CA WORLD SERVICE BOARD OF TRUSTEES BOARD TO BOARD MEETING MINUTES
December 3rd 2011
FINAL
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Randy G: Welcome to the Board-to-Board meeting, Saturday, December 3, 2011. We just finished a delicious dinner; it is 6:25 pm pst. Let’s open this meeting with a moment of silence, followed by the Serenity Prayer. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Introductions.
Randy Groen, Southwest Regional Trustee, WSBT Vice-Chair.
Teresa Neighbors, World Service Office Board Chair.
Linda Francisco, World Service Office Director of Operations.
Barry Jacobs, World Service Office Board Treasurer.
Joy Hutcheson, Pacific South Regional Trustee, WSBT Vice-Chair.
Richard Leve, World Service Office Trustee.
Bob Campbell, World Service Office Director at Large.
Terry Marsden, Pacific North Regional Trustee.
Brian Tenenbaum, Midwest Regional Trustee.
Richard Schafer, Trustee at Large.
Peter DeRafaelle, World Service Trustee.
Elizabeth Schmidt-Saldebar, World Service Office Board Vice-Chair.
Kenny Williams, Atlantic South Regional Trustee.
Janice Cook, World Service Office Board Director at Large.
Russell Sedman, European Regional Trustee, WSBT secretary.
Susan Dannhauser, World Service Office Board Secretary.
Randy G.: Thank you all for coming tonight. Thanks to Teresa and Linda, and the office for putting dinner together. It was a nice change of pace, the timing worked out well for us, we
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really had an opportunity to be at the quarterly to dig in and get a lot of work done prior to coming over here and I think that this might be something to consider scheduling along these lines in this kind of a timeframe in the future. Welcome Janice and Susan to the insanity of the Board-to-Board in your new roles. It’s exciting to have you on board. Brian got his first taste of the quarterly as well, we are glad to have him on board. It’s good to have some new faces and some new blood. I don’t have any agenda outside of the business at hand. I look forward to the Board-to-Board meeting, happy holidays to everyone. It’s been an exciting first three months as the chair. I make lots of mistakes and I will make more tonight, with your patience we will get through all of them. With them, we will get through it.
Teresa N.: I guess I would like to reiterate that and welcome everybody who is enjoying their first Board-to-Board meeting tonight. It’s been an exciting first three months for me with some interesting things going on here at the office, and I am grateful for everybody’s patience.
Randy G.: Richard, you had posted some of the reports. Are there any comments regarding any of the WSOB information, any to the WSBT as to what we are supposed to be doing?
Are there any additional items for discussion that have come up? Teresa and I went over a couple of things that were spurred up from the quarter over the last day and a half and we have added those items to the agenda, to new business. Other than that I believe the agenda remained intact, I don’t believe anything was done prior to the quarterly that needs to be added. Is there anything else? First item, convention reports. CAWS 2012.
Russell S.: Everything seems to be on track. Hotel rooms are being booked. We are almost at halfway with our obligations contractually and we feel confident that we will meet those
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targets. Reg Online is up and running. Total registrations at the time of this report being written are 78, which may seem low; I think traditionally we see low figures in our Fellowship.
Linda F.: I want to add that I am seeing new registrations on a weekly basis. They are coming in.
Russell S.: It’s nice to see that many of those are from overseas, which is very pleasing. I’ve been asked that both boards lead by example and I throw my hands up to the fact that I have yet to register. We could lead by example and get our registrations done. I am very grateful to the assistance and help of our DOO and WSOB Chair and Board for their support, coming ____________ by the bank account, the payments to and from suppliers seem to be working well. Fundraising is going well. I haven’t got the exact figures; I think we are at approximately £8,000 over expenditure.
Barry J.: We have over $18,000 in our account between what’s in England and what’s here. $15,000 is here; I reported it as of the 28th in my regular report, plus approximately $2,500 in England.
Russell S.: That figure, I do believe that to be true. We have had some expenditure recently.
Barry J.: That figure is dollars not pounds.
Russell S.: I don’t seeing it being an issue as a fundraiser event for the Fellowship. I believe we will do what we set out to do and make some money for World Services. Merchandise is available. Bob has just asked to get him a baseball cap, I try to bring some bits and pieces over, there is stuff on the website available. Speakers have been selected, workshops have been finalized, entertainment has been very creative and we are less than six months out. It’s gone quick, hasn’t it? We have a good committee, it is a large committee.
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Bob C.: Thank you Russell. I would assume that the majority of the attendees will be from overseas, is that correct? It wouldn’t be a surprise if it was that?
Russell S.: There will be a large number from the European region and it would be great to see a couple of hundred from the United States. I would hope that our usual turnout would be similar to an area convention which is anywhere between 600-900.
Richard L.: This is being recorded, please say your name before you speak, and do not put your phones on vibrate because the vibration comes through over the recording; please do not tap on the table. All sidebar conversations are picked up as well, everything is picked up by the microphone.
Randy G.: Any other questions for Russell? CAWS 2013.
Kenny W.: We have actually selected the name, Splash of Serenity. Some of you have seen this, some of you haven’t. This is the artwork that’s being currently contemplated on. Probably it will go between one and two. Do not scrutinize this please, this is a draft, so you can find some mistakes in there for sure if you look hard enough, this is a draft, it’s just some artwork that’s been submitted, some stuff that we’re working on. Fundraisers are being held and they’re on the way. I’ve taken the liberty to send the account information to Florida for the checks but I haven’t taken the checks there yet. I plan on taking them down there around the 17th of January, but they do have the account information so they can start actually putting the money in the account opposed to putting it into their local account. They can put it into the convention account.
Barry J.: The treasurer for the convention, Carrie, has been in contact with Linda and I to get some further information and is starting off great. We forwarded her some spreadsheets from Phoenix; we will also have her be in touch with Nick in London to
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familiarize her with ways to do things. We will give her Jena in Phoenix’s information as well; she had a wonderful spreadsheet that updated us on a regular basis with that convention. We are incorporating that in our pass it on to the new treasurer so money handling will be orderly. She is on top of it and proactive about that. Good things from the people in Florida.
Kenny W.: Appreciate that. The committees are in place. The steering committee and general committees are actually meeting on a regular basis. A lot of enthusiasm in the area for the convention and we are on target with most of our stuff right now considering the fact that we left out of the gate a year behind. So it’s a lot of people down there putting a lot of things together. The property is a really, really nice property on the beach so it’s going to be a lot of fun on the beach. That’s all I have.
Linda F.: Kenny, please take back to your committee that we’re available if they would like me to Skype into a steering committee meeting or anything.
Randy G.: Questions for Kenny? Thanks Kenny. CAWS 2014, Joy.
Joy H.: The steering committee is in place, they had their first meeting, and Peter attended, as I was unable to attend. Notice has been put out to the Fellowship requesting resumes for the general committee; it is on the Yahoo group. There is a CAWS 2014 Yahoo group and have posted certain files on there. We are working to get resumes from the region for the general and continuing to move forward.
Randy G.: Questions for Joy?
Linda F.: If you would ask them to put me on the Yahoo group that would be great.
Joy H.: I believe you are on the list, as well as you, Teresa.
Randy G.: Next item is Copyright and trademark protection.
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Peter D.: I spoke with Bernard Gans, he told us that the letters CA are being filed, the application, but it will be registered as C.A. because in Europe CA doesn’t mean a name. C.A. is an abbreviation and that’s what they are registering there. I mentioned this at the meeting yesterday that I think it would be a good idea if all our literature included C.A. so it’s not one way in Europe and one way in the United States so to be the same all the way around and Bernie, our attorney suggested that also. Over here, in this country we can use CA, it doesn’t matter what we use, both are protected, but over there it has to be C.A. That basically was his suggestion and my suggestion was that we do all our books, literature, everything with C.A. The logo can stay the way it is because it’s artwork, it doesn’t need a period between the C and the A, but anything on literature, books, any printing has to be C period over there. So if we’re going to do it over there I thought it would be a good idea to do it over here and we can use it how you want to use it over here but they’re both protected. And I foresee some issues in the future violating our trademark and the copyright, and Kenny will be sending out letters, Bob informed me that once we send out a letter, the clock starts ticking so we have to follow up with our letter to make sure they cease and desist what they are doing. If we don’t follow up, then we have the opportunity to lose our copyright and our trademark. If we don’t do anything at all because we don’t want to ruffle any feathers, we stand the risk of losing our copyright and trademark protection. I would suggest that the finance committee put in a line item for legal fees for this cause it will happen, it will come up and that’s basically, I talked to Bernie about that, and that’s what he had recommended and said. With that, I gave a letter to Kenny from Bob C. I forgot to talk to Bob C. about the Edmonton Group, we could probably do that tonight. That’s all I have.
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Barry J.: If you want us to put a line item into the budget, we need some sort of an approximation of what you think it may cost. Please use your best judgment, try to give us an idea. If we will need to call a lawyer four times a year and its $250-500 a time, that’s $2,000. If you need that, we will do the best we can, we will need some guidance. It is not a problem and looks like something that needs to be done. Perhaps you can ask the attorney how much he believes it will cost.
Peter D.: Every time we ask him something, the clock starts ticking. Could you help us out with an idea, an estimate? We might get one violation, we might get ten violations. We do we estimate?
Bob C.: I certainly can start the dialogue and probably not incur any money for the time being and probably get some good answers for starters. I am happy to do that. I have a couple of questions. CA, without the periods is protected. I have no problem using CA here and C.A. abroad, I don’t know why we would want to change because if we change we risk losing CA, that’s just silly after all the work we’ve done. If we were to change, wouldn’t we need conference approval to stop using CA and add the periods between the letters if we change what we currently do in the United States? I would think so.
Randy G.: From what I remember, all of the effort toward the C.A. and CA is that we received information that is either in the United States.
Bob C.: However, if we were to make it just one…ok so this is already conference approved? Okay, fine. I want to expand on getting a tiger by the tail when we write these letters. Peter correctly said what I told him, Expanding on that, when you write a cease and desist letter, it starts the time, and there is a certain amount of time that if they don’t cease and desist, you then have to take the next legal step in Federal Court. It is a serious deal. You had
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mentioned also, and Terry mentioned it as well, an informally approaching them first, before a cease and desist. That may take care of some of the problems. Perhaps calling them and having a common friend approach. I don’t know if they’re in recovery. We can have a friendly approach and say we can do this the easy way or the hard way, we would like to do it the easy way, can we come to an informal agreement that you stop it. Then we don’t get the clock going, we don’t have to get lawyers involved. As a side note, AA gave up the circle and triangle about 1987-88. They had the trademark and gave it up because it cost too much money to chase people and they said pass. There is a lesson to be learned by that. Last but not least, we need designated people to do this so we can track it and it does not get out of hand. We don’t want these letters going out willy-nilly. I don’t want to be misunderstood, we do need to defend this. There are certain things we must defend as trusted servants for the Fellowship. However, we can try to keep it inexpensive by doing it more informally. If we do write a letter, we must calendar it, or we can find ourselves in trouble. Especially if we write a letter to someone that knows the law; then we are in trouble. That was the warning I got from my friend who is the patent and trademark lawyer. He said here is some good stuff, but you write that letter, the clock is ticking.
Elizabeth S.: Are we speaking about print only, or are we also speaking about the Internet?
Peter D.: Both probably.
Elizabeth S.: Has the WSBT created guidelines on how you would like to move forward? I know at least, I hate to bring up my past, however, when I was a trustee, Leon would send out the nice communication. If it went further and there was not a response, he got a little more aggressive and somehow was able to delink them. I think it might be a good idea if there were guidelines created so we do not have to go back over this every ten years and it
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might be an idea to start with an informal communication, perhaps a form letter of things to say. So, whoever is in that position would just have two sentences to say from the WSBT or from whomever? If that didn’t work you take the next step, perhaps the next form letter of what that would say. After that, you could perhaps inform them you are contacting the attorney and taking the next steps and then get into the money of it. It’s just a thought, maybe guidelines can be created for this purpose. I think there are people around this table that have that experience on how they’ve done that. We not have this much experience five years from now of people who are not so Internet savvy. I unfortunately cannot, I have to much on my plate right now.
Richard S.: That was a great topic to bring up, and actually some of the things Leon did early on, because he remained on the IT committee, actually went into the IT guidelines. I was the former trustee of the IT. Kenny is the current trustee. We have worked together on this committee and a lot of the things are in there. The form letter procedures as maybe a letter as an internal document of the WSBT is a good idea. That is something we do not currently have, maybe we could work on that together to come up with primary, secondary, and final approach. A lot of that work has been documented and is currently in the IT guidelines.
Bob C.: Where do these issues go to start this process? The trustees or the WSOB?
Randy G.: The trustees, or directly to Kenny who is the trustee who oversees the IT department, especially for websites and those type of issues. Trademark violations that have been identified for Hope Faith and Courage sighting comes to the WSBT as a group. As a group, we make a decision as to how to approach them, what step to take next. It is pretty straightforward when we handle website matters regarding Facebook or other social
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networking sites. Any decisions or opportunities to make decisions outside of the process that is already in place is taken and looked as a board before any action takes place.
Bob C.: Presumable the referrals go to the WSBT and flow out from there, however you decided. Maybe what we need to do is have a box in the NewsGram, every NewsGram that tells the Fellowship what to do if you see these violations; tell them we need to know about them. Otherwise how will anyone outside this room going to know what’s going on, whether it matters, whether it cares, unless we hear a rumor somewhere? Shouldn’t we get some sort of a posting somewhere that says…whatever it should say? I think we need to do that otherwise we are waiting to get lucky.
Susan D.: You were just saying you want a guideline for the members to know what to do if they see a copyright violation being broken?
