Eagle Heights Garden Meeting Minutes 2013

Eagle Heights Garden Committee Minutes

January 9, 2013, 6:30 PM

Eagle Heights Community Center

6:00 – Delicious Food and great conversation by Gretel, Ann, Malcom, Andrew, Karen, Adam, Jenn, Alice, Josh, Ric, Will, Louisa, Sandra, Mike, Ulrike, Tingxing Lui, Alison, Angus, Mark and Melita.

Jenn welcomed everyone.

Garden Worker Report

Will said there wasn’t a report at this time.

Treasurer’s Report

Angus reported that we will end the year with a balance very close to the budget. Housing has been more up to date and accurate on the garden accounts. Angus is moving to a monthly reconciling of the garden accounts.

Registrar’s report
Gretel reported that the 2013 applications are about half in, which is a little ahead of last year. If you would like to garden, get your applications in. We have had a few no work day fees come in late.

The big Gym is reserved for the Seed Fair on April 6. Opening Day is March 19th. We will have orientations that day, a few during Spring Break and some the day of the Seed Fair. We will try to have two orientations in Chinese and one in Korean. Volunteers will be needed for these orientations.

Seed Fair- We are receiving seed slowly. Last years seed will not have to be sorted. There will be a seed repackaging on January 29. Please volunteer if you are able. The seed fair will be similar to last year. We will need about 30 general volunteers. We had 700 people attend last year. Josh said since we have all the gardeners in one spot, we should post the garden rules.

Garden Policies for dealing with Rule Breaking
Josh shared a copy of Gretel’s draft for how to deal with rule breaking. Gretel wants the appeal of the ruling of the chair to come to the Garden Committee. We should handle our own affairs. The next appeal of the Garden Committee is the Garden Organizing Committee (GOC), which oversees the Garden Committee at the University level. Jan in Housing is the official supervisor of Gretel, Will and Adam and is a member of the GOC.

There was some discussion of the timing of the action for different problems. Dogs off leash and broken glass need to be dealt with immediately. A weedy plot can have a later compliance date. Gretel said theft and non action by the due date goes to the chair. The gardener must have a plan of action when the meeting with the chair occurs. The chair makes the decision as to which action to take. Gretel’s job is not to act as the rule enforcer or hear an appeal.

Ulrike said she felt somewhat strange making the decision on the appeal. She asked if we had all the relevant information. Discussion ensued. Melita stated that this was a jury of your peers. The Garden Committee list had 60-65 names of the list.

Karen and Ann presented a draft concerning policies before, during and after an appeal of the chair’s ruling by the Committee. They expressed a need to act in a deliberate manner and not decide until all the facts were heard. It was decided that the two drafts complemented each other and they would be merged. Mike said that if there was an agreement reached with a gardener on probation that the gardener should sign a statement agreeing to the conditions.

A motion was made by Josh and seconded by Alison to accept these merged policy documents. The Garden Committee all voted to send the policy to the Garden Organizing Committee for approval.

At 7:55 Jenn said we were adjourned.

Submitted by Karen