CoTech summer gathering at Selgar's Mill.
Update 27/04
Poll extended until Friday 30th as requested by @Autonomic Co-operative. New text in orange, outdated text crossed out.
Update 22/04
Proposal has been updated following discussion below. New text in red, outdated text crossed out.
Poll has been closed and a new one opened :)
Background
@Sion Whellens (Principle Six/Calverts) first raised the idea of joining the CoTech gathering together with the Worker Co-op weekend on the forum here and it was discussed further at the CoTech Spring Gathering where we decided to run a poll to gauge interest.
The Worker Co-op Weekend will be running from Friday 22nd July - Sunday 25th July at Selgar's Mill, the space which is now being managed by Stir to Action. The CoTech gathering would be on the Friday during the day, meaning we would need to arrive on Thursday 21st evening, which means extending the booking at Selgar's Mill by a night at a cost of £1500 (inc of 5% VAT). This cost includes accommodation (camping and in rooms) and facilities (cooking, internet etc, washrooms) but not food.
It seems like at least 9 people are interested in attending (the poll was only live for a week), and the majority of respondents to the poll (4/8) felt that we should use the CoTech fund to cover the cost of the extra night at Selgar's Mill, plus food/drink for the Friday night/Thursday day.
The Worker Co-op weekend will continue on from Friday night - Sunday.
Motivation
It would be very nice to see people in person
Selgar's Mill looks amazing and it would be great to support Stir to Action
A more integrated worker co-op movement is a stronger one, this will encourage members to participate in the Worker Co-op weekend and form connections there
-
Covering the cost with the fund means people are more likely to be able to join, particularly after a potentially difficult year. This will also hopefully go some way towards addressing the travel cost/time to Devon.
Proposal
We commit to covering the cost of an extra night at Selgar's Mill (which will be a maximum of £1500) and the cost of food and drink for the Thursday night and Friday day time, estimated at £200 if it is not covered by ticket prices. Tickets will be sold via Co-ops UK at an equivalent price per night to the Worker Co-op weekend, which hasn't been confirmed yet but the prices from the last one were £66 for 2 nights camping, £84 for 2 nights in a room. which is as follows:
Camping (2 nights Fri & Sat) - £60 + VAT for members and £85 for non-members
Dorm (2 nights Fri & Sat) - £80 + VAT for members and £115 for non-members
Private room (2 nights Fri & Sat) - £100 + VAT for members and £145 for non-members
Saturday daytime only - £30 + VAT for members and £43 for non-members
They have agreed to give us a ticket to cover Friday night and Saturday day for the camping option only, at around £45 for members.
Accommodation - both camping and in dorms/rooms. As we will be there first, all the rooms will be available on the Thursday night. However, we don't want to be blocking them all throughout the weekend if people are staying on - so there are some logistics to be managed there.
Food - there are ample cooking facilities at the venue so we can cook throughout the evening/day, with enough willing volunteers. (I would love to hear if people are willing to do this or not. Otherwise, we can order food or go to the pub, but the budget might not totally cover that). Any surplus from ticket sales will go towards the catering costs and we can create another proposal re. how to manage food there. Any surplus beyond that would go back into the CoTech fund.
Timeframe
We need to let Co-ops UK know our decision as they will add it on the their booking form, making it easier for us all. So a short timeframe is necessary, and the poll closes in a week.
Please...
Ask any clarifying questions
Raise any critical concerns
Vote in the poll if you are a contributor of the CoTech fund
Comment below with suggestions/questions/volunteering to cook etc etc.
Poll Created Tue 20 Apr 2021 1:45PM
CoTech Fund - Proposal to cover costs of CoTech gathering at Selgar's Mill. Closed Thu 22 Apr 2021 4:26PM
Closing to open a new poll which reflects updates and discussion
Results
| Results | Option | % of points | Voters | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
Agree | 100.0% | 1 |
|
| Abstain | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Disagree | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Block | 0.0% | 0 | ||
| Undecided | 0% | 132 |
|
1 of 133 people have participated (0%)
Sion Whellens (Principle Six)
Tue 20 Apr 2021 1:46PM
If Solidfund goes ahead with a strategy session on the same day, and/or Young Cooperators Network goes ahead with a gathering on the same day, then costs could be shared. However these 2 groups have yet to consider. If one or both of them wanted to be there on the 22nd, it should be straightforward to manage numbers and meeting/breakout spaces to meet everyone's needs.
Lucy King Tue 20 Apr 2021 4:05PM
Great questions @Aaron Hirtenstein (Agile Collective), I don't know the answers and was actually wondering myself. Is there a way we can easily find out how much ££ we have in the fund?
Secondly, is there a way we can adapt the proposal to take your concern into account? E.g. we propose instead that CoTech contributes a certain amount per person who attends, and if this doesn't cover the whole cost, individual co-ops will have to chip in too? Sounds a bit complicated, maybe someone else can simplify somehow 😄How many people is it worth it for, for you?
Lucy King Tue 20 Apr 2021 4:23PM
Thanks to @PollyRobbinsOutlandish I have found out some of the answers - there's currently £3,505.07 in the account and this years subscriptions should come in around June/July. What I don't know is if some of that money is already 'spoken for'.
Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative) Wed 21 Apr 2021 11:27AM
@Lucy King wrote:
E.g. we propose instead that CoTech contributes a certain amount per person who attends, and if this doesn't cover the whole cost, individual co-ops will have to chip in too?
I'd suggest considering doing it the other way around, individuals / co-ops contribute a certain amount per person who attends and if this doesn't cover the whole cost then the CoTech fund covers the difference -- this is what was done for the last event in Newcastle.
Chris Croome (Webarchitects Co-operative) Tue 20 Apr 2021 6:24PM
For context each two day CoTech gathering in 2019, Newcastle and Sheffield, charged "low income price £11.00, standard price £33.00, solidarity price £44.00 and super-solidarity price £66.00" and people were left to make their own accommodation arrangements. As far as I recall we covered the costs in Sheffield and we agreed to cover the additional costs for the Newcastle event from the fund, £217.
We don't yet know the prices for the Workers Co-op Weekend, however we do have the prices from the last one, £66 for two night camping and £84 for two night in a room (these are the uk.coop members prices), so I would expect the prices for the additional day to be around half these prices. There was also £1,500 available as bursaries from SolidFund "to support people to attend the worker co-op weekend... subsidised/free tickets and contributions towards travel expenses".
I'd hate to see this proposed event not go ahead due to there not being an agreement to fully fund it and would expect that many of the CoTech co-ops could afford to pay for tickets, the two key things I'd like to see the fund used for are:
Helping people who couldn't afford to attend without assistance.
Covering any gap between ticket sales and the costs.
Ben Philp Thu 22 Apr 2021 4:42PM
This sounds like a sensible approach, I'm best man at a wedding the same weekend so cant make it I'm afraid
Aaron Hirtenstein · Tue 20 Apr 2021 3:23PM
Thanks for posting this @Lucy King Clarifying questions:
How much money is in the CoTech fund right now? How long is this for? My queston really is how much of the fund will this proposal take up and will we have any money left over til the next round of subs?
Critical concern:
I'm worried there are not enough interested / committed people in CoTech who can and want to go to this event - the poll tells me engagement is really low and it might require a lot of effort to find this out. I want to go, but I also don't want to use a large amount of our fund to support just a few people to go. For me this proposal only works with a good amount of people.