Bob C.: If they see CA or Cocaine Anonymous or our logo or anything like that, if they see any uses of our name or initials or trademarks by any entity other than a Cocaine Anonymous meeting, area, district, whatever. So if they see it with a recovery house, an Internet and it’s not a CA deal, please let us know.
Elizabeth S.: It’s not a guidelines, what Bob is saying. It’s an ad in the NewsGram. A box. You just gave a really long answer for a box.
Bob C.: That’s not unusual.
Richard S.: You asked a question that sparked something I believe should be brought up here. Whenever anything is discussed about legal terms, letters, anything like that, you have a large voice on the WSBT that says my opinion is any legal document or letter, anything, does not come from the WSBT, rather this office. There are two reasons. First, all business should come out of here, second, anything we are doing that would create any
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legal issue we want the board to be aware of what’s going on and any time legal counsel may be needed we would not be stirring a pot that we couldn’t back up or surprise the board, the WSOB. Anytime there is a term—cease and desist came up, that is a legal term I want to be certain came through the WSOB. It is important the WSBT is not sending out any legal cease and desist documents.
Terry M.: Along the lines of the Edmonton Hope Faith and Courage Society is actually chaired by a lawyer so I am concerned about this and hesitant. It has been a year since we actually received that document.
Barry J.: In beginning with this, maybe a letter from a chair in the NewsGram just talking about possible, just to get it out there, a letter informing the Fellowship, asking them if they suspect that someone is infringing on CA’s logo, whatever. They can report that to the office, we take this seriously, we want to protect our trademark, our logo, etc. Something informal way before you get to those next steps. This way it gets out to the Fellowship, telling them we do understand there is something up, hopefully we will get feedback, and go from there. That way we are not dealing with lawyers just yet, not incurring costs. We, as members of these boards have a little more familiarity of something that may infringe or may not before it gets to that next level, but we don’t know what it is until somebody tells us that there is a Hope Faith and Courage Society in Edmonton. We didn’t know that until somebody told us about that. We don’t know if somebody if printing literature that infringes until someone tells us. This is a softer way of going about what we are looking at before the next step.
Bob C.: I absolutely agree with what Richard said and I want to expand on it. The whole idea, the reason, and this came up with something else so gives me an opportunity. There
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has been periodic talk about merging the boards. Elizabeth and I were talking about this and the whole reason the two boards were set up just in case someone doesn’t understand it, is that the trustees need to be insulated and protected from any liability, they really do. This is very intentional. It’s also very intentional that the trustees own the trademarks and copyrights. So if someone goes after Cocaine Anonymous for something we did, they go after the board. That’s why the board has the insurance, or should have the insurance. They want to go after the board’s assets, that’s fine. Our trademarks and copyrights, as well as our trustees are protected. That’s the way it should be. And also, as much as I like an article being written Barry, people don’t read the articles. They may read a box. [laughter] Well, they don’t. They will see trademark, and say ok I want recovery. Whereas, if we put some sort of a box and say please help us, that’s more likely to be noticed. We can do an article too, but we need a box. Now, the trickiness with this separation is on one hand I absolutely agree that these letters need to go out from the WSOB, they need to be calendared by the WSOB, they talking with the attorneys need to come through the WSOB. Something tells me the trustees would like to know what’s going on and give their approval before we do it. We need to define that line. Maybe what we’re saying is this, maybe this is better, to have that box say if you see possible infringement, or however you want to put it, perhaps not legal terms, contact the World Service Office and let us know what’s going on. Then we certainly can route it to the trustees, fyi, this is what we think, etc. I feel foolish I didn’t put it that way because I’ve always protected the trustees from this and that’s the way it was designed. In case anyone wonders, it’s also the way AA designed it, so this is not original thinking. The buck starts with the WSOB, though it may not stop with us. I still think we need to do a box in the NewsGram.
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Elizabeth S.: Are we going to discuss this Edmonton Society in new business or are you going to send it to the WSOB?
Randy G.: We are currently in the midst of discussion and the direction is up to the people participating in this meeting.
Elizabeth S.: It seems as if we have an opportunity…have we had communication with this group at all?
Joy H.: Yes, it is in Terry’s region.
Elizabeth S.: Because I’ve heard of this group, not through Terry, but through delegates within that area and I believe there is a lot of frustration and it’s creating disunity within the area as well, though I am certain you are aware of that.
Terry M.: Yes, I am aware.
Elizabeth S.: I think the reason they are involving the trustees is that they don’t really know what to do, this is a perfect example of maybe stating one of those opinions. Have we talked to them at all?
Terry M.: No. The reason is mainly that we do not know the proper approach to take with this. That is why we came to the office six months ago looking for direction on the letter.
Elizabeth S.: Have we sent them anything yet?
Terry M.: No. The thing with the Edmonton Hope Faith and Courage Society is actually a clubhouse, owned by the Society and has an operating board. It is talked about in the 12 & 12, in the 6th Tradition. Part of the stuff coming out of that region right now is a conflict between memberships.
Elizabeth S.: I guess what I’m trying to find out is obviously this is a WSBT issue, is it something the WSOB should be included on, do you think you all want to make a decision
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and then inform us on how you want to move forward? Are you looking forward to a more open discussion so you can then make a decision? I am trying to figure out…
Randy G.: My recollection is that this is something we discussed at the last Board-to-Board. I’m not sure where or what direction we were looking. I thought Bob was involved at one point in time, potentially in the development of or what a letter should look like prior to a formal cease and desist letter. That is my memory without reviewing prior minutes. This matter has been at this table once. It has come up on our conference call and remained on our agenda. I think maybe there is some coordination effort that can take place. We want something to happen. We want to make sure, like Bob alluded to, if we take that next legal step, or at least recommend that the WSO send the cease and desist letter, are we ready? Are we ready, do we understand the cost involved with that, and is everybody on board before we pull the trigger to do that? At that point in time we don’t think we felt comfortable that all of those answers were in place.
Elizabeth S.: I think my hesitation for us to even be talking about it is that we have made decision as two boards together and that has not been viewed in a positive light by all of our Fellowship members. Specifically speaking to the stickering of the book. I want to make sure that if we are going to be making these decisions and making these kind of discussions as two boards together, we are really clear about what we’re doing and we are not…sharing information, gathering information, having you all make the decision and letting us know how to support you I think is good. Or, if we are now moving into that area of us making decisions, that’s good too. I just think we all have to be clear about what we are doing. At lease I need to be clear about what I’m doing, so I can put my head on the pillow at night knowing I did what I was supposed to do.
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Peter D.: This has been around for a year now. They are using Hope Faith and Courage, which is ours. It belongs to CA. They are using it. The longer we let them use it with us knowing that they’re using, we don’t do anything about it, the more susceptible we are to them saying hey, you knew about it and you didn’t do anything. I think this year, before this month is out, us, we, whoever, has to write a letter to them saying you are using…please stop. If they don’t do anything after that, then we go to the…since this guy is an attorney, I don’t think he’s going to roll over to a friendly letter. But we start with one friendly letter. But we do it this month, and we get it done, maybe Bob writes the letter, but we get it done. We agree together as a board however we gotta protect Hope Faith and Courage now.
Bob C.: I think we are in the middle of a natural development of a subject that started several months ago and gone back and forth. My recollection of what we talked about doing was me getting a letter going, actually two letters. I only got one; that took a while. We are now at the next stage. This is exactly how a lot of legal strategies develop. You get a problem, you start to think about doing it, after you do it you realize you have to do a lot more, for instance someone talks to another lawyer and they realize that its more complicated than you thought. I think we are in exactly the right spot. However, I really do agree with Peter that this one thorn in our side, we may be on the verge of being negligent if we don’t work on it. A friendly letter is in order and we need to find someone who seriously may be able to get this guy’s ear and talk to him, I don’t know. I would like to think if he’s sober that there’s a sense of decency to him not to harm the Fellowship. I feel we are in the right place and have already developed a system that if we agree and this is different than the stickers. This is a legal issue, we are responsible for protecting…all of us are responsible for protecting these intellectual properties of the Fellowship. No one else is
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responsible, the LA area isn’t responsible for protecting them, and it is the World Service Office. And the WSBT, and the WSO is an arm of the WSBT, we carry out their responsibilities and we have our own responsibilities, subject to their approval. Everything is exactly where it’s supposed to be. Now we have a lot more information and we can actually speed this up. We can get this going, we can get the referrals going, and there is at least one thing we really need to deal with pretty quickly, I agree with that. In dealing with that, we will have our system started up. I think we are talking a lot more specifically about having a system in place this meeting than we were last meeting. In my experience, this is not unusual, this is exactly how it evolves, and this is evolutionary.
Richard L.: We have had good conversations here at this office, I hate to throw the wrench in, if it does go legal, the problem is that this is international. We may have to go out of the US. We have had the conversation here, if we have to get an attorney in Canada, which might be a financial burden. I’m with Bob, we should get the letter, let’s see if he is spiritually a member and try the nice guy approach.
Brian T.: Just to make sure I understand, we have had zero contact with him?
Terry M.: The only contact I’ve had was that when this was brought forward, I responded with a letter and it basically said, the person that told me that I didn’t mean to say that. The whole Edmonton HFC Society was supposed to be a secret, it slipped out. I have not talked to the chair of the HFC Society.
Brian T.: I agree, a friendly thing, knowing this person, an unofficial…if someone could talk to him unofficially, he is not going to handle the letters, a nice letter in a nice, friendly way. His animosity towards this body from this gentleman.
Peter D.: Really? You know that?
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Brian T.: Yes. I have dealt with him and had conversations privately and he is not exactly a big fan of the process and either one of these boards, for that matter. I haven’t talked to him for a couple of years, but I’m pretty sure he’s fairly strong-minded in that opinion. If someone who could talk to him off the record and explain that this is for the Fellowship, we are just trying to do our job, maybe we can get something from him. I don’t want to see a mean letter go out. I don’t think a nice letter will be helpful. If we can, something more unofficial, maybe if we can find someone to talk to him to start off the process.
Richard S.: I was thinking along the same lines. Maybe a simpler approach and a phone call from the regional trustee, a friendly phone call from an appropriate member. Maybe a simpler start and bringing down the spin of all the letters. Not that they may not be necessary, but we’ve gone from a letter to protecting ourselves legally, financially, financial considerations. Terry has reminded us a few times during this dialogue that he hasn’t had any contact with him. I would respect Terry’s volunteering to make a friendly phone call and get started on this. Not trying to kill the dialogue, just sometimes I take off on an avenue and the simpler approach is way behind me and I need to back up.
Randy G.: To back up, this individual has stayed at my house numerous times over the years. We have some history. I will volunteer to get with Terry and give him the best course of action, it might be best if the phone call comes from me in lieu of the regional trustee to play good guy. There is always a little strategy involved in allowing that regional trustee to play that role so that may be a direction to go as well.
Joy H.: I think since this has been on our agenda for a year now, and quite possibly, if things don’t go well in speaking with this gentleman, we need to protect our intellectual property, including Hope Faith and Courage. I think we should have a letter ready to go should a
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friendly conversation not go the way we hope. The next steps should be prepared and ready to go.
Terry M.: I agree with Joy. We will readdress this in our quarterly. I think more of it is informational to if we start this it might be what’s coming and believe we may need to have something in place because I don’t believe this will be the last time this will occur. I would like to refer this back to the WSBT.
Elizabeth S.: I think we all agree that we want to make contact now, the friendly phone call. Communication is a letter to protect. If that doesn’t work, then an attorney. That seems like the game plan and I think that everyone _________ talking about that. We need to make motions, but I think that the WSOB involvement either in step 3 or 4. Until that time, we are good.
Kenny W.: I was just, I know the informal approach would work best in my mind right off top, but I think that, I guess my question is at what are we willing to protect this, at what cost?
Joy H.: At all cost.
Kenny W.: At all cost?
Joy H.: Yes. We need to protect our trademark and intellectual properties.
Kenny W.: I got that, we have to be clear about this. Breaking the bank?
Joy H.: We aren’t going to break the bank. We own it.
Randy G.: We do not know the cost.
Kenny W.: At what cost is my question.
Bob C.: Part of the problem is that we can always pull the plug, first of all, but I really do think we have an obligation to the Fellowship and conference to do this. One of the things, if
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I can sound a little altruistic for a second. You know, considering what some of the individuals in this world are like, it would not be a surprise to me if they felt they could use the word Cocaine Anonymous for an effort opposite of what we’re about. That would be pretty tragic. I don’t think I’m screaming wolf here, it’s entirely a possibility of someone just using Cocaine Anonymous or CA as an aberration and really sending the wrong message out. I, for one, want to protect that up to a point. Breaking the bank? No. But I think if it was breaking the bank we would have a good excuse to the conference why we tried our best. Enough is enough okay? I think we are getting ahead of ourselves asking how far are we going to go? It’s like anything else, we don’t know how far we will go.
Terry W.: I’m not saying that, it was just a question. I know we have to get these plans in place. The 1-2-3, the a-b-c’s. As I meant it, taking the friendly, informal approach would be the best thing to do. I know this is very sensitive, I’m on board with you. I don’t mind protecting it, but I’m saying at what point? This could get…I’m not a legal person, you are. I want to go back with what Terry just said, I think we need to take this back, pull this back for a second to the WSBT and let us hash this out a little bit more and bring it back forward again to this board.
Russell S.: Mine was the same question. I wanted to know if we got in the ring, how does it roll, is it $5,000, is it $10,000, is it $20,000, and I know you can’t answer that but I just wanted to know is it up there in those sort of figures?
Bob C.: It could be.
