MASNA June 14^th , 2006 BOD Meeting Minutes

 

(This meeting was held electronically on June 14th, 2005 9: PM EST)

 

Attendance:

 

BOD Present:

 

Cheri Phillips (President)

Steve Bentz (Vice President)

Cathy Garey (Public Relations)

Robert Lemcke (Treasurer)

Lisa O’Connor (Internet Promotions)

Amy Larsan (Membership & Secretary)

Charles Scannell (Industry/Webmaster)

 

 

BOD Absent:

 

 

Members Other Than BOD Present:

 

Kim Price (MARSH)

Kelly Jedlicki (LMAS President)

 

 

OFFICER REPORTS:

 

NOTE: All officer reports were distributed via email to the BOD in advance of this meeting.  They have been formatted and are inserted into these minutes.

 

1) President’s Report:

 

MACNA XIII:

 

·        Sent out an eMAIL to all MASNA members reminding them of the upcoming price increase for MACNA XVIII registration coming after the end of May.

·        Received this informal update from Kim Lowe: they have 92 booths sold, of which 22 haven't been paid for yet.  They have 103 attendees, as of a few days ago, which doesn't include the tickets given to the vendors or local club at the discounted rate.  They think they are doing well with their finances, especially if things move forward like they have been.

·        Worked w/ Kim on MARSH’s postcard/poster campaign. They are contacting clubs w/ the offer to send them postcards to distribute to their members and postcards/posters for local fish stores. They’ve also established a list of sponsors that will distribute the postcards w/ purchases. I also got her in touch w/ Steve to work out sending postcards and a poster for the MASNA booth he’s manning at the Drs. Foster & Smith event later this month.

·        Sent out eMAILs to all MASNA members, soliciting nominations for this year’s MASNA award. The nomination deadline is 7/15/06. The cost of the award itself will be less this year (unless prices have gone up a lot) since the design work was done last year.

 

 

MACNA XIX:

·        Reviewed and sent comments on the ExpoMart lease agreement.

 

Newsletter:

·        Completed writing the President’s corner, worked w/ Bob to get a short article on Saltwater U Two, updated all the MASNA Members in the News info for the clubs, redid the Marine Scene Header graphic to include the new logo, uploaded everything to MASNA’s FTP site for Chuck to work with.

 

MASNA Store:

·        Received first order for a BCCR DVD and sent that out to the customer

 

MASNA 2006 Photo Contest & 2007 Calendars

·        Invited Scott Michael, Larry Jackson, Daniel Knop and Anthony Calfo to be judges once again for the contest. Scott, Daniel and Anthony accepted, but Larry Jackson respectfully declined. An invitation has been extended to Eric Borneman and I’m awaiting a reply.

·        Sent Bob last year’s contest announcement and have been discussing changes to last year’s rules (learning from our previous experience).

 

MASNA Clubs Database

·        Added two new clubs to the database (ANCHOR and ACRO-RGV)

 

 

Misc:

• Ordered 250 more MASNA brochures from VistaPrint for distribution at the Foster & Smith frag swap event. They were mailed directly to Kevin Kohen’s office. Mailed the MASNA banner there as well to be used by Steve Bentz in a MASNA booth. He will then bring the banner to MACNA for the MASNA booth there.
  
  
• Sent out a message to all MASNA clubs letting them know of Drs. Foster & Smith’s new reef club discount offer

 

 

2) Vice President’s Report:

 

Organization:

• I spent a lot of time filling out the paperwork for this but I need to have the 2006 Corporation Filing completed by Bob Lemcke before MASNA can apply for 501(c)(3) Status so this project is on hold.
  
  
• Working with The Calendar Team to get corporate sponsors for this year.  I will be speaking with Bob Lemcke this week on our approach.

 

Membership:

• I will be talking with multiple sponsors and vendors at the Foster & Smith Frag Swap in 2 weeks as well as distributing MASNA Membership Brochures.

