Month: January 2012

Toronto 2012 ISO Conference Registration

The following was posted to
the ISO List today:

Greetings all,

A registration form for the 2012 SCA ISO
Conference, April 20 – 22, 2012 has been sent out by email to the ISO List separately.
If you are attending the conference, please complete and return the
registration form as soon as possible, and by no later than Wednesday, March 14, 2012.

All main ISO Conference meetings will take
place in the “Baker Room” at the Delta Chelsea Hotel, 33 Gerrard Street West, Toronto, Ontario, M5G 1Z4, Canada. Telephone 1-800-243-5732 or (416) 595-1975.

Please note that room reservations must be
made by calling the hotel by telephone at the above numbers and quoting the group name “SCA Conference” and/or group
code “GLDSCA.” Special rate room reservations cannot be
made online.

If needed, subway stations serving the
Delta Chelsea Hotel are either College (walk
south on Yonge Street one block to Gerrard Street) or Dundas (walk north on Yonge Street one block to Gerrard Street).

The meeting room booked for literature
development committee or other use from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. on Friday, April
20, 2012 is Room 303 on the 3rd Floor at the 519 Church Street
Community Centre, 519 Church Street, Toronto, Ontario, M4Y 2C9. The meeting
room is equipped with wireless internet access. There is a café on the ground
floor of the community centre serving food, snacks and beverages if needed, or
there are a number of other restaurants and coffee shops nearby.

http://www.the519.org/

http://www.the519.org/programsservices/fabarnakrestaurantandcatering

There will be optional self-pay meals at
nearby restaurants on Friday April 20, 2012 from 4:45 p.m. to 5:45 p.m. before
the conference, and on Sunday, April 22, 2012 from 1:15 p.m. to 2:45 p.m. after
the conference, for those who wish to attend. Firm times and details of
restaurant locations will follow.

The SCA Toronto ISO Host Committee will
provide a catered dinner on Saturday, April 21, 2012  at 7:00 p.m. 
This dinner is free for delegates who complete and return the registration
form by March 14, 2012. There will be a charge of approximately $20 for guests
of delegates. There will be an SCA meeting at a nearby meeting room immediately
after the dinner, commencing at approximately 8:30 p.m.

We plan to have some recovery activities
on Sunday, April 22, 2012  from
approximately 3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. 
following the adjournment of the conference, depending on demand. These
activities may include SCA long-share meetings, workshops, and other forms of
fellowship and socializing.  Please
indicate whether you plan to stay for these activities.

A few other items to note:

The guest rooms at the Delta Chelsea Hotel have wired internet
connection, not wireless. The ethernet cable required to connect is provided
in all guest rooms. Unfortunately, guests will not be able to use devices such
as the iPad or iPhone to connect with the internet in their guestroom with the
access provided by the hotel. The hotel’s lobby and meeting space floors are,
however, equipped with wireless internet, and that is provided at no charge for
guest use. This includes the
Baker Room, business centre, restaurant and bar areas. There are no time
restrictions on use. If you need more details, or have queries about using
specific devices at the hotel, please check with the reservations staff when
booking your room.

 

As
advised previously, the standard internet connection fee in guestrooms has been
waived for SCA ISO conference attendees. This is normally $13.95 plus taxes per
night. However, the hotel advises that when the internet is used in rooms, a
standard screen will appear and guests will still be prompted to accept the standard
charge. The hotel unfortunately has no way to remove the standard charge screen
when internet charges are waived. Although you
will need to accept the charges to use the internet, the reservations information
has been set up so that no internet charges
should appear on final bills.

For
anyone who requires wireless internet access at all times, there is a 6 square
kilometre continuous wireless hotspot service in the downtown Toronto core
(including coverage for iPhones and iPads), for which short term registration
and fees are available:

http://www.onezone.ca/

All
ISO conference locations, including meeting rooms and restaurants, are within
the One Zone wireless network area.

Where
telephone calls are concerned, delegates
may want to consider purchasing a telephone calling card/prepaid phone card in
order to save on long distance and roaming charges from guestrooms or cell
phones. Different types of card are available from local convenience stores and
the hotel’s gift shop, and at least some of them should work for cell phones.
Please check with the hotel and your individual service provider for details
about telephone charges.    

If
you plan to attend the conference and are reading this on the SCAnner, but are
not yet signed up on the ISO List for some reason, or you know of someone this
applies to, please forward us an appropriate email address, and we will send out
the ISO conference registration form and information directly.

Please
contact us by email at scatoronto@hotmail.com with any questions or
special requests.

Yours
in recovery,

Kevin – SCA Toronto

ISO Host Committee

The ISO Outreach Committee

Joe S. is chair of the ISO Outreach Committee, which is responsible for contact between ISO and those outside the Fellowship. Its functions include three that are highly visible:

  • It deals with requests from the media and develops a public information policy in alignment with the 12 Traditions.
  • It handles relations with hospitals, prisons and other institutions, other 12-Step Fellowships, as well as professional associations.
  • It takes responsibility for communications to ISO, whether by postal mail, electronic mail, telephone or other means.

Joe submitted the following report to the fellowship:

The annual Inter-Fellowship Forum meeting was held in Chicago on Nov 5, hosted by SCA’s Chicago Intergroup. Much of our time was spent on matters of the IFF website. A $100 fee for that website was paid to the site’s webmaster by SCA as we are the hosts of that website for the current year. A copy of the minutes of the Chicago meeting is available at S-Fellowships.org. 

The in-prison meeting in Avenal, CA is progressing. They were very appreciative of the Starter Kit that we sent them. They are currently meeting in the prison yard, but are trying to get a space to meet inside the prison. I volunteered to write to the prison officials on their behalf if it is necessary. I, also, invited their members to participate in our recently started Sponsor-by-Mail program.
The Sponsor-by-Mail program now has 5 sponsor volunteers and one prisoner volunteer. You can get a sign-up form and correspondence guidelines from outreach@sca-recovery.org

We now have a full list of respondees  to phone calls made to our 800 number. You can still volunteer as  a stand-by by contacting outreach@sca-recovery.org. 

Respectfully submitted, 

 Joe S., Outreach Chair