Sumac Admin Meeting
Minutes of Monday 4th March

Big Ups: Sumac is so clean! Thanxs to Esol class, brunch crew, pattern cutting crew.

R’s car has gone!! ( no-one knows where or how. But its not in the yard).

Chan- thanxs for taking thermostat off back wall.

Stripped wall, grand work, ready for mural.

Bens Sharkeys work hung and safe.

Mens toilet seat. Thanxs Tom.

Penny for delicious soup for the meeting!

Feelings: Fine, elated car has gone, tired , good.

Matters Arising: Camille to chase up Tom Dixon about compost Bio-digester idea.

C ask JT about the leaking parapet, and weather we get scaffolding.

P, D and TH to draft and send email on sumac admin: proposal for non-vegan perishable good storage in out- buildings.

D and TH to draft and send out email of secondary rules process of how to create them and enable people to take part.

Bin Rota sorted

In-tray: Bank Statement, been filed away.

Rates letter, informing us of our direct debit and our 50% discount.

Letter that regard Ukrainians finding people, Leslie road and Eline. Confusion aside as Andrew had been in connection and has been dealing with this.

Phone message to G about printing flyers.

Events: Tuesday: ABC Belarus 6.30 – 11pm

Wednesday: Community Circle 7 – 9 pm

Every Friday: Open Mic 8.00 – 11pm

19th Film Night (independent films, so licensing not necessary. Few) 8.00 pm

Home Brew Festival: Looking good as there is lots of interest. Date is a problem. Sally suggested June or August. Sally to email peps interested to set a date.

Open Space Discussion: Saturday 30th March: 11- 6pm: Discussion on Anarchism. Followed by a Take Back Control Talk, Workshop Event.

Games night combined with peoples kitchen. There will be a quiz. Money raised going to purchase a table football for the centre, an ex pub one with glass on it to double up as a table. (Idea to have sumac team like other social centres, or maybe events like ‘dart to an end’ like the 1-12 have)

Cleaning: This Thursday 1pm onwards. Penny to advertise publicly.

Residents: B. has moved in. J. is moving out- potentially this week or this month. Lots of interest, so potential of people moving in soon.

Collectives:

Finance: only 1person went to meeting. D emailed about having it next month, sometime. Invoices are in the in-tray.

Cafe: Peoples kitchen rota is full for next 5 weeks. Great!
Discussion on process of how PK and the money raised for benefit works. Clarification is: The people who cook decide were the money goes to. This is to encourage people who are involved in the benefit/cause to do the work. Also to highlight participation in the centre instead of the sumac being a ‘provider’.

Concerns were raised about ‘taking back control’ having taking so many pk fund-raising slots.

More tables are needed in the centre, 2 have just broken.

An events foldaway table to be used for washing up station, (as to not use an existing table) and then be slotted away behind the bookshelf. In shipping container now. Elsa to sort that.
More pots, pan and and bowl in outbuildings. Pats number to be posted on the wall of the cafe, as a point of reference for food store and equipment. Elsa to sort that.

Bar:
No meeting as there is a community circle happening on Wednesday in the space. So the meeting will be on Wednesday at 3 pm (sally apologies). Contact list for the bar volunteers is out of date. Jack to re-do this.
Jack asked for a call out for help bringing in barrels on Thursday. The barrels arrive every other Thursday (10am -12).
Bar hasn’t paid rent to Centre this month, as standing order was to the old account. Bar collective to speak to finance team. Jack to sort this.

Bookshop:
Great collection of books. This month we have 3 new books (one written by a 93 year old). ‘Revolution starts at home’ is still out of stock. Awaiting active distributions reply.

Library:
Ben is happy to take it on, but is awaiting tom to finish shelving.

Veggies:
Struggling to get Van on road, its failed to get a failing on the MOT. Oil hopefully fixed tomorrow.
Help is welcomed to do minor carpentry, filling and painting to restore the food stores and kitchen. Come along midday Tuesday, Thursday, Friday. Come along!

Garden:
Green-shoots are in process of finishing a proposal to have more raised beds in the yard.

Compost bin is full again! Arghhh! It was turned last week too. Proposal was made to pay someone(welder) to fix tumbler compost bin.

Food Bank: Fine. New shelves in the outbuildings. Woop woop.
Entertainment collective: Thinks are happening. Great!

Open mic night happening every friday! Pizza night, craft fair/ale festival in pipe line. Games night.

Rumours of live music ban: clarification: there is NO music ban.
Outbuildings: Chris has put a padlock on it. Great but where is the key? We need it clearly labelled. Proposed: get a couple of Solid Padlocks. T to sort it.

Esol Classes: L not here. Its Still happening.10 am-12 Monday morning. Female only space (but men can pass through). Please can there be clear notices of this on the door please. Someone?
Evening sessions? Some women came on saturday to express interest In the esol but cant attend due to work commitments.

Murial: People are prepping the back wall. Great. Please can the design (even if rough skeleton) be blu-tacked to the back wall/project wall for people to see and comment on. Elsa to chase up Rosie.