Peter D.: We just spent $5,000 to secure the name CA. Wouldn’t we spend at least as much to defend it as we did to pay for it, to get it copyrighted? We just have to do something about…if there’s a time we do stop, we should spend at least as much as we did to secure it
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to defend it. Just what I think. We spend $5,000 for CA and it’s going to cost us $2,000 to defend it, that’s a good deal. If it costs us $5,000, it’s still a good deal.
Elizabeth S.: I just recently had to do some legal action, and just in general, attorneys can be from $300-500 an hour. Usually a letter can/will cost at least 2-3 hours. If you go to court for the day, it is that many hours. There are costs for filing, travel. We all have our own experiences, that’s just my most recent experience.
Bob C.: You guys want to take it back, that’s fine. Can we discuss when it gets back here?
Peter’s point is really well made. Discussing it more at the WSBT is an excellent idea, I would like to hear about it in a month or so. I am certainly not telling you how to do it, it seems to me this is where it could fall between the cracks, and I do not want to see that.
Randy G.: It is on our agenda.
Bob C.: Could you possibly tell me when it will come back to the WSO?
Randy G.: We will let you know as soon as we make a decision.
Richard L.: I will liaison.
Randy G.: Next order of business, NADCP.
Linda F.: I had the pleasure of going for the very first time with Richard Schafer and Robert Lyle and gathered about 240 names. People stopped by our booth; we presented them with an HFC 2 book along with a packet of all of our pamphlets. I had communicated with both trustees on several occasions that I am looking for a letter, have found the letter, and will get to the letter. The first draft has been sent out and have received some wonderful suggestions from Richard and Teresa. It looks like the letter will go out before the end of the year to the Drug Court participants, it’s a reaching out letter, we met you there…is there anything else we can do, refer them to our website, to find meetings in their areas, if there
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are no meetings refer them to the website to get starter kits and touch base with us if they need any further information.
Richard S.: The upcoming NADCP is next year, from May 30-June 2 in Nashville, Tennessee. Nashville is in Kenny’s region so Kenny will be joining us there. One thing I did bring up at the WSBT is something I believe the WSOB needs to discuss also. The convention is ending on Monday, May 28. I’ve looked at all flights and there are no international flights out past noon that would not have a long layover somewhere else. It would basically be two travel days or leaving the following day, the 29th would get us one day’s travel, back on the same day, the 29th. That would have us in Nashville the day before Drug Court begins. I say this to make everyone aware of all of the efforts that especially the DOO has, the efforts and commitments she has at both places. While the normal attendees for your Drug Court are your TAL, your regional trustee and your DOO, the DOO and WSOB may want to consider other representation. I am planning on making that trip. I will leave the following day, sleep on the flight and be as prepared as I can be to set up for Drug Court. The office will have, Linda and I will coordinate this, but we will have the shipment waiting in Nashville. This is normal. It is usually there 3-5 days before, it can be up to a week and it is staged. I wanted to make you all aware of this, it can be discussed. I do not know if Kenny has yet decided on his travel effort. I am committed to be at both, I’ve made the trek from Milwaukee to Los Angeles the night before, so I went straight from the World Convention to Drug Court, facilitated Drug Court, then returned home. It is a lot, it was also not international. It was a lot. Sometimes it is what we do. I wanted to make sure it was mentioned. NADCP is normally the submissions for our registration and our hotel in January. I assume that is still the case. If there is any interest in discussion with NADCP as having one of us as a
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presenter; they extended that offer to us last year and we may be better prepared this year to do that where we may get a little more recognition from the attendees if we are a presenter at Drug Court. It does not cost extra, it is just a willingness to attend, be there and present.
Barry J.: At convention, just so you know, the DOO responsibilities at convention, especially that last day and possibly the day after convention to help tidy things up, finish a lot of things are extremely necessary. In Phoenix, Linda was there an extra day still working on things and closing up shop. Not trying to tell people when to come and go, but since trustee business is pretty much done at the beginning of the convention, maybe you guys or whoever is going, maybe a TAL leave a day earlier so you can go earlier, set it up, and not trying to cut your convention short, but if we do feel this something that’s that important that we need to participate in and people cannot be in two places at once, and there is a time constraint, the DOO is definitely needed to close up the convention. That is a known fact. Other people can set up the other convention. I’m just trying to make a suggestion that maybe the trustees can leave one day earlier, like you said the travel may be possibly two days to get there to set it up or one of your guys can set it up. Have somebody from the local area help and that way the other people will be there, if that’s a priority.
Randy G.: There was a discussion regarding the trustees leaving early. At this point in time, it’s really up to the two individuals as to how they want to handle that for themselves. A timeframe that would allow them to participate all the way through Monday at noon and leave at Tuesday and still get to Nashville, I think from a trustee standpoint, I think we are covered and believe we will handle those responsibilities. It was more about making sure in this meeting that it was just the information disseminated that the schedule is that tight
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and if we are overlapped with responsibilities for the DOO that the office board may have to make some considerations as to that participation. From our standpoint, I think we’re pretty clear on what we can do and when we can get there.
Elizabeth S.: I want to be really clear, can you repeat when you’re leaving?
Richard S.: The convention ends on the 28th. If I chose to stay until the end of convention, it ends at approximately noon. I checked flights and there were no international flights traveling home after morning hours, so I would not make a flight on the 28th, I would fly out on the morning of the 29th. You maintain the same date traveling back. I would arrive the evening of the 29th and the following day at noon you can set up. The event is three days. Elizabeth S.: Obviously it takes a toll on you and your physical health, really. Financially speaking, you would do a three-leg trip. Do you believe you can do that? It seems like a lot. Richard S.: It’s one of the reasons I bring it up here, I believe each person deserves the right to make that choice for themselves. I want to make sure that the Atlantic South regional trustee is well aware of the timing and schedules and periods. I also want our DOO, with the overwhelming commitment in Europe. Do I believe I can do it? I can tell you have not booked by ticket yet. I am still considering my options. My intention today is to attempt this, but I do not know. I may change my mind when I’m ready to click the ticket. I will inform the board of either. I can promise you that if I don’t believe I can do it, I will not. If I believe I can, I will do this.
Elizabeth S.: Is this the only Drug Court all year long?
Richard S.: Yes, the national, the only one we have participated in and have continually participated in since we re-arrived there.
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Elizabeth S.: I like the idea that we were invited to be presenters; I think that’s awesome and we should take them up on that offer. They may not ask always. The question is not if we are going it is rather who is going.
Randy G.: We will handle our portion of the responsibility, we just wanted to clarify the complications on your side.
Elizabeth S.: Linda, are you going to be able to do this?
Linda F.: We will talk about it.
Joy H.: You may have to send someone other than Linda.
Linda F.: Correct, and that’s been a consideration in mind.
Unknown: I’ll go.
Richard S.: We did discuss this at the last Drug Court to make sure. We know a year in advance when the next Drug Court is going to be. I looked at the dates and gave Linda a heads up. As it is getting closer, I wanted to make sure it was really discussed, the commitment was understood. Linda has a much clearer understanding, now having been
through both a world convention and Drug Court at the possibility of . It is also
something for the WSOB to consider. While the attendees for Drug Court are recommended as the TAL, the regional trustee and DOO, it may not be possible this year, it may be something you will want to discuss.
Peter D.: Is it more important to have the DOO close out the convention or attend Drug Court.
Linda F.: I believe close out the convention.
Peter D.: The general consensus?
Group: Yes.
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Peter D.: Okay, to close out the convention and get there and perform for three days I think’s insane, but then again, I know I wouldn’t do it. I’m too damn old anyway.
Linda F.: One added thing, last year was my first Drug Court and I thought it was very inspirational was they also allow us to hold CA meetings on the premises, in the hotel. We had one meeting where we had close to 25-30 people there. A couple of participants for the very first time, could stand up and say “my name is…I am an addict and alcoholics because in their areas they only have AA. That was, to me, very inspirational that we could reach out and tell them that we were there. International Drug Court.
Richard S.: We were invited by one of the facilitators for Canadian Drug Court, so it is not the International Drug Court that is held at different locations throughout Europe and I believe the African continent. We keep referencing International Drug Court, the only other nation we are venturing to attend is Canadian Drug Court. We’ve looked at the costs for two of these events, there is no line item in the budget for these events. Being prudent, I don’t know that this February is an event to attend. We do know that Canadian Drug Court is currently being manned by the local area fellowship. I have been in communication with this Fellowship. It is still something we are investigating and looking at to see if it is something that we can fulfill.
Linda F.: That’s Toronto, correct?
Richard S.: Yes. I say yes on record because I see Terry nodding his head out of the corner of my eye.
Bob C.: While I certainly believe that while we need to respond to being invited to these
events and recognize as a major recovery organization, in my mind it’s absolutely
necessary considering our finances that we appoint local representatives to do it and give
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them as much support as we can in terms of material and whatever. Then they can be there as Cocaine Anonymous World Services as our liaisons. But I don’t see us being able to afford, and you said that…I don’t see us being able to afford doing other drug courts outside of the United States for the next few years until we get our finances a little stronger. That doesn’t mean we can’t go. It means we have the local people do it and support World Services. It’s just competition for the dollar, we have to prioritize and right now we all know it’s a challenge.
Elizabeth S.: We haven’t really talked about it. We’re working on these translations with our French Canadian friends. Montreal is not too far from Toronto. It might make sense if we are planning to go to the International Drug Court to communicate with the French Canadian friends that whoever is doing that could go and represent translations and have that meeting with them then, rather than at their convention. It seems like we could carry members and save money. I know that’s in discussion already. So I was thinking it’s a month later and maybe that would work if we’re talking about doing International Drug Court. It’s just a thought. The cities are about two hours apart.
Barry J.: Financially we must consider what we can afford. In the finance committee, Brian you were there with me, Randy you were there too, I believe, we did try to budget a little extra money in the Drug Court column to see if we could financially do this. However, finances are a little tight this year so what I am trying to get at is yes we have thought about the financial. I am trying to let you all, as a board be reminded that yes we did think about International Drug Court within the finance committee; that we are trying to budget it in there. What may end up happening is something like what Richard was saying, we participate, we could help finance part of the booth or the facilitating of it and have the
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local area man it, which is a good part of the expense. We do have the booth. We can send them stuff. Everything can be there with the exception of us manning it. That’s something the WSOB should look at, as it is a financial aspect of it.
Richard S.: While your TAL does do the coordination and communications, the NADCP is an effort of the WSO, everything goes through the office. I wanted to make certain it was brought here. We are clear regarding the financial issues and maybe Randy could summarize some of the discussion at the office board because a lot of the same things that were discussed were brought up there. It could keep me from repeating or taking us 20 minutes out on a topic we don’t necessarily need to be.
Randy G.: Our areas or regions participate in a lot of, all the way from drug courts to good old-fashioned recovery fairs. For $50 you can get a table and set up outside at a recovery fair picnic. As these requests come in for participation, I talked to Teresa right before we started about the possibility. Do we have banners, do we have them accessible? Do we have table skirts that are more professional than just the white table that is the norm and stacking up a bunch of HFC books. If we can get back something from the office as to what those costs are, what the possibility is of allowing booth utilization, I think we have to be very smart about that. From my own experience in business, we had a booth that went out and we always got 95% of it back. You eventually will need to replace the booth and more quickly than if you’re the only one using it. Those are considerations for the office as far as how much support we can give. Even simple table skirts and allowing local areas to participate in these with some support. Buy a case of books, we will send you a skirt. We need to address some of these things.
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Terry M.: One consideration, we are so easily ready and prepared to facilitate Drug Court here in the United States and we are talking about the International Canadian Drug Court. I would like to see if we cannot afford to finance both, I would like to see if there is a possibility to rotate year by year. We have a Fellowship outside of the United States, this is more than just about the USA. I would like to see it maybe focused maybe if we can’t afford to do both, maybe rotate back and forth from International to National.
Bob C.: I don’t see that point of view, but that’s okay. The only thing I would add, I really do believe in is local talent, is a win-win situation. We really need to get some sort of orientation for them so they’re saying the right thing to people. We already have people who can do that. We just need to make sure whoever ends up doing this task for us has the proper orientation rather than just sending a bunch of literature and table skirts and say go for it. God knows what they may do. I think we have it down pretty good in terms of what we do, so the good news is you can do it for us, the bad news is we need to talk to you for a while and put you through an orientation because you are not representing the local area, you’re representing Cocaine Anonymous World Services. We do things a certain way, and that’s the way it is.
Linda F.: I actually like that idea, instead of rotating, I feel we need to get ourselves to a point where we can represent ourselves at both because if we’re not at NADCP, Narcotics Anonymous is there, AA is there. We are in that top three. If we don’t show up, I think that will send a bad message. Whether we use local talent, local groups, we need to be represented and maybe just send one person from the trustees or one person from the office, that can be worked out, instead of three to cut down on cost, hotel, etc. I do believe
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we definitely need to be involved with the International, however pulling out of National is necessarily a good idea.
Richard S.: I like Bob’s idea, it reminded me that I was trained very well by our former DOO/DRPD, who had a fantastic approach to the public side. I will take the task and responsibility of putting together a PowerPoint and sheet as not only a pass it on, but an orientation that can be used. I like the idea, I’ve had the most experience currently on this board. I will get it and bounce it off you.
Elizabeth S.: I think it would be first prize Barry if we could find money to do both. I think it’s really why we are a 501(c)(3), which is an educational non-profit. This is in the business of public information. If we do not do things like this, we can just not really think forward about our long-term planning and the future. It’s actually imperative that we do as many of these as we possibly can and that we are putting our hands out to introduce ourselves to as many people that will listen. That’s really how we continue to grow. I also think that being, it would serve us very well to attend an international convention in the country of Canada. I don’t know if the trustees have talked at all about Russell…
Randy G.: I’m sorry, I didn’t get that.
