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November 2002 Board Meeting Minutes - Preliminary Publication for Review

Here are the minutes from our last (November 2002) board meeting - Still not published as promptly as I would like, but a full week earlier than last month so I guess it's a slight improvement.  You'll notice that some of the information is "Old News" -- specifically the January meeting, which was totally changed the next day; but, for the most part, the minutes reflect the information that we had available at the time of the board meeting.
 
Also, I'd like to point out a couple of helpful hints.  Of course, I'd rather that each and every board member would SCOUR every line and become as intimately familiar with the minutes as I am, but I realize that's probably not going to happen.  You may have noticed that I usually <BOLD> each topic and each Board Member's Name to help you scan for the parts that affect you most.  Please pay specific attention to the section on our December meeting.  I may have missed it, but I don't have anybody as being responsible to actually buy the prizes at Kevin's store and get them to the meeting.  Did Kevin agree to bring them?
 
Please let me know of any comments or corrections as soon as possible.
 
Thanks,
Rick
 
 
Title: Greater

Greater

Seattle

Aquarium

Society Board Meeting Minutes: November 21, 2002

Board Members

Present

Paul Carey

Clay Hess

Bob Holmes

Erik Olson

Rick Rose

Dave Sanford

 

Absent

¶ Don Rudee (3)

Erika Barcott (*)

 

(*) In Absentia

¶ Per GSAS Board policy, Don Rudee has resigned his position as Board Member, having not attended three consecutive, regularly scheduled board meetings.

 

 Membership Observers

Kevin Foxen, Kathy Olson

 

  

Executive Committee Reports

 

  • The Minutes of the previous Board meeting (October 24th 2002) were accepted and approved.

 

  • The Treasurer’s Report:

  1. Current Balance: $4667.45

  2. No Outstanding Bills

 

 

Meeting & Program Schedule

Month Topic / Activity Fish-o-the-Month

SEP 10th Introduce yourself and your fish, solicit ideas Bob and Dave

OCT 8th Takashi Amano Video – Plant Tank Setup (Paul) Clay, Bob, Rick & Dave

NOV 12th Tank Lighting Workshop June, AH Supply

DEC 10th Christmas Party (None)

*JAN 21st /28th Rusty Wessel – Central American Cichlids (Paul )

FEB 11th Plant Auction (Erik) (None)

MAR 11th ** (Paul Carey)

APR 8th General Auction (None)

*MAY 6th Ad Koning – Lake Tanganyikans (Kathy O.)

*JUN 10th Paul Loiselle – on West African Dwarf Cichlids (Kathy O.)

 

(*) – Tentative, Special Dates

(**) – Mike Schadle is a possibility, but he has typically cancelled in the past due to work responsibilities.

The Board has requested that the entire club-year meeting & program schedule be displayed prominently for review and discussion each month. Therefore, it will appear at this point in both the minutes and the agenda.

The December General Meeting will be the annual Christmas party (discussed in detail later). Paul will confirm Rusty Wessel for the January meeting – coordinating with Julie at GPAS. The Board suggests to Paul that the March meeting be kept "local" or "low key". On the other hand, it would be nice to pre-arrange a high-profile speaker for the October time-frame – possibly Beverly Dixon.

Kevin Foxen has volunteered to host Rusty, Ad, and/or Paul (Loiselle) as needed – including airport pickup/drop-off, staying in his home, shuttling around to Seattle attractions, coordinating meals, etc. These are functions that Kathy (and Erik) have typically done in the past.

Kathy will provide a Task List (Job Description) based on her experience as Program Coordinator (or, Speaker Wrangler, as she likes to refer to it). This list will be of immediate help to Paul (as the new Program Coordinator), Clay (as President), and Rick (as part of the project to document the responsibilities of all Committee Chairs.)

 

 

 

Old Business

  • Newsletter Update

  1. October Newsletter Status

    2. Email update from Erika:

    Since there's no actual meeting in December, and since I will have a lot of holiday commitments (including a week's vacation in Seattle for Christmas! Yay!) the next newsletter will be sent out to arrive the first week of January. (This isn't JUST a selfish move on my part - I know all the correspondents that I rely on will also be suffering from the holiday time crunch.)

    Aside from that, I don't really have much to report. Some of you may have noticed that the last newsletter was NOT center-stapled. This is because I went to three Kinkoses, and NONE of them had an extra-long stapler! Then I said "Oh forget it, I'll just buy my own." Went to Office Max and discovered that the extra-long stapler costs about $45. Yeek! "Well," I thought, "We don't really NEED center staples, I don't think..."

