September 2009 Board Meeting Summary

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SUMMARY OF MOTIONS (approved unless noted)
DETAILS

The meeting was called to order at about 5:40 PM.

Present were Bev Anderson, Amy Considine, Wayne Hewlett, Laura Niznik, Karen Polastri, Cas Sammanasu, and Penni Smith.  Mike Green called in from Monterey.  A quorum existed.

M/S/C to approve August minutes.

The President’s Report received by e-mail was reviewed with a few comments.

Penni reminded everyone that any e-mail concerning items of interest to the whole board should be sent to everyone, and especially that the Reply All option be used.  She also reminded everyone to CC the board archives. 

Bev asked for feedback from those who had attended the Nonprofit Resource Center's Board Essentials training, who were Amy, Wayne, Karen, and Cas.  They reported that it was good basic information  and valuable to those serving on a board.  Karen said it was a good overview for new board members, but somewhat of a review for her.  They mentioned the three core elements stressed were duty, care, and loyalty.  Also discussed were finance issues and responsibility.

Penni gave the treasurer’s report.  The Bank balance is $26,958.89.  Uncleared items total $2,676.38, making the actual balance $24,282.51.  Support group reserves, included in that balance, are $6,634.43 (unchanged from last month).  Therefore, the total in the NCCNA general fund is $17,648.08.   She will be computing rebates in the next couple weeks, so the amount of our funds versus those of the support groups will change.

She also gave an update on the fundraising campaign:
            Contribution                 5,594.50
            Dues 2009 General     1,047.50
            Dues 2010 General     1,140.00
            TOTAL RECEIPTS    7,782.00

Bev will contact Origin and ask what they need for us to send so they can send us their check for the matching $5,000 contribution. 

Penni said that she still does not have the promised budget versus expenses report completed.  She did pass out a copy of Dick's budget, and explained that she will have different classifications than the ones he used, but that the total budget amount will be the same.  She will get the comparison done before the next board meeting.

Penni said the transition was progressing.  All the payment information for this year has now been entered into MAMA.  Doing that actually served as a kind of audit, as everything was gone over fresh.  She stands very strongly on the accuracy of our current financial information.

Penni also said that the new board members should schedule a tour of MAMA with her.  Everyone has been given logins and the access they need.  Bev suggested it might be better if they wait until after the new modules are completely coded.

Laura reported she was looking at various approaches to a revision of the brochure, but was not ready yet to do it, and thought that we should wait until the Strategic Planning Committee made their recommendations.  She is going to make some minor revisions to it, particularly regarding the support group listing, and send the brochure to the printer, as we need brochures for Bev’s fall trips and the Modesto health fairs.

M/S/C to print 5,000 brochures so there would be sufficient to give to Modesto for their two health fairs and sufficient for the rest of the year.  Bev is ordering them from Auburn Printers which has done the previous several printings. 

Amy asked about business cards.  Generic ones are available for anyone's use.  They are the same as the refrigerator magnets and have all the association contact information.  Individual ones with contact information for the specific board member have been created by Penni, who can do them in batches of ten.  Bev's are the only ones professionally printed, just because of the quantity needed.  Laura says she has never used all of her first ten.  Amy says she needs about a hundred because she gives them out extensively as a group leader.  The new members felt they would be content with an initial batch of ten, requesting more as needed.  Amy will be given the amount she needs.

Final plans were made for the Strategic Planning Day.  Bev asked for board approval to have Karen be the facilitator.  One that Laura had thought of was not available, and Karen had volunteered.  M/S/C unanimously to make Karen the facilitator.

Bev will welcome everyone, make announcements, and introduce Karen.  Karen will take it from there.

Shriner's is charging $1.65 per person for coffee and water service.  It looks like about 25 might come.  Laura will arrange for the lunch.  Board members will chair the following breakout sessions:  Fundraising, Grant Writing, & Research—Wayne, Support Groups—Bev and Cas, Board Development—Karen & Penni, Publicity—Mike, Health Care Community Relations—Laura, Membership—Amy.  Bev handed out the summaries for each breakout group.  Each person will review the summary for his/her own group and get back to Bev with any changes.

We discussed the survey plans.  After some discussion, it was concluded that the survey would be sent to group leaders.  They would be asked to pass it on to their members and present it in their meetings, asking their people to complete it.  Penni will post it on the web.  Bev will make some revisions, and everyone is to send in their comments and suggestions by Friday.

Penni gave the membership update.  Current membership, general and professional (1) is 804.  We actually had paid memberships for 2009 of 806, but two members have since died.

We then looked at policies.  We had two items to formally adopt, the Board Meeting Policy and the Procedure To Implement Policies, both approved at the July board meeting.

On August 12, Penni had sent out responses to these policies received from the Sacramento group.  She re-read some of their concerns.  She asked if we wanted to make any changes in response to their suggestions, and proposed a small revision.  The new board members were not on the board when the policy was initially approved, and other members still had some concerns, so the motion to adopt the policy failed.  Penni will send it out for review again with her suggested revisions in place. 

M/S/C to adopt the Procedure to Implement Policies.

We took a look at the financial policies again, the Support Group Financial Policy and the Request for Payment or Reimbursement Form Procedures.  Penni had made changes based on suggestions at the previous meeting.  There was still a question of whether to define what a “significant” amount of money was.  We decided to define it as $100-200, recognizing that some groups will need to keep more cash on hand than others.  M/S/C to approve both items with that change.

Now that the policy has initial approval, Penni will be sending it out to the groups in the next week or two.

We decided to postpone discussion of the Standing Rules revisions and the Membership Policy.  We also postponed the pre-draft discussions of the policies on projects, group fundraising, sales, and response to ads and offers. 

Bev presented some considerations needed in developing a policy on regionalization.  After her October travel, Bev says she will no longer be focusing on expansion, and wants to begin work on setting up regions.  There needs to be a policy in place to govern matters. 

Bev told the board about an upcoming event on October 20.  Bev sees the Yolo groups and groups in the Sacramento area becoming regions soon, prompted by this event.  Dr. Ezekiel Fink will be coming to speak on small fiber neuropathies.  The Yolo groups and Sacramento are working together on this.  He will be speaking in Woodland in the morning and Sacramento in the afternoon.  Both venues are free and the speaker is not costing us anything. 

Bev mentioned that Mike is coming up from Monterey for the Strategic Planning Day, and would like to have a board meeting afterward.  Bev said it would be better for her than having it on October 6 because of the travel she is doing that week.  Laura reminded everyone that she would have to leave even before the SPD events were complete.  Penni said she wasn’t sure she could endure that long a day, and Amy agreed that it might be too long just due to health issues.  Penni also said that we need to address rebates at the next board meeting, and that topic would likely take some time and would need full attention, again wondering if it would work after all the other events of the SPD.

We decided that we would keep the board meeting for October 6.  We will have a brief meeting after the SPD concludes so that Mike can get acquainted with the new members.

Someone asked that the meeting be structured so it could be completed in a 2 hour period, 5:30-7:30 PM.