First, Soluciones Practicas will hopefully be hiring a sociologist in the next week to implement the survey we sent a couple weeks back. This sociologist, and a technical surveyor, will draw data from several communities in San Pablo, including information about the previous water systems and specifics on how/why those previous water systems didn’t work out so well.

We also talked about funding this project/these projects because there are at least a few communities which could be the recipient of support, although Suro Antiguo would likely be the first. Grants are certainly one revenue source we are looking at, and we have a few potential leads. We’re also interested in potentially connecting with a local Rotary chapter because the San Pablo project could be right up that alley. One experiment, however, I think we can jump on right off the bat is using The Point to raise funds for a specific component of the project (for instance, hiring the sociologist). Yesterday, I came across a pitch titled, “Save NewsPageDesigner.com.” In less than 24 hours, and using the power of the internet to find a niche audience, they were able to raise $2,500 to save the website. I think there are two distinct components to the campaign’s success:

1. The “ask” was for a concrete goal. I feel as though non-profit fundraising is commonly for a large, nebulous amount of money. By breaking the “ask” down into specifics (hiring a sociologist, paying for a water tank, etc.), I feel donors might be more willing to support
2. You commit to donate, but aren’t charged until everyone in the community agrees that it’s a good idea.

For us to experiment with The Point, however, I think we need to: identify what specifically we want to raise money for, have a plan for marketing the fundraising effort, and set metrics for defining success with the experiment. The cool thing, though, is that we can experiment with this right away.

On the call, we also spoke briefly about Green Empowerment offering an “internship” to ODA members over summer 2009 for those that want to travel to Peru. Anna is receptive to the idea, but we need to better understand what specifically we need from GE to make that happen.

I think this approach has an interesting psychological advantage. There’s no cost to commit to an idea, and you’ll only donate if enough people think the project proposal is a good idea. It’s a bit like a 30 day money back guarantee.

Furthermore, if we can market it well, I think this could be a really effective way to fund certain physical components of a project (the solar panels, for instance). We give as much information as we can about the project, and the funders know exactly where their money is going.

The best example I’ve found is the “Pansenor Water & Electricity Project.” We can do it even better!

Granted, it isn’t the most uplifting film in the world, but it’s a must-see. Even if you’ve seen it before (hint, Shane), I would highly encourage you to come see it again. It is so many adjectives I’m lacking right now, and might just convince you to get involved with ODA.

There’s a community kick-off meeting on Wednesday, the 22nd of October at 7 pm in the Knight Collaboration Center (room 122 of the Knight Library). If you are a student at the University of Oregon, please contact us or RSVP on Facebook to give us a heads up on the number of people showing up. We’ve got to make sure there are enough snacks for everyone.

Also, we’re looking for professors and professionals alike to serve on our Board of Advisers for the fall term. The advisers will meet with the ODA team once per month tentatively on the third Wednesday to discuss project developments, give feedback on project and funding ideas, and help improve organizational strategy. Additionally, we hope the advisers will become more intimately engaged with our projects, as everything we do is easy to follow along with on our website.

The applicants will be voted in by the team after the first joint meeting this month on the 29th of October. Positions will be term by term, although applicants are more than welcome to serve indefinitely. Please contact us if this sounds like an awesome fit for you.

How do we best involve the community with our projects? One path forward is develop a core team, and then use that core team to crowdsource tasks to the community. I think this is highly feasible, and in tune with the open source concept, but we definitely need to fill out the positions of Finance, PR, and Tech first.

When should we schedule a meeting with our potential advisers? The game plan is to schedule this for the third or fourth week of October. Katie thinks is a really good idea, by the way. In the interim, we need to do a couple of things. One, we should identify what organization structure goals we have for ODA (do we want to be a student group, a non-profit, or a program of another non-profit?). I think this will evolve over time but, as I get to later, being just a student group doesn’t have the advantages we think it does. Two, we really need to establish the specifics of what we want these advisers to help with. A “job description,” per se, that lays out the number of hours per term we would expect them to contribute, when we would meet, and what type of support we want, among other things. Ideally, we’ll have a solid draft of this before we begin to solicit potential advisers.

