Structure Group Report 2012-05-31

STRUCTURE GROUP REPORT

May 2012

http://freegle.it/Structure

wiki link -http://wiki.ilovefreegle.org/Structure_Group_Report_2012-05-31

This is a summary of discussions since our last report of 30th April 2012, covering messages 10099 to 10231. Our membership stands at 71 (two more than last month).

The topics we have discussed this month are below.

Task 68 - Local Group Mediation.

In the case of a member being dissatisfied with their local moderating team to the point of making a complaint the mailbox handles it in a sort of 'unofficial' way by trying to calm the waters and attempting to offer support to both parties. The mailbox can only really offer a few platitudes.

The Reps have suggested that the Ombudsmen could act as mediators in this situation. To this end, is has been suggested that the Ombudsmen will work with the existing Mediation volunteer pool to come up with a process for offering mediation to group members. It has also been suggested that the Ombudsmen should work in an organisational role within the Mediation team rather than mediating themselves. Discussion continues...

Task 23 - Trademark.

The Reps have looked into this (probably several times over the past 2 years!) and have concluded that it would not be in our interests to try to trademark the name Freegle. The Reps monitor the Intellectual Property Office weekly to check if anyone else is laying claim to the name. Task Completed.

Policies Requested.

Chris will be putting in an application to be part of a lottery bid which requires us to have various policies, most of which we already have, but we will also need a Health and Safety policy and an Equal Opportunities policy. We already have an Equality and Diversity policy on our task list and we have now added Health and Safety policy as a new task.

Task 77 - Freegle Strategy - Structure Task List.

It was agreed last year on Central that we should adopt the 'stabilisation strategy' proposed by the Reps. A breakdown of the objectives in that strategy has been produced to identify tasks that can achieve it. The discussion follows two main questions. 1. Overall, do we think that the tasks allocated to us to achieve the strategy are adequate and appropriate? 2. Are we happy that the tasks we have on our list at present cover all the strategy aims? We are updating our Task List accordingly and discussion continues...

Task 77 - Freegle Strategy - Structure objective 2. To provide more (and more importantly, easier to use) resources to local groups.

So far on this, we have identified two existing tasks which might be applicable: Task 24 - Group Constitutions: provide model constitutions for groups Task 64 - Creation and remit of Wiki Editing Team Discussion continues...

Task 81 - Keep Up To Date On Legislation.

This task is to put in place a system of regular checking of new and changing legislation that might impact on Freegle. We are discussing the best way of doing that. Discussion continues...

Task 83 - Website Editing.

At the moment we assume (rightly) that the geeks are a sensible bunch and can tweak and change the website as they feel is appropriate and works best, but there is no particular mandate for them to do that. We are discussing whether there is a need to put in place a procedure for getting changes to the website?

A poll is being run:

We propose that the main Freegle website maintenance, updating and editing is the responsibility of the geeks team under direction from reps as they feel appropriate. A record of any changes would be useful for future reference. The result of this poll will be by simple majority and will be passed on to the Reps for consideration/implementation.

o Yes, I agree with this proposal

o No, I disagree with this proposal

o Abstain (please explain on group)

Task 81 - Cookies.

We are looking into whether any of our current applications falls under the new legislation on the use of Cookies and if they do, what action we need to take if any. We have looked at the need to have a new ‘Cookie disclaimer’ and have devised the wording. We are now deciding where we will need to use this. Discussion continues...

If any of the above topics interest you, or if you have proposals about the structure of Freegle to suggest, please do join our group. http://freegle.it/Structure

Task List Our Task List can be viewed at http://freegle.it/StructureTasks

The Coordinator for this group is Jacky (Great Yarmouth) Deputy Coordinator is Peter Johnson (Hunts) and Secretary is Wendy (Woodley) Owners are Jacky, Peter and Wendy.