CommunityMeetingMinutes20260705

See here for the full list of Community Meeting Minutes

Link to join remotely

Roll call / Attendees

Attendees: John M (Chair), Jackie, John S, Michael D (minutes), Adrian, Mike G

Apologies:

Actions from the last meeting

• Post-induction emails, Jackie to arrange a meeting (Jackie) No progress
• Induction processes to be reviewed (Mike and Jackie) No progress
• Create events space booking document that can be used for promotion (Chris T) Not here No progress
• Procedure to induct event organisers (Jackie & Mike) No progress
• Improve reporting of broken sewing machines Suggestion is to put up signage to make this clearer to people using the machines. Make sure the names of the machines are clear so we can track which are breaking. (Sanna) No progress
• People who make things at DoES [#1523] Neil has built a page on our website. (Jackie) to send out an email on our Google Group to find makers to populate this page
• Organise a Pat test event (Mike). 26th July date set in calendar. Tuesday 28th evening also.
• Mike to email google groups to recruit new members to the laser maintenance team. Lots of replies, will organise a formal meeting to move this forward, checking availability of people interested.
• Fibre arts team will lead on raising the issue of keeping the space tidy and using equipment appropriately, Michael Dales also happy to help. (Michael D and Snoof). Posters are up, hard to know what effect they are having. One overlocker was let in a bad state but didn't report it. Unfortunately they haven't been seen since, which is a same.
• Chris T to create physical broken labels that can be put in place on broken equipment Not here, no progress
• Adrian to ask on the Google Group if anyone wants to design a flyer No progress
• Sanna investigating people from Northern Lights building and considering how we could have the most impact with this community. Most moved to elevator and were looking for artist studio which does can't offer, but people are aware of the DoES offer.
• John to prepare some charity related questions for Sanna by the end of the week Sanna and John have had some discussion on this.
• Add cleaning bed to laser induction form and tell Darren (Jackie)
• Ask Powei at Eufy about sponsoring a children's event (Jackie)
• Pull together a meeting for community engagement on donation (see finances) (Adrian)
• Follow up on group discussion with updated finances (John)
• Review DoES income and usage to work out if overall charitable status would be of benefit to space sustainability (John, but other help would be appreciated).

Discussion on charitable status action item

John M had some answers to questions on what would the impact of charitable status for DoES mean:

• John spoke to an advisor who pointed out that DoES is probably not targeted enough to count for charitable status, just helping makers in general rather than specific needs group(s). The question was raised about then how does something like say the Liverpool Biennial get charitable status (not that it shouldn't, just that are there other definitions DoES might fall in to).
• How much effort it would be to be a charity? DoES would need a trustee board, more reporting, some extra accounting effort and a more detailed annual report. More work, but not necessarily a huge amount of work more than what is already done.
• It would enable gift aid, which is a little extra, but wouldn't be a huge amount as donations are not a large percentage of overall monthly income.
• The space has to be wholly or mainly used for charitable purposes - we'd need to track what parts of the space (event space in particular) are used for commercial purposes what proportion of the time. We probably have that data mostly, but again needs some more effort to pull together.

Someone should do the numbers to work out if DoES having charitable status would actually justify the overhead.

TEAM UPDATES

Laser

Mike G is looking into air assist improvements on all the machines. Running all three machines from one machine is one option, using a new quieter compressor.

Fiona

Fiona is working, some LED lights need fixing. External monitor working and spotter laser fitted. Up to level of Gerald.

Sheila

Sheila - no issues

Tony

Tony - no issues

Old

Carl - work in progress to get that to Birkenhack Sophie - needs new hardware to get it working again.

Fibre Arts

No update.

3D Printing

Four working printers: P1, A1 mini, Markus, and one Ultimaker. Planning to put other Ulitmakers out of way.

EufyMake is not currently sustainable given current usage levels. It consumes ink just whilst sitting there, and whilst it is busy on maker nights, that level of usage doesn't cover the overall burn rate on materials.

Overall 3D printer usage is trending upwards the last few months.

Makefest

No progress since last month. Organising team aim to have a tour of Scale on Monday to understand location layout and then start to organise in earnest as there is just 9 weeks remaining.

Somebody-should issue triage

• The issues are those labelled with the Meeting Actions label
• Updates are made on the individual issues

Agenda items meeting

None

Finances

John has prepared the financial report for June.

Operating profit of roughly £5K, which is good, but also has a story (see below). We have paid off all bills for last month and paid rent for next month, which appreciated from landlord.

That £5000 had several non-monthly incomes (e.g., quarterly desk payment) plus two donations totalling £2400 - one for £2000 and one for £400 from generous donators. It was noted that Mike G's post to the group encouraging the community to take it seriously has been in part a catalyst for these donations.

The £400 donation is the first from that donator, with a plan to donate a further £400 a month for a year to help DoES get back to stable. However, this is subject to a review of a plan on how to achieve that, due in August. If there is no plan or insufficiently detailed planning by August, then DoES will only receive the first two payments.

The review point is August 6th, which means that the next fixed community meeting, August 2nd, will be too late to do planning. As such we need to engage the community to come up with a plan before that. The intent is to hold two community meetings in July, one in a weekday evening and one on a weekend, to engage the community ahead of that deadline. Adrian has the action item to organise those.

Overall, whilst the donations are appreciated and helpful, and whilst DoES managed to be in the green last month, it was noted that we are still not in a stable financial position overall, as outgoings without the exceptional donations are still above income. Still two desks away from break even.

Events & Workshops

Jackie applied for funding for metal engraving workshop.

Other

None.

Date of next meeting

Sunday 2nd August 2026