    Also, as Rick has pointed out, if you read the months on the covers of the last two newsletters, it appears that we've skipped a month. This is

    because the first issue (which I worked on in September, but sent out the first week of October) was mislabeled as "September." I decided it was better to bite the bullet and skip the next month (so that the issue which arrived at your house in November was actually labeled "November") while I could still write off the error along with all the other "first issue" problems. :)

  2. Erik will send out a post-card reminder for the December meeting. (See item "December General Membership Meeting" for discussion on items to be included on the post card.)

  3. The fact that the newsletter was not center-stapled is not a problem. However, Erik has thought about that particular challenge in the past and has been tempted to make a jig. He may pursue that if/when time allows.

  4. Spring Article Contest

    • Theme: "Most Impressive Tank" or "My Favorite Fish"

    • Deadline for submission: April 30, 2003

    • Erik will promote the contest via GSAS-Announce.

    • Clay will promote the contest at the upcoming meetings.

 

  • Low-Priority and On-going issues that have had no recent "major activity" will, in the future, be listed separately at the end of the minutes and agenda. Major activity taking place before a board meeting will promote the issue to Old Business for as long as it makes sense to do so.

 

  • The following Library issues were discussed by the Board.
    • Erik will not be addressing the issue of creating a VHS Tape of 2000 – Present Speakers at this time. This item will be considered resolved until readdressed by Erik in the future.

 

  • Meeting Activities for younger kids – Dave & Bob

  • Dave passed around several examples of the full-page artwork that the art class at his school has created for the new GSAS Children’s Activity Booklet. Bob has also done several pencil drawings for the project. All were excellent! Although an actual "Activity Booklet" is a longer-range project, Clay asked Dave to have copies made of several of the pages to be used for a coloring "Contest" at the Christmas Party. (See item "December General Membership Meeting" for further details.)

  • Rick has no progress to report regarding pages for the coloring book that promote GSAS. As yet, an incompatibility between the logo graphic and Rick’s software is causing a delay in several projects.

  • In addition to the coloring pages, we would also like to have word searches, puzzles, and a maze (all aquarium/GSAS-related, of course). Rick will look on the Internet and other resources for ideas, etc.

 

  • Bob has emailed the rough draft of his philanthropy article to Erika. Erik will send the scanned pictures that go along with the article to Erika.

  • The new Name Tags were ready for the November meeting for all those who responded to Rick’s request for "Interests". Those who had not yet responded with their interests had a pre-printed peel-n-stick tag. Feedback from the membership was very positive. This project is now complete, although on-going as new members join and as interests are provided by the less-active members.

 

  • November Meeting – Tank Lighting Workshop – Clay, Erik, Rick

We received quite a bit of very positive feedback from the membership about the recent Lighting Workshop.

Email excerpt from June Olberding

I don't know about others but I really liked and got lot out of the wiring demo. Already have plans to up grade more tanks. :-> This obsession never ends.

 

The Board discussed what other workshops might be possible in the future – a DIY Make-it-and-take-it CO2 generator, for example. Some members have expressed ideas to Clay about different possibilities including presentations by the members. He would like to encourage this as long as the Board can be assured that they will follow through reliably. Maybe several members could give smaller presentations in 20-minute slots.

 
  • New Members’ names in Northwest Aquaria
  • Email strand between Rick and Erika

Sounds good to me! (Erika)

 

Rick Rose writes:

Hi Erika,

As you may have noticed in the board meeting minutes that were published

this morning, I presented my suggestion to publish the new members' names to the Board at our October meeting and it was very well received. I did pass along your reservations about "identity fraud", but we don't really see any harm in publishing only the names (and no other personal information). If somebody wanted to take on a new identity, they could just as easily make up a name.

The format that the Board would like is very simple. Something like the

following...

 

The Greater Seattle Aquarium Society would like to welcome the following

new members!

Rohm Gustavson

Brian Gregory

James Joyce

Preston Cheung

Chad Oftedal

Kate Breimeyer

Cary Wheeler

Ben and Andrea Browning

Meredith Crichton

... and the following new sponsor

King's Discus in Seattle

 

The names above are the actual names that belong in the initial listing.

These go back to last June and would catch us up to current. Thereafter,

there would obviously not be as many in any one month.

Thanks,

Rick Rose, GSAS Historian/Promotions

  • See item "New Members since last meeting" for additional names to be included in the next (January 2003) edition.

