Meeting minutes

meeting minutes

can someone put this page into shape ? we have lots of meting minutes still floating around in diferent wikis, and some mintues of wheel minutes, and as the whole page should not become too big it woulod be good to have one subpage per meeting - with good titles including the date of the meeting

here we have the minutes of the meeting in prague and the one in the lobau both happende dezember 2006

prague was about bt and wcn, the relationship between the tour and the office, and money issues

lobau was an evalution meeting of the 2007 tour, with some deas about the future

prague

Minutes meeting 13 december Prague

Present: Camilla, Randy, Joao, Ivan, Roeland, Janneke, and Jan on skype.

Youth grant of the last two years

Some questions were raised about last year's grant:

- What happened with the money leftovers from 2005 and 2006?

- How much did WCN get?

Camilla already answered them partly by mail, and gave some further explanation. We have to use the money according to the rules. Randy mentions that it might be better to find other funding than from the Youth programme that fits more with what biketour actually is. Camilla has an excel sheet with all the financial information that she will send to Joao who will distribute it to anybody who is interested.

Youth grant for this year

WCN will not do the Youth grant this year. The application is already partly finished, so if we find an organisation in Portugal or Spain they could still apply. (but anyhow it would be too late to use the money for this year's biketour) We discussed some pros and cons of having eastern European or Caucasus countries as partners, but finally it will depend on the organisation who will do the application.

EVS position

If we would apply for EVS, the person could only start in May, which means two months before biketour starts. That would only help if it is a person who is already familiar with biketour. If we do that, it would make more sense to have the EVS person in Portugal or Spain, and an organisation there could apply. It depends on the organisation we will find.

Communication between biketour and WCN

We talked more about the Youth grant.

Camilla was surprised that these things are so unclear for biketour people, perhaps Roeland could have communicated more. Randy says that some of the plans as made in Moldova for the leftovers of 2005 did not happen because there was nobody to do it. Perhaps we also expected more money because part of the travel costs had to be refunded, because we did not have the right tickets from the right countries. Next time we should make sure we have the right tickets (right places and dates). The rest of the money went to 2006. Officially it is not possible to keep leftovers form a grant for another year. Jan mentions that a solution could be to transfer money to another country (e.g. to pay our webmaster in Vienna) and that money could be used for the next year.

Roeland mentions that the Youth programme is being changed, that it could be a problem for biketour. We could try to find money from other sources, concretely this will depend on the organisers of this year. We also agree that biketour actually does not need so much funding.

Future relation between WCN and biketour

Randy makes a statement about the meaning of biketour for WCN. Biketour is in line with WCN’s mission, and in principle they want to support it. For 2007 WCN could offer to support outreach, the website, or possibly apply for an 2008 EVS volunteer. This person cannot be project coordinator and cannot handle finances, and it would be good if it would be somebody who is already familiar with biketour. WCN has limited capacity, but they are open to ideas from biketours side, what are their needs? Some ideas how WCN could help are being a contact point during the tour, or for storage of equipment. WCN also wants to provide materials to hand out.

Ivan mentions that it would be good if WCN would send somebody from the office to participate in biketour, this would be good for the connection. Randy agrees, and mentions on the other hand that biketour people could also be more involved in other WCN projects. The carfree exhibition could be a good project for biketour and WCN together.

How to go on in 2007?

We agree that biketour doesn’t know yet. WCN is in principle open to help if we tell them our needs, but that will depend on the organisers.

Other possibilities for fundraising could be to have sponsors or donations from individuals. We mainly need that money for the international coordinator. At the moment Roeland cannot be international coordinator if there is no money.

Some last points

- Camilla will send the info on excel sheets.

- Jan asks Roeland to please communicate as much as possible with other people.

- Next biketour meeting will be in Portugal or Spain.

lobau

Meeting Lobau 18th dec 06 Janneke, Jan, Joao, Ivan

PART ONE: EVALUATION 2006

1.COMMUNICATION

issues in 2006:

- nothing on org mailing list

- nothing happened before february 2006

Joao says: no support from the office, bad communication with the office and with Roeland, he didn't say alternatives to grant money.

- lousy communication on the road; not enough time for org. circles. Problems with Dzemian, Csaba

Jan thinks: Studene we bad meeting (big costs from it, was it worth?), communication issue started from that meeting

Ivan on communication:

- communication wasn't biggest problem this year

- I wasn't at Studene, but Tabor was OK, except for incident with Olga

- experienced BT organizers had no problems with informations missing

Joao on communication:

- Studene - Sapi didn't manage communication -› messy meeting -› bad seeds - on the tour:

Lithuania - Joao vs. Vita

Poland - Dzemian vs. old bt people

Slovakia - Rado didn't participated in the group, Michal just translated

Hungary - Csaba often out of reach

Slovenia - very good, had only one meeting Ivan with Lidija. Open dynamic organizer.

Croatia - good: ivan joined earlier, bad - when he was out due to bike problems

Other communication remarks:

- big rule: MEET PERSONALLY!!!

- how to make people read the booklet????

- good this year was working mobile phone system

- maybe to invest in mobile internet

- wcn offered online contact ... ?? (can't read :)

- fight NO REPLY culture from 2006

The Future:

- have the roles on IC and NOs CLEARLY DEFINED!!!

- explain NOs what their role implies: in a session (presentation) on meetings and skype

- more talking sticks during biketour

- presentation on consensus at beginning of the tour

- installing of a board: regular skype meetings!!

