Plans for the next few months:
People are keen to continue with a regular presence on local high streets when weather improves, e.g. our regular Sunday morning outside Berkhamsted Civic Centre. We plan to restart this (either as vigil or outreach) e.g. every other Sunday from Easter – though we may have some sessions in March too, to flag up the April rebellion (starting April 1st). We discussed using these slots to promote the CEE bill to passers-by. Need to source some CEE leaflets, or put together our own. (Chesham XR have a petition calling on their MP to support the CEE bill. Could Dacorum do the same for our MPs?)
We want to organise an online ‘Heading for Extinction’ talk early in the new year, and promote it through social media and postering. If possible, we would like the talk to emphasise that there are many roles within XR beside arrestees, and that support roles are equally vital (Bex to ask trainers how much flexibility there is in the standard talk to accommodate this).
We need to plan other local actions – to be discussed further in the new year.
We would like to organise another NVDA training session, as it has been more than a year since the last once, though any training would probably need to be online at the moment.
We are pleased to be able to share links to the series of talks organised by Chesham XR entitled ‘Understanding the Climate Crisis’. These talks are available as recordings on the Chesham XR website: http://www.xrchesham.co.uk/climate-talks.html
Barclays stickering campaign this Friday – volunteers offered to cover Berkhamsted and Hemel.
Website now up and running – xrdacorum.co.uk.
We agreed that it would be useful to have a membership database, rather than relying on the Facebook page as a data storage. We weren’t sure whether there were any GDPR implications in asking people to provide their contact details – to be researched (Kathryn/Bex?). Chesham XR have an email membership list, and it would be useful if we could have the same for Dacorum XR. Gather contact details via paper/digital forms and input to mailing list?
We would like to be involved with Berkhamsted Town Council’s volunteer planting schemes to plant up wasteland areas. Kathryn to liaise with Town Councillor Wendy Conian on this.
Important to continue to do press releases for all actions/events, as these are generally published verbatim by the local paper, which is good publicity.
Skills needed within the group:
We are well set up with people who have skills to make banners/posters/props
We particularly need somebody with technical skills to support website, etc. – any volunteers??
We would welcome somebody to take photos of local actions and post them to relevant social media – any volunteers?
Other points:
XR currently has three themes within local groups:
- Actions
- Movement building
- Community (food security, energy security, tree planting, etc.)
Among the members present at the meeting there was most interest in pursuing the first theme – actions. We don’t currently have enough active members to break ourselves down into three separate groups for the three themes, but this may change over time.
We were very impressed by Chesham XR’s campaigning with placards around the town Christmas tree. There are plans for Chesham XR to be involved in an exhibition at the Elgiva Theatre focusing on revolutionary movements.
We agreed to have weekly meetings on Wednesday evenings at 7.30 starting after Christmas. It may be that we follow Chesham XR’s model of having alternate ‘business’ and ‘social’ meetings. TBC.