Service Matters • October 2018
GreySheeters Anonymous World Services (GSAWS)
Board of Trustees - Announcements
Sunday, September 16 TOWN HALL Meeting Summary
Thank you to the Board of Trustees of GreySheeters Anonymous World Service for hosting the second quarterly Town Hall on Zoom. There were 30 GSers there to hear the Board answer the fellowship’s questions and to raise more questions if there was time. The Board handled such a large and diverse meeting beautifully on the Zoom platform.
The BOT members introduced themselves by abstinence date, date they joined the Board of Trustees, their role as an officer and a liaison or member of a committee.
| Officer | GreySheet Community/Intergroup | Liaison to World Service Conference/Board of Trustees Committee | Board Member Since | |
| Mary B. | Chair (2016) | New York Metro | Structure, Finance (World Service Conference) | 2014 |
| Yael A. | Vice Chair (2016) | Israel | Communication, Website subcommittee* (World Service Conference) | 2015 |
| Sue S. | Secretary (2016) | Connecticut | Bylaws & Governance (Board of Trustees) | 2016 |
| Nicole A. | Treasurer (2017) | Los Angeles (Western States) | Finance (World Service Conference) | 2016 |
| Ofer L. | Israel | GreySheet (Board of Trustees) | 2016 | |
| Sara S. | Europe | Literature, Website subcommittee (World Service Conference) | 2016 | |
| Gulla B. | Iceland | Archives, Website subcommittee (World Service Conference) | 2016 | |
| Bennie T. | Los Angeles (Western States) | Conference (World Service Conference) | 2016 |
* The website subcommittee is a subcommittee of the Communications Committee
The attendees were from France, England, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Illinois, Michigan, Texas, Oregon, and California. There were also several people on audio only.
The questions that had been submitted to the Communications Committee in advance concerned:
-- Timing of Town Halls
-- The 2019 World Service Conference and the Committees: Proposals and motions from the conference committees are due to the Conference Committee by April 1st and will be published on the website for all delegates to discuss with their groups so they can come to the conference in September 2019 and vote their group’s conscience on of each motion.
-- The GreySheet Committee: The GreySheet Committee is an ad hoc committee of the Board of Trustees. Therefore, the recommendations of the GreySheet Committee will go to the Board of Trustees who will create motions for the conference based on the recommendations of the committee. The motions will then be considered by the conference in September 2019.
-- Relationship between GSAWS and “Cambridge GreySheet”: The purpose of the GreySheet Committee is to capture in writing for the first time the oral tradition that developed in Cambridge Massachusetts when “the GreySheet Community” within OA was born. This oral tradition forms the basis of the shared abstinence of the members of GSAWS.
-- Being self-sufficient to serve our primary purpose – carry the message.
Each was addressed by a specific Board member.
Questions that came up during the meeting included:
-- How to respond to questions about what’s not on the GreySheet;
-- Who has standing to bring proposals and make motions at the World Service Conference;
-- Was the proposed Conference Charter actually approved in 2016;
-- How to respond when someone is starting off a newcomer and telling them things that differ from what you understand are common practice in GreySheet;
-- Is the Structure Committee preparing a Service Manual for the Conference Committees and the Board that will address rotation of service.
Actions that came out of the Town Hall:
-- The BOT Treasurer will bring the question of self-supporting / primary purpose to Finance Committee
-- Two other BOT members will connect interested delegates (GSRs and ISRs) and volunteers to World Service Conference Committees
-- The idea of having a Yahoo group for committees to share proposals will be taken to the Communications Committee
-- The Communications Committee will be asked to re-publish descriptions of the various committees, their work, and their chairs in another issue of Service Matters
-- The BOT Chair will consult the conference parliamentarian about who has standing at the conference and whether the charter was approved (based on the 2016 conference records)
These Town Halls were a brilliant idea of the board’s – made possible, of course, by recent advances in technology that allow so many of us to join a Zoom meeting and see everyone else. The Town Halls increase our unity and strengthen our fellowship by giving everyone the information they need to be more involved in our life-saving organization. Thank you to the Board of Trustees and to everyone who was there. I loved it and I am looking forward to the next one which was scheduled for January because of the winter holiday period.
Call to Action: All GSR’s who are currently active need to make sure their contact information is listed correctly on the GreySheet.org website and that wherever possible they are planning to come to the World Service Conference in September 2019. Please consider joining a World Service Conference Committee if you haven’t done so yet. Participation is the key to harmony!
Q & A Corner
Question: Who are the urrent GSR’s and how do we keep that information on the web site up to date?
Answer: This is an important question, especially now, with the 2019 World Service Conference coming up in September and the Conference Committees working diligently to come up with proposals and recommendations by March 15 so that the word can get out and discussed in individual groups in plenty of time before the Conference. If you are currently serving as a GSR in your group, make sure the information is up to date by checking GreySheet.org website. If the information about your meeting time and location and GSR are incorrect, please make the necessary changes and send them towebservant@GreySheet.org It is up to the Intergroup Rep to have a listing of the meetings in the intergroup and the correct names and contact information for each GSR in that region, and local groups can do their part to make sure information is correct.
