BOARD MEETING
June 13 and 14, 2008
Penn Stater Hotel
State College, PA

Present were:
Gary Bean – President
Mike McCarthy – Vice President
Neil McLaughlin – Secretary
Dan Songer – Director at Large
Tom Horan – Director at Large
Cindy Burger – Director at Large
Alan Stormann – Director at Large
Jim Bonner – Director at Large
Timon Linn – Life Member Representative
Excused was: Bill Trexler – Treasurer due to a medical emergency.

Bill Donahue welcomed the Board to Penn State.

At 3:20 pm, 6-13-08, the Board Meeting was called to order by Gary Bean.

Pledge of Allegiance was led by Gary Bean.

Moment of silence was held for those who have passed on. A special remembrance for our military and the 4 boy scouts who recently died in the tornadoes in IA.

Minutes of the last Board Meeting were called to be read. Dan motioned that the minutes be accepted as published in the Clipboard, 2nd by Alan. Motion passed.

Dan conducted a tour of the facility and showed us the rooms that we would be using during the conference. A brief review of the program and schedule was conducted during the tour. An in depth review of the program was conducted by Dan at the meeting room.

The program schedule and attendees list was reviewed.

Point of Order: Timon requested that the board review a piece of old business before continuing the discussion of the conference.

Old Business: An application was received by Timon for Life Membership on June 1, 2008 from Gary Bean. Review and discussion was conducted. Timon made a motion that Gary’s application be accepted, 2nd by Alan. There was a unanimous vote to accept Gary Bean as a Life Member of NECUSA. Gary was welcomed to the Board as a Life Member.

Discussion continued on the Conference: Discussion was held to extend an invitation to our vendors to have at least one of their representatives attend the New Member/Life Members First Conference Attendees reception on Sunday evening prior to the Vendor’s Reception. It was noted that we will have 28 vendors in attendance representing 19 companies.

Vendor relations with the Board were discussed and all board members were encouraged to improve our relationships with our vendors. Member participation was discussed and the small number for this year’s conference was the primary topic. Between the economic situation, Father’s Day and IACLEA’s 50th Anniversary Conference to be held next week combined this year to keep our numbers down. We have 45 registered to attend this conference.

Administrative information, raffles, give-a-ways, board attire for the differing official events and scheduling issues were discussed.

Motion to recess the board for its dinner session was made by Cindy, 2nd by Mike. All were in favor. Meeting recessed at 5:30 pm until 6:00 pm for the board dinner. The business meeting will officially continue tomorrow morning at 8:00 am.

Board dinner - 6:00 to 8:00 pm.

Breakfast – 8:00 am, Saturday, June 14, 2008.

Board meeting called to order by President Bean at 9:07 am, Saturday, June 14, 2008.

In Attendance:
Gary Bean – President
Mike McCarthy – Vice President
Bill Trexler – Treasurer
Neil McLaughlin – Secretary
Dan Songer – Director at Large
Tom Horan – Director at Large
Cindy Burger – Director at Large
Alan Stormann – Director at Large
Jim Bonner – Director at Large
Timon Linn – Life Member Representative
Excused was: N/A

Final discussion for this year’s conference was concluded. Discussion of the 2009 conference was brought up by Gary.

2009 Conference: Tom reports that we have decided on using the Mystic Marriott in Groton, CT. He has lowered our projected room night numbers to 10-10-50-50-50-50 and when we sign the contract we will be obligated for 90% of our count. Comments would have to be made in our advertising that we have a limited number of rooms booked and that attendees will have to book their rooms as early as possible if they are going to stay at the conference hotel. The contract is to be signed within the next couple of days. One approach discussed was to try an “early-bird” registration process with a discount so that our numbers can be assessed contractually. Another suggestion is to attach a mail back postcard to get anticipated attendance. A deposit will be required for the hotel ($3,000) to accompany the signed contract.

Frustration was discussed in reference to our infrastructure not being able to keep up with the timely conduct of these events i.e. notices out, posted, ads, etc. It was recognized that many of the issues were circumstantial and not any individual’s fault, a request was made for each board member to stay on top of issues to minimize delays in mailings, website updates, and Clipboard notices, etc.

We need to find a creative picture to advertise the Save the Date card so that we can have them made up as soon as possible. We should target early August for mailings and there was a suggestion to “Save the Date and Save the Budget” theme for the mailer. There should be a follow up mailing in January and a Clipboard announcement in all of the next issues. Mail back postcard could be in the January mailing. Theme could be Violence on Campus for 2009.

2010 Conference: Options appear to be Cape Cod (Red Jacket); Maryland (Timon to research prices in the Annapolis area); Gettysburg or Hershey, PA and upper state New York (Saratoga and/or Lake Placid).

Break 10:10 to 10:20 am.
Committee Reports:
Publications – Mike discussed the Clipboard and noted an increase in advertising interest. Color advertisement (full page $150-$200 - half page $75-$100 - increase over black and white ads that we publish) has been requested by certain vendors. Costs were obtained from our printer, Sonship Publications, Rochester, NY. Quarter page ad for the rear cover can also be pursued. Editor’s decision will determine placement of the ads (quarter vs. half page) on the rear cover.