Elizabeth S.: I think it would serve World Services very well, and the Fellowship to attend something in Canada. Representing a trustee, an office board member, whoever that is. I think it would be very good for us. I also believe we are booming internationally, and I believe that we should put our energy where there is excitement, passion, and go all in in those positions in business.
Randy G.: I know Terry attends conventions in Canada, I know Robert does, I know Kim did, is that what you mean?
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Elizabeth S.: Not necessarily, I’m not talking about the World Service regional trustees. I’m talking about World Services. I’m talking about attention from World Services, whether it’s much more of a kind of, like we are going to Canada as World Services, members of the WSOB, members of the WSBT to do something international.
Randy G.: So you’re thinking somebody from the WSOB could be attending those conventions?
Elizabeth S.: I think both. Not even necessarily the conventions, it feels like they’re coming to Canada. I have to say, after the thing with Calgary happened, there has not been a lot of warm feelings, still, from some members of Canada. I think wherever we can show support it is beneficial to the Fellowship and flows outward to the local meetings. “Did you hear that the office board and the trustees came to an international function in Montreal and they’re supportive…” I think that can all be very good.
Randy G.: I have no issues with the office board if they want to try to put together a budget for that type of participation. I want to make sure I am hearing you correctly, I thought I heard you say somebody from either of these boards. I do believe the trustees participate in those conventions in conjunction with their area visits.
Elizabeth S.: Let me rephrase it, I think it’s probably more of the WSOB.
Barry J.: Just to sort of bring this together, maybe we can create something with the PI committee, get them involved in training people to participate in the drug courts. Like you said, there are fairs and a lot of things all across the country that areas and regions participate in all of the time, and we should be sending the same message to Phoenix as we do to a National Drug Court, or an International Drug Court. This is Public Information and we should perhaps get this committee involved in helping us create a set way of doing
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things, and also help with manning, participating, setting up, going out and spreading the word in this area. We cannot be in all of these areas at the same time. This will occur, when Drug Court occurs right after the convention. There are 20 people right here and that’s only 20 people among thousands.
Randy G.: Next item, ad hoc committee regarding HFC 2.
Joy H.: We discussed this at our quarterly meeting and have discussed different options, of course we were waiting for numbers. I have those numbers now. We have 12,778 soft cover books, 9,737 hard cover books. Total inventory is 22,515 HFC 2 in inventory. I did a comparison of last year’s sales over this year’s sales, and last year’s average per month over a four-month period was 733 books. This year, it is 364 books per month. Since we got the book, which was the 2009 conference. I do not know what sales were in 2009, I’m sure if we wanted those figures we could get them. Sales have dropped drastically, even though we have stopped stickering them.
Randy G.: I am going to ask the ad hoc committee outside of presenting this information, does the ad hoc committee have any further report to bring these two bodies regarding this? Do you have any ideas as to what direction to take this information? What I don’t want to do and am hoping to avoid is to take this ad hoc’s committee’s business, toss it out here in the middle of the Board-to-Board, not that a discussion may not be healthy, however, I want to first know if there are any suggestion from the committee regarding the information they’ve received.
Joy H.: One thought is to increase the price of the book.
Randy G.: That is a committee recommendation?
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Joy H.: That was a suggestion from a couple of people from the ad hoc committee, it is not the collective voice.
Linda F.: Hazelden, one of our bigger booker purchasers, for the very first time, ordered the HFC 2. They have in the past only purchased HFC. They did not place a big order, it was only one case, however, that was maybe a good step.
Elizabeth S.: I would like to meet as an ad hoc committee.
Joy H.: I posted to the group a couple of times with no response.
Elizabeth S.: I don’t know that I received anything, I am glad to participate and will look right now.
Barry J.: First of all, sales of the book last year were higher because prior to last year, there were no sales and we were making up for a lot of backorders. That was part of the sales of last year, and why sales were pretty good. Furthermore, the price of the book was discounted as stickered and we held that discounted price. What we can see, like Joy pointed out, is that we are selling an average of 365 books a months on average, unstickered, and what I’m getting at is that I’ve taken a poll from our customer service representative and other people. Generally our book just being sold institutionally, in other words, they are being sold to meetings, areas who will buy that book at $4.75 or $5.75. As long as it is a reasonable price point, the book will be sold. At 365 books a month, that is approximately 4,500 a year. If the book price was raised $1.00, that means an extra $4,500 in our coffers. Book sales should not diminish based on that. In a time when our sales of chips, literature and books are down, it is something to think about to create more income. We own these books. It is not a product that once it is sold, we will then have to replace or take part of that money we earned to buy or replace the product. We own 20,000 units
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outright that we need to move. We need to maximize our profitability on those books. That is our business, to keep these doors open. I am not a member of this ad hoc committee, make a recommendation to the committee.
Brian T.: What price did we sell the books to Hazelden for?
Linda F.: $4.75.
Barry J.: If we did change the price, as we changed the price down, where we gave notice to people, there should be notice and an opportunity to purchase the books at the currently discounted price and inform them that is set right now. We further inform the Fellowship that was a special price, we do not change the price of the book, we discounted the price of the book. What we are doing is changing the discount from $8.50, the original suggested retail price of the book down to $4.75.
Richard S.: Two responses. One, I wanted to bring back up, when Elizabeth was speaking earlier, you referenced business that was done by both boards regarding the book. I was there, I still support that and believe things like that regarding the book, I think it’s very healthy for both boards to make those decisions. I said it that night as well, on record. I think it is better for our Fellowship. In response, and Barry touched on it, Joy’s comment came out of some discussion about raising the book price. It was more of a promotion, a business strategy to announce that the book price will be going back up in maybe 90 days; not only giving one the opportunity, but maybe promoting some sales that we might not normally have. The price adjusting eating our income and maintaining sales we are already getting. That was the discussion that occurred today.
Bob C.: I actually thought we were going to be talking about printing the HFC 2 for England and where that was. We haven’t even talked about that yet. I would like to hear something
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about that. We hear about it every board meeting, we certainly talk about it. I don’t want the trustees to think it’s not on our place, because we are dealing with it all of the time. Secondly, I am not excited about raising the price of the book. If we want to raise the price of the book, sell the damn books and get a new printing. It just sends the wrong message. This is a recovery book, we need to make money. I think potentially it puts a bad taste in my mouth, raising the price of the book back up. It is a point of no return when we reduced the price, I don’t care what gimmick you use, I’m not impressed with the gimmick that’s it’s a part-time reduction. Whose kidding who? We’re not Harper Rowe, we’re just a little organization, let’s sell the damn books for we got them for sale for. I thought we were going to talk about what we can do to sell more books, and funny me, I don’t think that raising it a dollar is going to do one bit in helping sell more books. It may help us raise a little more money, I don’t have to defend myself about raising money. I’m everyone’s biggest pain in the ass when it comes to that. We need to sell the books and not raise the price, my opinion. We need to get that European version online to the other part of the world that is so supportive of us. Thank you for being so patient with us. We need to get those books. Barry, did I hear you say that we’re not supposed to be putting money aside when we sell books. Did I hear you say something like we don’t put money aside out of every book sale to make a book fund so we’ll have the money to do a new printing? Because I thought was our, we started that ten years ago.
Joy H.: We have a prudent reserve of $75,000, $50,000 is the office prudent reserve,
$25,000 is the book reserve.
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Bob C.: So we do maintain a book reserve. Barry, I misspoke, I am sorry. Randy said he did not hear that either, I apologize. I just want to make sure we are keeping the book fund going so we don’t end up with no books and no money.
Joy H.: It’s been that way since I was the treasurer of the board.
Elizabeth S.: I like the idea of making marketing plans, I think it’s really important for us as a small business to create marketing plans. Not only with HFC 2, but with all of our literature. I think the finance committee has done a beautiful job in creating the World Contribution Program, the Gratitude Month, the Birthday envelope. They have done their part. I think, where I see it now, I don’t believe we need to be raising the price of this book. I believe what we need to be doing is marketing this book, like we did to Hazelden. I know I went to my own local recovery store and asked why they didn’t have HFC 2 here, or any CA chips or literature? They said they would call and start doing that. I think we have responsibility and members within our Fellowship have responsibility if they have a plan. If they know what to do, and I don’t think that raising the price is necessarily going to get them…I’m in business and I cannot imagine raising something a dollar or $5 after it’s already been marked down. It’s not going to make people want to buy any more. If we had created it in the beginning where we said this is going to be a ninety day or six month deal, or a year and made the announcement that way, then yes. But we didn’t do that. As I recall, that’s not how the announcement went. We talk a lot, I am a finance girl, I’ve been a finance girl for CA for a long time. I have tried to figure out ways to save money, I’ve tried to figure out ways to think of new, creative ideas to raise money. The most money that is raised, just from the history is when trustees go out to their local areas or local conventions and meet with their folks, communicate with the people. Then those folks know these people are
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representing World Services and they send money in. That helps us do things like Drug Courts and making the PSA video, creating a new international HFC book. Hopefully getting this French translation version of HFC 2 done. Pamphlets for Farsi, Spanish. That’s what it’s really about. It’s not about raising a dollar a book, that’s not where the money comes. It’s like nickel and diming us to death, but the money comes from hugging your Fellowship members. They’re just like us. When I was a newcomer, it took a lot for me to put a whole dollar in that basket, because at the time, I didn’t have a whole lot of extra money. All those dollars put in those baskets that are sent here, I think we have to be totally responsible about how we spend our money more than anything else we do here. I think it’s important as a newcomer, if they need a book, they don’t have to spend an extra dollar to get that book. In my opinion, we should be selling that book for what we pay. 88 cents. We charge $4.75, it’s more than what we pay. My point is, we have to think about carrying the message which we do mostly through our publications. Whether it’s through our literature, books, pamphlets and the Internet.
Richard S.: I want to speak to what I previously clarified about what was discussed at the WSBT today. I think it’s important that it is also recognized that what I also shared, looking at Richard and Peter was, we come together, we work online and come together quarterly and discuss the book. You all meet here every two weeks and sell the book. You walk around the books in the warehouse. I am very aware of it. I hear loud and clear, while I still think it’s a good idea, I respect what the WSOB has to say from the day-to-day point of view and the interaction of the orders that come in. I will still be in the minority. I’m okay with that, and will also support your views and your decisions that come out of your discussions. I wanted to make certain that was clear.
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Barry J.: I would like to put it out there, I polled the customer service person, who interacts with people all of the time. I polled the DOO, I have gone out and inquired to people and made some calls and asked. Like I said, people that are buying this book, will buy this book for the price we put it out at. Yes, the member of the Fellowship that want the book will probably get it from their meeting who will be glad to give anybody who cannot afford a book, a book. But the meeting or the area are the people that will probably buying that book. They have had the money to buy at least 365 of them a month, approximately. It will buy maybe a few less, but they will be willing to spend that. Second, I was in this group, this bodies discussions when we lowered the price of the book. The reason we lowered the price of the book was because of the price of a stickering situation. We were not selling the book at all, we decided it was not a perfect book with a sticker on it in the US. With a sticker on it, we felt the book needed to be discounted, as it was not perfect. We are not stickering the book in the US, it is a perfect book, it meets our requirements and our price that we originally sold the book at was $8.50, or $9.95 with shipping and handling. What I am getting at is right now I am looking at what we have in our coffers. I am looking at what our budget says we should be selling and I am also looking at a large inventory of books that we also have other projects we would like to get done. We need the funds.
Russell S.: I’ve been coming to this Board-to-Board for a year now, each time we talk about this book and how can we get out to our Fellowship, for me that’s not obvious. I don’t believe our Fellowship are going to take any more of this book regardless of the price. The power of the purse is speaking, to be honest, as to how much of the Fellowship want this book. I believe there is an opportunity for a long-term, twelve-month plan. How can we get rid of that inventory of books? When we celebrate our 25th anniversary, an area in the
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European region sponsored a book. Their goal was to get a book in every library in every major town in the country and every treatment center in the country. The did a flyer and sent out a letter and got the Fellowship going about the PI way of doing it. They bought 1,100 books and got them onto 1,100 shelves around the country. Can we do that on a worldwide level. Can we spend the next few months thinking of this? The PI book has got the flyer: Sponsor a Book. It’s got a form letter saying we are celebrating 25 years, we could change that, we are celebrating 30 years. Ask our membership as a PI exercise to buy a book. Get on a long-term plan. If we shift 5,000 of them, great. As far as going back to our Fellowship, trying to get them to buy a book, they don’t want them and I think we’re just banging our head against the wall, talking about the same thing. As far as shifting inventory, look in the PI workbook, it’s there how to do it. Let’s do it on a worldwide scale, Gratitude month next year, the 30-year celebration, let’s get HFC 2 into every local library in your area, here’s how you do it. Let’s support it and shift 5-10,000 books. Or we can talk about if it should be $4.75-5.75-9.95, whatever.
Bob C.: It’s the first time I’ve heard the Fellowship doesn’t want HFC 2, was I asleep during a meeting or something? The Fellowship does not like HFC 2? I mean, I knew there was a fuss over the labeling, putting a label on the book and all of that stuff. I mean, is that the consensus, the Fellowship just doesn’t want the book?
Russell S.: If you heard me say that, that’s my view, my opinion.
Bob C.: I know, I’m asking everybody. Richard say, yes that’s true.
Richard L.: I’m being sarcastic.
Bob C.: If the Fellowship doesn’t want the book, to piggyback on what Elizabeth said, this should entirely change our marketing strategy as to what to do with the book. Let’s get on
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with life. However, I haven’t heard that from members. The only thing I’ve heard at all, if anything, is complaints of the labeling, over putting the label on the page. I haven’t even heard that many complaints. So, there is a lot of silence here, I think everybody is thinking the way I am. None of us have heard the Fellowship does not like HFC 2, right? Okay,Russell. Is there a consensus out there that, are there rumblings in the Fellowship that they don’t like the book?
