Envisioning a Sustainable WWFOR

by Brenda Collier,  Facilitator, Transition Committee

How do we get there?  At the February Area Committee meeting, we finally acknowledged that WWFOR cannot afford staff: The treasurer had nightmares of waking up one payday without money in the bank to meet payroll!  So a “Transition Committee” was set up to make a plan.  [We are currently expecting to pay our full-time Organizer (Ellen Finkelstein) through September and our part time Office-Manager (Sara Rinehart) through November.]

The future the Transition Committee envisions is for a streamlined WWFOR where much of the responsibility rests with chapters and individuals and where information can be easily be shared on the Internet, facilitating better communication between FOR members and chapters across the Western Washington region.  This will facilitate WWFOR working on issues such as nonviolence and racial and economic justice – either in coalition or as a WWFOR project.

The future the Transition Committee envisions is a WWFOR where we continue to do all of the things we are currently doing, but obviously this cannot happen without significantly more volunteer help.

In an effort to gain more information, we sent out a couple of email surveys to find out what people would like from WWFOR and how people could help.  From these surveys, we found out more about what our members want, received interesting ideas, and now have a list of potential volunteers, who we are in the process of contacting.

In addition, we have updated a list of tasks that staff created several years ago from which we are creating a list for volunteers.

• We will need people to carry out office tasks, like checking email and answering the phone
• We will need people to be on the Coordinating Committee that will replace the Area Committee
• We will need people to represent WWFOR on the peace and justice groups we work in coalition with
• We will need people who want to take the lead on issue-based peace and justice projects in the name of WWFOR

If you would like to help us move into a new and volunteer future, if you would like to help us plan, or if any of these tasks appeal to you, please let me know (Brenda Collier, at 206-524-2505 or bmcbmc@earthlink.net) or you can call the WWFOR office.