February 7, 2008 at 7 p.m.
Present: Bill Brown, Esther Patt, Marsha Woodbury,
Carol Inskeep, Richard Schnuer, Mary Cory, Stephen Portnoy, Law
School Chapter: Tristan Bullington
The meeting was formally brought to order shortly after 7 p.m.
After the members of the steering committee introduced themselves,
Esther Patt introduced guest Randy Rosenbaum, Champaign County Public
Defender. The summary of his remarks will appear in our next
newsletter. We learned that, as is often the case, the Public
Defender's staff has its hands full and is spread thin.
After his informative talk, Esther thanked Mr. Rosenbaum for meeting with us.
The minutes of the December meeting were approved.
Old Business:
April 6 Annual Meeting
The meeting will be a brunch at The Great Impasta on Sunday, April 6,
2008. Bob McChesney of Media Matters on NPR will be the speaker.
A postcard just went out for the Hate Speech Forum, and it reminded
members to save the date for annual meeting.
The newsletter should go out 3 weeks before the meeting, about March
7. The deadline for articles is February 28, Thursday, to get
information to Bill.
Nominating committee Esther, Lynn, Steve, and Carol Inskeep is an alternate.
The Awards committee needs to figure out awards by Feb. 28.
Hate Speech Forum
Talking Back to the First Amendment: A Community Forum on Free Speech
and Hate Speech, Thurs. Feb. 28th at 7:30 pm UI law School
Auditorium, 504 E. Pennsylvania Ave. in Champaign.
Steve Helle will moderate the forum, and Colleen Connell will
participate on behalf of the ACLU. One speaker has accepted, Paul
Weischel of the Jewish Federation. Carol Spindel has the name of a
speaker about hate sites on the Internet. There will be four
microphones and a podium microphone.
Law School Forum
We had a report from Tristan Bullington, who reported that it went
off very well. The forum was a debate between the three candidates
for State's Attorney, two Democrats and a Republican.
New Business:
If anyone can help at the ACLU table on Feb. 23 at the Midwest
Bisexual, Lesbian, Gay, Transgender, Ally College Conference at the
Illini Union on Saturday, February 23-please email Esther.
There is a new series of Freedom Files videos.
The meeting was adjourned at 8:50 p.m.
Note: The time of the regular monthly meeting has changed to 7:00 p.m..
The next meeting is on Thursday, March 6, at 7 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Marsha Woodbury