Millennium March

The Interior GLOBE will join with Fed GLOBE at a reception April 28, 2000, at Jeff Brooks’ House - Jay will supply the address - to welcome the out-of-town GLOBE members to the March.  Interior GLOBE members are encouraged to help staff the FED GLOBE Booth on Pennsylvania Avenue between 3^rd & 9^th Sts., NW, on Saturday, April 29, 2000, from 2 - 5 PM.

USDA Pride

USDA Pride will host their celebration on June 13.  They will have Barney Frank and their Secretary speak at the event and we want to make sure that DOI does not schedule an event at the same time.  Assistant Secretary, Policy, Management and Budget, John Berry, has been asked to request our speaker for another time.

Newsletter

Our first Newsletter was passed out and Tami was congratulated on her great work on a very professional looking newsletter.  Maria discussed the need to use our remaining funds for postage or copying of the newsletter.  All agreed that the funds should be used.  Maria then asked if all members in the future could send in their interoffice mail addresses to receive the newsletter by interoffice mail, so as not to spend funds on postage.  Communications should go to Daphne Berwald (DaphneBerwald@bia.gov).

Stonewall

GLOBE received inquiries about providing a press release for the announcement of Stonewall on the National Landmark program.  Maria wrote a release and it has engendered articles in many newspapers around the country, such as Florida Times-Union, The New York Times, The San Jose Mercury News, and the Atlanta Constitution.

Diversity Council Meeting Report by Ike Kelley

Ike Kelley is the new Interior GLOBE representative to the Department’s Diversity Council, which is the Departmental oversight committee on diversity issues as they impact the employees of the Department of the Interior and its offices and bureaus.

Ike reported that the over all impression that he took away from the first meeting was that the members were supportive of gay and lesbian issues and many of them took the opportunity to personally tell him so.  At this Council meeting, over half the attendees were new members, not usual for the past Council sessions.  At this meeting in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, there was much discussion of the Council’s role in the Department and the objectives, charter, and goals of the Council.  The Council had been holding meetings outside the Washington area to attend minority colleges and universities to find out if programs that encouraged minority hiring and outreach were working.  During FY 2000, a goal of the Council is to focus on recruitment and retention of recognized minorities under Title 7.

The Council’s method of working on issues is to send suggestions to Assistant Secretary Berry on how the Council feels Diversity should be addressed.  Ike found that he constantly needed to remind fellow Council members to broaden their ideas by making diversity include more than recruitment through affirmative action, and to include gay and lesbian issues.  They seemed to be receptive.  Ike contributed to the final Council statement to Assistant Secretary Berry, which permitted him to insert a more positive statement about the inclusion of gays and lesbians in the workforce of the Department.  This statement was acceptable to all.

There was further discussion of the other presentations at the Council Meeting from the Deputy Assistant Secretaries for Human Resources and for Diversity in the Work Place, and Offices of Educational Partnerships and Equal Opportunity.  Ricardo Daw y Anaya, from the Office of Educational Partnerships supports the inclusion of gay and lesbian students groups in his outreach.

There was discussion at this point in the report from Ike about other ways for GLOBE to support gays for targeted recruitment actions.  Some ideas were to make sure the zero tolerance memos are up, and that EEO policies are sent out to employees.  It was suggested that the Solicitor's Office, which has reportedly stated in the past that gays and lesbians cannot be officially counted by the Department, be asked again about allowing gays and lesbians to self identify on personnel forms, now that the President has issued an Executive Order barring discrimination against gays and lesbians for employment in the Federal Government.  Amending the Departmental Diversity Plan to be more inclusive of gay and lesbian issues was also suggested.  The GLOBE Leadership will talk to Richard Nolan about this when he comes to Washington later in April.

The Next Diversity Council Meeting will be held in Washington, DC, June 7-9, and GLOBE has been asked to participate by:

1. Providing a written assessment of how DOI handles our diversity issues and recommending what actions GLOBE would want DOI to take (Andy will start drafting our assessment)
2. Bringing a representative from an outside group to give an outside view on DOI diversity policies and activities.  The membership agreed to ask FED GLOBE to be that outside witness.

Review of By-laws

Michael Sadie, Treasurer, has been reworking the old by-laws.  He is to be commended for the hard work he has put into this effort.  The Executive Board met last week and recommends the following changes:

Drafts of the by-laws were passed out. Interested members are to review these and send any comments to Michael Sadie.  Members present at the next meeting will vote on the changes.