From the September Regional Dewan Meeting:
Portland: Camille reported Portland was having a fund raiser on Saturday that Marius Harold is putting together – music and a meal. He and his daughter, Hermina, will be playing and singing, as well as Emile and Brina. Iliana will be reading poetry and she thought Mo would be playing. This will be a dessert event to raise money for Cuban youth, in Cuba, to travel to the Youth Gathering in December. So, hopefully, it will raise a lot of money and be a fun event as well. Camille also reported that services for Stephanie Schurik would be held on Saturday, September 14th. Portland’s core members feel that the center needs new chairs to be more attractive to renters. The new chairs will cost $5000. They also need a new roof and, the area above the women’s latihan hall needs to be rebuilt so they think that will cost at least $26,000 to $30,000. She looked into an MSW grant and that’s not going to happen until next June and she thinks the goal for the re-roofing has been set for next summer. Also, because they have already had an MSW grant, they are not sure they can get any money from MSW. It may well depend on how much money they have. They also have a promise of a loan for $20,000 from the region that they plan to use. She wanted to know if it would be fairly easy to get more than $20,000 if it was needed. After some conversation, Sherwin reported that right now the building fund has about $75,000 in it and so, if a decision is made to go above $20,000, then, yes, there is capacity for that. The loan apparently was committed four years ago – that money is still in the housing fund as nothing has, as yet, been forwarded. The money was made available but was not collected. At that time, it was promised for a handicap ramp and Portland painted the house and performed some foundation work but that was all done without the loan. Right now, Camille reported there is about $15,000 in the housing fund but they need about 100 chairs. Camille reported they were having a problem with the bank. They need signatures so that Maria Baker can retire as treasurer. She is trying to arrange for everyone concerned to go to the Credit Union together when they are at Menucha to sign the necessary papers. Oswald wanted to ask a question, just as a member of the region. He wanted to ask “how can we not provide for this roof”? He asked for a motion to move this forward. A motion was made to approve any additional funding for Subud Portland’s roof project over and above the $20,000 loan that is already committed to them.