 

  • Bob has finalized the "New Member Letter" and will provide a copy for records. He is still working on the draft of a "Renewal Letter" for the Board to review. Clay will sign a bunch of membership cards and give them to Bob to be sent out with both letters.

 

  • We reviewed the Sponsorship task list - Erik
    1. Review and update the list of sponsors that offer a 5% (or more) discount to card-carrying members. - Done
    2. Get new business cards for each sponsor. If the phone number listed on the card does not include the area code, clarify what it is for our lists. - Done
    3. Provide these results to Erika for publication. – Status Unknown
    4. Update the membership database - Done
    5. Update the website – In Progress
    6. Dave contacted Conway Fish Store about sponsorship and got their business card for Erik. They have agreed to offer a 10% discount to card-carrying members.
    7. Rick contacted Nick at Snubber’s Fish about continued sponsorship, and got a business card (unchanged). Nick prefers to "wheel-n-deal" and does offer good prices to club members.
    8. Anyone on the Board is welcome to do the same at any other fish stores in their area. – On-going.

 

  • Clay will talk to Diane Elliot and ask her to see how Rich (a lawyer) would advise us to proceed with regard to Liability Insurance – Outstanding.

 

  • The Board discussed the following items in planning for the December General Membership Meeting.

    • Christmas Pot-Luck

    • Bob will buy the ham and pop and be reimbursed by the club.

    • The sign-up sheet offered at the November meeting (plus additional commitments from board members) yielded the following…

      1. Salads: Susan M. (Coleslaw), Bob Holmes, Paul Winchester

      2. Chips/Snacks: Woody Loyko, Clay (mayonnaise and pickles)

      3. Side Dishes: Cary Wheeler, Susan Rose, Dave Sanford

      4. Desserts: Kevin Foxen, Paul & Rosalind Carey, Kate, Heidi Crane, Florian & Isabel

      5. Other: Ed M. (Bread/Rolls), Erik Olson (Rolls and mustard)

    • Dave will pickup the utensils, cups, and napkins and will be reimbursed by the club.

    • Summer Quinn offered to provide 15 lbs. of cod, but after some discussion, the Board decided that would be too much given the amount of food left over after last year’s party. Clay will follow-up with Summer and express our appreciation for the offer.

    • We will again have an Aquarium-Related Gift Exchange (playing the game where you have to decide whether you want to keep the gift that you drew or trade with someone else before you unwrap yours). Erik will promote the gift exchange on the post card reminder, noting that the price guideline has been increased to $15 and discouraging the use of live fish or plants as gifts.

    • A Kids’ Coloring "Contest" will be promoted at this year’s party using some of the artwork that Dave is collecting for the Children’s Activity Booklet. The Board discussed the caution that should be taken in promoting too much of a "competition" among the very young children. The outcome of the "contest" should be guided in such a way that "everyone’s a winner!" and none of the young ones feel left out.

    • Erik will again be in charge of the Fish-O game.

    • Prizes
      1. Kathy offered to come up with "a few small things" from the Olson Collection.
      2. Kevin will "call the Reps" and feels that there will be no problem in procuring another Eclipse Six (like last year) for the Grand Prize.
      3. Kevin will donate some small items (key chains, etc.)
      4. GSAS will purchase a 150w Heater and an AquaClear 200 from Kevin’s store.

 

 

New Business

 

  • New Members since last meeting.
  • #414 Swinford, Greg
  • #415 Quinn, Summer
  • #416 Loyko, Woody

 

  • Erik will update the website to reflect that June Olberding has accepted the position of Hostess, and to show Bob’s current email address.

 

 

 

Low-Priority and On-going Issues

 

  • Official Bylaws - Rick

  1. Dave has obtained a copy of GPAS bylaws and passed them on to Rick

  2. Erik has obtained a copy of AKA bylaws and passed them on to Rick
  3. Rick has no progress to report

 

  • Promotional Materials for GSAS – Rick
  • Poster Boards (for Fish Stores) and GSAS fliers are still outstanding. The layout for the business cards is complete, but the project is basically on hold due to an incompatibility of Rick’s software with the GSAS logo graphic file. Clay, Dave, Erik, Bob, Don, Rick, and Paul (by subsequent email) prefer to have their phone numbers preprinted on the cards; Erika has declined to have business cards.
  • GSAS Fliers are in the works.

 

  • Committee Chair – "Job Descriptions" – Rick has no progress to report.

 

 

Next Board Meeting Location

Possibly at another member’s home TBD (or at Bob Holmes’), Thursday, December 19th 2002, starting promptly at 7:30pm (depending on final location).

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