Below is a description of the World Service Committees, as well as links to the chair of the committee. Please review to see which of these committees you would like to serve on. You may also write to Bennie or Sara on the Board of Trustees who have volunteered to help assign willing GreySheet GSR’s and ISR’s to various committees.
Archives Committee
The Archives Committee focuses on collecting and archiving material to preserve the history of our fellowship.
Dottie R, Chair: dottie301@hotmail.com
Members: Inka O, ingridka.oracova@gmail.com
Board Liaison: Gulla S, gullabaldvina@gmail.com
Communications Committee
Purpose - to communicate news and information on GSA World Services and related events to GSA’s members;
Function - to work with other service committees and the Board of Trustees to keep GSA’s website, greysheet.org, up-to-date; to publish regular newsletters (Service Matters); to reach out to the fellowship's registered meetings with news updates and reminders to members to subscribe to the newsletter; to send regular reminders out to groups and members listed on the International Phone list and Sponsors list to ensure their contact info is up-to-date; to serve as a vehicle for communication between members and BOT when doing so would facilitate participation and inclusiveness.
Eileen W., Chair, ekwiard@gmail.com
Members: Susan M,sbmilberg@gmail.com
Annette T, saturn63at@gmail.com
Ofer L, ofer.lamdan@gmail.com
Board Liaison: Yael A, yael.amir@gmail.com
The Website Committee is a branch of the Communications Committee. It focuses on managing our website, identifying long-term and short-term goals and communications between our webservant and website professional. At the moment, the committee is working hard on making the Greysheet.org website more user friendly and information more easily accessible.
The Website Committee chair is Sallie: sallie@salliegoetsch.com
Members: Grainne M. grainnematthews@sbcglobal.net
Board Liaison : Gulla in Iceland
Finance Committee
The Finance committee meets regularly:
1. To review the monthly GSA income and expenses;
2. To discuss the monthly and year to date budget for Greysheeters Anonymous;
3. To review the GSAWS portion of future WSC budgets;
4. To recommend financial policies and procedures; and
5. To craft any Motions related to finances to be presented at upcoming WSCs.
We maintain a strict fiduciary responsibility to all members of GSA.
Chair: Nicole gratefulnicole301@gmail.com
Board Liaison: Joy C. joyfulhikr@aol.com
Literature Committee
The Literature Committee is responsible for all GS literature. If the literature is longer than a pamphlet, the project submits a proposal to GSAWS and then gets presented at the next World Service conference for votes to be passed as Conference Approved Literature. The committee is helping the Archives Committee with interviewing people and at some point in the future what will become our GreySheet History Book. We are also working on a book Living Abstinent that would be similar in content to the Living Sober book of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Chair is Joey M: jmelmore@optonline.net
Board Liaison: Sara Smaddie6300@icloud.com
Conference Committee
The Conference Committee organizes the World Service Conference, which includes: hotel site selection and negotiation; preparation of the registration packet; preparation and review of the minutes from each previous Conference for distribution and for acceptance in 2019; compilation of the Delegate packets; and development of policies and procedures for the conference including parliamentarian, transcriber, and agenda, and minutes; Conference Charter (submission has been made to the BOT); and pursues selection of potential cities and housing for subsequent WSCs to be presented in 2019.
The Conference Committee is currently meeting for one hour weekly by phone on Monday evenings at 8:30pm eastern time. If you are interested in becoming a member of the Conference Committee and you are a GSR or ISR, please e-mailmarjorie.mayerson@gmail.com. Non-voting volunteers are welcome and much appreciated.
For additional questions, please contact marjorie.mayerson@gmail.com or myndie@gmail.com.
Chair: Marjorie M., marjorie.mayerson@gmail.com
Board Liaison: Benny T thomasbennie3@gmail.com
(GSAWS and its Board of Trustees are responsible for negotiation of contracts related to the Statement of Purpose of the Conference Committee. This includes World Service Conference housing and food contracts and those with parliamentarian, transcriber, and minute prepares, which will be coordinated with the Conference Committee). All committees’ motions and recommendations for 2019 WSC will be due and posted on our website by March 15, 2019 to give groups, Intergroups, and the Board of Trustees ample time to discuss the materials for voting during the WSC.
Structure Committee
The Structure Committee has been working on revising a document for voting at the World Service Conference, a process for Conference Approval of Literature, and revising a motion for donations. The Committee team are also discussing the Service Manual that would include the 12 Concepts and ways to make GS more visible to people with eating disorders.
Chair: Gary G gguttman@compuserve.com
Board Liaison: Mary B. marathonmary83@hotmail.com
Public Information Committee
If you are aware of opportunities in your community to do some public information, get in touch with this committee who will be happy to guide you in the best way to do this type of outreach. If you have any public information stories, news articles that have been generated about GSA since last year in your area, please let the public information committee know, so that they can write about your progress
Chair: Jim T jimtnyc@gmail.com
GSA Events
Upcoming Events around the world: https://www.greysheet.org/events
28th New York City Round-up: October 13-14
Contact: sheilarao442003@yahoo.com to volunteer.
European Intergroup Retreat in UK: October 26-28
Contact: gsaeurope@gmail.com for info on registration.
Tradition Seven Workshop on Zoom: Sunday, November 4
"Every GSA group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions."
Hosted by the European Intergroup for GreySheeters everywhere