Humboldt Unitarian Universalist Fellowship

The Social Action Committee keeps abreast of conditions and problems affecting human welfare, and helps the Fellowship as a whole to do so. Our current areas of emphasis as determined by a vote of members of the Fellowship are: War and Peace, Universal Health Care, Mass Extinction/Global Warming and Civil Liberties. The Chair of the Social Action Committee is John Sloane (jbsloane@humboldt1.com), the Co-secretaries are: Marianne Pennekamp (mariannp@humboldt1.com) and Jean Munsee (munsee@csulb.edu), the Treasurer is Bertha Hansen.

The Social Action Committee meets the first Sunday of each month after the last service for about an hour and a half. Currently we are working on a handbook for the officers, setting up The Crux of the Matter (an approximately three-minute program on KHSU) and The Humboldt Forum (a community program that will consider issues of import to the community, the state, the nation and the world) as well as ongoing activities such as the Social Action Brunch, a brunch served at the Fellowship on the third Sunday of the month, with the proceeds going to local organizations or charities.

So far this calender year [1/05] we have contributed to:

UNESCO, Veterans for Peace.
National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.
St. Vincent de Paul Dining Facility and Food for People.
Tuna Sunday which is the first Sunday of the month where one of our members collects money or tuna to provide protein to the Arcata Endeavor.
Tuesday night at the Arcata Night Shelter where every Tuesday night the Fellowship community prepares and delivers about twenty meals to the Arcata Night Shelter.
Unitarian-Universalist Service Committee (UUSC) coffee project where one of our members sells fair-traded coffee and hot chocolate the proceeds of which go to the Fellowship and UUSC.
The annual UUSC Guest at Your Table collection which is sent to UUSC.
Jail Book Project where one of our members collects paperback books to take to the County Jail so that the inmates can have reading material.

We also present about four Sunday morning services a year, which deal with issues of concern (for 2004-2005 we are presenting programs dealing with the UN, the Arcata Night Shelter, Global Warming, and Universal Health Care). We distribute about $1,000/year to organizations outside our community to support their work in areas of concern to the congregation (up to 1/05 we have contributed to UU United Nations Office, UU for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, UUSC, UNICEF, UU California Legislative Ministry, and Amnesty International. Every winter solstice holiday season one of our members organizes a holiday gift giving to the Rio Dell Head Start Program where members and friends of the congregation pick a child and buy a present for that child. We have co-sponsored a forum on military recruitment with the Quakers and a Monday night at the Fellowship program on nuclear weapons in Space. Anyone may volunteer to be a member of the Social Action Committee by contacting one of the officers or by attending a meeting of the committee on the first Sunday of the month at 12:30 (except during the summer when the committee meets at 11:30).

One does not have to be a member of the Fellowship to serve on the committee.