Minutes July 2010 Meeting
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ArkGeo Board Meeting
July 16th, 2010
Members Present:
Immediate Past President: Pat Vaughn
President: David Spicer
Executive Vice-President: Richard Lee
Treasurer/Secretary: Beth Daniel
Judy Vaughn
Ron Laster
Tim Stone
Guests present:
Wayne Lunsford, Maribeth Laster
SUBMISSION OF MINUTES OF LAST MEETING
OFFICER REPORTS
President's Report was submitted by Pat Vaughn, immediate past president.
Prepared by: Pat Vaughn
The past year has been a great one for ArkGeo. The Board, working closely with the different committees, has worked diligently to insure the continued growth and forward direction of ArkGeo.
51 new voting members have joined ArkGeo this year for an increase of about 32%. We also saw an increase in membership participation. In our recent Board election, nearly 35% of our members voted
ArkGeo Board Members have held several “Eat-N-Greets across Arkansas which has added to membership participation and increased committee signups.
The Community Relations Committee, working hand in hand with the Board, introduced a new monthly challenge that has already proven to be a great resource to increase membership participation. Because of this challenge, awareness was realized for a committee to deal with membership relations and that committee has been established.
The Board also worked closely with the Events Committee in the organization of our recent Annual Membership Meeting at Petit Jean State Park and it, along with a hotdog roast event Saturday night and a CITO event Sunday morning, proved to be a huge success.
The Fund Raising Committee has been very active this year and has introduced new merchandise that has proven to be popular with the membership and is continuing to work on new ideas to increase funds.
The ArkGeo Board worked very actively with the Election Committee to assemble a slate of candidates for 3 Board positions this year as well as adding several new committee members to our committees.
Working with the Website Continuity Committee, the Board created and filled the position of Co-Website Manager which has given ArkGeo more control and better maintenance of our website. Some Executive Committee members were also given “delete” rights to help combat spam issues on our website which has proven to be a positive step in this continuing battle. New Moderator Guidelines were also adopted to insure members that censorship would never be an issue.
ArkGeo has also been very active outside the association this year working with state agencies, school groups, the Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts, Venture Crews, and communities throughout Arkansas to help improve geocaching across the state. Although not finalized, we have been assured that a geocaching policy for placing caches in Wildlife Manage Areas throughout Arkansas will be in place in the very near future. We continue to monitor the progress of this policy and are committed to seeing it implemented.
ArkGeo has worked, through our state reviewer, with the Arkansas State Parks to assume the responsibility of maintaining the State Parks Park Challenge caches. This is a great opportunity for ArkGeo and farther shows the commitment of your ArkGeo Board to continue to improve geocaching for all of Arkansas.
Treasurer's Report
Previous quarter’s balance $ 2013.69
Expenses:
Fundraising committee:
Brian Landers $ 110.85
Soda bottles/cap samples
Eagle Graphics 955.94
T shirts/caps
Events committee:
Sam’s 135.29
Event supplies
Petit Jean State Park 154.81
Pavilion and one night's campsite rental
Misc. Expenses:
Frank Philpott 27.13
Phone card – conference phone
Expense Total: $1384.67
Deposits:
June 2010 671.00
Paris Event, annual event, & prepaid caps
Quarterly interest deposits: 1.65
Current balance $1301.67
Website Manager's Report was unavailable.
COMMITTEE/OTHER REPORTS
Election Committee
Elections were held in a timely manner with the following members elected to the Board by the membership:
Judy Vaughn (MathSeeker)
Ron Laster (rkl of rklmbl)
Tim Stone (BSA543)
The following members have volunteered and been placed on committees:
Ron White (ronwhite) Events
Holly Thorwarth (gingerose) Membership Relations
Justin Murphree (arkfiremedic) Membership Relations
John Auvil (Photojunky) Membership Relations
Edie OBryant (Edieo) Elections
Rich and Carla Swanson (The Griswolds) Fund Raising
Jason and Lisa Nuckols (jclaudii & southerngirl) Events
Valerie Biendar (ceeker7) Fund raising
Jim Fryar (Likestocanoe1) Events
Fund Raising CommitteeFund Raising Committee
The Fund Raising Committee has added three new items to our current inventory – soa bottle cache containers, t shirts, and caps. If you are hosting an event in the state of Arkansas and would like to have ArkGeo merchandise available for purchase, please contact a member of our Committee and we will be happy to make the arrangements!
