On Sept 20, the Environmental Change-Makers held a full-day event in Los Angeles called “Life After Oil: Designing the Transition.” In this event, we explored the Transition concept originated by Rob Hopkins in response to the twin crises of peak oil and climate change. Read more about our “Life After Oil” series here.

The following is the “What worked, What didn’t work” analysis the group did at the end of the event.

WHAT WORKED

“the food”
Peter had homemade the lunch–pasta salads, green salads, and more–from as many fresh and locally-sourced ingredients as he could find. Farmers’ market melons provided snacks, locally made (120 mile) vinegar and California olive oil made up the salad dressing.

“No waste, no paper products”
We used reuseable “real” china plates, reuseable cups with filtered water, silverware, and cloth napkins. As participants finished their meal, a sorting line of bins received compostable food scraps, laundry/napkins, dirty dishes. Bins were provided for any recyclables and garbage, but there wasn’t much!

“Garden tour”
At the end of the lunch hour, we offered a tour of the Community Garden as a way of sharing one of our local group’s projects, and also a devious way of rounding people up!

“Seeing Rob on video and advice given”
Seeing and hearing Rob Hopkins for the first time was quite an emotional experience for many of our participants. One person said we should have handed out tissues. We used a tape Rob had made for the IFG conference because it had the content we needed. But we asked Rob to write a little something that we could read to Los Angeles. It made a profound impact.

“You’re a city - Celebrate!”
Continuing off the prior point, Rob’s letter to LA told us not to think of ourselves as a town, but to celebrate the fact that we’re a city - we should figure out how to do this. One participant described being on a Transition email loop with people from small towns, and feeling torn, wishing she was in a town, yet at the same time feeling the urgency to Transition her entire county (i.e. millions of people). Rob’s words were quite meaningful to LA.

“Meeting other people (mixing well)”
We had 46 people attending. A large group came from Santa Barbara (96 miles north of us). One came from Paso Robles (218 miles north) and another from Templeton (216 miles north). Two came from Frazier Park (67 miles inland from us), One from Laguna Beach (56 miles south of us). A group of 5 came from the San Fernando Valley (20 miles north). The rest were from various parts of our extended LA basin. From the start of the session, we emphasised that the event was in fact a regional gathering, and to appreciate that and make the most of the opportunity.
Participants commented that they liked the fact that we had lots of “mix ‘em up” activities built into agenda, and that we told them to spend their breaks with people from other areas since they’d be getting together with their own area at a later point in the agenda.

“Group brainstorming”
In the afternoon session, we held a group brainstorming session about the Scoping issue in LA. We are an enormous city, far bigger than anything to which Hopkins has yet applied these Transition concepts. We asked the question: how do we break this massive task down into manageable portions? Participants appreciated the opportunity to discuss it as a large group.

“Preparedness”
I can’t remember what this comment was about - I think it was about the fact that this group of participants was remarkably prepared. Many (if not most) had checked “veteran” on their registration form when asked how much they knew about climate change and peak oil. We only had one or two newbies to the material. Additionally, we had asked during the registration process that participants do a small amount of prerequisite reading on the basics of peak oil and climate change.

“Read education / can be joyful / hope” … ???

“Group coming together; community”
I can’t remember this one either - I think it was about the wonder of seeing so many people together in one room all committed to working on the Transition concept. Getting people from distant geographies together had a profound impact, and helped people feel they aren’t working on this alone.

“Working time”
People appreciated having time designated to actually do some work with people in their same geography. They expressed satisfaction that the day wasn’t all “being talked to,” that they got to put some of the ideas into action.

“Transition conversation / Timeline to Sustainability”
Joanne’s explanation of her “Timeline to Sustainability” (brief description here http://legacyla.net/transformation/?p=192), and its companion details, “The Transition Era”

Following Rob’s exercises
Using Hopkins’ exercises, verbatim, right out of his book, works really well.

Widespread publicity in the region
We’ll leave this one in the “what worked” column, because clearly having a regional gathering filled a need. What didn’t work was getting more of our immediate local neighbors out for this event, getting more participants from our core of regulars who’ve attended our other meetings.

Hiring a few teens for cleanup
This was Peter’s idea, and by the end of a long, full day, it was very welcomed.

DIDN’T WORK

“Too much scientific info / liked it”
This one was about our guest speaker’s presentation on climate change. He got quite detailed on the science, which some people didn’t like, but others did like!

“Identify the dots”
When people preregistered, we had asked their area of expertise/area of influence/skills for a power-down future. We had put colored dots on their nametags which corresponded to their petal(s) on the Permaculture Flower. Unfortunately, we overlooked that item on the agenda and thus neglected to explain the dots until quite late in the day.

