ArkGeo_Board
10-24-2008, 12:27 PM
Arkansas Geocachers Association
October 10, 2008
Board Member and Committee Reports
President's Report: An Eat-n-Greet event was held at Joco Java in Clarksville on August 16, with 29 registered attendees. Ouachita National Forest official was contacted concerning the status of geocache permit policy changes and this information was posted in ArkGeo Forums.
Treasurer's Report: Current bank balance as of October 8, 2008 is $2286.09. Fund raising has an additional $113 to be deposited. This will bring our balance to $2399.09.
Website Manager's Report: None.
Election Committee Report: The following members have been recruited by the Election Committee and appointed to other committees since July: Chris Akins (Fund Raising), Ryan Lehman (Events), and Sandy Fryar (Events). Possible candidates for the next Board election are being discussed.
Fund Raising Committee Report: Two new members joined the committee since the last meeting: OENavigator (Chris Akins) and BSA534 (Tim Stone). Meetings were held on October 2nd and 7th via SPChat to discuss fund raising initiatives. We are looking into the following items to sell: car window decals, car flags, path tags and ball caps. All will require an upfront expenditure from the board.
Community Relations Report: During the July 11th board meeting Community Relations Committee member David Spicer (paris1time) was asked to post in the forums to see if anyone in the membership would be willing to help with a “newsletter”. He received an e-mail from Tim Stone (BSA534) stating that he would be glad to help. His e-mail stated that he had “worked at a small print shop for over 16 years and one of my main jobs is setting up newsletters”.
The board asked that the Community Relations Committee select a new chair. Jerry Turner (Cachemates) had previously been appointed as Board Liaison and the Standing Rules state that the Board Liaison can not be the chair. David Spicer (paris1time) posted a thread in the Community Relations Committee forum seeking nominations or volunteers. After receiving none, David Spicer (paris1time) volunteered to serve as Chair if necessary. There were three members who responded with “yes” votes.
The Community Relations Committee was also asked to work with Frank Philpott on meeting with Senator Pryor. There has since been a change in the Ouachita National Forest Geocaching Policy and no meeting was needed.
The Community Relations Committee was asked to work on publicity. Two ideas for possible publicity and for promoting the Arkansas Geocachers Association was the possibility of participating in the Arkansas Highway Department’s “Adopt-a-Highway” program or adopting sections of trails. Both possibilities have pros and cons. The committee would like to see a poll in the forums to get feedback from the membership on their feelings about the subject. The poll could be posted along with a post giving the details about the two options along with their pros and cons. The committee will work on obtaining the details and creating the post.
Events Committee Report: The Piney CITO was a success. Jason and Lisa did an excellent job on putting it together. In the future the committee hopes to be able work more closely with the other committees on projects like this to help get the word out more.
Lake Ouachita State Park has been emailed about the 2009 ArkGeo annual social but a response has not yet been received. A couple of other parks want to be considered (Magazine and Wooly Hollow). Wooly Hollow has not yet been checked out but this will be done in the next few weeks. The goal of the events committee is to have the location and date in place by the end of November. That way the committee's efforts can be focused on planning the event and working with the other committees on getting prizes and spreading the word. The goal is to have a much larger turnout than this year.
Status of ArkGeo Goals
Goal 1 - Increase membership to 200 by 5/31/09.
Voting membership is 144 as of 10/6/08, an increase of 8 new members since our last meeting in July. Efforts to increase membership include recruitment at Eat and Greet in Clarksville in August (President, Frank Philpott) and emails to new website users to invite them to become voting members (Immediate Past President, Wayne Lunsford). Currently, these emails are done manually, so not all new website users are contacted. Wayne plans to investigate with the Website Manager (Bert Drake) the possibility of getting the new website software to do this automatically.
Goal 2 - Implement 2 fund raising initiatives to increase ArkGeo bank balance to $2500 by 5/31/09.
See Fund Raising Committee Report.
Goal 3 - Hold 1 general membership meeting by 6/15/09.
See Events Committee Report.
Goal 4 - Hold 1 CITO event by 6/15/09.
No progress yet, due to on-going work on the general membership meeting. May be coordinated to occur the same weekend as the general membership meeting, as was done this year.
Goal 5 - Hold 2 "Eat & Greets" by 6/15/09 in each of the following regions of the state: NE, NW, Central, SE, and SW.
