Dear Gardeners, I hope you all are still enjoying this never-ending summer I am sending a few important news here, so please read carefully and let me know if you have questions: 1. Welcome new member for plot #10 Janet Peterson is our new member and she will be gardening with us from plot # 10, Congrats and Welcome Janet! 2. Renewal reminder Those of you who have not yet paid the annual membership fee, please call or go to the Food Bank before September 30 (the earliest the better as we have people in the waiting list). I called everyone today and left messages to those I couldn’t find. (Suzanne, your phone comes as not assigned, have you changed the number?) 3. AGM reminder Our Fall AGM will happen on Wednesday, October 8 at 6 PM and the location is: Semiahmoo House Society: 15306 24 Avenue, Surrey, BC – Tanya and Susan will send/post details about any other directions. Please remember that the AGM is mandatory for all garden members. If you have good reasons for not attending, please contact me at my cell phone or via email. You will still have to send or designate a proxy for voting. 4. AGM agenda items Please start proposing agenda items. The most important ones are: 1) Reviewing past season’s successes and opportunities for improvement (what worked, what didn’t?), 2) re-visiting committees’ work and review if that is the sustainable way to have the work done, 3) community garden coordinator and co-ordinator election and roles definitions and 4) planning for winterizing (cover or winter crops) 5. Community Garden coordinator election Because our garden belongs to the Food Bank and falls under Sources Community Services umbrella, we need to make sure they approve the garden coordinator. They have asked me to continue and I would love to do so, but I also want to give the opportunity to other gardeners to do this. I suggest you start thinking about who you would like to nominate (you can choose yourself and a second option and we will vote at the AGM) For those who want to nominate themselves the role includes: - 100% accountability to the Food Bank (Jaye and Denise, cc here) - Creates a welcoming atmosphere of respect and trust among members - Responsible for calling/running to AGMs and at least two other events/meetings a year - Responsible for moderating/posting at our Facebook group: https://facebook/#!/groups/foodforthoughtcg/ - Responsible for sending email reminders and calling members - Responsible for supervising that the membership agreement is followed and respected - Go-to person for questions, emergencies and complaints - May organize and coordinate workshops, visits and other events with the support of members committees Note: while all of us need to put at least 8 hours/year of volunteering work (beyond caring for your plot) according to our membership agreement, the coordinator puts a bit more, mainly in administrative work. I also propose that next year, instead of one coordinator we may have two, giving the opportunity to share the work and be there when the other can’t. 6. Practical Permaculture workshop We will have a workshop on “general” Permaculture coming next week (Wednesday Sept 17, please see poster attached for details) but I am planning a longer Permaculture workshop focused on “practical Permaculture for gardeners” ...the best dates are probably late October or early November (or early 2015), I will need a space to do it ...the workshop will be free for all gardeners and any other gardener from any other community garden, including people interested who may not yet have a plot. Please email me if you have a place where we can do this. I just need a projector and a room for ~ 12-20 people. Most likely this will happen in a Saturday morning. Regards to all, Silvia
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 20:22:17 +0000