First Hats Off Dinner
Castlemaine – 1st July 2008
Background
The hats off dinner was called by Carol McDonough and Ian Lillington as a result of the United Nations Association of Australia World Environment Day win by ‘the communities of Mount Alexander Shire’ and a desire to have an open community conversation about ‘where to from here’ in terms of how to springboard from the win. Coinciding with this was the release of Rob Hopkins’ book: ‘The Transition Handbook – from oil dependency to local resilience’, documenting “one of the most dynamic and important social movements of the 21st Century” (Richard Heinberg, foreward, p,8). This book outlines how the transition formula uses “Permaculture principles, the psychology of social marketing, and inclusive processes like ‘open space’…[to…find]…a way for people worried about an environmental apocalypse to invest their efforts in ongoing collective action that ends up looking more like a party than a protest march” (Richard Heinberg, foreward, p,10).
The challenge was put forward to attendees that this initial conversation may spawn an ongoing series of ‘hats off dinners’, guided by the transition concept, branching out of diverse and ever expanding circles of intimacy. It is hoped that such conversations may build on the existing ‘buzz’ towards change, celebrate and share milestones and achievements to date, and capture the collective imagination, and harness the skills and abilities of the Mount Alexander community in moving from project innovation to widespread buy-in and whole of community resilience in facing the changes ahead. It is also hoped that this process of becoming a
20 adults and 3 children attended the first dinner? They were randomly invited according to who bumped into who down the street and who they invited.
Notes from the dinner (NB: I have taken the liberty of ‘theming’ the notes to make them more readable, while trying to maintain the integrity ‘flow’ of the discussion)
Everyone introduced themselves around the table and were then invited to share whatever they thought to be relevant to the conversation, after a very brief introduction of the concept and how the dinner came about.
Alternative ways of organizing ourselves – Lucy expressed that we might need to be careful not to find ourselves reinventing the wheel and forming yet another ‘organisation’ – handed over to Janet to explain alternative ways of organizing ourselves towards collective productive output. For future discussion. Janet also shared that she feels it is important not to forget to acknowledge and take into account the elements at play here that are ‘beyond human’ (ie: the spiritual).
WHAT might this look like?
- Be time limited, active and productive (Joel)
- Adopt the ‘transition’ title as a town, not as another organization (Bron)
o The term ‘transition’ isn’t very powerful for a town – feels a bit like the sort of place you would pass through (Puck)
o What about ‘transform’? (Suzi)
o Transition concept very flexible – not threatening for councils to embrace (Ian)
- Spread the word, lobby, bring in funds, bring together people
- Tree analogy – there are so many limbs to this
- An education role – not just about building community trust, and changing mindsets – about teaching new skills (see below under ‘big picture’)
- Practical measures towards resilience – Bron reminded us of the need to focus on the practical issues underpinning resilience: food, water, fuel.
- Document the growing brainstorm list of what is already happening
‘Big Picture’ (visioning) vs ‘small picture’ (projects)
Clarification of purpose – there was some attempt to explore whether people wanted to engage in bite sized, project-based action, or big picture thinking, or both. There was a mixed response. Lucy shared Carol’s big picture for the process which was to move beyond the project based activity stage towards a more developmental ‘surfing of the wave’ which captures the whole of community and seeks to spread the stories of our community far and wide. Lucy articulated her understanding of the importance of inspiring people with good news and spreading the word in harnessing the ‘viral effect’ of behaviour change. Dean agreed articulating it as an organic process. Wendy still felt there was a place for the ‘hard truth’ story to shock people into action and offered everyone copies of a powerful powerpoint presentation she has to this end.
Action – there was agreement that many people don’t want a ‘talk-fest’, they want immediate action towards, for example, gassifiers, community gardens, personal gardening etc. Much discussion of the ‘emergency factor’. Equally though, there was some feeling that we didn’t want to reinvent the wheel, and also some didn’t want to become just a disparate group of projects.