Springhead: Tom Curly was in contact with ellie. Sally to take over.

Cars In Yard: Yeees. One had gone but we still have 3 broken vehicles. Discussion on D who has had a few deadlines. Speculation on probs with car, electrical fault but D had intent on selling it. Proposal: Ask D to sort moving the car by next meeting or attend the next meeting to explain circumstances, as the deadline for rolling it the car onto the road is May. Elsa to do this.

Secondary Rules Proposal:
Please come up with proposal! Dom and Tom to come up with proposal. Draft ones are available on the website, but haven’t been formally agreed.

Sumac decision process is an open space, so a series of meeting would be good.

Concerns raised over the people kitchen being busy, socialising, new to space, people drinking alcohol. Is academic time the right time to be doing these things?

Post-Visioning Catch up:
People present in the admin meeting are not part of any of the groups. D put it on agenda to keep an update of what came out of it on the list.

Welcome group: Idea of a working group ‘The welcome Team’. Create, encourage a more welcoming environment.

How do the post visioning teams communicate?
Progress is happening. But need to be fed back.

Post visioning Review Session, a date needs to be set. Jack to use Doodle and post it on admin list.

How to make admin list more open?

Anyone who wants to be added onto the list, can be added on. (unless agreed not).

Who can add people? Pat can add people. Then approved by moderator.
Concerns raised inviting new people to the list, if the communication was going to continue with similar tones as last few weeks.

Proposal:
Invite people to join the list through Sumac News. (J do draft email. Sent it to C, before sending it to the list)

Maintenance:
Tables! The centre need more. (2 have broken). Look out for some!

Pattern Cutting Group can use veggies trestle tables.

Bench smells, well the soft furnishings in the centre do.

Pool Table: Put up and covered with glass (double up as a table). Who proposed to do this? Dean, Ian??

Solar Panels: Discussion about fitting solar panels on the roof of centre. Especially relevant if if there will be scaffolding anyway for the fixing of the leaking parapet. Discussion on having 5 solar panels (cost approx of 3,600). The possibilities of Sumac being paid for the energy that the solar panels generate (£260 approx a year above inflation), reduced energy bill. Discussion on how/if sumac has all the cash (finance team could answer that maybe) or weather we go down loanstock/individuals who in the past have helped and set up the centre in the first place.

C to ask JT about scaffolding situation. C to email proposal about solar panels to the list. C to contact Finance group about weather Sumac is able to front all the cash is an option.

Exterior Painting: If we have scaffolding we should use it to paint the outside of the building. Would be nice to paint a sign on the wall. Or put up a screw in/temporary one up. Rumours that it has to keep to same colour, E. to check with deeds/land registry. Well hunt down documents.

Freedom Bookshop: Shall we take damaged stock or queue? How much money is useful? J. to contact them asking this. Pat may swing by and ask them to Tuesday.

Research Proposal: General feeling it was a great idea and would like to help A., but don’t know enough of the info to make it happen. Research again and re-propose it? Its going to need 2-3 people to bottom line it. Sumac can’t front the money, as we don’t have it, and its too much of a gamble for the centre. Anyone to contact A.? Or is he on the list?

Company Assets:
L. is setting up a community interest company. If it dissolves all the assets go to the sumac. If this is correct understanding, group is ok with it. L. to confirm.

First Aid:
Elsa and jack have gone through and sorted first aid kits.
There is one behind the bar. One in 2 boxes in kitchen. One in the bottom draw of filing cabinet, which also contains numerous bandages and dressings.

Sumac should have a list of who the fist aid trainers are, in a visable place. Idea of having more first aiders. Action medics doing courses? Ask Andy W to run one especially? Jack to look into this.

Heath and Safety Catering Level 2 courses are cheap if not free for community groups. Elsa look into this.

Radical Roots:
J. feed back from the gathering:
RR agreed the proposal : Rootstock to increase their lend to Radical Roots by 3.75%.

Social Centre Working Group mainly spent discussing whether we are a working group. Questions on whether there is a need for core members, came to conclusion that it wasn’t necessary as the group doesn’t do anything with specific commitments. But there was a general feeling that the group would like to share skills and commitments with each other.

Request from other co-ops: cowley club asked for sumac secondary rules. They are on the sumac website. Request from 1-12 club asked for sources of funding for disables access. Jack has done replied to this.

Sheffield and Manchester are setting up social centres, but are not at a point to find a building yet.

R Routers to visit formally known Dale Farm, to talk to them about co-op models as a way to purchase land, but not with the intent of necessarily joining radical roots coops.

Next gathering: 17th-19th May. Keverel Farm. South Cornwall. There is a need for marquess and kitchen. So we need vehicles from Notts (as the stuff is here).

Four peps form Neds have shown interest, but they have no-driving license or vehicle. C to ask Wild peak and JT if they are going.

Cornerstone Email Discussion
Proposal: If there is a response from the Sumac Centre it is ALWAYS done by a working group of 2 people or more. In larger groups if the content is likely to be controversial.