Community Relations Committee
In the last 3 months the Community Relations Committee, with each member of the committee also being a member of the Membership Participation Committee, has helped the events committee to solicit prize donations for the annual meeting, made a proposal to the board for "points for participation", developed the list for and judged "The Caching To Do List" each month, and proposed some changes in "The Caching To Do List" rules.
Events Committee
The ArkGeo Annual Event turned out to be a great success! Total attendance for each of the three events was much better than expected.
Annual Meeting: 108
Hot Dog Roast: 66
CITO Event: 48 - by far the most ever for a CITO in Arkansas!
We were able to stay under the original budget with expenses totaling $ 290.10
Supplies - drinks, chips, paper goods, condiments, etc. $ 135.29
Pavilion and camping $ 154.81
(Several of the cachers pitched in and paid for Friday night's campground fees saving us $82.31.)
There is no progress to report on the selection of the location for next year’s event. Plans will be finalized by the end of August.
We are in the planning stages for the first ever Arkansas Challenge Event! We will continue to the next stage if the board approves the hosting of this event.
The Committee has come up with a proposed budget of $250 for the annual event and $250 for the challenge event for a total yearly budget of $500.
Special Committee for Website Management Continuity
This committee has been unable to contact our current Website Manager this quarter, but our Assistant Website Manager has been able to make much progress in the blocking of the IP addresses of spammers.
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UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Status of ArkGeo goals: The status of the ArkGeo goals for 2009 – 2010 were reviewed. Goals for ArkGeo for 2010 – 2011 were set.
https://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYZq ... ZmRy&hl=en
Website Issues/Blocking of IP addresses: New Board members were brought up to date on the issues of blocking IP addresses of spammers.
Future of Website Continuity Committee: It was decided that this Committee shall continue due to its continuing need.
Status of Budget Proposals from Committees: The Events Committee has made their budget proposal. Other committees will continue to discuss this issue and present their proposals at the next Board meeting.
Status of Addition of Forum Moderators: Richard Lee, as Executive Vice President, will be added as a moderator for the forums. Frank Philpott will be removed as he is no longer a member of the Board.
NEW BUSINESS
Moving the ArkGeo account to a new bank:
The Treasurer was authorized to research options for the move of our ArkGeo account to a different bank. While First Security has been quite generous to ArkGeo in the past, present and future committee members and the Treasurer are finding their locations to be inconvenient.
In the past, the Treasurer and the Secretary have been the authorized users of the ArkGeo bank account. Due to the combination of those two offices, the Board has voted to authorize access to the ArkGeo bank account to the Secretary/Treasurer and the President of the Arkansas Geocachers’ Association. These offices are held by Lizebeth A. Daniel of Jacksonville, AR and David Spicer of Paris, Ar as of July, 2010.
Arkansas Challenge Event hosted by ArkGeo:
The Board authorized the Events committee to proceed with planning the first Arkansas Challenge Event sponsored by ArkGeo to be held in the Fall!
ArkGeo help with Clinton Event in October:
In the interest of promoting geocaching in the north central region of the state, ArkGeo will make their assistance available to the Event being held in October by the Van Buren County Area Cachers .
Making the teleconference open to the members:
The quarterly meetings of the ArkGeo Board will be open to all members by teleconference in the future. Please keep in mind that it is a long distance call and plan accordingly. We will add an item to the agenda for members’ questions and comments.
Annual change of ArkGeo online account passwords:
Provision for the change annually of the ArkGeo online account passwords was made. These will be changed each July when the new Board takes office. All Forum access to new Board members and new committee members will be updated as needed.
Staffing of the Membership Participation Committee and all other Committees:
The Board voted to discontinue the Ad Hoc Committee of Membership Participation and to establish a permanent committee to be named the Membership Relations Committee separate from the Community Relations Committee. Each of these committees will be staffed separately and will have their own Board Liaisons. New members of all committees are listed under the Election Committee report. Board Liaison to the Community Relations Committee will be Judy Vaughn. Tim Stone will serve as Liaison to the Membership Relations Committee.
The Board voted to amend the By Laws to reflect the committee changes. The By Laws were amended to reflect the changes in the Secretary/Treasurer’s duties.
The next Board meeting will be held on October 8, 2010 in Conway.
Meeting was adjourned at approximately 9:45 pm.