Joy H.: Can I respond?
Randy G.: I have many people who would like to respond. Right now I have Bob, then several others.
Elizabeth S.: I just have a couple of questions. Russell, I don’t know where that thing is, and I am on the PI committee, I’ve been looking in my files on the PI group, can you forward that to me?
Russell S.: It is in the workbook. The PI workbook. It was approved at conference, the flyer was approved at conference.
Elizabeth S.: Thank you, I am new to that committee, so there is a learning curve there. I love that idea. I have to tell you, Bob, this is my opinion, Russell had his opinion about this book. I think that as soon as it came out and there was a kind of a hold on selling it because of How It Works, there was kind of a bad feeling with the book. We haven’t really been able to shake that. In my home group, it’s like, they still wanted to pass out the big book and sign it for the newcomer, I made a big stink by saying no, it’s a CA meeting, it’s going to be HFC 2. I think that’s only because I’m so outspoken and strong-voiced. I think there is a bad stigma with this book, unfortunately, as soon as we can get into reprinting the new book. I have to say 22,000 is not that many. It takes 22 areas buying 1,000 books, or 40 areas
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buying 500 books. You know, I know that when we started doing the contribution program we did a big thing where we were getting different areas and regions, it became kind of like a contest at who could get the most people to sign up to donate. Maybe you guys do something like that. Your trustee regions. Who can get the people to buy the most books to put in libraries or prisons or whatever they want. Maybe make it fun, exciting, enthusiastic way to carry the message. I think we have to spin it in a positive way. It’s been so negative for so long, I think it takes time, as we all know, to educate. It takes years to educate. People just now are referring to the finance guidelines.
Peter D.: Talking about, I go to three CA meetings a week in San Diego and I have noticed that we have talked about this. I have thought back. I buy the books for the area meeting cause I come up here. I haven’t bought a case of books for our area in probably four or five months. I’ve noticed that our meetings, they sell the big book and give away HFC to the newcomer. Because if the newcomer’s got a choice, he’s going to buy the big book first and since he doesn’t have any money, a lot of the meetings give away HFC and then they go to the area and buy some more books. So, what I’m going to try and do in my area is talk to the book guy, who is a friend of mine about stockpiling a couple of cases of books, just to get them out of here, I would rather have them sit down in our area than sit up here. At least the money will be in the coffers. And that’s not done, I don’t see it in my area meeting, I don’t see anybody pushing the sale of the book. There’s no complaints, the likes or dislikes about it, but if they have a choice in the meeting, the buy the big book first and we give them the book. We buy probably a case and a half a month for H&I, cause I pick them up here also, and we give them away at the meetings. That’s how each area should go about buying books. Let the areas stockpile the books if they can, at least we will put the money
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up here. They’ll eventually go away, they’ll eventually be used. And $4.75-5.75-3.75, they don’t give a shit really in my area. It doesn’t matter. Stay at $4.75.
Joy H.: At my regional caucus at the conference last year, I gave away four cases of books to my entire region that were stickered to get them into the book. Last year, at our quarterly meeting at this time, at the Board-to-Board, we decided not to sticker the books any more. We put it out to the Fellowship that we were no longer stickering the books in the US. Las Vegas came up with a plan to promote the book and have a book drive, and we lowered the price to $4.75 for softbound, maybe $5.75, I forget. Last year before conference, book sales were up. This year before conference, book sales are way down. If we actually look at the numbers. In our discussions at our quarterly meeting, the PI idea came up, I made it number one for the subcommittee’s list. I think it is a great idea. CA is turning 30 soon, so that would be a good plan, I will post it to the group. At least we are not at 36,000 like we were when we started. I don’t care what we sell the book for. I don’t care, we just need to be able to get HFC 2 in French and HFC 2 in English without How It Works in it to the UK, the European Region without stickers in it. That should be our goal. That’s been my goal all along and what I have been trying to move forward and I think that’s why we starting talking about the European fulfillment center. We own the books, there’s not much we can do about it; they are paid for. The money is back in the coffers to print new books. We still have a $25,000 reserve because we’ve made up for the books from the current sales we’ve had from the minute we received all of these pallets. I think it’s time to move forward and eventually those books will go away, whether we give them to prisons or keep doing H&I with them or whatever. It’s time to move on and focus on the rest. French, Spanish, it cannot always be about the US. I get calls from Mexico City every three months. I called
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here and we are sending a starter kit to them. They want stuff in Spanish. French and French Canadians want stuff. We need to focus on that. That is what we need to move towards.
Bob C.: A couple of things. I am hearing that the books were selling well a while back, then I’m hearing they’re not selling well now. I think if they’re not selling well by the next time, if they continue not to sell well, I think we need to look at lowering the price and of course at the same time, I think this is a great idea, to get the books in the library, I think that’s a fabulous idea. I want to point out something, and I’m not going to be really clear. Hindsight is 20/20 of course. I would like to think we’ve learned a lesson in terms of maybe moving too quickly on one of our products and damaging that product, and I wonder if we should not really try and remember if we should try and remember this because this is a financial mistake. Standing up for principle, we need to stand up for principle. Don’t get me wrong, but we need to look at the financial impact and I think we were naive. We are no longer naive. Let’s learn our lesson. God forbid if something like this, if this aroma starts coming again, somehow affects one of our products, I think hopefully there will be some of us around that will say we need to think long and hard before we do anything that is going to tarnish this product. Because we did this before and we paid the consequences and paid is, and literally paid the consequences. We need to move slowly in these issues and I hope we’ve all learned our lesson before we just react and pull the plug, because in the end, we’re not doing the labels, in the end, we’re selling them like they were made in the first place. Yet we’re suffering the consequences. Maybe we can learn from that. I repeat that if we continue to have slow sales from this product we need to treat it like anything else. We
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need to move it off the shelves and we need to get more product. Meanwhile, we certainly can get it, make use of it in the libraries and the institutions, what a great idea that is. Elizabeth S.: I think I would just like us to consider maybe the WSBT to consider this ad hoc committee to consider, when we get to 10,000, cut our losses, go to reprint, and kind of put those on the back shelf and either donate them to international new areas starting, put them in jails, prisons. At the 10,000 mark, we are only 12,000 books from that, it’s easy and then we can move onto a new book that will increase sales, it’s going to have a new momentum, a new, positive feeling about it. We can start selling that. I’m just saying if we can get behind that idea, as soon as we get to the 10,000 number, we are going to have new books. That’s just my feeling at this point. I think we can do that by time we have our next Board-to-Board.
Randy G.: Barring objections from anyone, I would like to offer an opinion. I started this line item with a respectful recognition that we establish ad hoc committees to hold members from both boards to work in between our get togethers to address those things like Bob mentioned, the printing of that book for the European region without a sticker and what it takes to make that happen; to look at pricing issues, to look at, and quite frankly our head is in the sand if we believe the Fellowship is excited about this book, even non-stickered. I have listened while we sat here in long discussion where the thousands of books we sold went. They were given away. They were bought by H&I and given away. They were bought by areas and given away. They are bought by areas and given away when someone buys the big book. They weren’t given because this is a must-read. I think the number and the quantity of these books that are being sold is a message and I appreciate some people that will stand up and ask us to take a look at that. And that’s okay, it’s okay to realize we put
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out a version two, something that someone believes they’ve already got, and quite frankly from my feedback from my area and region, is that HFC came out, it was really cool to have a storybook. We wanted the stories of Cocaine Anonymous to go side-by-side with that big book. Then what we did, Cocaine Anonymous came out with another book with some more stories. It was just more stories. They bought them, they read them. It was just like the last book. It didn’t become that much to read we were hoping. Not that there’s not great stuff in there, there is. I think the recognition of it, the quantity of books, we absolutely have to learn from. Deciding we have to price drop, or add an extra dollar, we’ve got a lease on this facility and the only cost to us for those books now is the square footage it sits on. If it took four, five or six years to sell those books, our cost truly is zero, except inventory. I would as that the ad hoc committee recommit. I would ask that the individuals that are part of that committee take heed in here. There have been a ton of great ideas presented today and ways we can go about putting the book on the shelf. To recognize that our Fellowship is not buying to read it, we are buying it to give it away is important. I did not hear anybody else tell me in this long discussion that these books are being bought to be read by the people that are buying them. They’re bought to be handed out, given away. I think if the book was truly “we want it” it would be bought because people wanted to read it. That’s a message we just have to just be aware by simply the quantity of books that we are selling. I ask that the ad hoc committee remain busy and bring the ideas back to this group, back to the board and WSBT and we can determine how to go forward in selling literature, to make money and carry the message; and do those things well. Because we do those things well. This book may just have been one of them.
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Linda F.: The new printing of HFC 2 with the corrections is currently at the typesetter, but every time we take a step forward we have to stop and take a step back. We had to put a halt on it because of the conversations we had at our last meeting with respect to the disclaimers on the steps and traditions. Since we are at a halt, it was brought to my attention we want to try to update some of the information, I have just asked a couple of trustees to get numbers so the preface can be updated as to meeting numbers can be updated and countries, etc. It is silly to think about reprinting old information if we can reprint with updates. I was also asked to do some research on the copyright, do we have to, if we are making changes, do we have to apply for a new copyright? I think I sent to the ad hoc committee what I found online. If we are just doing housekeeping corrections, we do not, if we are changing actual stories, we do. I think we are ok with the copyright. My next question is, when we list the copyright, if we are doing a reprint, do we need to add a new date?
Bob C.: A second printing with a new year. Look at the inside of the big book. First edition, second printing.
Linda F.: Thank you. Second printing. It is at the typesetter, it is on hold awaiting new information. I feel we should get it back very soon.
Joy H.: I know it took a while to get the original so that we could make changes, so it was up to date and corrected. Could you please keep me in that loop?
Linda F.: Of course.
Randy G.: Next item, 7th tradition money from abroad.
Teresa N.: We have come up with a solution that seems to be working. I am going to yield to Barry or Linda.
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Linda F.: We have received a 7th tradition contribution from Holland. The way it was done is they asked us for our international banking pin, it is basically our international address. I have that available where they can wire money directly to our account. It is an IBAN or SWIFT number. We have basically that information so the European countries can do 7th traditions by using that information.
Barry J.: We will also accept 7th tradition through PayPal or any means one chooses to use. We are not promoting it, we are just making it available. When we accept a check internationally, we are charged fees for transfer of funds, currency exchange, and foreign check fees. We can lose quite a bit, depending upon the dollar amount in exchange. Each country regulates fees. PayPal does not have those fees—however, we do not promote PayPal, Russell.
Russell S.: It’s a wonderful way to receive money, though it goes against our financial guidelines.
Barry J.: I just said receive money, the guidelines for your local area should be met by your local area and there are ways, even with those local guidelines to utilize dual signatures and other safeguards to get money through…just like you go through any bank to do an IBAN, the exact same way, you can do that through PayPal, instead of going from bank to bank, you’re going from bank to PayPal, PayPal to us. We’ve created a foreign in-house for whenever we do any electronic transfer of funds. In other words, when we transfer the funds from one account to another, we have a form in house that was created, it requires two signatures, a description of the reasoning, all paperwork and all that we actually go to the bank, the bank creates us paperwork, we have two signatures on it, we are following
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the guidelines, but we are doing electronic transfer. We will be glad to provide you with that form, anybody who would like it.
Russell S.: I still have concerns, whilst this body may had great guidelines in place for making wire transfers to pay for conventions or pay for an invoice in the UK you have your wiring system in place, the majority of areas don’t and our financial guidelines state _______ and all these sort of things. How I see it, I am privy to be copied in on these emails sometimes and I’m not…be cognizant of the areas’ ability to not work safely within these things that you’re promoting.
Barry J.: I am just explaining to this body, that’s all I’m doing. Not to all the other people.
You can take it to the area however you choose to take it. To this body, we do accept PayPal and we will accept PayPal. If a local area wants to follow the guidelines, there are ways of electronically transferring funds within the guidelines if there is a paper trail. It is the exact same way you would do an IBAN, it is an electronic transfer of funds.
Teresa N.: I didn’t mention this, we have established a fundraising ad hoc committee for our board, finance fundraising committee. One of the things they are charged with is handling the 7th tradition and donations from abroad. We would be happy to have Russell be a part of that.
Elizabeth S.: Jason from the UK is currently a part of that committee. I feel if any trustee would like to participate in any of these committee that would be wonderful, I also think we need to consider the right of participation, and share the information we have.
Teresa N.: What we have set up and managed to do for now is a temporary solution to allow them to get some money over, it has allowed Holland for the first time to send money.
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Russell S.: My home area is still recovering from a very large misappropriation of funds, which was wasn’t noticed because the reasoning was, well it’s been sent by PayPal, that’s why the money was paid into my account to be cleared. That is why I am a little sensitive about it. To encourage that sort of activity when such a large amount of money was siphoned away from the Fellowship due to those sort of practices, then I am going to continue to be vigilant.
Elizabeth S.: We have the financial fundraising committee, Teresa, are going to discuss the other ad hoc committees we have at the WSO?
Teresa N.: No.
Elizabeth S.: So we are excited and working on it. If you have any ideas you would like the ad hoc committee to work on in regard to that, especially the 7th tradition, we would be glad to hear about that. I believe Bob is the chair.
