9-21-2010 Northern Wisconsin NORML Meeting Minutes
9-21-2010 Northern Wisconsin NORML Meeting Minutes
2 new people showed up today
Jay passed out handouts to everyone, and Glenn suggested that we we color code the papers – maybe one shade of paper for Industrial, one for Medical, one for Recreational, etc.
We finally got our regional membership approved by NORML – woohoo! Next, we will need to file paperwork to apply for nonprofit status and do some other paperwork, which we hope to have completed by the end of the year.
Jay gave an update on the Waushara Argus – they only allow 3 letters per year per person, and they only accept letters from people who actually live in Waushara county – we have two volunteers who are willing to publish their name with letters. We need more volunteers. The Argus is very restrictive in addition to being a resident of the county – it can’t be anonymous, it has to be 150 words or less, etc etc etc.
Jay talked about the other newspapers that we could be writing to and how we encourage our members to write in to the various newspapers.
Ron Johnson – briefly mentioned how he is against medical marijuana, but we don’t know his stance on Industrial.
Jim Langer for governor – he was on NPR with other candidates and talked about marijuana and hemp. He had never considered the issue before he started meeting with and speaking to Jay. We have the sound byte on the Friends of Jay website.
Jay talked about how he wishes we were seeing more new people showing up every week at the meetings, but how we are doing great so far, he gave membership forms to the two new people who came to the meeting, and talked about inviting other people to join us.
Glenn – he said he’s involved in multiple civic organizations and you always see the same few people – how you don’t really see any new faces. He thinks it’s an issue with citizens not participating in things.
The new arrivals were talking about how they found us on a community calendar and got all excited about it, sent out text messages and invites and facebook posts and things like that, and they got no response. They, themselves, are “get involved” kinds of people – which comes back to what Glenn said – that there are only so many people who are willing to get involved in ANY kind of activism or event.
Glenn also said that no matter how much you advertise, how many flyers you hand out, etc, the thing that seems to be most effective is to do the “one on one” thing. To point to a stranger and say “you – come help us”. Make people responsible – make them see it’s not “somebody else’s problem”.
We also talked about making business cards for Northern WI NORML so that we can pass them out to members each week, so that they can pass them out to their friends, etc.
We closed the meeting out with a discussion of the total cost of the drug war vs the revenue we could have made by legalizing it.
We discussed the Jim Langer issue for awhile more. Tim John was the democratic challenger against Barrett – John is an heir of one of the large brewing companies – John is going to come aboard with Langer and Selthofner since he did not win his primary. A general discussion of Wisconsin politics and related news news followed. Discussed several different races and known stances of the candidates on the marijuana issue.
Discussed the Friends of Jay concert.
Discussed marching at the Golden Days Harvest Fest in Green Lake next Saturday – line up at 3pm. Meet at the soda machines around 3:30 or if there are no soda machines, meet by the bathrooms.
Harvest Fest in Madison – Jay will be speaking on Saturday in addition to many other guest speakers.
From the Land will have a Friends of Jay booth (fromthelandfestival.com)
