Some replies to my DailyKos offering on Dem Meetups:

Raising your own money is one of the most important organizing tools that a local organization can do. If you like what meetups are doing for you, raise the money and do it yourself. That’s how political power is made. Don’t ask the DNC or anyone else to do it for you.

And…

Don’t hold your breath. They won’t, especially since that $9 charge goes up to $19/mo. beginning in January 2006. Meetup is an independent org and using party funds to subsidize groups there is NOT a good solution.

I am an organizer for my local DFA meetup, and we are having this problem, too. DFA has agreed to pay the $9 for all DFA groups for next month only to allow us some breathing room and transition time. But, the consensus (though not unanimity) among Meetup hosts seems to be to get out of meetup entirely and create a new system. I see you mentioned Dean’s Get Local tools, but those don’t really cut the mustard and replace the function Meetup provides. Thus, emphasis now is on creating a new system tailored to political grassroots organizing needs.

Thus, either the Dem Party needs to follow DFA’s suit (and with Dean as Chair, that is entirely possible… much more possible than the party paying for people’s meetup fees), OR you should consider consolidating Dem Party Meetups into DFA meetups in the new system. I’m sure some wouldn’t like the latter option, BUT it is something to think about and might help consolidate the base and eliminate some duplication of grassroots effort.

lastly…

Dem and DFA Meetups should have merged ages ago.

The message Dean brought us was “take back our party”…so why are we still meeting separately?

Anyhoo, re the $9, soon $19. If it was a yearly or semi-yearly fee, that’s one thing. Meetup’s got to make some money. But charging this per month, and charging the longstanding organizers, is too much. They’re going to suffer some serious attrition. Do you think the organizers of the witches meetups or anarchists meetup – or socialist meetups, for that matter – are going to pay a monthly fee to host their own meeting?

My Reply:

I understand about how passing the hat leads to some ownership of the meeting for those that come, we were already doing that by dedicated ourselves to a more stable paid room ($24 a month), rather than a less stable free one. But, the $9 and eventually $19 just to use meetup.com is too much!

Alos, not that I don’t like DFA, but I think there needs to be a local grassroots meeting for the Democratic Party. The DNC needs to do something.

Either support us through meetup.com or offer an alternative.