Brian T.: When we wrote the financial guidelines, I think about zero thought was given to collecting funds outside the United States. We talked about this little bit, it probably needs to be addressed by the finance committee also, maybe it’s part of this fundraising committee also can play parts in it, that’s fine. I think something needs to be added to those guidelines. That stuff wasn’t going on when we wrote it, though it was just a few years ago. It was not as prevalent, the electronic age, what the Fellowship is doing. It is probably something the finance committee should be doing at the conference, something the conference should be looking to upgrade and change and add to the guidelines. Perhaps the committee you have can add to and share that. Also, Barry I would like to see a copy of that.
Bob C.: If you noticed, in my report I vaguely referenced being made chair of some finance committee and someone mentioned what the title of that committee was, I have to write it
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down. With that being said, I am the chair of that, which is fine with me. I would request Russell, I’m really not trying to be, I’m curious, if you could send a memo of what happened and what you’re concern is to us so we can address that I would appreciate that. If you could send a memo kind of explaining. I’ve heard snippets here and there, it’s really not something people give reports on per se outside of their area. I need a memo on that so I can see what happened and what your concern and where you think there is a problem so we can address that and try and maybe solve that problem or at least answer that. If you could send that to me I would appreciate it. Cause I am very sensitive to everybody being on the same page.
Russell S.: When you say memo, you mean like an overview?
Bob C.: An overview of what happened, and why? I don’t need names, rather what your concern is with this. Again, what is the name of this committee I am chair of, seriously?
Elizabeth S.: Fin Fun. Financial Fundraising.
Bob C.: Thank you.
Randy G.: Next item, Status of the WSO.
Teresa N.: I would first like to acknowledge the fact that the WSOB is now a full board. [applause]. I am very excited to have a full board. Moving down to items for the office, we passed the gavel from Tom to me, that includes going to Wells Fargo, signing off on the bank accounts, taking care of credit cards. I met with both WSO staff members in November. I meet with Linda on a regular basis. I met with Sheila, it was productive. My feeling is that Linda is doing a great job and continuing and eager to learn all the time, and collaboratively with people. I am happy with the progress there. We have been very busy on the board since conference and set up a number of ad hoc committees. One, you have
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already heard about, the Fin Fun Committee, we have a PSA Committee, Translation Committee. They are all really busy. In addition, we recently discussed and came up with policy regarding AA disclaimers that now affect all of our publications. We believe we have it right now. I have handled and continue to handle various human resources items that are confidential. [Discussion about Shipping clerk redacted California labor law, found at MZ000033]. Linda and I are discussing the restructuring of the office to possibly save us some money. When we come to a final decision we will keep you all in the loop.
Joy H.: Regarding the outside professional. Since we are 500% above and beyond our budget in that area, and I know why, since our warehouse employee is returning, is our outside professional going to drop considerably?
Teresa N.: Right now our outside professional has only been working part time, about 28 hours a month. When the warehouse employee returns, that position will be eliminated.
Peter D.: Do you have any more information about the IT guy? I forgot last time I was here. Teresa N.: Nothing yet.
Kenny W.: I know that you haven’t finalized anything with regards to your reconstruction, but what is the options consist of?
Teresa N.: I would like to finish that discussion with Linda and then have the discussion with my board before I were to say anything.
Russell S.: One of the biggest ________ I can see going on is the translations and there is
this issue with the French translations. At conference we have a couple of meetings with delegates from French speaking areas, it was very productive, but I don’t believe that the work has been finished. There were discussions on the possibility of a member of the
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WSOB attending their area convention in January and I was wondering has that been discussed further.
Teresa N.: It has been discussed, it has begun on our board. A motion has not officially been made yet, though discussion has been had regarding the possibility of sending a board member to their convention for the purpose of being able to represent the office and WSO with respect to translations and helping to facilitate that so we can get that done.
Russell S.: It is December, time moves quickly.
Elizabeth S.: I do think the communication with our French Canadian friends has continued, and last week we got another email from them, I believe communication continues, it’s positive, relationships are formed and they continue to move forward. I don’t know if everyone knows that, but we’ve been working really, really hard to make sure those continued relationships continue to be in conversation so people are not feeling not heard and not part of the participation process. I think that as the WSOB translation committee we are really doing a good job.
Teresa N.: To add on, if we weren’t in the budgetary situation we are in, there would be no question as to sending somebody. That’s been a big part of the discussion. We cannot afford to reimburse a board member to attend.
Russell S.: I am not doubting the communication isn’t there. I’ve been privy to a lot of it. I appreciate the work that has been put into it. Having experienced sitting down in front of people, those couple of hours, the meetings we had at conference were worth so much more than 20 emails a Skype call or anything. We made more ground in one hour in front of those members having a coffee and with respect to whilst we are in communication with a particular member, the delegates and other concerned members may be haven’t had the
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opportunity to sit in front of us and ask questions and had stuff explained to them. I think that is something I would not like to see overlooked. I think they deserve a visit. I think I would be very helpful to have somebody there.
Brian T.: I have a question concerning Ryan, a couple of things. How quickly is he working, is he doing a good job, because I know that as the Illinois area, I know Debbie has called you a couple of times. Last time she called, it wasn’t on the website. Also the PI survey is still not on the website.
Linda F.: The thing with Debbie was probably my mistake, I got a local thing and an Illinois thing, I thought she was referring to the Illinois, that is on—I gave the wrong information. Brian T.: The survey that was passed at the conference, they want surveys filled out, we didn’t get copies of it at the conference because it was a draft, it was going to be put on the website. Last time I looked was just before Thanksgiving, it still wasn’t there.
Linda F.: I’m not sure anyone has forwarded me a final copy to be put on.
Randy G.: We should check with Robert, who heads up PI.
Linda F.: Usually when I get something final, I try to get it up on the website within a day or two. Debbie’s thing was my mistake cause I got two and thought they were the same.
Barry J.: Our webmaster is a volunteer, just so you know. He instituted a bug system. He can only go to things that have been presented to him. If they were presented to us, we present them to him in the order we feel we need them taken care of, rather the office needs them taken care of.
Brian T.: It’s still not on there.
Barry J.: PI may not have correctly presented it.
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Brian T.: I am talking about the Illinois convention, Debbie has sent it twice, it’s not on the website for February. It was started a few weeks ago.
Teresa N.: I have to look and see when Linda actually put in the bug, if she just put it in, it’s likely…I don’t know when she was able to figure it out. When did you put the bug in for the Illinois convention?
Elizabeth S.: I think we also need to remember as the Board-to-Board meets here, this is Linda’s first out of conference time, she’s still in the training experience process of knowing when the guidelines get updated, that’s something that needs to go here, and to the website, and has to go in the file. There is still a learning curve we are working with here. Also with Ryan. He is also a new webmaster for us as well. I think the idea that we have this bugzilla and that we now actually have a process of tracking thing, that is kind of huge, and organized and much more professional than it used to be. It probably should be up a little quicker and for whatever reason, I don’t know why it is not, I have to say, and it’s not an excuse, we have to remember we are in a place where we are training a lot of people. That was Linda’s first conference, this is her first 90 days out of conference.
Brian T.: I am not placing blame, I just want to know what’s going on.
Randy G.: We mentioned tracking this bugzilla, is there an average turnaround that has been established?
Linda F.: Most of the time it goes within 7-10 day. Again, I heard someone say Ryan is a volunteer, so he does this on top of his job and other things. Quite often, he will come to our board meetings and spend the entire time doing nothing but updating, that’s twice a month. I will follow up with him via email to see if he can give me a projected timetable. I probably gave him seven in one day, and that was only one.
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Elizabeth S.: It is not under local events, it is under other events. See, it’s right here.
Brian T.: The first thing you see when you log on to the website.
Randy G.: Any other questions for Teresa regarding the status of the WSO?
Richard S.: Thank you Teresa.
Teresa N.: The landlords did some refurbishing, we have new carpet, paint, they updated the kitchen and bathroom. All new lights.
Randy G.: Next item, the European fulfillment facility.
Russell S.: Nothing much further to report on this from last time. I’ve got some information Linda sent me, some orders. I’ve pulled six orders. We have got quotes from some facilities, what it would cost for them to handle, I am just trying to work out the local postage rates, I did not get a chance to put it all together before this meeting, so next time.
Randy G.: For the new DAL’s, what we are doing in looking at this, is the opportunity to establish a fulfillment facility in the UK that potentially stock, provide and distribute secondary inventory resource center. At this point in time Russell is gathering the cost of what it takes to do business across the pond, back and forth as to what we can kind of set up to do from a local distribution standpoint as maybe a secondary option. Questions?
Elizabeth S.: How does that work exactly? Where does the money go, how is that money here, what does that look like? Have you already talked about that with us?
Russell S.: Yes, there is a report. It is basically a storage facility somewhere in Europe. All my research so far has focused on the UK. It would be a fulfillment facility which keeps the stock, orders get placed and shipped from there.
Elizabeth S.: Like an office?
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Russell S.: A distribution center not an office.
Bob C.: The orders come here, we tell them what to ship, they send them out.
Elizabeth S.: An independent company. Thank you.
Randy G.: Update regarding the non-addict trustee.
Richard S.: Those of you who attending long-term planning, this was brought up. The non¬addict trustee is an unfilled position, and those of you have not attended long-term planning, we look forward to seeing you at the next meeting at the world convention at the UK. Questions came up at the WSBT. Members of the WSOB brought up some questions. This position affects us, so we want to make sure we keep you apprised of the discussion of things that are going on. Some of the topics and some changes. As far as the position itself, the topic which was also at long-term planning, developing and gathering, who, where…where do they come from; clergy, medical, legal, and recently discussed, was members from the community of recovery. Coming from all regions submitted to regional trustees. That’s making the request for people to develop those relationships and see what may be of interest. Asking all areas to consider candidates through their regional communication channels; so regional trustees reaching out and asking if you have contacts that may be a good fit in this area? One topic that came up is that there is no resume format for a non-addict trustee, so the TEC is looking into a format that would be able to be filled out and submitted. Another topic, we have not had a non-addict trustee since back in the days when they were selected by the WSBT. We now have an election process that includes TEC. That would have to be added to the election process. One thing I realized in our brief description and review, there is no term limit for this position, that should be a consideration both for our board and for the individual to held hostage. These are some
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items of discussion that are currently going on around this position that is unfilled and that we have an interest in filling and bringing that outside perspective to our board for some help.
Randy G.: For the new folks for the office board who may have not participated, there were two open trustee positions. The TAL 2, that position was suspended. It was an action taken so it is officially set aside and suspended. The non-addict trustee position was never suspended, and has just gone unfilled. In long-term planning we recognized it was unfilled, and we have a responsibility as the WSBT, much like the WSOB did, to fill their board, to go look for that individual. There is currently no budget for the position. There is a line item that will make things a little easier. The process to find a non-addict trustee might be a lengthy one in that we would have to find that individual, they would have to understand and be patient that we need to find the funds to put that individual in place. Those are only a few issues to help get you up to speed with what Richard so eloquently laid out.
Bob C.: As a historical point, AA did not have an alcoholic trustee until the 50’s. That was a huge announcement. Their original trustees were all non-alcoholic trustees because they didn’t know who was going to stay sober and they needed to put people in charge. That’s kind of an interesting point. There’s always been talk about the non-addict trustee probably coming from the Southern California region for practical reasons. We certainly have a huge pool of talent in every area here and financially it would really make it a lot more palatable to our budget to come from Southern California. That’s not my agenda, I’m just saying that’s what it is. Last but not least, all of these ideas and everything are going to be referred to S&B.
Richard S.: They have to be; they go in the manual. These are ideas we are discussing, yes.
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Terry M.: However, there are already qualifications in the World Service Manual.
Bob C.: If you are thinking of more clarification, it will need to go to S&B. Thank you.
Elizabeth S.: I have a couple of thoughts. I’m very good friends with Father Francis, who was our former non-addict trustee, I would be glad to give you his number. He would be probably very delighted to talk to you about his feelings about being a non-addict trustee with us and also ideas of possible candidates or things he might think are good. He is very pro-Cocaine Anonymous and a very good family friend.
Richard S.: I look forward to that, thank you.
Elizabeth S.: Also, I think in discussing this, you may want to consider putting someone who is not one of us through out interview, which seems very…I think our interview process, just from having sat through the interview process looking for a DOO and not having people who are addict interview for those processes, I think it’s very different. In developing that, really think about how you want to move forward with that. I don’t know if I would suggest that a non-addict trustee would be someone I would put through a process like that. I might suggest maybe accepting resumes, looking at resumes, and choosing a smaller group rather than having 20 people sitting around a table asking you questions. I don’t know if that is the most professional way we could choose one of our non-addict trustees. I think we could vet them and make a decision that this could be a person we would like to see and have your top three and go from there. It is a very different thing.
Most people who are trustees on boards are paid for their positions, and we do not offer this as a paid position. I think we need to be careful about asking too much in the beginning, we need to be careful about that. I also think the trustee board should really kind of consider the areas which you have professionalism in areas you may have need,
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cause you kind of know what your board looks like. Brian will be the longest one sitting around the table currently. Brian is going to be a finance guy and kind of an all around well- rounded guy. We might not know if Brian is the most spiritual person, maybe we want to have someone spiritual there. Maybe an attorney, or the recovery world. You need to kind of decide and make it a part of the guideline so trustees in the future think about that as they’re choosing. You don’t want to choose just your friend, you want to choose someone who is going to challenge the board to think outside the box rather than just kind of doing it our way because it’s the nice way. Thanks so much for all of your hard work.
