That\u00a0 members\u00a0 be\u00a0 provided with ample\u00a0 opportunities and encouragement to participate in coop activities and community life at Woodsworth.<\/p>\n
FlNDlNGS<\/p>\n
1.\u00a0 Five\u00a0 years\u00a0 ago,\u00a0 block reps had a range of duties:\u00a0 welcoming\u00a0 new members, presenting them with an information packet, arranging cleanup details with the staff, delivering the Weekly, and meeting periodically with other block reps.\u00a0 Today, the block rep system appears primarily to sen\/e as a delivery mechanism for the Weekly.\u00a0 There is no longer a block rep coordinator and no joint meetings.<\/p>\n
2.\u00a0 51% of all members report knowing the name of their block rep.<\/p>\n
3.\u00a0 A review of Board\u00a0 minutes shows that the topic of participation\u00a0 has come up on Board agendas only once (Oct 1987) in the past three years. \u00a0 The issue was on members’ meeting agendas frequently in 1983-84, but has since been an infrequent topic.<\/p>\n
4. In\u00a0 June,\u00a0 1984,\u00a0 the\u00a0 membership\u00a0 passed\u00a0 a\u00a0 participation\u00a0 by-law\u00a0 and policy, making\u00a0 mandatory an average of 4 hours volunteer time per month, with exceptions granted by the Board.\u00a0 The policy is apparently still\u00a0 on the\u00a0 books,\u00a0 but is not enforced.<\/p>\n
5.\u00a0 The\u00a0 Co-operative\u00a0 Housing\u00a0 Federation\u00a0 of\u00a0 Toronto\u00a0 is\u00a0 currently\u00a0 reexamining the clause\u00a0 in the\u00a0 model\u00a0 by-laws\u00a0 making\u00a0 participation mandatory.<\/p>\n
6. 85% of all members report that they believe the co-op provides ample opportunities\u00a0 for\u00a0 members\u00a0 to\u00a0 participate\u00a0 in\u00a0 volunteer\u00a0 and\u00a0 social activities.<\/p>\n
7. 66% of all members report taking part in last year’s spring clean-up. 51% report attending a social in the penthouse after a members’ meeting.\u00a0 37% report attending last year’s street dance.<\/p>\n
IMPLICATIONS<\/p>\n
The block rep system has degenerated from being a major part of the co-op’s infrastructure for supporting participation to being a newsletter delivery service.<\/p>\n
Members\u00a0 seem\u00a0 to\u00a0 believe\u00a0 that\u00a0 Woodsworth\u00a0 provides ample opportunities to participate. \u00a0 Participation in spring clean-up and the social after members’ meeting is positive, but street dance attendance does seem to be falling and this should be considered.<\/p>\n
The development and enforcement of participation by-laws as a means of increasing\u00a0 participation has not been successful\u00a0 and should be abandoned as a strategy.\u00a0 Maintaining the current level of participation and building on that base should be accomplished by identifying and promoting the benefits (i.e., education and skills enhancement, meeting neighbours,\u00a0 etc.)\u00a0 rather than\u00a0 by\u00a0 devising\u00a0 unenforceable\u00a0 rules\u00a0 and punishment.<\/p>\n
RECOMMENDED ACTlONS<\/p>\n
1. The production of a revised members’ handbook must be a major priority. \u00a0 The members should budget in 1989-90 an adequate amount of money to support a committee that will hire the necessary help to write, print and distribute one copy of a revised handbook to each coop unit by December 1, 1989.\u00a0 In each following year, a budget and policy should be put in place to ensure regular annual updates for the handbook.<\/p>\n
2. The\u00a0 Board should make the\u00a0 rejuvenation of the block rep system a major priority in the coming year.<\/p>\n
3. The\u00a0 Board should gather information and\u00a0 report to the\u00a0 membership about other housing co-ops that have hired full or part-time community development workers in order to support participation and volunteer committees.<\/p>\n
4. The Board should bring forward to a members’ meeting a plan for designating and honouring a Woodsworth Member of the Year, as a means of rewarding outstanding co-operative spirit within our community.<\/p>\n
To: Home page with table of contents for Social Audit 1989<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" That\u00a0 members\u00a0 be\u00a0 provided with ample\u00a0 opportunities and encouragement to participate in coop activities and community life at Woodsworth. FlNDlNGS 1.\u00a0 Five\u00a0 years\u00a0 ago,\u00a0 block reps had a range of duties:\u00a0 welcoming\u00a0 new members, presenting them with an information packet, arranging cleanup details with the staff, delivering the Weekly, and meeting periodically with other block … Continue reading “Social audit 1989: Objective 8 \u2013 Participation”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[589,484],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-participation","category-social-audits-archives-outdated-documents"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16195\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woodsworthcoop.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}