2. LENGTH OF BT 06, PART AFTER ECOTOPIA

Ivan's concerns: group was smaller after E. and not clear if there was proper goal: Ecotopia is nice goal, in case of Split we tried to make artificial goal.

Joao: BT is not about goal (Split was formality in fact) but about the way, pleasure of it, the change..

Jan: still, lots of BT people participate because of goal... - some 10-12 people joined from E. - so there is sense in that (some 3 people joined at E unplanned).

Conclusion: can we have several smaller goals along a route? (it worked in 2004: conference in Berlin, camp in germany, ecotopia..)

Duration:

- very few people stayed for 3 months.

- maybe very long BT was reason for very few people at all times?

So generally we like idea of after BT but tour should be shorter.

Conclusions for future:

1 - aprox. 2 months,

2 - longer part before E and shorter after,

3 - several smaller goals along the route.

3. PARTICIPATION OF PEOPLE

Several issues:

A) why so few ppl are interested in BT in general? (outreach issue?)

Croatian example:

there was outreach txt in english at several web sites even before Ivan wrote croatian one. Croatian was at some 10 web sites and alternative / activist / cyclist portals. During the route there was incredible media coverage (some 20 appearances). Number of NEW people who participated in Croatia was 1, some 3 of previous BT participants joined.

B) DIY doesn't work over years!!! (in fact, does it work on biketour at all?)

- after BT "core people" leave, group hardly makes even basic circles (example at Croatian part)

C) question of ACTIONS on the tour: how much, do we need and like them?

- actions are crucial for identity of Ecotopia BT (reminded by Daka and Ivan)

- actions are crucial for BT media appearance (example of Croatia - 20 times in the media, because of actions)

- but often participants are bored with actions (again example of Croatia)

D) Daka's and Ivan's notes from ex-NO's meeting in October 06:

1) PERSONAL FREEDOMS vs group commitment:

There is issue of personal freedoms (people who don't want to get up early, who want to have totally free rest days, who have private needs.. etc) repeated every year. In our opinion (as organizers from 05 & 06) there should be some sort of discussion with people when we gather on the road: people should give advantage to participating the group benefit over their needs - that is the essence of bloody biketour!!! (small illustration: an old biketour person had task of cooking dinner one evening, but decided to have decent shower first - so dinner happened later - bad bad biketour person!!!) So participants should be asked for personal compromises, for example: not to do morning yoga on every morning but on some, not to sleep long on every morning, etc.

2) All people will be strongly invited to tell their SPECIAL NEED AND FEATURES. (for example Ivan: "I have extremely crappy bike and could stay behind the group because of malfunctions")

3) some more STRICT RULES about times of morning departure, safety etc. Yes, rules are unpopular, but without *certain* rules project falls apart and leaves trail of grumpy organizers behind...

4) school for National Organizers! It's a hard and very specific job - we should work more with them. Please notice: every year is repeated that organizers are people new to BT, every year they are disappointed eventually - another reason for proper school.

5) SAFETY ISSUE: considering where we have been last 4 years and what happened on a way (accidents, attacks to participants, etc) we were lucky in fact. What if we won't be that lucky in future? Better worry that sorry: lets introduce soft set of rules, starting with HELMETS. Jan commented - safety is personal responsibility...

6) Daka's question: Can we ask ourselves what is REAL AIM of Biketour? He says - if it's daily distances and food - it isn't Ecotopia Biketour.

PART TWO: DECISIONS AND PLANS FOR 2007

As we know from previous meeting with WCN, Biketour DOESN'T HAVE FUNDS FOR 2007!!! This means there won't be person in WCN office, no Roeland and no EVS person from February (when Joao will leave). Leftover of money from 06 is aprox. 850 euros. We have 3 bob trailers, + baby trailer which will hopefully return to Prague.

Several measures to deal with this situation:

Joao will travel in February (on voluntary basis) to Spain and Portugal to MEET personally people interested to do local organizing.

For organizing of the tour we will ask some organizations (environmental ones I guess) in the countries where BT will pass (considering project can't pay NO's). Contacting them probably starting with Joao at WCN in January. Such a organizations could even do some fundraising, or put BT inside existing projects in some small shape.

Another thing is we decided to make board (started at meeting at Ecotopia in August).

Why - people don't reply to emails -› frustration

What - experienced people who commit to MEET VIA SKYPE TWICE A MONTH and answer mails on the list + to care for organizers this year, answer their questions & ask them how they do. Furthermore, another function should be to have ADVISORY ROLE and decision making function (at least when BT is not on the road), but strictly voluntary. To avoid formal feeling, we'd like to use name THE WHEEL (or just wheel)

Interested people join 1st meeting of the Wheel, time to be announced. The Wheel members have obligation not to be authoritarian and grumpy on the road!

Info on 2007 route:

Starting possibly in Barcelona

- straight west to Santiago de Compostela

- southward to Lisboa.

So far the most possible venue for Ecotopia is south of Lisboa (not in very south of Portugal as was thought earlier).

Joao calculated this takes 60 days already, with 50km average per day. Question is where to put staying at eco-projects we want to do this year?

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Spanish contacts:

- Marcos (Amici dela bici) - Joao phoned him. Lets talk to him that his organization could support BT after advice of The Wheel; Joao will do it after 1st skype meeting

- Jan has 2 contacts but now cannot remmember names

- Diana and Eva from BT

- Sara from Ecotopia - no mail reply

- Xavier - does anyone know where he is???