The new Web page coordinator, Jackie Gutshall, will meet the board this morning. Web committee should be identified and advertised. Jackie will provide passwords and web access information to Neil for organizational continuity and files. The board will request her recommendation on the list serve options. Several members have complained about the drawbacks of Topica (access issues) for our List Serve. Application info still has not been changed in reference to membership fees, etc. Persons to feed information to her should be Tom Horan, Mike McCarthy, Neil McLaughlin and Gary Bean. All changes should be reviewed by the Publication’s Chair before posting to the website. Mike and Tom will be identified as Co-Chairs for the Publication’s Committee. A bullet should be published in The Clipboard identifying the board member that the information coming out of the field should be sent to.

Discussion held on the directory. The membership files were discussed and it was recommended that the web site needs a link for membership updates – those updates could be made quarterly by the membership Chair. Article should be put out indicating who our new web coordinator is in The Clipboard.
Board recommendation is that we will put the issue of a printed directory to the membership at the business meeting as recommended at the Winter Board Meeting.

Break 11:10 to 11:20 am.

Recommendation made to link our web to Higher Ed Jobs.com. They have a Public Safety Page listing open positions in our field. This issue will be discussed with Jackie when she arrives.

Advisory – Gary Bean – No reports.

Constitution By-Laws – Dan Songer – No Reports. A recommendation to post them on the website was made because they are only available for review in the printed Directory.

Nominations: Dan Songer brought up issues for this meeting. Elections will be held for the following positions: Treasurer – Bill Trexler’s position to 2011; Director at Large: Tom Horan’s position to 2011; Alan Stormann’s Position to 2011; Life Member – Timon Linn’s position to 2010. Nominations from the floor will be solicited from the membership at the Business Meeting.

Professional Development: Neil McLaughlin - No Reports. Neil requested that Board members, who had volunteered to provide the committee with PowerPoint presentations at the Winter Board, send them to Neil to be reviewed to select topics. Vendors provided positive comments to Bill Trexler in reference to the Mystic, CT, 2007 Professional Development program that was co-sponsored by Neil McLaughlin and Dave Meyer.

Awards: Cindy Burger reports that there is one award submission for the Bunker Award. (Chris Gough, Husatonic Valley CC, CT was selected to receive this award. Dave Meyer will receive the award on Chris’ behalf at the banquet). There were 9 applications submitted for the Reynolds Award. (Stephanie Thibeault, Kristopher Conway, Elise Britt and Katelyn McCarthy will receive the award at the banquet).

Life Membership: Timon reports that Bill Ellick was accepted for Life Membership this May. Pat Ingalls, Hamilton College, will receive Life Membership automatically upon her retirement at the end of June 2008. Gary Bean accepted for Life Membership at this meeting.

Secretarial Report: Neil McLaughlin – No Report.

Treasurer’s Report: Bill Trexler passed out the treasurer’s report. Renewed NECUSA credit cards passed out to the President and Secretary, replacing the cards that expired.

Lunch Break 12:00-1:00 PM

Meeting reconvened at 1:00 pm.
Point of order: Jackie Gutshall was introduced to the Board. She gave an overview of her background and abilities and a discussion ensued about upcoming changes. Jackie’s email is: jackie.gutshall@gmail.com . Discussion held on maintaining an updated membership roster on line. Form can be developed that members can use to update their information that can be automatically sent to Gary and Tom, as well as Jackie. Data can then be approved for updating by the review committee. Jackie can make the changes on a daily basis.

List serve discussion followed. Jackie will get back to the board with recommendations on what to do with the list serve and how it will function.

Mike brought up the issue of posting the Clipboard on the web. The rationale was to hold back publishing current issues and generally ran a year behind. Recommendation was made to post at least one issue behind.

Discussion ensued regarding creating a Members Only section on the web page. That section would include the on-line directory and other organizational information accessible only to members.

Budget discussion continued: Bill Trexler passed out the Balance Sheet. Contact must be made with Quicken to answer questions on the budget. This will be reviewed Sunday to conclude the budget discussion.

Audit Committee will be discussed after the budget review. Jim Bonner volunteered to chair the audit committee at the Winter Board meeting and will be reviewing the data that will be supplied by Bill Trexler so that the committee can review the data.

Old Business: Gary has asked for quotes for lapel pins for new members. Cindy will also price them for comparison purposes. Signature Badges was our last vendor for the pins. Our supply of window decals is sufficiently stocked.

New NECUSA shirts, maroon, are here and available for $25 each this year.

Membership committee transfer from Gary to Alan is still to occur within the next few weeks.

Publications responsibility is also in transition from Mike to Tom.

Personnel changes for our vendors (printing, web page, mailing, etc.,) will be covered in an article by Mike McCarthy and published in the next Clipboard.

New Business:
Topics to be reviewed by the membership at the annual business meeting:

Directory
Changes for correspondence to Treasurer
Presentation for 2009 Annual Conference
Ballot for the 2010 Conference will be distributed to identify desired location for conference Call for interest in hosting regional Professional Development segments.
Electronic votes should be recorded by the Secretary and reviewed at the Board Meetings.

Dan Songer motioned that Jackie Gutshall be hired as our new web master, 2nd by Mike McCarthy. Motion passed.

Good of the Order:

Grant availability was discussed. If anyone hears of grant opportunities they should be forwarded to Mike and Tom for posting on the web page.

The board will meet in the lobby at 6:30 PM for a Board Dinner with our conference hosts, Bill Donahue and Steve Stiles.

Motion to recess made by Gary Bean, 2nd by Jim Bonner.

Motion passed at 2:30 pm.