Meadows Festival Minutes

There was a meeting to discuss the future of the Meadows Festival tonight at Cameron Rose's house. This is a very brief set of minutes (I may miss a good deal since I wasn't thinking about taking proper minutes at the time - at least the action items should be present).

Please, if you are reading this blog and have some ideas for the festival, add a comment to this post.

Next Meeting
Wednesday, 4^th April, 2007 from 19:30 at Cameron's house.

Action Items
The following steps will be taken to further the project:

1. All - To visit any festivals that come up to report on them
2. All - To prepare different proposals about the form the festival might take
   
3. Andy - To further investigate the Meadows Festival Association to get budgets and details of anything that might be lurking there
4. Cameron - To get permission from the MSCC to be the legally responsible entity in the planning stages
5. Cameron - To begin discussions with potential sponsors
• Royal Bank of Scotland
• Bank of Scotland
• Quartermile
• Sick Kids fundraisers
• Fairground
6. Cameron - To invite other councils to the next meeting
   

Attendees

• Andy Devenport (Tollcross Community Council)
  
• Cameron Rose (Marchmont and Sciennes Community Council)
• Hugh Leather (Marchmont and Sciennes Community Council)
• Justine Stansfield (Southside Community Council)
• Linda Hendry (Southside Community Council)
  
• Susannah Lacey (Marchmont and Sciennes Community Council)

Introduction
The group was informed of the previous meeting of the MSCC at which the status of the Meadows Festival was discussed. The MSCC was keen to continue the investigations of the festival. Peng Lee Yapp has withdrawn from the project, it is not clear if this means that the Friends of the Meadows wishes no longer to be involved. The group very much appreciated Peng's contributions and will miss his input.

The motivation for the project is to have a community event; possibly this may be different from the previous ethos.

The timeframe for holding the festival in 2007 is already passed and so all work is for a festival in 2008.

Legal Issues and Responsibility
We discussed the need to have a legal entity that will be responsible for the festival. There may be some issues further down the line in creating a legal entity to front the festival. However, we decided that as a matter of expediency, the MSCC would be asked to be the legally responsible entity where such is necessary for any parts of the initial period, only. This will not mean that the MSCC will be bound to be the responsible entity for the duration of the festival project.

Dates
It was noted that the previous festivals were always held on the first weekend in June.

Public Meetings and Involvement
The question of when and how the greater public should be involved was a topic of some debate. Options include holding public meetings, questionnaires, advertising in the local newspapers and speaking to local councils.

It was decided that going to the public would wait until a list of options for potential different ways to hold the festival has been drawn up by the steering committee.

Meadows Festival Association
The status of the existing charity is uncertain. It may be that they will hold on to the name. It is possible that the accounts for 2006 and 2007 have not and will not be returned.

This gave rise to thoughts about the name of the project. It may be necessary to alter the name to avoid conflicts with the existing organisation.

Further investigations were felt needed to ensure that no hidden pitfalls await due to the status of the existing charity.

Form of the Festival
Different parties had different opinions about the form of the festival. It was decided that it was important to have a number of possibilities so that further discussions could be based on concrete proposals and so that we can clarify that we are all talking about the same thing.

We will attempt to gather a small number of proposed festival ideas for next meeting. The ideas may come from other events run throughout the city or simply from the imagination.