Windsor Park Community Garden
Meeting Minutes 7/5/05

Attendees:
James, Jimmy, Selwyn, Mohan, Elizabeth

Location:
James' house (pre-meeting tour of house, yard and pond)

Topics Discussed:
Garden Design
Articles of Association
Timeline
Regular meeting location and dates
Miscellaneous

Garden Design
Selwyn and Elizabeth met earlier in the day to fine tune and flesh-out the design begun by the design committee last week. Selwyn enlarged the design and brought color copies to discuss. The group was generally happy with the design. There was some concern that the chickens might be too close to the apartments which would be against city regulations. Some suggestions were made for added elements a labyrinh, bat house, purple martin house.

Articles of Association
James passed out revised copies for us to take home and read. He will send a copy to the listserv also. Comments and suggestions will be discussed at the next meeting and we hope to finalize the documents at that time.

Timeline
Elizabeth brought a group participation exercise for creating a timeline. We didn't have time to do it, so she explained how it works and we will do it next time. She has created a stack of post-it notes with a task on each one. We will start by placing one on the wall, then pass the stack around the group. Each person will place their post-it note on the wall in accordance with where they think it belongs in the timeline. When all post-it notes are placed, the group will discuss
the order and decide whether it needs to be adjusted, and whether anything needs to be added or deleted. We may also assign dates to some of the tasks.

Elizabeth shared the list with the group and they wanted to have a copy to think about before the next meeting. The list is at the end of this email.

Future Meetings
The group agreed that regular meeting times and location would make it easier to promote the meetings and increase attendance.

Location: We like the idea of meeting close to the land in case we need to check something out. The church has something going on most Tuesday nights. However, the Austin Peace and Justice Coalition rents one of the church's classrooms and may be willing to let us use the space. The library is also booked on Tuesday nights. Elizabeth will check with the librarians about the possiblity of meeting in the reading room. If all else fails, we are pretty sure we can meet at Messiah Lutheran Church.

Dates/Times: Tuesday seems to be the best night for most of the people in the group. For the forseeable future, we will conduct our regular meetings on first and third Tuesdays and committee meetings or additional group meetings (as needed) on second and fourth Tuesdays.

Miscellaneous
James is compiling a list of resource organizations.
Mohan has opened a free checking account at University Federal Credit Union, and deposited our grant money.
James passed out a phone/address/email list which we all promised to use only for the purpose of the community garden.
This was not mentioned at the meeting, but Mohan has asked the Windsor Park Neighborhood Assn. for the funds to send two attendees to the workshop in College Station on Building Successful Community Gardens The executive committee will make their decision on July 9th.


TIMELINE TASKS (in no particular order)
Install rain barrels
Form committees
Finalize Articles of Association
Plant flowers, vines, shrubs
Complete the site design
Solarize pods
Build raised beds
Build shed
Create logo
Lay water pipes
Plant compost crop
Get wired for electricity
Build labyrinth
Build chicken coop
Plant trees
Create ponds
Spray compost tea
Build compost bins
Vote in officers
Create sign
Lay drip irrigation
Lay granite paths
Install purple martin house
Install bat house
Build pergola at garden entrance
Build sheltered potting tables
Procure large rain barrels
Install rain gutters
Research tree selections
Stake out design
Build pavillion
Bring in bee hives