Present: Randy, Steven, Arie, Vincent, Roeland, Anna

Announcements

• Arie having 30th birthday party on Saturday, April 8. All welcome.
• We've cleaned up our office's back garden!
• Computers are now working after some problems, including viruses. Pegasus Mail not yet set up.
• We now have Quark Xpress 6.5 on CD-ROM.

Agenda

1. Grantwriting and Project Development

Arie feels that it's too much work and not wise or sustainable to have the grantwriter also doing the project development side (concept, details, finding partner orgs, etc.). So this a problem to be aware of. Other organisations probably do not have the grantwriter do project development to the extent that we have.

Solution: Project coordinators need to provide the grantwriter with notes describing the project and work with the grantwriter to make budgets and answer questions. All projects, new or otherwise, need to have a designated project coordinator who is responsive to working with given funding deadlines.

Example of one related ongoing problem: For next year's proposed project development meeting that has been applied for, Joao was supposed to give Arie the names of partner groups and names of leadership team members three weeks ago. She has talked to him a few times a week for three weeks and still no reaction. So this is really problem for Arie as a grantwriter to not have the necessary cooperation and respect for deadlines by those who agree to provide certain information.

Solution: See above, re: having active project coordinators.

Related issue: Says Arie: We need to make sure that whoever is a grantwriter in the future needs to be a self-starter type, not a "what do you want me to do" type person. She's trying to figure out a good way to split her role with Roeland, who (as we decided previously) will be grantwriting assistant.

2. WCN Leaflet

We're editing the text of our last leaflet, in time for Tabor. There will be English and Czech versions. Steven will update the Pagemaker file and coordinate with Petr Kurfurst for the Czech translation.

3. Building Projects

Roeland: The idea is to build a loft in the second room of the office to serve as a combination bed/storage shelves. Also we will drill the metal bike racks that we already have into the cement in the back garden. Another idea is an outside shower. We decide to do the loft and bike racks first. We'll also look into the cost of an outdoor table/umbrella/chairs set. And we'll get a couple shovels for making a garden. There will be a team-building garden planting day to be announced.