Ignition Northwest Board Meeting June 9, 2011
Meeting began at 6:40 PM
In Attendance: Karie Burns, Mary Saucier, Sharon Afforde, Kay Morrison, Christian Jacobsen, Andrew Birklid, Tabasco Mills, Joel Sack, Zoey Platt, Eva Luna
Resigned from the Board: Craig Ackermann
KB: Proposed that Craigs’ departure from the Board was done in good faith, and according to our draft bylaws, and therefore he is eligible to run for the board again.
Seconded by Tumbleweed
All were in favor
KB: Do we want to keep the same Board Meeting schedule? Thursdays at 6:45?
All were in favor.
KB: Meeting location?
JS: We should explore options.
™: Don’t care.
AB: Said something already.
CJ: Would like to move.
KM: Would like to stay if possible. (Sharon, Mary, Zoey agreed).
KB: Will do another 6 month reservation.
Old Business\Open Topics\On-Line Votes:
INW presence at Critical: Last camp; Wine& Cheese; Greeter’s Shift
SA: Spoke to Ali about the Wine and Cheese. She is excited, and knows the budget. It will be Friday afternoon. (Potluck is Sat.) She will send emails to us about what to bring. SA is making sure the INW banner will be there. Ozzy is making an INW presence in the Hub.
KM: Is the Last Camp coordinator. Submitted our Theme Camp request.
Board Meeting Location & Time review
Committee Reports:
Art:
™: Second round of Art Grant checks are going out.
™: 6 days until Microgrants close.
™: On track to spend all the allotted money for grants.
™: Marco is running point on the Pratt Scholarship stuff.
Communications:
Pratt scholarship communications
MS: Sent out Phase I of the Pratt Scholarship email. Are working on beefing up the PS page on INW site to have interviews with Cyra and Ken.
MS: Stuart has given some history, which will be rolled in.
MS: Ivan will be updating the Cycle graphic
MS: I am also documenting everything, and will deliver to Tumbles.
JS: When is the Newsletter coming out?
SA: When we have content for it, and a system in place to produce it.
Finance:
JS: Signing checks.
Events:
AB – Town Hall wrap-up
AB: Success! Wish we had a bigger turnout, but we always say that.
AB: Venue was great. Supportive of us.
AB: We had art at the event. Wish we had more, but was glad we drew that line in the sand.
SA: We forgot to have a note-taker at this one.
™: The only thing the Art breakout group talked about was the grants process.
KB: Can we post the outline and some expanded notes on that, so we don’t have a blank spot on the web site?
MS: I will work on this with Ivan.
AB – CM Update
AB: CM is happening.
AB: Time to start poking people about buying tickets.
AB: No in-person ticket sales this year. Might do the Potluck thing again, and sell tix there.
KB: Radio headsets have all been ordered. Should be here by Weds.
MS: I’d like to find out when my Greeter’s Shift is so I can schedule time at Cocoa Dome.
KM – Site Committee
KM: Talking with a pro realtor about this. Things are getting close. We may need to move this up our priority list.
Producer Selection
KM: May need to rethink our strategy. Maybe we get a group of people together and appoint them to do it.
AB : I agree. The doubling-up of Producer roles helps with load-balancing. However, I do think we need to honor the process we have in place, and follow through with it.
MS: As a part of my role on C13, I am going to document the Production process so it will be less daunting to people in the future.
SA: There was some discussion about contacting potential candidates in person, rather than emailing the lists. I have been trying, and gotten a little interest here and there.
EL: We are struggling to get people together to lead the existing events… so what is our future for other events? How can we entice people to take on more responsibility? Do we need to break it down even further?
JS: Break it down even further into…. what?
EL: SEAF has a much bigger structure of managers to put the event into place. It may be hard to get someone to step up for Seacompression because they think they are having to do it alone. Everybody wants to come… but nobody wants to put it together. How do we bridge that gap? How do we make it a Team that makes it happen?
JS: We have been doing this very democratically over the last few years. It is time for us to do this more professionally? Maybe we need to pay people to do this.
CJ: We keep saying we are not Event Producers, so what if we just flat out hire an Event Producer to do this?