 

MACNA Follow-up and Presentations:

• Will be speaking/attending the Drs. Foster & Smith 2-day Coral Frag Swap event in Wisconsin in June.  We will have a booth at the event and I will be doing my best to work OEM’s for the Calendar Sponsorship, new Corporate Sponsors and new MASNA individual members.
  
  
• Will be speaking at CTARS Reef Club in Connecticut in July (topic TBD).

 

Scholarship Fund:

• Continue to revamp the Scholarship Fund web page with Chuck S.
  
  
• Still in discussion with two major suppliers which may bring an additional $5,000 to $10,000 to the Scholarship before September, 2006.
  
  
• Posted a proposed set of roles to fill the Scholarship Fund Committee on April 9^th for the BOD to review.  It appears most of the BOD agrees with the roles and I will move forward with further definition as best as I can over the next month.  I need to repost this and put it to a vote at our BOD meeting this week.

 

 

3) Treasurer’s Report:

MACNA Host Agreement

• Received in June and deposited $1,615 check from MARSH representing installments 1 and 2 (out of 4) per the MACNA Host Agreement.

 

2006 Photo Contest

• Provided BOD with proposed Photo Contest and Calendar major tasks and associated start and end dates
  
  
• Held various discussions with Lisa and Cheri regarding the contest
  
  
• Distributed updated 2006 Photo Contest Rules for review to Lisa
  
  

2007 Calendar

• Investigating pricing 12x12 calendars, but nothing conclusive except that it would require images with much higher resolution and would be more expensive than 8.5 x 11 to produce. Heavily leaning towards keeping the 8.5 x 11 format for the 2007 calendar and will revisit 12 x 12 for next year when technology allows for more folks to have higher megapixel cameras at lower costs.
  
  
• Discussed with Steve Bentz his list of names of different Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) that would be appropriate calendar sponsors as well as added publishers and food producers to his list.
  
  
• Discussed with Steve Bentz pricing options and timing to approach sponsors for calendar sponsorships. He will discuss sponsors of this with OEMs at Drs Foster and Smith Conference mid-June.

 

MASNA, Inc.

• Discovered that MASNA’s corporate status was inadvertently allowed to lapse.
  
  
• Researched what would be needed to re-establish Ohio corporate status and learned that we will need to hire a Registered Agent.
  
  
• Communicated issue to BOD and requested and received approval to re-establish Ohio corporate status and hire a Registered Agent.
  
  
• Sent payment for single DVD consignment sale to Dr. Carefoot.
  
  

 

May, 2006, Financial Summary:

1. Income             $148.49
2. Expenses            350.70
3. Net Loss          (202.21)

 

• Cash Balances as of 05/31/06 is $10,981.02 (including Scholarship Fund of $4,761.02)

 

 

 

4) Director of Membership Report:

 

Membership Report June 2006

           

	2002- 2003	2003- 2004	2004- 2005	2005- 2006	Diff From 2004- 2005	Comment
Individual Members	88	64	115	149	+34	New:   Jeff Fullmer Dustin Fry Beth Joiner David Daniels Robert Sosolik Dennis Gallagher   Renewals:
Club Members	20	27	44	41	-3	New:   Marine Aquarium Society of Northern Arizona   Renewal:
Corporate Members	10	10	19	26	+7	New:   Oceanus Systems   Renewals:

 

• Sent out welcomes

 

• Answered any questions members and those looking to join had. Big thanks to Cheri for helping me out with this when I was unable to this month.

 

• I voted on any BOD threads that were posted. I apologize for some of my responses not being as timely as they could have been.

 

 

5) Secretary’s Report:

 

Board Forum Votes:

 

• Motion made by B. Lemcke to re-establish Marine Aquarium Societies of North America, (MASNA), Inc. in Ohio and to pay a company to be our “Registered Agent”. Motion passed 5 ayes, 0 nayes

 

http://www.masna.org/forum/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=388&an=0&page=0#388

 

• Motion made by C. Phillips to order 250 MASNA brochures for $108.64. Motion passed 5 ayes, 0 nays.