NE -- An Eat and Greet at Cracker Barrel in Jonesboro has been posted and scheduled for Oct 21st.
NW -- Cracker Barrel in Alma has been contacted to possibly have a breakfast meet and greet there. They will not "reserve" a section in advance, but stated that they felt that they could accommodate a meeting. Board member David Spicer will try to host one of the two eat and greets himself, while asking another member to host one, so he is looking for a date he would be able to have a breakfast at the Alma Cracker Barrel before the end of the year then search for a host for another eat and greet in the Fayetteville area after the first of the year.
Central -- Two local geocachers have been contacted, BSA534 (Tim Stone) and cpdenton (Chris Denton), both of Conway. They have expressed interest in co-hosting a fall or early winter Eat & Greet (probably either November 15 or November 29). Two events in one day has been discussed, one as a breakfast at a restaurant and another that evening as a hot dog roast at either a local park or home. Several new Conway-area caches out in preparation. Most likely, there will be another Eat & Greet in the early spring.
SE -- Working with local cacher in De Wit to locate a meeting place. Hopefully will get this one scheduled in the next few weeks. Also exploring the possibility of holding one in Helena.
SW -- Considering holding one in Hot Springs and another in Hope to attract geocachers from the Texarkana area.
Goal 6 - Work with Ouachita NF officials to reach agreement on the waiver of, or significant reduction in, geoache permit fee for geocaches placed within the Ouachita NF, by 12/31/08.
COMPLETE
Goal 7 - Publicize ArkGeo through an article in one of the state's newspapers or TV news coverage of an ArkGeo event, by 5/31/09.
No progress to date.
Goal 8 - Recruit at least 5 nominees for next Board election, by 4/1/09.
The election committee is currently in the process of discussing who they are going to approach to recruit. They have several names they are currently discussing, but don't have a firm list as yet.
Goal 9 - Meet each of the ArkGeo Election Schedule milestone dates.
Discussed the Election Schedule with the Immediate Past President (Wayne Lunsford) and made some wording changes in the schedule to clearly match milestones with the Board's scheduled quarterly meetings in January (Elect new Executive Board) and April (Recommend slate of nominees).
Goal 10 - Complete move of website to a new host server by 11/1/08.
Status not available.
October 10, 2008
Board Member and Committee Reports
President's Report: An Eat-n-Greet event was held at Joco Java in Clarksville on August 16, with 29 registered attendees. Ouachita National Forest official was contacted concerning the status of geocache permit policy changes and this information was posted in ArkGeo Forums.
Treasurer's Report: Current bank balance as of October 8, 2008 is $2286.09. Fund raising has an additional $113 to be deposited. This will bring our balance to $2399.09.
Website Manager's Report: None.
Election Committee Report: The following members have been recruited by the Election Committee and appointed to other committees since July: Chris Akins (Fund Raising), Ryan Lehman (Events), and Sandy Fryar (Events). Possible candidates for the next Board election are being discussed.
Fund Raising Committee Report: Two new members joined the committee since the last meeting: OENavigator (Chris Akins) and BSA534 (Tim Stone). Meetings were held on October 2nd and 7th via SPChat to discuss fund raising initiatives. We are looking into the following items to sell: car window decals, car flags, path tags and ball caps. All will require an upfront expenditure from the board.
Community Relations Report: During the July 11th board meeting Community Relations Committee member David Spicer (paris1time) was asked to post in the forums to see if anyone in the membership would be willing to help with a “newsletter”. He received an e-mail from Tim Stone (BSA534) stating that he would be glad to help. His e-mail stated that he had “worked at a small print shop for over 16 years and one of my main jobs is setting up newsletters”.
The board asked that the Community Relations Committee select a new chair. Jerry Turner (Cachemates) had previously been appointed as Board Liaison and the Standing Rules state that the Board Liaison can not be the chair. David Spicer (paris1time) posted a thread in the Community Relations Committee forum seeking nominations or volunteers. After receiving none, David Spicer (paris1time) volunteered to serve as Chair if necessary. There were three members who responded with “yes” votes.
The Community Relations Committee was also asked to work with Frank Philpott on meeting with Senator Pryor. There has since been a change in the Ouachita National Forest Geocaching Policy and no meeting was needed.