“Interest groups”
Before the breakout session, we discussed as a whole group how the breakout should take place. One thought was on geographical lines, another line of thought was to break out by interest groups in accordance with the petals of the Permaculture Flower. The decision was made to divide first by geography (north of Ventura vs south of Ventura) and then to divide further by petal of the Flower. By the time the actual divisions took place, however, people gathered solely by geography. Some participants yearned for the division to have been done differently.

“longer time in big group - not breaking up”
One participant expressed a wish that the group brainstorming had been longer prior to moving into the breakout sessions.

“More info from government”
The local liason from our U.S. Representative’s office joined us as a participant, briefly midday. Other participants yearned to have heard him speak — his impressions of what we were doing, etc. However, given that we didn’t know he was coming, and that he didn’t appear until midday, the only possibility toward realizing this would have been to spontaneously abandon part of the planned agenda midstream and put him on the spot, which we didn’t do. We note that he seems to be doing exactly what Ben Branwyn’s Transition Primer advocates that government do: following our lead.

“say ‘we’re positive’”
“negative=by yourself”
“negative=more negative”
“fear triggers action”
“creativity should not be stifled”
This series–falling both in the “What Worked” and the “Didn’t work” columns–arose from an interaction between two participants which apparently took place outside the main session, then came to the attention of the group in the closing analysis. One felt that negativity was out of place in a Transition Initiative session, and the other felt that if we were feeling hopeless, it was good to say it like it is. In discussion points that followed, several participants mentioned that skills in conflict resolution techniques would be useful for the steering group.

“Straight from problems into solutions/neglecting the addiction analysis”
In Hopkins’ book (p.85ff) he uses the psychology of treating addictions. Participants felt that the LA session skipped this part of Hopkins’ work, by presenting the problems and then going right into discussion solutions/Transition concept.

“Didn’t talk about personal change”
Related to the above point, one participant expressed that if we didn’t share the inner journey we had ourselves been on, we wouldn’t connect with the people we were talking to. The Transition movement would appear like “just one more environmental thing.” Another participant said we should “talk to others’ heart”.
The day after the event, a participant circulated via email an article she and a fellow participant had written which relates to these topics.

“not being clear in the questions”
The afternoon breakout session question wasn’t explained well, such that at least one group didn’t clearly understand what they were supposed to be doing. It should be noted that this question wasn’t one that came out of the Hopkins book.

“not enough youth and minorities” among participants
“language/culture attentiveness”
“honor those who are doing this work”
The first point opened up a rich discussion. (The two following points are more like suggestions what to do about it.)
It started when a participant mentioned regret that few youth and minorities were with us, given the diversity of LA. This comment added to other discussions including how LA has some of the greatest covert racist divides and that relocalization runs the risk of intensifying a bad thing. The people who had been in the WestLA breakout group had discussed how going local would inevitably mean cutting someone’s livelihood, the reference being to racial and cultural LA populations that are currently marginalized. The point was made that as those currently-marginalized populations were educated in the need for food growing, local economic development, etc, we’d have a very different dynamic. [note: get the phrase used, something like “reduced need for income.”]
Another participant, who does a lot of work with LA minorities and underprivileged, responded that people who are living this stuff on a regular basis (growing own food in front yards due to poverty and necessity, for instance) are embarrassed by it, and also don’t see the point of spending a day in a workshop talking about it. It was mentioned that we needed to find a way to communicate to people who are already doing it, that they have the right idea, that the consumer population needs to get back toward what those front yard vegetable growers are doing — that we need to find a way to honor the fact that they’re on the right course.

Material that relates well to this discussion was brought up on Rob Hopkins’ Transition Culture blog about why there were so few blacks in the UK Transition action. Conclusions brought by Rob and others suggested the language used by the Transition movement might be creating a cultural barrier. See the Transition Culture blog discussion of September 5, 2008, in particular the 5 Sept 10am comments of Jane Buttigieg (here).

the A-Bun-Dance
Stolen from Brad Lancaster, who earlier this week passed through So Calif on his Rainwater Harvesting tour. Many participants had seen Brad. We described how while he was talking about water, the concept applied to our work too. We could be scared by scarcity, or we could experience the ABUNDANCE … A-Bun-Dance … This was the signal to stand, wiggle your buns and celebrate. We used it gleefully several times throughout the day.

the bell
We tried to use a bell to gather people at the end of breaks, and also to mark the time to change partners in the Peak Oil Self-Teach. It didn’t work too well, since nearly 50 excited participants in an echo-y room really overpower a little bell. Several participants came up and offered suggestions they’d seen that worked. One example: The leader stands in front and says “if you can hear me, clap your hands once” The leader claps once and a few join him. Then the leader says “if you can hear me, clap your hands twice.” This time more join in. The participant said that where she’d seen the technique used, by the time they reached 3 claps, everyone was together and quiet.
We’ll have to try it!