Nicotine Anonymous- A 12 Step Program offering support to those who want to stop smoking and other forms of tobacco and nicotine addiction.

Nicotine Anonymous Northern California Intergroup Minutes

November 15, 2008

Jerome's Restaurant, Petaluma

In attendance: Keith, Ed, Harry, Terry, David, Mike B., Jon, Melissa

Treasurer's Report
- Regular balance as of Nov 15, 2008: $594.62 (see Ed's Treasurer's Report for detail)
- Discussion about rolling the negative chip numbers back into the general balance and not having a separate chip balance (because it looks like a liability when it's not)
  - Motion made to go back to the old way of reintegrating chip balance fund into general fund and not running a separate chip balance: PASSED
- Motion made to accept Treasurer's Report: PASSED

Saturday San Francisco: Still going strong, still 12-15 per meeting. Good and healthy.
Monday Oakland: Picking up a little, averaging about 8 people. Some newcomers stay, some don't. Old-timers drop in now and then.
Tuesday Santa Rosa: About 4-6. Regulars, old-timers.
Monday Petaluma: About 5-8, all old-timers. Least amount of time is one year. Only a few newcomers, but the meeting is hanging on.
Thursday Kaiser San Rafael: About 7-10, doing well. A few people with 9-10 years. About half old-timers and half newcomers.
Tuesday noon Santa Rosa, Interlink Self-Help program (new meeting): About 2-3, still new.
Monday San Francisco: Average is 5, ranges from 2-7. Secretary has 7 years, everyone else is newcomers. Meeting is hanging on.
Saturday San Rafael: Pretty good, about 11-15/week. A few weeks ago, there were 20 people there! Going up again. Mix of old-timers and newcomers.
Possible meeting to come: Victor M. from the old Monday meeting in Hayward called Ed and wants to get the meeting restarted. Ed encouraged him to do so but maybe consider a different night, possibly Tuesday. Keith will get the number of the Hayward person he knew so he and Victor can connect.

Delegate envelopes went out with no problem.
Catherine didn't respond to Keith's inquiry about the stuff we wrote at the Retreat for 7 Minutes.

World Services Report: Board meeting was held in Long Island on October 25, 2008.

The new Nicotine Anonymous book became available on November 4.
World Services website update is ongoing
There was talk about setting up a donation program based on the Faithful Fivers, a San Francisco AA program. Members will be able to pledge an ongoing $5/month to NicA World Services. Will be discussed at April conference.
Both the Oprah Winfrey show and the Ellen Degeneres show have been in contact with NicA (through Jan S., current chair-elect of WS), and have shown real interest in learning more about our program. Currently grappling with 11^th Tradition and anonymity issues. We'll see how it develops; more to come.
There was talk about bringing online groups more into the mainstream of NicA. Suggestion to change the language of by-laws to be more inclusive of online groups. Will be discussed at April conference.
Next meeting will be January 24, 2009, in Orange County CA.

Mike B. updated the schedule this morning. He has been slow to update the website in general in part because the program to make changes is somewhat unmanageable. No disrespect to John, who designed the site originally, who did a great job at the time. It's just that there are several issues that could use improvement:

Right now the process to update information is pretty unwieldy. Updates that need to made on a regular basis: posting Intergroup minutes, posting events (including Intergroup meetings), posting updated meeting schedule.
There's a greeting card sender which has not been used legitimately in months and months (probably years) but is causing NicA NorCal email to get an excessive amount of spam (Harry said up to 300 spam messages/day).
Site loads OK on a computer, but very slowly on a phone. Because more people use iPhones etc for looking up websites, it would be good if we could improve its loading speed.
Site is looking a little dated.

Easier to update
Easier for future web servants to learn how to use
Not a generator of spam
Make it easy for real people (not spammers) to get in contact with us, so we can give out information, help people start meetings, etc
Keep linking to World Services website (our NorCal website is one of the first to pop up when people do a Google search for Nic A)
Quicker to load
Looks good

Motion made to let Mike B. start looking around for non-binding quotes for a new website design (he'll start with his friends who'll probably give him a deal): PASSED
Motion made to also start looking in the fellowship for a qualified website designer, via word-of-mouth and via letter/email from the Chair: PASSED
Motion made to post an announcement about needing a website designer on the front page of the website: PASSED
Motion made to disable the greeting card sender because of excessive spam: PASSED

Ed's story will appear in an upcoming 7 Minutes. He was interviewed by one of Akron's co-chairs.
Ed will also write an article for 7 Minutes about the 7^th Tradition and the 60/40 split between World Services and local Intergroups.
Mike B. and Vicky recently told their Nic A stories on SteppingOutRadio.com, an online 12-Step radio station produced in New York (the station covers any 12-Step program, not just Nic A).
After a full year of service, Michael M. is stepping down as Meeting Schedule person. The January schedule will be his last. Please announce in your home meetings that this service commitment is available.
Melissa will resend all the Intergroup minutes she has from 2007 and 2008 to Mike B. to be posted on the website. Ed will send all the Treasurer's Reports from 2007 and 2008 as well.
Keith has been in contact with the Sacramento folk about hosting our next Intergroup meeting. Last he heard they were still waiting to confirm a meeting space. If we don't hear from them by December 1, we will hold the January meeting at Mandana House in Oakland. Keith will email all of us with a final word.