[Businessmtg] Background informatin for Business Meeting Agenda Item #2

[Dawn Werezak]

Hello Everyone,

The question as to what do we do with our monies over and above the Prudent Reserve is one that I feel very strongly about after having been involved in online service for a few years now and getting a better understanding of what happens behind the scenes.

In our face to face meetings (at least the groups I have belonged to) we have a Group Representative who represents our group at the District Level.  We have a District Rep who represents all the groups in their district at the Area Level and so on up the chain until our voices reach WSO's ears.  It all flows quite nicely if you look at the organizational chart in the Service Manual.  Face to Face meetings HAVE representation and a voice within the structures of Al-Anon.  Many f2f meetings also send a portion of their monies over and above their prudent reserves to WSO.  The last group I was treasurer for f2f divided their monies like so:  WSO 20%; Local Information Centre 40%; District 20%; Area 20%.  Our group conscience was to send the bulk of our monies to our Local Information Centre because we believed in supporting our local community first.  Even though our group averaged 5 people a week we were successful in meeting our financial commitments on a regular basis.  

According to our traditions each group can decide for themselves what they want to do with monies over and above an 'ample' prudent reserve.  That is where we are at ASP.

Now some of you have been members of f2f meetings for a long time and have done service at that level and have also, I imagine, voted on what to do with the monies from your group, etc., and likely most of you have voted to send money to WSO to support them and the services they offer to groups.  Based on that information I have heard from several people that they would like ASP to follow along that same route...because it is always done in f2f meetings.

Prior to serving on line my thoughts were right in line with that...support our program from the grassroots level up.  I have long since changed my mind about that and here is why:

1.  ASP is a registered meeting with WSO.  We are not a group.  Since we are not a group we have no voice in WSO and no representation either.  We are not allowed to have a representative because we are not a group.

2.  ASP has been around for 10+ years and I believe, correct me if I am wrong Steve, that we were the first online Al-Anon meeting on the world wide web.  

3.  ASP must sign a copyright agreement each and every year which allows our chairpeople to quote the literature that they are using in a meetings.  Face to face meetings are not required to do so.

4.  ASP has been de-listed in the past because someone on the web out there complained to WSO that they could not find us.  WSO de-listed ASP without notice or finding out what happened and without contacting ASP's contact person.  They would not do that to a face to face meeting without contacting the main contact for that group first.  ASP has always had a main contact with WSO.

5.  WSO does not serve online meetings.  I have been working since I took over in May of 2006 to get our information that is listed on the Electronic meeting list that you can get from WSO by visiting the main page to have our contact information and domain address changed.  I was contacted in July of 2007 and asked to fill out a form with our information (again) and send it to WSO.  If I did not do this ASP would not be on their electronic meeting list.  I might add that nothing changed on that list from May of 2006 to July of 2007.  After several emails and filling out twice on a hard copy and twice on line copies of this form and sending them to WSO since July, I have been in regular contact with WSO to find out when our information was going to be changed.  It was like beating my head against a brick wall at that point as I have had f2f meeting contact info changed in a matter of hours with a simple email request or a phone call to WSO.  Finally today I checked again (I have been checking weekly) our domain address is listed on the WSO electronic meeting list that they send out when you request it off the main pages.  It has taken 19 months for them to make a simple change on their website.  They have also not noted that we have permission from WSO to quote CAL online, which is not true as our agreement is valid until March of this year and I am sure will be signed off by Ric B. when he receives our new request sometime in the next couple of weeks as I have filled it out and dropped it in the mail to him.

The second reason I say they do not serve on line meetings is that it has taken them 10+ years to put any mention of Electronic meetings in the Service Manual.  The new service manual for 2006 - 2009 finally has mention of Electronic meetings on page 36 which talks about 'starting an electronic Al-Anon meeting'.  Page 80-81 also speak about electronic meetings. And on page 40 I found this interesting tidbit regarding expenses:  "A group is not responsible to fully support a clubhouse or an electronic meeting a Web site that hosts them."  

The reason I found that as interesting is that while I agree with not fully supporting a clubhouse, online meetings cannot exist if the membership does not pay the expenses for the site that hosts them, unless they have a benevolent member like Steve who has his own space and paid for 10 years for ASP to have a home in the electronic world.  This of course went against Tradition 7 which tells us we "ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside traditions".  Today we have the opportunity to be self-supporting and we are moving ASP into that realm slowly but surely.

I have joined what used to be called OLA-IS (online Al-Anon information services).  They have changed their name to OLA-OC (online Al-Anon online community). The reason for the change was they were requested by the Board of Trustees to act as an online Outreach Committee for the fellowship since only a real-world Area can have an Information Service within the current structure of WSO.  By using "IS" in their name it implied that online is an Area and electronic meetings according to WSO cannot be Areas because of geography.  OLA-OC does make contributions over and above their expenses to WSO.  This is contradictory to me because since electronic meetings and OLA-OC are not part of the service structure of WSO then that tells me that WSO is accepting donations from an outside entity.

The third reason I say that WSO does not serve or represent groups is that they do not respond promptly to requests by online meetings at all.  OLA-OC has a sub-committee that has been trying to work with WSO to put together representation of electronic meetings at the International conference in 2008 in Pittsburgh, similar to what they had in Salt Lake.  Repeated attempts by the committee head to coordinate or even receive information from WSO regarding this matter have not been answered at all.  The committee which started with such enthusiasm has lost much of its enthusiasm because they cannot get a response from WSO.  They are still trying though to work within the confines of lack of response from WSO.

I have seen this myself, first in trying to get our meeting information updated and recently in not receiving a response from WSO regarding more information on the Knowledge Based Decision Making process.  I have sent three requests to WSO since October asking for more information and they have not responded.  That was never the case when I was dealing with f2f meeting business with WSO.  

6.  WSO does not ask for electronic meeting input into any thing they publish regarding on line meetings.  When the pamphlet S-60 (or perhaps it is S-66) The Electronic Al-Anon meeting Guideline was put together, it was done so by WSO without input from any of the on line meetings that were out there.  Policy was generated without talking to those who knew what was going on in that forum.  In fact, although it is mentioned in the service manual, you cannot find it on the members site because I just went and looked.

Again, I give you all this information so that you will perhaps be sparked to ask questions and to discuss how our online meetings are treated by WSO.  Although we exist, we are not truly part of the structure of WSO.  We have minimal mention in the service manual and do not show up in their chart "Structure of Al-Anon Family Groups" which no longer appears in the 2006-2009 service manual (it was in the 2004-2006 manual.

I ask you to think about how global our meeting is...we have members from all over the world and in many different time zones at ASP and yet we are not considered an Al-Anon group and we have no voice in how Al-Anon works.  We are truly an unrecognized source of support and representation of Al-Anon within the structure of AFG and WSO...and we are a growing population as well.  

So as this phase of our discussion begins I ask that you step back from what you have seen/done in the f2f world when it comes to business meetings and use your knowledge to be objective and look at what the best interests of ASP truly are and where we can offer the most help to those that are suffering from the disease of alcoholism.

Love and Serenity,
Dawn