Wednesday, August 21, 2013

May 21, 2013 Board Meeting Minutes

Board Meeting Minutes

Columbia Old Time Music & Dance - May 21, 2013

In Attendance:

John Wetzel, President
Dianne Britton
Connie Robinette, Secretary
Virginia Winn, Treasurer
Lucy Gordon
Robin Ducker

Absent
Tim Piesch, Vice-President
Kenny Greer
Stephanie McCravy
Scott McCravy
Jacob LeGrone
Fred Druseikis
Marguerite Frongillo

Meeting Convenes:

Minutes of previous meeting were discussed and motion passed to approve and accept minutes.

Treasurer’s report was presented by Virginia Winn. Discussion followed. John submitted receipts for two direct boxes to the Treasurer for reimbursement. Motion passed to approve and accept Treasurer’s Report.

New Business:

Results of election reviewed.
John Wetzel, President
Tim Piesch, Vice President
Connie Robinette, Secretary and Social Media
Virginia Winn, Treasurer
Jacob LaGrone, Member at Large/Student Liaison
Dianne Britton, Database Manager and Member at Large
Fred Druseikis, Member at Large
Robin Ducker, Member at Large
Kenny Greer, Member at Large
Marguerite Frongillo, Member at Large/Booker of Bands and Caller

John Wetzel distributed the 10 dance dates for 2013-2014 for review. Consensus of the group was that the dance should continue to be held on the third Saturday of the month.

Someone reminded the group that Fred offered to do the sound should John be unable to be at a particular dance either for illness or to attend another event. Virginia Winn offered her support as she also has experience in this area.

Meeting date for next board meeting will be August 20th. Motion was made to end meeting. Motion approved, meeting adjourned.

Respectfully submitted: Connie Robinette

Saturday, May 11, 2013

Minutes March 19, 2013


Board Meeting Minutes
Columbia Old Time Music & Dance
March 19, 2013


In Attendance:

John Wetzel, President
Dianne Britton
Fred Druseikis
Stephanie McCravy
Scott McCravy
Jacob LaGrone
Connie Robinette, Secretary
Virginia Winn, Treasurer

Absent
Tim Piesch, President
Kenny Greer

Meeting Convenes:

Minutes of previous meeting were discussed and motion passed to approve and accept minutes.

Treasurer’s report was presented by Virginia Winn. Discussion followed.

Discussion of recommended expenditure involved the purchase of direct box to take the signal and convert it to a low impedance to improve sound quality. John Wetzel, providing his appraisal as Sound for the dance, observed that we didn’t need a high end device for this.

Suggestions were made to improve the financial spreadsheet to make it easier to assess our universal net worth.

Motion passed to approve and accept Treasurer’s Report.

New Business:

Dianne Britton discussed status of board email.

Slate for next election was discussed. President John Wetzel begrudgingly says he would continue to serve as President for the next year in the absence of another willing candidate. Other members currently serving on the board agreed to continue in their ongoing capacities and Laura Goderick was approved as a member at large. Slate for the May election established.

John presented Booking Policies which he observed as a collection of all of our materials so that we could ratify it as a document.

This Policies and Parameters document was discussed and approved. Fred was assigned role of Parliamentarian. This document will be mentioned in the minutes but not available to the public.

Request made to add teacher/trainer to each of the dance schedule updates so that this information is available to the caller and to the dancers. Link to Facebook page was also suggested. Connie agreed to implement these changes.

Meeting date for next board meeting will be May 21. Motion was made to end meeting. Motion approved, meeting adjourned.


Respectfully submitted: Connie Robinette

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Minutes January 15, 2013

Final Minutes for Jan 15, 2013 COTMD 
Board Meeting Called to Order at 7:45pm. 
Attending: John Wetzel, President
 Tim Piesch, Vice President
Virginia Winn, Treasurer
Dianne Britton
Fred Druseikis
Lucy Gordon
Marguerite Frongillo
Jacob LeGrone

 Absent:
Connie Robinette, Secretary
Scott McCravy
Stephany McCravy
Kenny Greer

Approval of previous minutes: 

Approval was so moved, seconded, voted on and passed.

Best practices for keeping up with current policies: Discussion covered the pros and cons of publishing the policies for public record verses publishing the policies for private Board use only. Presently they are not published in the minutes nor are they available to the Board on the website. No decision was made at this meeting and the discussion was deferred to the next meeting. In the meantime it was agreed that John and Marguerite would jointly produce a paper outlining COTMD’s present policies regarding the payment of both local and out of town bands and callers. Once written the draft would be distributed to the Board members for feedback. They would then adjust the draft to reflect the Board’s input if needed. How the policy information will be published will be discussed and voted on at the next meeting.

Treasurer’s Report: The treasurer distributed a break out of the November & December 2012 Expense Reports and a summary of the 2012-2013 Season Bank Statement Report. We made a profit for both dances. We presently have $1,510.87 in the checking account and $251.00 in cash. It was so moved, seconded, voted on and passed.

Board Email Information: Dianne distributed a list of board member information for review. Those members present reviewed and okayed the information. No vote was necessary.

