Minutes GA 03.04.2012

Minutes Occupy Utrecht General Assembly April 3, 2012

Overview:
1. Choice for Alternatives
2. Several Working Groups
3. Leonard Kater for EMMA
4. Cleaning up the Camp
5. Things to do

1. Choice for Alternatives

Thursday April 5 at 13.00 is the next meeting with representatives from the municipality about what happens after Queens Day. They make a decision, after that we can only fight that decision. This assembly we have to choose between going outside (in Amelisweerd) or going into a building (which we hope we can choose in dialogue with the council).
a) Going to a Building
Florian did research on several buildings, he has a list of several pro’s and con’s of buildings. Some others add some more to this list.
Pro’s:
- There is room to organize activities, general assemblies, lectures, theatre, etc.
- We can connect with other organizations for a more stable basis
- We can explore city agriculture and get local people active in this
- We could make a give-away shop to connect with local people
- We could start a do it yourself bike repair center or something like that. Unemployed people can have a job here.
- It’s a possibility to really make an Occupy community. Some people can live there, and everybody can be responsible for different specific projects.
- We can facilitate meals and eat with Occupyers to make a group feeling
- We could make a foundation, which has many advantages. But this is a question for later
- There will be no rent, we can squad or get permission from the city council
Con’s :
- It is very important that the collective goal is shared. Also, there may be drug users
- Who pays everything? Things are arranged now through donations, but in a building there will be more electricity costs, so there must be enough people to carry the project

b) Eco-Camp/Going Outside
Hans has been exploring the possibilities of an Occupy Eco-camp in Amelisweerd. An eco-camp gives you a face in the outside, it may be still too early to go into a building. But we need to learn from our problems at the camp here of daily drug and alcohol abuse. Camping is also a lot of fun. We’ll reach another group of people we don’t see in the city. However, some people think that now we are here we can put pressure on the council to give us a building, because they want us away here. Once we are in Amelisweerd we can never go into a building again with the same cooperation of the council.
c) Guerilla tactics

Demian has developed some ideas for small groups that can go everywhere in the city, to decentralize Occupy. However, his idea is that all this should be organized for a specific point, so it is not necessary to discuss guerilla tactics now. However, we should be aware that going away from here does not mean that we can never show our face in the city center.
The decision process:

We split up in small groups of four and try to reach consensus on the basic idea in this group. This gives everybody the chance to talk.
Several fears for going into a building come out of these group discussions:
- Occupy might institutionalize and become a closed group
- The quality of and rules for inhabitants
- It could become an uncontrollable situation
- Sustainability, maintenance, energy of the group
- Are people going to take their responsibility?
But there are also some additional positive feelings that come out of the group discussions:
- We can really experiment with living in consensus and community
- We could become a pro- movement instead of an anti- movement
- This initiative could set an example
- More people can come, both because we’re at a different location and because we may be taken more seriously because we are an institution now.
Everybody agrees with the procedure, 80% of vote = consensus.
The vote: Building: 12; Outside: 1; Several people don’t vote.

2. Several Working Groups

To organize for some events several working groups are formed:
GroenLinks: Patrick will e-mail the interested people
May 12: Pieter Jan will pull this project, people who are interested should mail with Pieter Jan
Festival Next Saturday: Anita will take the lead in this

3. Leonard Kater for EMMA

Leonard is co-founder of EMMA, a foundation that is concerned with the well-being of all life on earth. They offer to educate people on the UN, the economy, and related issues. He gives a small lecture on the environment and making people aware that they are spoiling nature in their everyday life’s. There are plans to invite him for another lecture, maybe somewhere in the coming weekends.

4. Cleaning up the Camp

Zacharias says there are too many tents for the number of people sleeping on Occupy. We plan to break some things down and clean up the camp this Thursday.
5. Things to do:
- Demian, Manolie, Myrte & Florian: discuss our alternatives with the council on Thursday and communicate this back to Occupy
- Working group GroenLinks: Patrick will e-mail the interested people
- Working group May 12: Pieter Jan will pull this project, people who are interested should mail with Pieter Jan
- Working group Festival Next Saturday: Anita will take the lead in this
- Everyone: clean up the camp and break some things down Thursday April 5