 

http://www.masna.org/forum/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=375&an=0&page=0#375

 

 

_____________________________________________________________

 

• I sent the meeting notice to all members. I also posted on RC and RDO about the upcoming meeting

 

• I finished the May meeting minutes and sent them out to the BOD

 

 

7) Webmaster’s/Industry Report:

 

• Various email correspondence answered
• Monthly updates to the website

 

• Various website changes to several pages as notated by board officers

 

• Published 15^th USCRTF meeting report in the industry section

 

• Laid out and published the Spring Newsletter in pdf format and uploaded to the website for distribution

 

• All board members given fully functioning email accounts and removed the old limited forwarded accounts.

 

 

8) Internet Promotion Officer’s Report:

 

• I am on standby for Bob to help with the calendar.

 

9) Public Relations Report:

 

Participate in Board Forum votes re:

 

• Renew incorporation status of Marine Aquarium Societies of North America, Inc. in Ohio and to pay a company to be “Registered Agent”.

 

• Purchase of 250 MASNA brochures for $108.64.

 

Participate in Board Discussion re:

 

• Screen for annual meeting/booth

 

Offered assistance to Photo contest and calendar

 

 

MEETING CALLED TO ORDER 9:00 PM EST:

 

10) New Business:

 

• Motion made by C. Phillips to accept the May meeting minutes. Second made by C. Garey. Motion passed, 6 ayes, 0 nays at 9:03 PM EST

 

11) New Business:

 

• A MACNA XVIII update was given by Kim Price.

 

• There are 90-100 booths sold and more in negotiations. About 20 unpaid and will be released if not paid by the end of the month.

 

• There are around 150, if not closer to 200 registered attendees, which doesn't include the deal we made with the various local clubs. There were about 130 registered attendees by the May 31st deadline. According to our rough calculations, if MARSH can get about 200 more attendees, they will be over breaking even.

 

• The Friday and Saturday menus are selected

 

• There is a good raffle so far and they are constantly working on getting more items.

 

• The speaker’s titles are up on the website.

 

12) New Business:

 

• The summer issue of Marine Science needs to be sent before the end of August.

 

• C. Garey will start contacting sponsors about placing their ads in that issue. She will also see about writing an article about her clubs trip to the new public aquarium.

 

• S. Bentz will write an article about eh Dr. Fosters & Smith frag swap and the scholarship fund.

 

• Larsan will find any club information to add to what C. Phillps has already updated.

                                                                                     

• C. Scannell will work with the new formatting for the next issue

 

13) New Business:

 

• B. Lemcke sent out the final draft of the photo contest rules. He is also updating the photo release form so that everything will be ready for updating the website.

 

• There is still some work needed to be done on the full announcement. The BOD agreed that the announcement should not be sent out until the website is updated.

 

• B. Lemcke asked the question to the BOD if MASNA should have exclusive rights to use and publish and sell the images. The contestant retains copyright. A board forum thread on this topic will be made for the BOD to discuss this further.

 

• C. Phillps will negotiate with Reefcentral.com about advertising the Photo contest. A. Larsaon will do the same on Marinedepot.com and C. Scannell will do that for Reeftalk.com.

 

• Joe Scavo will be contacted about making a banner for the Photo Contest as he did with last years contest.

 

14) New Business:

 

• A question about the MASNA award has come to C. Phillips attention, if MASNA has accepted nominations from Non-MASNA members in the past. It was agreed that MASNA will not accept nominations from Non-MASNA members as it has been in the past.

 

• If there is a tie the BOD has the right to decide who will be the winner.

 

15) New Business:

 

 

• S. Bentz will amend the current thread in the BOD forum for votes on scholarship roles. He will do that when he receives more information form Nancy and other MASNA founders.

 

16) New Business:

 

• A treasurer report will be sent ASAP

 

 

Motion to adjourn meeting to general discussion made by C. Phillips. Second by C. Scannell. Passed 7 ayes, 0 nays at 11:06 PM EST