08 – Meeting called to order, we’ve hit quorum.
• 7:08 – Community Agreements reviewed
• 7:13 – Adoption of the Agenda (Motioned by Anthony, Seconded by Minnie)
• 7:13 – Motion to Adopt Last Minutes Meetings (Motioned by Tiffany, Seconded by Rahima)
• 7:14 – Minnie with land acknowledgement
• 7:14 – Special Election for Steering Committee
  • Tiffany – Reviews process for special election. In summary, we allowed a week for nominations, and only one candidate, Mike Y, for the election.
  • PJC – Chair recognizes Anthony for a 30 second nomination speech
  • Anthony – Gives 30 second nomination speech
  • PJC recognizes Mike Y
  • Mike Y – 60 second speech
  • Tiffany – Reviews the voting process
  • Anthony – Motions to elect Mike through Unanimous Consent (Seconded by Ash M.)
    • No objections to vote by acclimation
• 7:19 – Housing Justice Campaign Update
  • Klaire – Update on the first lit drop of the campaign! 22 people showed up, and hit over 4 different locations of Siegel Suites. A bunch of people had interesting conversations with people, and people were thankful for the information they received. One location had folks get kicked out, but this didn’t stop us.
  • 7:21 – Next lit drop, might be a canvass, will be 9/18. Going to do a research event where Klaire and Angel review how to look up hot spots. 8am to 10am! Join us next Friday or Saturday to help out on research. 50 or 60 properties  ideally on the predatory landlord website. It’d be nice to work with others on these projects.
  • 7:23 – National Housing Committee Update
    • Right to Counsel campaign is a priority of national DSA
    • Spoke to lawyer comrade in right to counsel national committee, will get in contact with folks from legal aid.
  • 7:26 – Reviewed how to best stay up to date with the Housing Justice campaign. Reviewed how to fundraise for LVDSA
  • 7:27 – James A asks how many funds we have within LVDSA
    • Aimee responds with General Fund, Mutual Aid, Housing Justice, and additional fund for ad hoc projects.
• 7:28 – Mutual and Community Aid Priority Update
  • 7:29  – Community Aid update
    • Brendan introduces himself, introduces comrade Sebas
    • First Sunday Solidarity hosted as stewards. Serving over 30+ people in our community. The items that were sent over went quickly.
    • Sebas and Brendan are writing a resolution for Holiday Solidarity event
    • Event with the Nevada Native Caucus coming soon, meeting coming up this week with Nevada Native Caucus
    • Contact Brendan via slack or hit him up via email
    • Even though Sunday Solidarity went well, we need more funds for Mutual Aid fund!
    • Sarah – What does Sunday Solidarity need for products?
      • Anything  in good condition, anything that could be used by our unhoused neighbors.
    • E. Mercedes Krause – The request that people have given are non-generic feminine hygiene products and spray deodorant.
      • Has some funds also
      • Can coordinate pick up or drop off in Slack discussion channel or via lasvegasdsa@gmail.com
    • Brendan – Open dialogue and speak more with the Nevada Native Caucus.
    • Maurice – Basic questions?
      • DSA did take over leadership of the Democratic Party?
        • DSA members are in leadership of the Democratic Party
      • Maurice would like to be a fundraiser
    • Justin & Lillian give an update
      • Justin reviews the goals of mutual aid
      • Lillian reviews update of meeting tomorrow
    • Anthony – What things do you need help with?
      • Delivery drivers, dispatch, etc.
      • Lots of ideas, but not exactly sure yet
• 7:47 – Electoral Priority Update
  • Cody – Initial updates
    • Val and Cody had looked into the different assembly, senate, city council, and other races coming up. Tentatively looked at 8-10 different seats.
    • Top part of the priority, locating folks that can run in these seats.
  • Val – Meeting
    • Next Thursday at 8pm, but maybe 7:00 or 7:30, depending on people’s availability.
    • Going to identify people to recruit for these districts.
  • Anthony – Will pitch how to make it easy for people to plug in and find socialist candidates that feel confident that can win power and make meaningful change.
• 7:51 – Treasurer’s Report by Aimee
  • Treasurer’s report is coming along. It’s coming together quickly, but Aimee is a volunteer.
  • I missed the numbers, but revolved around venmo transfers.
  • Shout out to the survey fundraisers!
  • General fund: ~$8500
  • If you have any questions, please hit the lasvegasdsa@gmail.com
• 7:53 – Mental Health Crises Procedures & Working Group
  • Anthony makes argument for why we need practices and procedures to assist members who may be going through a mental health crises, while still acknowledging that we are not mental health professionals
  • Anthony drops a when2meet in chat to review how to approach these situations and resources we need to have on hand.
  • https://www.when2meet.com/?12736445-iJGfk
  • We can’t rely on ourselves internally and can’t pretend that we are professionals, but we want the resources handy and available for distribution when we need it.
  • Justin works with another group that hosts weekly support groups
• 7:59 – LVDSA Formal Positions Working Group
  • Lorenzita – LVDSA would support other organizations efforts to Tax the Mines or Repeal the Death Penalty, for example.
  • An issue we’ve faced is that LVDSA can’t officially provide testimony due to lack of official positions.
  • Officiial positions will allow us to support bills and decide how formal positions would look and be communicated to the public.
  • Sarah – will we be posting about the TX Abortion Ban?
    • Anthony – We want to make this group around issues like this. We are trying to find the line between what the steering committee can say and what it should not speak about.
      • It goes from SC to Comms
  • Maurice – When you mention Media re abortion, Maurice works with NARAL and Planned Parenthood, Maurice is a writer to some degree. It’d be valuable to have a collective voice around these issues, either through newspaper or a broadcast channel.
• 8:08 – SC Updates
  • Alvin – Organizer Trainings Google Form, different trainings that are available
  • Jackie – Member Engagement Update
    • Get involved as a facilitator
    • Help welcome new people
    • 1:1 onboarding as well
    • How to plan social events, want to get as many people involved as possible.
    • Most important ways for members to be involved, besides showing up for events, is to be on our slack.
    • Field pitch
• 8:11 – Upcoming Events
  • Jesser reviews upcoming events
  • Austin K. asks if there are any political education events coming up
    • Eco-socialism just happened
    • One’s planned, two part series on Latin American struggles on Cuba and Chile
• 8:14 – Open Comment Period
  • Kristofer – CCEA organizer. Within CCEA, Kristofer is the President of CCSO. 4 of the 6 bargaining unit members are LVDSA members. Recently drafted condemnation of CCSD leadership for the re-opening of schools. Asking for people to post in support and take part in the 9/9 School Board meeting for their negligence and malfeasance during this public health crisis.
    • https://bit.ly/badreopen
  • Brendan – DSA National Working group just released their first edition of the MAWG-azine. There’s a shout out of Brendan and Aimee!
  • Lisa Ortega – Got a $30,000 grant to plant trees in food deserts, hoping to get people to plant trees! Want to start planting in January, currently formulating where the food deserts are.
  • E Mercedes Krause – Plug for attending school board meetings.
  • Cesar – Is DSA trying to do something around redistricting?
    • Need to make sure our communities are being represented in redistricting
  • Lorenzita – Pokemon GO Clean up the park
  • PJC – Thanks everyone for coming tonight, thanks the stewards for their hard work. Field pitch to help the stewards.
  • Anthony – Did emails help attendance? Yes
• 8:30 – Tiffany motions to adjourn, Anthony seconds