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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2010 - Womens Commission - Annual ReportCity of Fort Collins Women’s Commission 2010 Annual Report For the year 2010, the Commission members were: Annette Zacharias, Ginny Carroll, Merry Hummell, Catherine Himmes Douras, Barbara Goff, Sue Baccari, Beth O’Brien, Kristen Sergi, Ashley Burroughs, and Catherine Kelley. In 2010, the Women’s Commission was able to accomplish the following: > We established our three focus areas as: Poverty, Safety, and Health. > Decided to spend the year to reform the bases of the commission and not focus so much on outreach as on developing a strong commission plan for the future; we decided to spend 25% of 2010 on short term projects, and 75% on long term, strategic projects. > We held a first annual retreat in February, where we worked on strategic planning for 2010 and began structuring how the Commission would function in 2010. > Decided to concentrate on one issue each month in relation to our three focus areas, and present this issue to the community through our presence at community fairs/festivals, radio, or op-eds in newspaper. > David Roy remained the Women’s Commission Council Liaison. > Decided to not do the annual junior high/middle school student essay contest. > Decided not to hold the Marcile N. Wood award in 2010. We met with the Human Relations Commission to discuss collaboration for the future for the Marcile N. Wood award. They will include this award in their annual awards breakfast, beginning in 2011. The Women’s commission will assist in the review process. > We presented the International Women’s Day Proclamation at the City Council meeting on March 2, 2010. > We had a booth at the June Pride in the Park event, and passed out information on Women Entrepreneurs, in celebration of June being Entrepreneurial month. > Have begun working on forming a cohesive message and image for the Commission, beginning with a motto that sums up the Commission’s work. > We gave extensive input to the Plan Fort Collins process, providing input numerous times throughout the year and attending Plan Fort Collins meetings regularly. > Commission members met with David Roy a couple times to bring our Commission back to the table and work on making the connection between City Council and the Commission stronger. > Members of the Commission attended the National Women’s Studies Association’s national conference, held in Denver on November 11-14, 2010. This was an opportunity to learn what is going on in the world of academic women’s studies and network with women from all over the country. > We began a dialogue with other Boards and Commissions, holding the first breakfast on Dec. 1, 2010. We also had members of the HRC attend our meetings, and we reviewed all of the Boards and Commissions work plans to stay informed of their efforts. > We have put in a request to City Council to increase our Commission member seat number by two and to designate two member seats as youth seats. > Agreed to be more of a presence at City Council meeting in 2011, trying to have a Commission member attend each one. > Continued our membership with the National Association of Commissions for Women (NACW). > Worked with City Council and the City Attorney’s Office to update the wording of the function of the Commission. The CAO initially proposed changes that the Women’s Commission felt were too restrictive, so the Commission provided what changes we believe should be made. > Guests to our meetings included: -John Voss, the Budget and Finance Manager for the City of Fort Collins, who discussed the city budget -Laura Williams, volunteer coordinator/public relations for Crossroads Safehouse, who gave us a picture of what Domestic Violence looks like in Fort Collins -Elaine Boni and Maya Jaiman of the Human Relation Commission -Naomi Chavez and Nadia Iranpour, journalism students from CSU interested in what the Commission is and does The Commission was able to meet the goals of our 2010 Work Plan. We’re proud of our accomplishments and believe we’ve been successful in laying a strong foundation for future years.