ACA members accepting the call of service work provide the energy we need to do the good work of ACA around the globe. There could easily be 300 million adult children in the world, so the work ahead remains steady. But we make progress each day. p.536
In October, we received 386 requests. I emailed 986 answers. As for telephone calls, we got 31 that I returned using Skype for anonymity.
International connections made this month:
Poland, Sweden, St Maarten, Grenada, Germany, UK, Canada, Turkey, Scotland, Hungary, Greece, S Africa, Virgin Islands US, Netherlands, Israel, Bolivia (via Larry)
!!THE VERY FIRST ACA LIGHT WAS TURNED ON IN TWO COUNTRIES!!
ST MAARTEN AND GRENADA!!
Remarkable events:
------------ Around the world: After working since August with St Maarten and Grenada members, they each turned on the ACA light! We are working to support the under-structure through professionals and institutions & they each received their New Mtg Starter Kits. Gloria cleaned up the database on the Turkey listing as there are only 2 meetings still active. The office and MaryJo forwarded me contacts from Greece, S Africa and Virgin Islands US, because of that I am working with the Greek member to help defray her literature costs with the MPS budget seeing this as a good investment in Greece, her plan is to work her program, get through the steps and start the 1st meeting in Greece; she will help with translations too. The Virgin Islands member is hoping to do the very same too. The S. African member started the first meeting in Johannesburg. Now Africa has 4 ACA meetings for the continent. I work with these countries to provide a firm groundwork by providing facilities and professionals with literature to send members their way. Israel focus: There are only 2 meetings in Israel, I reached out to find out their status, and an Israeli member said she will be my contact to let me know what she finds out about the status of the meetings. I encouraged her to beef up Israel with literature that we will help with professionals and institutions through BBI packages. As a good investment in Israel, I will help fund their literature shipment in November with MPS budget. It sounds like Larry is helping to start the 1st Bolivian meeting, more on that later!
----------- Intergroups: -Sweden IG569 is involved in translations and they supplied me with a contact for a BBI package which I handled this time. A CT group reached out with their 1st 7th Tradition donation to WSO and I connected them to their IG so they could do a 60/40 split. A member in Hawaii reached out for guidance in starting an IG and AZIG and OHIG reached out and I sent them both to the IGSC. I reached out for Gloria's help to see if the S FL IG is still active. I see there is a Missouri IG604 and IG605 for Colorado that I’ve never seen listed before. I reached out to them both to find out how they are doing. CO replied that they had their 1st meeting and are excited to see what CO meetings need help with. The fact that several IG’s & meetings are listed on meetup.com was brought to our attention. I reached out to Dallas to offer support and follow up on their announcement of starting an IG. I visited the AZ IG TC and they are really working to support and link their meetings and do the hard work of ACA in a group conscience type of way, it was a great meeting. I made an IG help sheet with all of the emails at the top with corresponding IG names for ease in connecting by email and a full list below stripped of hyperlinks and passed them to the IG bylaws committee and the rest of the board and the IGSC.
-----------ACA Teen: - A member asked what it would take to get ACA Teen up and running such as in Santa Barbara CA.
-----------ABC: -I updated my ABC template for 2015. A member asked for 2014 proposal examples in order to make a new proposal for 2015.
-----------Teamwork: Gloria 40 Office 25 Majbrit-8, MaryJo-1. Ines-(For future MPS person FYI: I send emails to Ines for information often when it is a Spanish speaking country and I explain to the member that they have a Spanish speaking person with whom they can connect in their native tongue), Larry-16 (1-Workbook Msg pages, binding breaking and Braille translation) Joan-4 who reminded me that H & I meetings are not registered. IG SubCommittee-5 Executive Board: 0. Jude and Bonnie are doing well. Jude is going solo on “find a meeting” requests and doing very nicely with those and she pointed out my “signature” was still showing Outreach as a committee; she is now being copied to a wide variety of requests.
-----------Events: 2- events were added (Ojai, CA and S. CA.) 1 event made a request (Camp Recovery) and I am waiting for an announcement. I am waiting for a flyer from Camp Recovery and the S CA event. There are 4 Non WSO sponsored events listed. There are 2 WSO sponsored events listed: The yearly Annual Business Conference and the monthly Teleconference.
----------- Public Information related: Here is a list of who is arranging for BBI packages: Austin TX Counseling Center, a VA counselor, a list of 4 Veterans Affairs offices in CA, a British Columbia community living facility, 7 MA methadone clinics, a FL sex addiction counselor, AZ IG posted BBI announcements on their website, I reached out to Castlewood Eating Disorders facility, -- I contacted The Barnstable County Department of Human Services in CA to add us to their new Service Directory. I reached out to a bicycle magazine doing an article on recovering from Childhood Trauma and I told her about the ACA program. I updated the ACA contact information for [email protected]
-----------From the fellowship: Telephone meetings: 5-concerns –2 complaints, 6-requests for guidance and a long list of emails for guidance on a non registered set of individuals requesting guidance about becoming an ACA entity to form Safety guidelines and formats and group services for 32 meetings held on different days and times with separate group consciences and group contacts. I worked extensively with a member who is allegedly blocked from an entire 32 meetings on one line. A member found a typo on the website, sent to Scott and Larry. Facebook: A member shared concerns of a Facebook ACA page that is lacking in Traditions; I helped her with this issue. I noticed a closed ACA Facebook page that has full portions of ACA literature posted on their “files” page so I sent the information to Larry. When I posted about copyright information, I was then blocked from the group. A member forwarded his document "mini-inventory Emotional Sobriety" that I sent to Larry. A member shared their Atlanta ACA meetings link and I saw that it was a mix of ACA and non ACA literature and they displayed the ACA logo, I asked him to take the request to his group to see if they would be willing to remove the non ACA literature or remove the ACA logo. I increased the font on MPS reports for a member. Requests I worked with: "I am not in ACA but I am in AFG and/or AA, how do I start a meeting, they're pretty similar I was told." or "I've never attended ACA but I'd like to start a meeting". “Can we play ACA BRB recordings in between telephone meetings?” "Can we have a meeting focused on working Tony A's steps using his book?" "A member is dominating service, is there information in the text about that?""My pastor wants to start a meeting, how do we get started?" "Does ACA have a list of slogans?"
-----Common requests: =How do I find a therapist? How do I find a sponsor? How do we donate? Does ACA have 501(c) status?=