The Community Relations Committee was asked to work on publicity. Two ideas for possible publicity and for promoting the Arkansas Geocachers Association was the possibility of participating in the Arkansas Highway Department’s “Adopt-a-Highway” program or adopting sections of trails. Both possibilities have pros and cons. The committee would like to see a poll in the forums to get feedback from the membership on their feelings about the subject. The poll could be posted along with a post giving the details about the two options along with their pros and cons. The committee will work on obtaining the details and creating the post.
Events Committee Report: The Piney CITO was a success. Jason and Lisa did an excellent job on putting it together. In the future the committee hopes to be able work more closely with the other committees on projects like this to help get the word out more.
Lake Ouachita State Park has been emailed about the 2009 ArkGeo annual social but a response has not yet been received. A couple of other parks want to be considered (Magazine and Wooly Hollow). Wooly Hollow has not yet been checked out but this will be done in the next few weeks. The goal of the events committee is to have the location and date in place by the end of November. That way the committee's efforts can be focused on planning the event and working with the other committees on getting prizes and spreading the word. The goal is to have a much larger turnout than this year.
Status of ArkGeo Goals
Goal 1 - Increase membership to 200 by 5/31/09.
Voting membership is 144 as of 10/6/08, an increase of 8 new members since our last meeting in July. Efforts to increase membership include recruitment at Eat and Greet in Clarksville in August (President, Frank Philpott) and emails to new website users to invite them to become voting members (Immediate Past President, Wayne Lunsford). Currently, these emails are done manually, so not all new website users are contacted. Wayne plans to investigate with the Website Manager (Bert Drake) the possibility of getting the new website software to do this automatically.
Goal 2 - Implement 2 fund raising initiatives to increase ArkGeo bank balance to $2500 by 5/31/09.
See Fund Raising Committee Report.
Goal 3 - Hold 1 general membership meeting by 6/15/09.
See Events Committee Report.
Goal 4 - Hold 1 CITO event by 6/15/09.
No progress yet, due to on-going work on the general membership meeting. May be coordinated to occur the same weekend as the general membership meeting, as was done this year.
Goal 5 - Hold 2 "Eat & Greets" by 6/15/09 in each of the following regions of the state: NE, NW, Central, SE, and SW.
NE -- An Eat and Greet at Cracker Barrel in Jonesboro has been posted and scheduled for Oct 21st.
NW -- Cracker Barrel in Alma has been contacted to possibly have a breakfast meet and greet there. They will not "reserve" a section in advance, but stated that they felt that they could accommodate a meeting. Board member David Spicer will try to host one of the two eat and greets himself, while asking another member to host one, so he is looking for a date he would be able to have a breakfast at the Alma Cracker Barrel before the end of the year then search for a host for another eat and greet in the Fayetteville area after the first of the year.
Central -- Two local geocachers have been contacted, BSA534 (Tim Stone) and cpdenton (Chris Denton), both of Conway. They have expressed interest in co-hosting a fall or early winter Eat & Greet (probably either November 15 or November 29). Two events in one day has been discussed, one as a breakfast at a restaurant and another that evening as a hot dog roast at either a local park or home. Several new Conway-area caches out in preparation. Most likely, there will be another Eat & Greet in the early spring.
SE -- Working with local cacher in De Wit to locate a meeting place. Hopefully will get this one scheduled in the next few weeks. Also exploring the possibility of holding one in Helena.
SW -- Considering holding one in Hot Springs and another in Hope to attract geocachers from the Texarkana area.
Goal 6 - Work with Ouachita NF officials to reach agreement on the waiver of, or significant reduction in, geoache permit fee for geocaches placed within the Ouachita NF, by 12/31/08.
COMPLETE
Goal 7 - Publicize ArkGeo through an article in one of the state's newspapers or TV news coverage of an ArkGeo event, by 5/31/09.
No progress to date.
Goal 8 - Recruit at least 5 nominees for next Board election, by 4/1/09.
The election committee is currently in the process of discussing who they are going to approach to recruit. They have several names they are currently discussing, but don't have a firm list as yet.
Goal 9 - Meet each of the ArkGeo Election Schedule milestone dates.
Discussed the Election Schedule with the Immediate Past President (Wayne Lunsford) and made some wording changes in the schedule to clearly match milestones with the Board's scheduled quarterly meetings in January (Elect new Executive Board) and April (Recommend slate of nominees).
Goal 10 - Complete move of website to a new host server by 11/1/08.
Status not available.