[Businessmtg] ASP Group Representative Report - Post Script

[aohara77 at comcast.net]

All,

Just a few notes to share from Saturday's Area Assembly.  We did not get
through the entire agenda, there was a lot to cover in four hours.  In fact
it went over the four hour mark.
- there are 872 groups, 375 have GR's and I think we had 257 people
attending when the meeting started.  I counted 175 participants at the end
of the meeting.  Note the participants included the tech team that was
supporting anyone with issues and the Area officers.

Reports from the GEA Secretary, GEA Treasurer and the Group Records
coordinator followed the opening of the meeting.  

- the chair led the opening, Steps were read by one GR in English,
Traditions were read by another GR in Spanish and the Concepts/Warranties
were read in French.
The chair announced that after more than one full year since being formed,
the Area is fully self-supporting - right in line with Tradition 7
-Group Records coordinator had 3 charts to share - Number of Platforms - 18,
again with Zoom and phone capturing the highest number of groups; 18
different languages, and every time zone.
- Secretary's report was a recap of the July 2022 Meeting minutes - Motion
to approve was set forth by the secretary and the vote was tallied by a show
of hands and was accepted unanimously
-voting procedures were defined and there was a motion made to approve.  The
procedures were challenged and will need to be revisited and brought forward
again at the next meeting.  A request from the floor was to change the
procedural vote from substantial unanimity to 2/3 of the voting members -
and to exclude abstentions from the voting member count.
-because of the proposed change, voting on motions was halted and will be
revisited.
-the Budget was presented  and we were supposed to vote on the proposed
budget but that was put on hold until the voting procedures get worked out.
-our Area Delegate, Ozzie, resigned in February, recruitment for that
position has not yet begun.
-on the agenda was a vote for Alternate Area Delegate, per the service
manual, this vote required a 2/3 majority of the voting members.  We voted
twice can couldn't reach a 2/3 majority, and switched to the two who had the
most votes.    We then moved to "lot" where the remaining two were put into
a bucket and then one was drawn.  Nieta Greene was voted in as Alternate
Delegate for our GEA area and will attend the World Service Conference next
month.

The summary from the District Thoughtforce was in the packet but was NOT
discussed in yesterday's meeting.  

Please let me know if you have questions.

Anne


-----Original Message-----
From: Businessmtg <businessmtg-bounces+aohara77=comcast.net at asp-afg.org> On
Behalf Of aohara77 at comcast.net
Sent: Thursday, March 2, 2023 9:15 PM
To: aohara77 at comcast.net
Cc: ASP Business <businessmtg at asp-afg.org>
Subject: [Businessmtg] ASP Group Representative Report

Hello Business meeting friends,

 

I will do my best to keep this report reined in, hard to do justice to the
work that is going on in the area - despite years in Al-Anon and group level
service, this is new territory for me.  

 

The GEA - Global Electronic Area, is Al-Anon's newest Area.  It was created
and established to serve virtual Al-Anon groups.  ASP is just one of 875
virtual groups registered with the Al-Anon World Service Organization (WSO).
The first area meeting took place in late 2021.  I stepped into the Group
Representative (GR) role in January 2022.   I am new to the role, having
served as a GR when  I was very new to Al-Anon in the early 1990's.  The
definition of the GR hasn't changed much - the GR will attend meetings and
assemblies.  Per the service manual, the GR should be an informed member of
the Al-Anon family groups and be familiar with the service manual.  The GR
will be the voice of their group bringing information from the group to the
meeting and then bringing information from the meetings back to the group.

 

In my short time as GR for ASP, I have learned so much about myself and how
this program works in much larger forums than our meetings.  I have a
dedicated email box where there is a lot of Area activity.  Lots of
questions being posed in that forum.  Unlike ASP, many of these groups are
new and were an outcome or result of the pandemic - some GR's have  a lot of
operational questions about their meetings.  

 

What this new area doesn't have is districts.  Districts in the F2F meeting
world are broken out by geography.  Several groups in a geographic area roll
up into a district, simple.  There is a District Rep (DR) that elected by
the GR's in that district, and the DR holds meetings in the district.  The
DR is the liaison between the groups and the Area.  Without geography, how
do we create districts?  Each GR was asked to go back to their groups for
input and thoughts on how we could create districts.

 

Several months ago, in our ASP business meeting, we discussed districting
and how this new GEA could design its districts.  After some discussion, I
went back to the GEA with some of the thoughts that came out of the
discussion.  The basic recommendation from ASP was to layer the group
types/platforms into districts - there are 23 platforms that support virtual
meetings.  

 

Now I watched Al-Anon at work through another lens.  To determine how the
districts were going to be created, a District Thought Force was assembled,
I was honored to participate in these District Thought Force meetings that
took place weekly.  Skillfully facilitated by one of my peers, we spent
about 8 weeks discussing and documenting thoughts and considerations.
Outcomes from the Thought Force have been summarized and will be shared at
the next Area meeting on March 4th.  I believe those outcomes will be the
foundation of the next phase of discussion which will be a District Task
Force.  It is the task force that may bring the discussion to the next level
and possibly a vote.  

 

On March 4th, I will attend the Area Assembly, our Area Secretary prepared a
43 page packet that has been distributed to the GR's - that packet contains
a complete update from the Area Treasurer, minutes from the last Area
Assembly, the names and "resumes" of GR's interested in becoming the
Alternate Delegate for the Area and more - at the meeting Saturday,  we will
vote on the Area budget and elect an Alternate Area Delegate.  

 

I am happy to answer questions anyone might have, particularly if there are
more details you are interested in.

 

Yours in Service,

 

Anne O.  

 

 

 

 

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