Derby Cultural Diversity Arts Network

Donna Greene (DG), Corey Mwamba (CM) and Gopa Nath (GN) were present.
Stephen Munn (SM) had apologised.
Pete Meakin (PM) and Wenna Stockdale (WS) were invited and attended.

The discussion flowed around three areas, which arose throughout the meeting, namely;
Budget
WS and PM stated that the budget amount is £10,000 exactly. This is less than expected as there was money not spent or allocated for spending from the last Diversity Officer's post. However, this money was not allowed to be carried over into the Steering Group's budget.

The budget does not belong to the Steering Group as such: the money is allocated by the City Council Arts and Events Team as a “Cultural Diversity pot”. The Steering Group and wider Network then make recommendations to Arts and Events as to how that money is spent. Any money not spent on arts activity in the budget could be allocated for another activity for the Network.

PM suggested that dividing the money in a 1:1:3 ratio may be prudent: this gives

• £2000 to be allocated for administration costs;
• £2000 on meeting needs, such as hire, refreshments, and so on; and
• £6000 for an artists' small grant.

All agreed in principle.

CM asked if the small grant was actually part of the City Council's existing artist grant provision. PM stated that this money was separate from Arts and Events £4,500 small grants allocation.

PM and GN reflected that artists have found the normal process tricky: all agreed that the application forms can be a barrier for artists trying to raise funds for new work. Arts and Events hoped that the Steering Group's allocation could be used to fund new work from local existing artists recommended by the Steering Group, with no application process.

The Steering Group argued that that method would not empower the local artists in terms of being able to work in the arts world at large, where application forms do need to be filled in. Instead, some of the money should be used in preparing people for the forms, and enabling them to write decent applications. PM and WS agreed and said that Antoinette Burchill (AB) could run a training session on the forms for one of the meetings.

Action: PM/WS to notify AB of Steering Group's intention to use her for a training session, and Steering Group to arrange a day for this

Administration
Although all are happy that CM is offering his services as administrator for the Steering Group, the City Council needs a proposal letter that formalises a service agreement between a group and a freelancer.
Action: proposal letter to be drafted by Steering Group for a service agreement

Some agreed terms are:

• £2000 split into three payments across the year
• writing of agendas and minutes for meetings
• maintenance of web-site
• organisation of meetings, including venue/personnel/equipment hire

Network members
WS said that although AB had sent an e-mail asking members of the Arts Forum to state to which groups they would like to be affiliated, none of the Steering Group had responded even though thirty-seven others had flagged an interest in the Cultural Diversity Arts Network.
Action: Steering Group to register group affiliation to AB by e-mail

PM thinks that AB might be storing the names in an Excel spreadsheet acting as a database, and said that the Steering Group could pass on the names it had collected. CM pointed out that neither the Group or Arts and Events could pass names on because of the Data Protection Act, but a comparison of names could be done. As the Steering Group's back-up database is a very portable Comma Separated Values file, it should be easy to do a quick scan and compare.
Action: AB and CM to meet and compare databases; PM/WS to notify AB

There was discussion about the Cultural Olympiad launch. The main detail of the event is in the main notes for the Network meeting, but PM did ask the Steering group to make recommendations for artists to Bob Rushton at the Assembly Rooms.