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January 2001 DIA Newsletter

Does the DIA Have a Future?
By Janet Broughton

Has the DIA reached the end of its lifespan? That is the question the Board discussed at its December 6th meeting.

While many particular DIA activities are going strong and have a life of their own, the organizational skeleton is not healthy. We have not had a chair in months, we have only five board members who have attended over half of the board meetings in the past year, and general attendance at our meetings has been thin.

The board members at the December meeting all agreed that we should explain to the DIA members what the situation is, and provide some background information. Different board members proposed different options; those are described below.

Background information
The DIA is a corporation, and our corporation bylaws, on file with the State, require us to have officers and an active board. Our election of officers and board members must occur in February, and our collection of 2001 dues would have to begin soon.

Our membership holds steady at about 120 dues-paying households. The dues pay for duplicating and mailing the newsletter that goes out 11 months a year, for our post-office box, for the flowers that members plant and maintain in containers all around the neighborhood, for the "dimondnews" web-site name, for Dimond t-shirts, for donations to the MacArthur Metro and the Friends of Sausal Creek, and for minor miscellaneous expenses.

We hold 11 meetings per year. Increasingly these have been "open board meetings," though there have been several with a more specific theme, for example, the November "Meet Rebecca Kaplan" meeting. Some of the open board meetings have had agendas prepared ahead of time and listed in the newsletter; others have not. Attendance at meetings has ranged from about 6 people to about 18.

Options
It is not an option to continue into 2001 as we have been functioning in recent months. We cannot keep violating our legally binding bylaws.

Some board members think that the best option is to dissolve the corporation, leaving each of us to find some other way to work for the good of the Dimond. For example, the web site might serve as a kind of forum through which people could team up on specific projects. Perhaps that would in turn lead to the formation of a new organization, with a different structure and some new faces and energy.

Other board members have thought that the current board members should work on outreach, going door to door and block by block to bring in new people, including new board members and officers. Only one current board member, however, was ready to take on this extra work.

Still others thought that at this point we should simply ask, in this issue of the newsletter, "What do you, as members of the DIA, think should be done?" That is why this newsletter includes a questionnaire, which we hope everyone will fill out and return. At our February meeting we will discuss the results of the questionnaire and then decide what to do.

D.I.A. Questionnaire  
To read replies to this questionnaire click here

Please answer the questions below and then email your answers to: dia@dimondnews.org. Please indicate if we have your permission to post your answers on the Dimond message board; your address and phone number won't be on the message board.

  1. What hopes and goals do you have for the Dimond neighborhood? What activities in the Dimond would you like to take part in or support?

  2. How can the people in Dimond work together best as a neighborhood group? Are meetings and gatherings important, in your opinion? What formats for meetings or gatherings do you think would work best (e.g., large, small; general interest, task-specific, social; frequent, infrequent; regular, ad hoc)? What other ways of working together would be effective (e.g., phone, mail, internet)?

  3. In the past, the DIA's liaisons with the City's departments and officials have communicated our needs and goals and have helped us get information and news. What do you think Dimond needs in the future to ensure good relations with the City?

  4. Would you be willing to serve as a DIA board member? (This would involve going to board meetings at least nine times a year, helping to organize meetings, and taking active part in at least one of the DIA's working groups.)

  5. Would you be willing to be a chair or co-chair of the DIA in 2001? (This would involve chairing meetings, putting together agendas, and representing the DIA to such people and agencies as our council members, AC Transit, local business people, and leaders of other neighborhood groups.)

  6. Would you like to see the DIA continue to exist, or would you like to pursue other options? Examples: the DIA could approach the Dimond Business and Professional Association about merging; we could all work through other existing organizations and structures like the Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council, the Interdepartmental Working Group, the Friends of Sausal Creek, the Park Advisory Council and the DimondNews website; or we could form a new group.)

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