Can use ENVS as our fiscal sponsor? Boy, this was a fun question. I learned quite a bit. Apparently, unlike I had thought before, the University is not a 501(c)3. For a number of grants, we need to have 501(c)3 status specifically. Katie will look into whether ENVS can provide this for us, but it might not be the best option because there is a significant overhead cost. She suggested we talk to Green Empowerment and/or the Institute for Culture and Ecology as to whether they can provide fiscal sponsorship. It sure would be sweet to have someone in charge of finances to look into this for us.

Where should we look for more people to get involved? I think we’ll plan on marketing ourselves to the Sustainability Coalition on campus, but Katie suggested we also connect with the UO Business School and Jcomm. Both are good ideas, we should advertise out when the team goals are a bit further along. We’re also welcome to put flyers up around ENVS when we get to that point.

What do you know about Meyer Sustainability Grant? Katie is 90% sure this is a grant for projects on campus, and mentioned that Steve Mital definitely the contact person for this. Considering MAPLE Microfinance was launched by a grant from this fund, I think we still should look into it.

All in all, it was a wonderfully productive 45 minutes, and I look forward to working closely with Katie in the near future.

It is possible that the highland lagoons could serve as a potable water source with pipes flowing to many communities, although this would be a major infrastructure of 10s of km of pipes. For the time being it probably makes sense to focus more on small-scale distributed options.

20 households (HH) and the primary school get water from a piped system with an enclosed spring box. The remaining 50 drink from untreated surface water. 2-3 HH capture a few springs and channel them into a pond. Water is then delivered in pipes from the pond to the households. Most people drink from ‘puqueos’ (shallow surface water holes) or ‘quebradas’ (streams or gullies). Some people boil the water because a health promoter told them that the surface water is dirty.

Community groups include: Programa Juntos, Comedor Popular, Ronda Campesina, Asociacion de Productores and now the Frente de Defensa de las Lagonas.

There is a milk cooling plant (gas-fired) that the teacher rents to Nestle. Each morning 4 milk trucks deposit the fresh milk into the plant. Milk production is basically the only income of the community (80 cents of a sol per liter, each cow produces 5-10liters per day). There is no public transportation other than getting a ride on the milk truck. 

Electricity options

Strangly, there is a TV tower in this village without electricity. The tower does not work because they don’t have gas for the generator.

There is a river 3-7km away, apparently 4 times the size of the other river in Regalado (where ITDG is installing a micro-hydro). Gilberto from ITDG will visit the site to see if there is potential and if it is feasible to power the town at this distance. Otherwise, wind power seems like a good option. ITDG-GE are currently applying to a foundation for a 500w wind turbine for the secondary school.

Then, this week, Rafael Escobar, the leader of ITDG here in Cajamarca, and I went to meet with CARE to talk to them about water in San Pablo, so that we as least don’t duplicate efforts, and at best, can collaborate. It turns out that they are working with the provincial and regional government to develop a plan for water management — both for potable water and other water uses. They would like to work with ITDG on such a larger water program in San Pablo. In the next 4-6 months ITDG will be developing a whole integrated province-wide proposal for electricity, water and economic development in the area. In the meanwhile, we can get going on the smaller water project in one or several communities with ODA. This project with ODA will be a model for the other projects.

So, now we need to identify what exactly that project will be. On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, I’ll be going to San Pablo with Rafael, Walter and Liliana, all Peruvians who work for ITDG to identify a community to start with. We’ll also be identifying a community for a small wind project, installing a 500 watt wind turbine for a school, so there is a chance that both projects could occur in the same community. So, by the end of next week we should finally have some more information. During this first trip, we won’t be doing the house-to-house detailed needs assesment, but will take into the broader factors of need and opportunity. For the next trip, it would be great if ODA could refine that needs assessment tool that you began to gathering examples for.

Even if we don’t win the money, though, taking the time to answer the questions for both components of the Clinton Global Initiative commitment and grant process proved to be a valuable experience.  The prompts forced us to think deeply about who we are and what we’re trying to do, as well as provide specifics on how we hope to accomplish it.  The format in which we synthesized this, too, makes the grant application a valuable read for anyone that wants to come on board with the team and our projects.

If you’re a member of the Clinton Foundation’s MyCommitments website, please do vote our project up.  I would imagine the voting system does indeed count for something.