Projects / initiatives (already happening / could happen)
Small Towns – Genevieve told the Newstead story and urged that we not leave the smaller towns out of the picture but also to allow them to be somewhat inward focused. The key issue for them is transport – need to find ways to share trips, and different ways of conducting meetings (eg video technology)
Transport – Joel shared the Wesley Hill car share pool initiative (where no-one owns a car – there is a pool of shared cars for use when necessary for reasons of distance or load, but otherwise walking or cycling is the preferred mode of transport)
It was discussed that the buses don’t seem to be used enough – is this because the timetables don’t work? How can we encourage people to use them more? Would be worth chatting to the owner of the bus company
who seems genuinely committed to providing a responsive service.
Food – Kathryn shared the story of shared local slow food dinners started by Jac Semmler – now running every second Monday. Often while brought together by the common interest in local food, end up talking big picture.
Town Money – Ian introduced the concept and was told it had already started in Maldon as supported by the Bendigo Bank and local traders.
‘Big Picture’
Changing mind-sets / culture – Suzi felt the change wasn’t just about changing mind-sets and culture, also that often it was a matter of filling a skills / knowledge gap eg: (as per their experience at Fryer’s Forest) negotiation, communication, car share etc).
The ‘community’ opportunity – Lars noted the irony of how removed we have come from ‘community’ – if you run into someone in a car you could get killed, if you run into someone as a pedestrian, you have a conversation!
Re-learning ‘how to share’ – Lars felt people come here because they are drawn to being part of a community – they are open and willing to re-learning how to share.
WHO might be involved?
- Use existing networks (eg: C500, Newstead, MASG etc)
- How do you contact those people who don’t self select? The disengaged. Fear (Wendy’s power-point) vs celebration (the ‘up’ side of ‘peer pressure)
- How to involve our neighbours – eg: US Crime study – e-mail list amongst neighbours helped reduce crime (better still, talk to your neighbours!). In this community diverse people live side by side – opportunity to influence.
- Local government has a huge role to play (relocalisation) (Joel)
o Should get Council on board because our capacity to survive is the only strength of this community in terms of its ‘natural’ resources – economically we don’t have much else going for us. (Lars)
WHY?
- Because we can
- Because we can’t not.
- Ride the wave - Build on, acknowledge, celebrate, share our achievements to date
HOW?
- Start with what is already happening, and working towards resilience, and build on it. (Janet)
- Build on whatever is happening to build community, infiltrate existing organizations and through these, model for the rest of the community
- Capture & document diversity – eg: Deanna’s Carbon Heroes – especially those who have made major shifts in their way of thinking and living – powerful stories (Dean).
- Documentation – Suzi expressed the need for documentation of this process – Janet had a camera and Lucy took notes with that very intention.
- Communication – Sarah flagged possibilities for communication including a transition blog, website and e-group. Disucssed information over-kill and how to manage
- Lucy offered herself as the ‘story-catcher’ (when she gets back from leave at the end of September) (Other stories: bike trailers, bikes on trains campaign)
- A group in NSW was offering to make a documentary of a town which put itself forward as being at the point of transition – was a while ago – Gen to pass details onto Lucy
- Education role / Study group / learning – Sarah felt a study group or opportunities for learning more about the transition concept and underlying principles such as permaculture would be beneficial and would assist us in carrying out our role in the ‘trickle effect’ towards passing on our learnings to our networks. This idea was well supported. Other ideas for reaching broader community:
o Film nights
o ‘Open mike’ nights for sharing stories (Lucy)
o Invite an ‘expert’ eg: a few years back Council did a series of 9 workshops where different people spoke about their different areas of expertise – was a huge turnout (Jim). May serve to ‘broaden’ the buy-in – bring in speakers with credibility & expertise.
§ This community has plenty of ‘experts’ within & that is the whole point of the transition concept.
§ Maybe organize a program of speakers for next year?
Where to from here?
- Meet once a month and share successes (? More frequently)
- Another meeting with 1/2 ‘tutorial’ from someone on transition concept and other 1/2 sharing of stories, food and networking
- Media release from tonight’s meeting to advertise next one
- Explore alternative ways of organizing towards productive ends (Janet, Lucy) (eg: ‘think tank’ theories)
- Name: ? J RATS (Resilience And Transition Society) – Dean!
Next Meeting
Mon 14th July 6.30pm 8 Campbell Street
– bring a plate to share;
– spread the word;
– Ian to give short presentation on ‘what is transition’?
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