Richard S.: I would like to respond both to the locale and perhaps to where the individual comes from in their walk of life. I understand it would probably be most financially beneficial if they came from Southern California. My thought was being open to the selection and seeing what comes rather than focusing on a particular area. I believe that individual probably will come from Southern California where we might have a lot more contacts, a lot more people that may be familiar with Cocaine Anonymous itself or members of the Fellowship. I feel it is important to be open and leave it open to all regions. Again, I am often in the minority and I have no problem if later on down the road that is where it lies and the majority says no, this is the focus of our search. I am not the one in charge of what we’re doing, I am just facilitating getting us on the road to filling this position. I’ve definitely heard, I just want to make sure why I didn’t just say we’re focusing on the Pacific South region. My thinking is that we would be open to walks of life and locales of where someone would come from.
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Randy G.: Some guy in London’s an international business expert and if we had to have him Skype in to our meetings to understand international finance and the distribution of this, I think God will provide the right individual when we ask for it.
Linda F.: I wanted to comment as being the non-addict interviewee. I completely agree with Elizabeth that you’ve got to handle it a little bit differently and my suggestion would be to maybe have an interview committee or group of two or three people with the original interviews and once you narrow that down, bring that to the boards. Tailor the questions. I have had to build several boards of directors where we have had boards though not trustees, but again I want to piggyback on what Elizabeth said, you want to look at what your needs are. Usually you look at somebody, then give you the time, treasure, talent and figure out what you need and whether these people can give you time, give you the talent, because this is an organization that wouldn’t take treasure from a normie anyway, just focus on the time and the talent.
Richard S.: Duly noted, and will be forwarded to the lead on this.
Randy G.: Next item, copyright letter outside, are there any other concerns or questions? Next, financials.
Barry J.: I forwarded current financials to the WSBT, also with a few notes. One of the things brought up earlier was our outside professional, which was so high. Salaries are down, which makes up for the reasoning behind that. There are other, I don’t want to say mistakes, but they are mistakes. They are numbers in the wrong positions. We are in the process of cleaning up QuickBooks. We are actually in ok financial mode. Our bills are getting paid, we are collecting 7th tradition, it is holding with what we budgeted, and the only downside is sales, which are down. 7th tradition has held up to our budget, however
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when we were in finance committee and created the budget for this current year, we lowered the expectations of our 7th tradition because of previous history. We knew that it was down for three previous year periods so we lowered our expectations and adjusted all of the budgets based on that. The down side is we budgeted our sales based on previous years sales and we’re down. That’s where I’ve come into my suggestion. The biggest thing, and Elizabeth mentioned it before, and I am going to mention it, what helps sales and 7th tradition is pressing the flesh. You guys are out there in the world, out there in your regions, talking to people, going to conventions, regional assemblies, meetings, the more you guys, and all of us go out and tell them; a lot of people don’t even know we’re selling a book again or that we’re selling the book unstickered or that we have a square chip, the commemorative chips, or the skull t-shirt, or things like that. Go check the web store and see the things we have so you know what we have that they may not know and may want to buy because sales help operate this office and that’s the bottom line. Sales of that stuff in that warehouse help keep the lights on, Linda paid and things get done like going to England. Other financials I wanted to bring up regarding England, we have everything Wells Fargo has asked us for, we have presented all paperwork, all corrected documents, we have heard from Wells Fargo UK that everything is in order and they are in the process of crossing t’s and dotting I’s and sending us out deposit books. Everything should be here, until I get the deposit books, I’m telling you that’s where we are at. We have not received them yet. We have letters, we have emails, Russell has seen the emails. I have been in contact with Russell, as instructed, part of the ad hoc committee, other financial means just in case. I want both boards to know everything necessary to operate a convention is operational. We have an account and have followed the guidelines. The day after Arizona
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closed, we had an account in place for England. We paid for items and are making deposits. We are passing things over either using credit cards, IBAN’ing or wire transferring, doing everything necessary to guarantee this convention will be up and running. We are operational. If that account does not open, we are working on other means. I am 99.9% sure that account will open.
Bob C.: We are still in deficit spending, right?
Joy H.: -$24,000.
Barry J.: We always work toward zero. That is how our finances are set up, our numbers work that way.
Bob C.: The point of that question is that we are making less money. Thank God we made as much money in Arizona that we did, and a lot of people misunderstood what all that extra money was cause it wasn’t all that extra money. $80 of the $120 was already in the budget, so we didn’t even make $120,000, we needed the $80,000, then the other $40,000 was in deficit spending, really deficit spending because we’re losing $3,500, we’re spending $3,500 a month more than we’re bringing in. It did not used to be that way. It did back in the day it was that way. The way you describe going to zero, I mean that’s what it was really like back in the day. But for the last ten years it hasn’t been like that, or eight years or something. We’ve done pretty well. In the last ten years we’ve usually made more money than we’ve spent. Our 7th is down, and our sales are down and we’ve reorganized the office. We’ve cut out, we’ve made sacrifices, but the fact is we’re in deficit spending more than normal. Which is even more the reason why we need to shake the trees. There is a lot of money out in those Fellowships, I really think there is, there are hundreds of thousands of dollars out there. I will tell you, if you want to look at the spiritual part of it, money, property and
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prestige is what takes these organizations down. Sitting on large amounts of money is when we start to have problems. It is a spiritual experience to donate the money. It’s the trustee’s job to go shake the trees. And it’s not easy, but I really believe that. So we need that money and they need to give that money just as much as we need the money but we need to always be talking about right now how we’re in deficit spending. That needs to be said.
Randy G.: Questions for Barry?
Richard S.: I would like to respond to a remark that was made that the convention is working within the guidelines, the emergency guidelines. We don’t have an account that we can utilize for the convention.
Barry J.: We have an account in the US. Wells Fargo even year account is the account we are currently utilizing to pay the bills, it is the standard that we have always had, whether that convention was in the United States or anywhere. We established an emergency guideline account to facilitate any extra things that may come about. However, we have not been using that account for anything more than collecting funds and forwarding those funds to the United States once they have been collected. Those emergency guidelines have been followed. The operational account for that convention was in place just as the guidelines state, the even year account the day after we paid, in fact we paid extra because we sent over funds sometimes in US dollars, we found out we could pay some of the vendors with credit cards or IBAN. Some vendors are in the US. We get funds mailed and the emergency guidelines are met to the dollar and letter and the treasurer of the UK account sends us everything. We do not pay bills with that account unless it is absolutely necessary. It is more a petty cash account. The regular guidelines require a petty cash account to be $500
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however, in the UK it is a little larger amount and we are following those guidelines. Other than that we are paying for everything here out of the US even year account. We are operating. They understand it takes a little longer and on most things we get to it on time. We try to get to their requests as quickly as possible. The extra account with the emergency guidelines at the convention is being followed but we are not utilizing it for anything more than emergency needs and transferring funds back to us.
Richard S.: I was responding to the comment that we have been operating within the guidelines, I think it was a little misleading.
Barry J.: I’m sorry.
Richard S.: I wanted to make sure…
Joy H.: He did say it was at the end of convention when we approved the emergency guidelines.
Richard S.: I will yield to Russell and Joy, thank you.
Russell S.: We do have the issue of getting the money back. We have safe operational bank accounts. One of which is under emergency guidelines at the moment, which is working.
The issue of course is getting the money back, so it’s not all prepared.
Barry J.: It’s not 100%, but we’re getting there. It’s the first time we’re having an international affair. Did you have accounts in Montreal? [answer unclear] Under these guidelines, this is the first time we doing this after the 2008 banking debacle. I have been in touch with Russell about this and other concerns we have, we will get into those in the ad hoc committee. The money is to the penny over there, spending, everything is getting paid as needed, everything here is paid for. Our regular operating is controlled. We are
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tightening out belt wherever possible, doing whatever we can to save money. We are printing a lot of our own literature as opposed to outsourcing.
Joy H.: Let’s be honest, this account should have been opened two years ago. When the UK got the bid, Nicholas and I brought it up to Tom and John when he was the chair. That is when the account should have been opened. Two years is a very long time, we’ve known about this for a while, finally it is getting done, we are skirting along the lines of operating per the guidelines, only because we created some emergency guidelines. Technically we are skirting the lines. The reality is 99.8% the account will be open by the time the convention begins and the funds made at convention will be deposited into this new account and the other account can be closed, liability can fall where it should rather than where it should not.
Russell S.: How are we going to close down the emergency bank account, because I am a signatory on that account, I would like to get off that account as soon as I possibly can. Are we going to have a united front on reporting to the steering committee, letting them know this is when we are closing it down?
Barry J.: Once we have the other account operational, we can find out what we can do with the other account. According to the emergency guidelines, we have to close the account, I believe within 30 days. I want that money coming here, not the UK, and we will worry about funding the UK account as necessary. Bookkeeping wise, that is the cleanest way to do it. Perhaps not the most efficient, but the cleanest way, because then we are done with it and everything is where it belongs. Okay, so push books, t-shirts, and everything.
Randy G.: Any more questions? Hearing none, I know we’ve been here for four hours, we are on 14. We have a few more items. There is one more item that was part of the original
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agenda and a few more added as a result of the quarterly, just a few more minutes. First item of new business transcription cost and requirements of the conference, WSBT quarterlies, WSBT and WSOB Board-to-Board meetings. To give you an update from our quarterly, our transcriber was not able to fulfill the duties in her role regarding the August quarterly and Board-to-Board, so here in the last few hours we made contact with a previous transcriber and she agreed to do the August quarterly and Board-to-Board. The funds are a little more than what we have traditionally spent. It has been a $300 bill to do what we call a weekend set. We have agreed to pay her $400 to have that done. She can jump on that right away to have us caught up. We do not have a transcriber in place for this weekend’s quarterly or this Board-to-Board but we are looking into either a technology solution, potentially voice-to-text, we are looking at some other opportunities. We will try to resolve that issue and get back on track and let you know. There was a lot of discussion regarding the requirement of recorded truly transcribed word for word of our quarterly and we are going to continue to look at that regarding the WSBT quarterly meetings and the WSBT/WSOB meetings in the future. At one point in time, we feel it may be prudent to ask the conference whether that escalating cost is truly responsible to the requirement. We understand the legal requirement to be that there is a recording of our meeting and that recording could be potentially kept at the office but there is no legal requirement to actually have that transcribed word for word. We will keep you posted as we need to discuss that.
Elizabeth S.: I didn’t realize that it was a legal requirement to transcribe these meetings, or rather to have them recorded?
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Randy G.: Our understanding is that the recording of your Board meetings are a requirement. A record.
Elizabeth S.: I just have to say that I believe in your discussions, it would save you all a lot of time and the Fellowship a lot of money by having someone take minutes. That’s what our secretary used to do.
Randy G.: This is the conversation we are getting into. We are asking to make sure we are getting exactly what our legal requirements are. We will let you know.
Elizabeth S.: I understand the conference, it’s where main motions and big changes of the Fellowship happen. I think we have to know. We’ve even recently had to go back for the How It Works and wording of the additions. That’s really important. I am sure you will work it out. There are companies, when I was a trustee, we had a company we just sent it to, and they would do it. It was less. There was a company, there was a lady that came in and did it while we were there.
Joy H.: We’re looking at the Department of Justice to see what the requirements are.
Randy G.: To piggyback on some discussions Teresa and I have had, in our quarterly regarding the conference, you have two secretaries typing, obviously they don’t type word for word. The day ones, twos, threes that I get handed to me before I leave are pretty detailed. Not to erase the recording of that conference, that recording can always be made available to anyone who requested it for any reason and possibly save the Fellowship that $2,500 of publishing that in a word-for-word document and having access if it were needed. You can take the dailies and go through it in any position you need to know, it can tell you where to go in the recording versus the $2,500 to publish. Opportunities and options, that’s what we are really trying to discuss and look at.
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Elizabeth S.: Just because I am not necessarily in agreement with you and Teresa about not doing this at the conference, I can see why it would be beneficial at quarterly trustee meetings and the Board-to-Board meetings. For the conference, I view it very differently, that is just my opinion. Will this be something brought forward at the conference if the WSBT decides this is the direction that they want to do it, or is this time to talk about why we disagree?
Randy G.: I can tell you that today’s quarterly, the WSBT felt in no way that either of these boards should have the responsibility to make this decision, it would be a conference-based decision. At some point in time, the fiscal responsibility, when we ask our districts and areas to take a look at where we’re spending money and how, we need to ask ourselves to look under every spot as well. How many times have, if 10 people use the transcribed minutes or the transcribed word-for-word documentation from the conference for three issues, is that worth $2,500 a year, when that opportunity to go to a recording and find that information is actually still there. Those are the kind if questions involved.
Richard S.: Some of the issues and concerns brought up by members were things like, when you say “strike that from the record” that would not be available if not transcribed and approved. The recording would have things that are of concern, like sometimes when we discuss monetary values and things like that, things that are stricken as well. There was a lot of discussion about this.
Barry J.: As you just said, if something is, if we are not transcribing it, and it is a recorded history, where things said “strike that” or whatever, instead of paying somebody $2,500 to transcribe and/or not transcribe that stricken moment, we could probably have somebody on a committee and go through the recording and strike portions.
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Randy G.: We are months away from conference.
Elizabeth S.: I am going to talk about the $2,500 and going to make a quick comment. We talk about saving money, we try to talk about afford this, I have to say, we are not in as and dire need as we have been in the past and I think we have created a very negative financial view and picture. I think it’s not like we are 90-120 days late on our bills. I think there was a time when we were and we were operating completely in the red all the time. I have to say I think we’ve done a really good job and I think we continue to think about ways to save money, hence the $2,500. I have to say, as the WSBT continues to have the discussions around this, and believe me, I will be very vocal about this on the WSOB, there are certain areas we should not skimp. I think we should be thinking about which areas those are because I think the future of our Fellowship depends on those kinds of decisions.