AB : I think we do have a SEAF-like structure for managing the event. So maybe what we need to do is better publicize that fact so people don’t feel like they are taking it all on their shoulders.
AB: We need to treat this more professionally.
AB: By hiring from within the community, we protect our ethos. Can we maintain that if we hire someone from outside?
AB: We need some new blood. Not just the old jaded crusty fucks.
SA: The Volunteer Database could be an answer to this. If we knew who the key volunteers were, and were in regular contact with them, then we might not have this problem. I have found that talking and engaging with them constantly has produced results, and is the path forward here. There is a lot of built-up apathy in the community.
™: There are a lot of people that want to volunteer to be leads. At each meeting there are people that step up and take on Duct Tape, or Hub, or other lead positions. The only way to make room for them to do it, is if the people who have been doing all the work (AB, Ivan), don’t step up, and leave room.
KB: Maybe we need to talk to the other regions and see what they are doing.
JS: We don’t have another revenue stream, so no matter what we do, we need to make this happen. Without this money we are dead.
AB: Scare tactics? “No Seacompression this year. No venue, no Producer. Peace, out.”
KM – Georgetown
KM: Sarah and Joel are in communication about what we are renting out.
JS: Damage deposit?
KM: I don’t feel we ever decided on that.
AB: What happens if there is damage?
(silence)
KM: Going to pay Lance to run and manage the equipment.
AB: We need them to at least fill out our contract. If the equipment is damaged, they need to pay for it. But we are waiving the damage deposit.
JS: I’ll get the forms signed.
Business Topics:
AB – Dropbox
AB : Played around with it. It worked pretty well. Synchronized automatically. There isn’t really version control… but… am also looking at Google Docs for domains.
7:30 – 8:45 Randy – Strategic Plan
(Randy presented his proposal to us. The notes below simply cover things that had a bit more conversation around them. These notes are not comprehensive. Review Randy’s proposal for the full details.)
RE: Got a lot of electricity and interest from Focus Group members about the 4Culture advocacy issue. People wanted to advocate for the arts. This is something we need to remember.
RE: The committees that the Board have developed are a genius step for getting people more engaged.
RE: We are two-tiered: Board and Everyone Else. If we had a yearly membership model, where for $100 you get a ticket to Critical, ticket to SC, and an INW t-shirt, would be an example of how to build a “middle class”.
RE: The committees are the seeds for creating greater engagement from the community. Anything people want to do in the community, is already covered by a committee. People just don’t get that yet.
RE: “INW should fund art year round!” Randy, “Well, actually, that’s what Artist’s Trust does. So INW should connect the artist with Artist’s Trust.”
SA: What was the community’s perception of the INW brand, and communications overall?
RE: The group I talked to was self-selecting, so it skews their focus and commitment. They are not average. But their perception was the INW just sat on the money. They don’t understand what INW does, month to month.
JS: Getting away from “event producers” to “fostering” is important.
™: In all honesty, we are event producers. We select the team, we create the budget, and we manage the finances. When you say “fostering”, I see us opening up the table to proposals for how people want to do SeaCompression, and then we choose the best proposal.
EL: What is the difference between Mission and Vision?
RE: The Mission is why you are a 501(c)3, and the Vision is the world you are trying to create.
New Business\To Dos
Schedule Fall Retreat Dates
KB: We will have a July Meeting.
Round the Table & Hours
CC: 9
ZP: 1
MS: 11
SA: 5
KM: 8
EL: 10
B: 10
TW: 6
™: 90
JS: 10
Meeting ended at 8:56 PM
Upcoming topics:
June Busi: Skills Bucket – current skill sets, assets, contacts
June Busi: Annual Review of Documents – identify docs that need to change or are missing
Jun e Art Non-Event Based Granting status
June Art CM Art grant status
Jun Busi: Goal Review
Jun Com: Monthly newsletter?
Tabled – do not forget about:
TW – Sliding scale rental deposit (percentage of replacement value)
INW Office
TW – Migration from google docs
Sharon – Community Resource\Volunteer Committee
CC - Bylaws