General Email to Dance Community: Virginia is supplying Dianne with updated email addresses from each dance. Dianne is inviting the dancers to join our dance community. If they have not accepted the invitation in three months then they are deleted from the general list. Dianne also lets Virginia know who they are and she deletes them from our master backup list. No vote was necessary.

Written Contract for Bands & Callers: Although it would not be a formal contract, it was proposed that bands and callers should receive a written statement, preferably via email, but if that is not an option, then via Facebook, Twitter, or snailmail, stating precisely what they should expect to receive in payment at the dance. It should include both the payment for the gig and any travel, if applicable. If it is emailed then it should go out via contracola@gmail.com so that the information would be stored on our website. A copy of the same information should be emailed to the Treasurer. It was so moved, seconded, voted on and passed.

Back-to-Back Dances with Lake Murray: Susan Fort, Lake Murray Contra Dance Coordinator, has requested permission to run a back-to-back dances with us if we are booking an expensive out of town band. She would have the LM dance on the Friday before our Saturday dance. We agreed it may work if we both booked it as a big contra dance weekend and it was only done under special circumstances. Dianne will talk with Susan to inform her of the Board's decision. This is still up for discussion. Nothing was voted on at this meeting.

Student Pricing: It was agreed that dropping the student price to $5.00 has been successful and that we would continue for the foreseeable future. It was so moved, seconded, voted on and passed.

Slate for Season 2013-2014: Everyone on the Board is encouraged to seek out new possible Board members. Look for people who come regularly and are enthusiastic. Ask them if they are interested and have the time. If yes, get their contact information. Tell them their name will be submitted to the slate for consideration.

Lucy will not be able to serve next season because she is not able to come to the dances due to her obligations in Charleston.

Dianne and Fred had to leave before this discussion came up. Stephany, Scott, Connie and Kenny were not at the meeting. These 6 Board members need to let Virginia know if they are willing to continue serving.

The following Board members have agreed to serve another term in their present capacity if elected: Tim P. [Vice President], Virginia [Treasurer], Marguerite [Bands/Callers], and Jacob [Student Liaison]. John did not commit to being President again although he said he would if it was needed.

Our next meeting is scheduled for March 19, 2013 at Virginia’s house, starting at 7:00pm.

Meeting was adjourned at 8:48pm.

Minutes submitted by Virginia Winn on 02/05/2013.

Saturday, January 19, 2013

October 23, 2012 Board Meeting Minutes

10/23/12 Board Meeting Minutes

Columbia Traditional Music and Dance

Present:

Dianne Britten
Fred Druseikis
Marguerite Frongillo
Lucy Gordon
Jacob LeGrone
Scott McCravy
Stephanie McCravy
Connie Robinette
John Wetzel
Virginia Winn

Order of Business

The minutes of the previous meeting were read and approved by vote.

Treasurer’s Report:

Virginia reports that, as of this meeting, we have $1048.87 in our bank account, and $85.00 in cash. A discussion was held concerning the financial loss we incurred at the last dance. Reimbursement forms were passed out to Fred and John for expenditures made. Status of the Board Email List & Dancer Reminder Email list were discussed.

New Business:

1. There was discussion of officially raising and modifying the current rate for paying “out of town bands”. These rates were adjusted by supplying a new method of calculating the fee, with an upper limit and with the amount otherwise proportional to the distance traveled by the band to reach us. Travel compensation is thus built into each fee, and no travel adjustment is added on top of that, since the adjustment is already imbedded in the primary fee. Callers would continue to get compensation for travel at the usual rate. This change was voted on and approved by the board. Marguerite Frongillo (in charge of hiring bands and callers for this season) has the details of this new pricing policy in writing, and will supply a copy of this information to the president.

2. The possibility of sharing out of town bands with Lake Murray Contra dance was discussed and Dianne Britton, point of contact with Susan Fort, agreed to speak with Susan regarding outcome of the board’s discussion.

3. Jacob LeGrone broached the topic of lowering the cost of dance attendance for college students. While the financial risk for Columbia Traditional Music & Dance Group is considerable, the need for community building appeared to be greater. The dance lost a considerable sum of money at the October Contra dance. An increase in attendees would have helped make the dance break even.

The Board agreed to try a new rate for students for the November dance and see what happens. Students with an ID would attend the dance for $5.00 per person. "Students" to mean persons in possession of a valid and current student ID (high school or university). This change was voted on and approved by the board.

Members of the board asked that Jacob LeGrone, who is also a member of a group of USC student contra dancers, that he encourage this group of dancers/students to support our contra dance group by attending our monthly dance from November to June, and particularly, that this group consider the local COTMD dance community schedule when considering dates for visiting out of town dances as a group.

Jacob LeGrone and Virginia Winn were to work on fliers for on campus distribution.

Virginia Winn, Jacob LeGrone and Connie Robinette would have a meeting to discuss marketing.

Discussion ending, a motion was made to end the meeting. Motion passed and meeting adjourned.


Connie Robinette
Secretary