Minutes for February 22, 2005 Meeting

Old Business

1. The minutes for February 8 were approved as written.
   
   
2. Progress Reports
   • Banner: The banner has been finished and is very impressive. We all gave thanks to Julie Tourtillotte for her fine work in designing and constructing it. We have the added bonus of an attractive logo for brochures and the website. Zae will contact Kay about putting the logo on the website. We have used the banner at three vigils so far. It was so windy at the federal building on February 14 that we could not hold the banner up. We suggested cutting some V's in it to let the wind through. Zae will ask Julie if she has ideas on how best to do this. We brainstormed using the banner in marches and parades and at the midwest peace summit and rally. Perhaps the St. Patricks day parade is not the best venue since the banner is orange and blue.
     
     
   • Volunteer speakers publicity: Zae is still working with a group of Peace Not War members on this. About all it needs is formatting and insertion of the logo. Her opera had consumed all her time since the last meeting. We all applauded her for a fine job with the opera. For most of us who attended, it was our first opera. The opera will be performed in its complete form in April 2006.
     
     
   • Midwest Peace Summit and Rally preparations: Lee informed us that the Civil Disobedience action planned for Sunday, March 20th, will probably not occur until Monday and it will definitely not be at the rally site. This information was enough to allay last meeting's concerns about safety of the rally participants. There will be an emergency teleconference this week because preparations for the rally are moving slowly. The IJPN leadership hope to involve more people in Indy in this effort. The police permit has been obtained for the south side of the Circle and negotiations for porta potties are underway.
     
     
   • Tax Day plans: The WRL pie chart leaflets have been ordered for the evening vigil -- 6pm - midnight -- on April 15th at the main post office. It was suggested that we try to get permission from the postmaster for us to leaflet on the post office property. We discussed the penny poll idea. It seems that Friday, April 15th, might not be a good day. Folks suggested March 17th near the St. Patricks Day parade for more exposure. We will discuss the idea further at the next meeting. There was some concern that we should make the focus of the poll the misalignment of the U.S. spending priorities and not on tax resistance. Some suggested buckets for the pennies (or beans) were Schools, Roads, Health Care, Military, and off in a corner the war in Iraq and Afghanistan since the latter is funded by supplemental measures.
     
     
   • Weekly letters to Congress: Ed and Ellyn are sharing the job of composing a weekly letter and hand delivering it to the offices of Chocola and Bayh along with a printout of the week's US dead. The letters are not yet on the web. The letters were sent to the MPJC listserve in email messages and need to be formatted to put up on the web. Peter will do it soon.
   
   
3. Procurement subcommittee report: We can get white magnetic ribbons for cars that say "Bring the Troops Home Now" for $2 apiece for 50 or $2.50 apiece for 25. At first we decided to wait until Dustin was present to present a plan for selling these ribbons, but Ellyn offered to front the $100 to purchase them. We decided to sell them for $3.00 at the rally on March 20th and at the weekly vigil. We will brainstorm other venues at the next meeting.
   
   
4. Student brunch: The Notre Dame Peace Coalition hosted this very successful event on February 12. Goshen Colege, Notre Dame, Dowagiac High and Clay High all had student representatives. There were reps from the Catholic Peace fellowship, Peace not War, Notre Dame Peace Coalition, Democracy Now, Military Families against the war, and several reps from MPJC. It was a good opportunity for the students to expand contacts and to coordinate student efforts throughout Michiana. We pushed the summit and rally since organizing for these will be good experience. One of these gatherings a quarter is planned. Zae suggested the next one be held at Saint Mary's to try and get more SMC students involved.
   

New Business

1. Bus for the March 20th Rally: Paul and two Notre Dame students are coordinating renting a 56 passenger bus to leave the Notre Dame Circle at 8am and leave the rally at 4pm for the return to Notre Dame. The cost of the bus is $844.00, which puts each ticket at $16. Paul had tickets all printed up. We are to try to collect as much money as we can before March 6, which is the date the deposit is due. Paul has redesigned the flyer for the rally to include local sponsors. We need to add Peace Not War as a sponsor. Ellyn will put it in text form out to the list serv and Peter will put it on the website. Money for tickets should go to Laura Fox (lfox1@nd.edu) or Paul Mishler at IUSB. We will check progress on the bus at the next meeting.
   
   
2. New url for MPJC: Peter has obtained a new url -- www.michianapeacejustice.org -- the old url is still valid.
   
   
3. Local plans for March 19th anniversary of start of war: We decided at the last meeting to incorporate this protest with the regular Saturday vigil from 1 - 2 at Grape and Cleveland. Pam will make the Quagmire Accomplished banner available and we will use the MPJC banner. Someone will bring it to Indy the next day.
   
   
4. Other topics and Issues
   • Glenda Rae needs someone to take the signs to the vigil on March 19th as she and Rey will be at the peace summit.
     
     
   • Bob Garman, long-time union and peace activist has suffered a cerebral hemmorhage. He is in Room 519 at Memorial rehab center.
     
     
   • The reps and senators are in the district this week. Rey will look into Lugar's schedule. Chocola's South Bend appearance and a link to sign up to attend is listed below. Please get in touch with them this week to voice peace and justice concerns.
     
     Congressional Town Hall Meeting.
     Congressman Chocola
     Saturday, February 26, 04:15 PM
     South Bend Public Library
     304 South Main Street
     South Bend, IN 46614
     RSVP: http://action.moveon.org/socialsecurity/gatherinfor.html?event_ids=170334
     
     
   • Pam mentioned a meeting she attended recently in which some very racist remarks were made. We agreed that MPJC is concerned with both peace and justice and urged her to keep us updated on the situation.
     
     
   • We had a long, spirited discussion about how to get young people actively involved and trained to organize in schools, churches, and other groups around peace and justice issues.
   
   
5. Next Meeting. We will meet at 1036 N. Niles on Tuesday, March 8th. It will be announced via the List Serv and at the weekly vigil.