Barry J.: I would like to say yes, you are correct, we are not behind. However, this office is running on 2-1/2 to 2-3/4 people. We suspended the DRPD, we don’t have anybody in long-term planning. We have other things that are not getting taken care of…
Joy H.: There are tons of people on long-term planning.
Barry J.: Okay sorry. What I’m getting at is the $2,500 may be able to pay for a WSOB member to go to a regional event to do translations or it may be able to create a new French piece of literature or create a Spanish piece. You are correct, our bills are getting paid, we are operating, we are holding our own, however, we have just had a very good convention that has been carrying us over and we cannot plan on always having the best conventions. We have to be the financial overseers of our funds.
Linda F.: I am going to be the first to admit this is all very new to me. I have been involved with a lot of large non-profits. This is the first one I’ve ever seen record, have people typing
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that you can watch while it’s happening, and then have somebody else transcribe the same thing. It seems to me, a little overkill and money that may be spent better. Maybe I don’t understand all of the reasoning behind it, but I think the fact that as things are happening, you have, if not all 200 people in the room, you definitely have 100-150 people in the room, at least five are watching the typing happening. I would think if mistakes are being made, that’s going to arouse somebody’s attention at that time. It seems redundant to me. Help me understand why it’s not.
Bob C.: We are talking about a record of our history and a record of our World Service Conference, the most important part of the World Service Organization, period. The only authority, the top authority. We either get it letter perfect or we don’t get it letter perfect. I must tell you, I’ve seen a lot of sloppy corporate notes, I’ve seen a lot of abbreviated corporate notes that you really don’t know what happened and I can tell you one thing. In Cocaine Anonymous, unless the tape machine broke, we know what happened, okay? And we are talking about our history and we’re talking about what is important stuff to us and why we would change that for $2,500 or $3,500 is beyond me. It’s our history and it’s a record of what we do at the World Service level and to change that is I think a big mistake.
Joy H.: Do you know that before I was a trustee, I was on archives, we were going through the archives and the first box I went to was the transcripts from the very first World Service Conference. I got to tell you, there was no recording, it was all on paper. Yellow paper. It was from 1985, it was aged. The archive is in print. Even in our digital world today, things happen. Fires can take our original documents.
Richard S.: I think we need to continue to transcribe. I understand that we have not been transcribing the WSBT quarterlies and the B2B’s as long, but I think it’s a healthy practice. I
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think it’s beneficial to have an accurate record. Being a former secretary, you don’t catch everything, you do your best. I think it’s beneficial to have everything so that something can be referenced or looked up by not only the Fellowship but to aid future boards to see what was done and why, maybe what the discussion was. Your question was why the duplication. The duplication, in my experience, is because both recorded and typed is in case one or the other fails, so that the record is there and doesn’t go by memory.
Linda F.: If the recording fails, the transcriber doesn’t have anything to transcribe. My question is there are two people up there typing, then you send the same recording out to be transcribed, which is pretty close to what those two people were already typing.
Richard S.: It may or may not be. In an electronic world, it’s far better to distribute a PDF file than it is a media file. That is my opinion. Part of my experience with technology over a long period of time.
Linda F.: We just had the last ones transcribed, whose responsibility is it to listen to the transcription to see if it’s correct? Is that my job? Do we check it?
Richard S.: I would assume it is someone on the conference committee, whether that’s a member from the WSOB, the trustee from the conference committee, I do not know. We should look into that. I was actually going to ask somebody who had some historical time at the office during prior years. Once those transcripts are completed, it is my obligation to the WS Conference Committee to review that section when the Conference Committee was up there and motions were made and that those motions are in the handbook. I do not review it in it’s entirety, but I take that section, it’s my obligation to sign off on it before I report to the office to please post the new handbook and guidelines for Conference Committee. That may be the piecemeal way it works out, I do not know. That’s part of my
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obligation as the trustee to Conference Committee, I must review the transcribed minutes and make sure everything is appropriate in the guidelines.
Richard L.: I remember Tom waiting for Kevin Murphy to review them last year at this time, so maybe somebody will talk to Tom. I remember they were waiting for the transcript to come back from Kevin. I am thinking Tony.
Brian T.: It wasn’t Kevin last year, it was Tony.
Richard S.: Do you have the transcript?
Linda F.: I have the disk, I think she sent them to me.
Richard S.: So we don’t take up more time would you email them to me and we will figure this out on what we do this year?
Randy G.: An item of new business that came from the quarterly, we reached out and talked to the trustees about the 2015 convention. We believe we may have as many as one, if not two regions coming forward to make bids for 2016, however no one is aware of any region or area…
Kenny W.: I mentioned that yesterday, or maybe today.
Brian T.: Tennessee in 2015, Illinois in 2016.
Randy G.: Okay. We talked at great length at having the office consider and prepare if that didn’t happen. We have not been formally notified that we have a request to do 2015 as per the manual. I think it is important the office board consider starting to discuss the responsibility to put on that convention if in fact we do not have an area or region step up, that is what the manual suggests. We wanted to make sure you were aware. We’ve also got some areas, I’m reaching out to Houston, I think they have a Fellowship strong enough to put together something in a hurry or in conjunction with…
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Brian T.: I am aware that on the 5’s and 0’s AA has their convention and in the past that has affected us, our attendance. Atlanta and Detroit. Many members did not come to Milwaukee but did attend San Antonio, that was part of the problem in terms of our financial attendance. If it ends up, particularly at the office, from a financial situation, take that into consideration, maybe a scaled down version. You’re competing. AA international is over July 4th weekend.
Richard S.: I want to be clear, especially for those board members that are new, the WSBT is saying the WSOB be aware of it, it is the effort of both boards to take on that responsibility. Elizabeth S.: So I am clear Randy, I want to make sure, 2015 we have no one, 2016 you have maybe Illinois.
Richard S.: We have one potential for each year.
Joy H.: Tennessee for 2015, Illinois for 2016.
Elizabeth S.: We decide on 2015 and 2016 at this conference. In thinking about that, it kind of reflects maybe how the Fellowship feels about doing a convention every year. Something we may want to consider. If we are having to pull hair out to have people host a convention, maybe we shouldn’t be having a convention every year, maybe it should be every other year. Just a thought, not that I agree, it’s just a thought.
Randy G.: Consider the financial ramifications of that.
Bob C.: If we don’t have a convention right now, we’re hosed. We need a convention every year. That’s the other side of the coin.
Randy G.: We want to make sure that C.A. that notification and the requirements for our literature takes place with Cynthia and the LCF committee. The C dot A dot requirement for any future publications.
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Teresa N.: Are we communicating that now?
Randy G.: From an office standpoint, any publications that would look for publication here at the office should recognize that is the only way to present our published material in a copyright form in place for worldwide distribution.
Teresa N.: Do we need to make that change in the manual first?
Randy G.: My understanding was the last conference, our current trademark in the United States was either CA or C.A. What we have now just learned is the only way to have a copyright in Europe is C.A. so that would present us with, if we want to put out one document that is going to be a worldwide document and we have to consider where we send or sell it, who ends up with it, it should be C.A. and that be applied to all of the literature.
Teresa N.: You basically want to create a document explaining how to properly use a C.A. document overseas.
Randy G.: No, it would be, you have an either/or in front of you today that truly is just a C.A. if we want these publications foreign or domestic.
Elizabeth S.: Was this voted on by the WSBT as a motion, if it was it needs to become a policy given to the World Service Office because it is changing the statement of policy as how CA can be used. So if you all are making that decision, giving the direction of the office to change its publications, which are owned by the office, then you need to say that to us. To just kind of lackadaisical say to us you’re going to go with the C dot A dot changes the statement of policy as described in the World Service Manual.
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Randy G.: It is not lackadaisical to find out the only way our CA can be put in the copyright in Europe is to use it in one of the existing options. It is just the fact of the copyright in Europe.
Elizabeth S.: I’m sorry Randy, I didn’t mean that it’s lackadaisical that we’re doing it or not doing it. I think for protocol purposes, the WSBT, with that information, needs to make a motion and give that policy to the WSOB so we can then move forward with it. We can’t really do anything until you all do that, according to the guidelines. Even though the attorney said so, you are changing the World Service manual and the way it’s described under the Statement of Policy. You are saying as the WSBT, we have received new information that all CA will be C dot A dot for future printings. Then we can move forward.
Peter D.: Isn’t that a referral to the Conference?
Elizabeth S.: Let me just say something, because I am so involved in this as well as other things. I think this is the time, if we are going to change it, to change it. We are in the total re-layout of all of our pamphlets, we are getting ready to re-do our HFC 2, so I think this timing is actually quite perfect cause we’ve just gone through this disclaimers and we’ve just kind of cleaned all that out. I think if we’re going to do this, this is the time to do it. Randy G.: Is putting our literature in line with the copyright laws of where we want it to be copy written, does that require conference approval?
Elizabeth S.: In my opinion, I would just say, I would make a motion as the WSBT, because it’s in this section right here in the manual where it talks about it. No other individual or entity may use the name Cocaine Anonymous, the block letters CA…not C.A. That’s where I think it would go, in there. Cause you all are acting as the conference when the conference is not in session, so yes, it’s within your, in my opinion, right. It’s not really controversial,
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there is nothing controversial about it. You all should make that motion and let us know so we can let Cynthia know.
Kenny W.: From my experiences working with S&B, anything that changes this manual has to be a referral. If it changes that manual, it has to be a referral.
Joy H.: See that second logo, it was not a referral.
Kenny W.: It may have not gotten, it may have slipped under. From my understanding, anything that changes that manual, and you were on S&B too, I’m sure you were too. From my understanding, and that’s what I believe. You can correct me if I’m wrong if anybody else, and there’s nothing wrong with making a referral. I don’t see any resistance or a problem with that.
Richard L.: It is also my understanding that the trustees represent the conference when the conference is not in session. We did discuss this Randy at our board. If we do exactly as Elizabeth said, make this motion and it’s passed, I can bring it back to the WSOB and then the WSOB can follow through with it. The whole purpose is to have one piece of literature that’s uniform because as we discussed at the WSBT, it’s what our trademark attorney brought to us. I would rather bring it back and as trustees make a motion, and if that motion passes, I will bring it to the WSOB. Additionally another 12-step program uses the dots.
Richard S.: I did confirm, I did check the online printing of another 12-step program, both their domestic and international site, they do use the two dots when referencing in text.
The logo remains and does not require it. I wanted to say a couple of things. I agree in us being reminded that we need to have a motion to change or set policy for the WSOB to carry out ______ to follow through. One of the reasons this seemed to roll easily
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was this is not a panic moment. We have years to deplete our current inventory and to introduce this change. I think the discussion is healthy and not a panic mode; not an error that was made. It is a change to be discussed and implemented going forward.
Janice C.: I am concerned about confusing the Fellowship, we just told the Fellowship no C dot A dot, we just told them this last year. I understand about the inventory and everything and that we have years of that, but what about flyers and stuff that the Fellowship puts out? I think we need to be clear. We changed it last time because the copyright lawyer said we had to. Now because of the way it is viewed in Europe it has to be changed again, so my concern is that we’ve set a policy, and we need to be clear. I don’t know if it has to go to S&B. I sit on S&B, but you guys told us what the change in the logo was going to be and we decided how to put in. I don’t think it needs to go to S&B if it’s a legal issue. I wish we could just make up our minds and stick with one thing.
Linda F.: I just want you to know currently we are doing the C dot A dot. This is our most recent brand new brochure and everyplace in here is C dot A dot. It is so new we have not yet updated the disclaimer, but we will. It is an updated version of one of the older pamphlets to the new format, it is also C dot A dot. I think we are already kind of going in that direction so I would love to have a motion to keep doing that.
Peter D.: The reason why it was suggested that C dot A dot be used was a suggestion between the attorney and myself for uniformity for Cocaine Anonymous in print. If you want to write up a flyer here that says CA, you can do that. But if we write a brochures for California in CA, we got to make sure they don’t go to Europe, because in Europe they have to have C dot A dot. We need to make it so there’s no hassle, so all the print should be C dot A dot. If you want to make up a flyer here that says CA, you can do anything you want here,
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but over there, they don’t have that option, they have to use C dot A dot. So just to keep uniformity, like in the book and brochures, that is why it was suggested to do that. As far as a referral, what if it went to the floor and they said no, we don’t want to do that?
Kenny W.: Their choice.
Peter D.: Then what do we do?
Joy H.: We cannot protect the logo.
Kenny W.: They’re not going to though.
Peter D.: I don’t like “they’re not going to.” We don’t know what they’re going to do.
Brian T.: We have a legal responsibility.
Joy H.: My question is, the section Elizabeth read in the manual that talks about the block letters CA I think we don’t put the C dot A dot in that section, just the block letters in that section. If we went strictly to C dot A dot all over, what happens to our copyright of the block letters of CA.
Peter D.: We are covered either way, in the US.
Bob C.: First of all, I am rather amused at hearing in the middle of this discussion of whether we should do it or not, we are already doing it on some of our pamphlets, I think that’s kind of interesting.
Randy G.: As a point of order, it had been for a long time, a point of issue by a few and specifically one of more assertive delegates that it needed the period. The documentation has…
Bob C.: The only other thing, as a big proponent, a huge advocate of not changing anything when we should have conference approval, that being said, if we are going to do it the way it’s suggested, it really needs to be clearly described as a housekeeping issue the puts us in
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alignment with legal advice. That needs to be very clearly put, otherwise it would have gone to the conference. It is only a housekeeping issue, that needs to be spelled out.
Randy G.: Any other questions for the group? That will end our agenda, if there is nothing else, will accept a motion.
Joy H.: Motion to adjourn.
Richard L.: Second.
Randy G.: There is a motion to adjourn, there has been a second. All those in favor? Opposed? We are adjourned.
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