Late last year, I got the idea for a series of short weekly videos in which members of the board would speak to the ownership. It would be a way for the board to start being more communicative about the work they were doing, the decisions they were making, and the reasons behind them.
I knew there was no chance anybody on the board at the time would agree to do this, but I had hopes for the next board. I asked Laura Park, if she were elected, if she would be willing to do weekly videos even if no other board member was up for it, and she said yes. Later, after she was elected I think, she came back to me and asked if she could start by doing them just every other week, at least until ICE was out of Minnesota. (As she was super busy organizing her church’s response to ICE actions.) I said that would be fine, and started lining up possible fill-ins: former board members or chairs or former chairs of committees.
We started with a video by Laura, and then by an alternate. And then Laura said she wasn’t ready to do another one yet, and then again, and then…she eventually told me she changed her mind about doing them at all.
She told me her reasons, but I’m going to ask her to put them in writing so that I can publish them here, partly because I don’t want to make any mistakes in relaying them to you, and partly because she did make a commitment to do these videos for the ownership, and now that she’s changed her mind about doing them, she ought to explain her reasons for herself, directly to the ownership.
I would not have launched this feature without an assurance that I could deliver videos to you every week. I thought I had that assurance. I’m suspending Phone-side Chats until I can get such an assurance again, and this time, I’ll need to be much more sure of it before relaunching.