MAWS Conference Report 2013
May 24 – 27, 2013 Los Angeles, California
By Jeremy F. District 13 Delegate
The conference was very productive and went smoothly this time. The hosting district, District 6, L.A. South, found a pleasant little college campus, the Doheny Campus of Mount St. Mary's College, to stage it, We stayed in the same dorm building the conference rooms were located in. The host district did a great job of organizing it, like finding an excellent mobile catering service for 3 sets of breakfasts and lunches.
Resolutions:
All the resolutions were voted on the exact same way our district voted on them:
1. Yes To adopt the Mediation pamphlet into MA literature.
2. Yes Suggested District Service Committee Addition: Internet Subcommittee
3. Yes Publish MAWS Smartphone App – MA Mobile
4. Yes Amend bylaws to allow remote attendance to future MAWS Conferences.
5. No The Definition of Sobriety in MA is to Abstain from Marijuana
6. Yes Policy for Uncommunicative Trustees
Some notes. #4 is just a study resolution, It doesn’t enable remote conference attendance as is but sets up an exploratory committee to examine the options of implementation.
Concerning #5
On further examination, I might have supported #5 at least with some amendments. Upon reading the current MAWS service manual, the suggested meeting formats require even meeting attendees to be clean from all drugs just to get a chip. Of course, one can argue that meeting formats are suggestions, but the MAWS ones have the imprimatur of authority that my suggestions don’t. It might have been better to inform a potential group that they can ask people to be completely clean from all drugs or just marijuana for that group’s requirement. Personally, I like our system where an attendee is only required to be clean from pot but trusted servants have to be completely sober.
MAWS Finances
MAWS ran in the red the last fiscal year to about five thousand US dollars, or about 20% of the total. They made up for that by dipping in their prudent reserves. We can help by upping our contribution to MAWS or you can donate directly to them via their site. One concept they use that we don’t is that they have a recurring (weekly, monthly, quarterly) donation payment plan which would automatically make a donation directly from your PayPal account.
What We Can Take Back to Our District
We need to liaison better with our MAWS & other district counterparts directly, like Bureau chief to ANLP head, webmaster to MAWS webmaster (which should be easy because I am on the MAWS Internet Committee too), etc. We also need to replicate the functions of normal districts like establish a formal public information, help line, outreach committee, etc. The MAWS Public Information trustee is willing to come to one of our DSC meeting to discuss ideas. Other districts have bought advertising on local buses and put PSA spots on local radio stations for MA.
Other MAWS News:
We have a new chairperson, Micah S. from District 15 Long Island. He replaces Amy H. from District 8.
We have a new district, and Canada’s first, District 19 Toronto, Ontario
The MAWS Outreach Committee officially split off from the Internet Committee.
The MAWS app is a reality now and is available from MAWS at
Finally,
I thank District 13 DSC for allowing me to be the delegate to this year’s Conference
In Loving Service,
Jeremy aka Jakester