13 November 2007 Planning Meeting Minutes
SKI BUDDIES Planning Meeting Minutes: 13 November 2007
Address: Ski Buddies; P.O. BOX 20003; Seattle, WA 98102
Attendees
Mark Pollock, Chris Turcotte, Tom Rowan, Bud Wright, Ray Blocknia, Steve Wegener, Carl Wilson, Cathy Jessup, Fred Grant & Greg Snider met at Fred’s & Greg’s place for our third planning meeting of the 2007-2008 winter sport season. Thanks for hosting us, gentlemen.
Agenda
- Publicity
- Potlucks
- Website
- Membership
- Newsletter
- Treasurer Report
- 2007-08 Planned Trips
- 2008 Banquet
- Next Planning Meeting
Publicity:
Great placement of last ad in the Stranger (right next to “Savage Love”) resulted in a great turn-out at the potluck. Decided the investment ($315 each) was worthwhile and will run another ad next month; Fred will coordinate with Stranger.
Cocktails at “Purr” social event was fun, with OK attendance. As a result Steve decided to join in and get involved – and brought a bunch of friends to the potluck. We want to do it again and Ray is willing to coordinate again with Barbie Humphreys, the owner. The date will be Thursday, December 6th, 7-10pm. We should also post this event to the website. Ray would like to hang the SkiBuddies banner, so he can get it from Fred & Greg. It would be really nice to have more members there.
Potlucks:
The 2nd potluck (11/11) was well-attended at the Mt. Baker Community Center. Tom has booked the same location for the December potluck (12/9). Gil did a great job as MC; thanks Gil. Maybe get Mary Douglas as MC next time; Mark to contact Mary. The raffle worked great especially the Whistler items: thanks to Lee for sheparding this process.
Maybe decorate the hall for Xmas? Lee Johnson has Xmas decorations and Tom will send note out asking folks to bring any extra Xmas stuff they’d like to use.
Shane suggested buying packs of lift tickets from the ski area: they’re $5 off per ticket and we could sell them to members or use as raffle items.
Current plan is to rent the Washington State Garden Club on Beacon Hill again for $125 each for 1/13/08 & 2/10/08 potlucks. Bud willing to MC in January.
Website:
Things are going well on the website. Ray suggests update to home page; still shows info from last year. He’ll take a shot at updated it. Also need to update the Dec potluck date from 12/10 ? 12/9.
Members can download a club membership list through the site. Folks can opt to not have their information shared.
Since Ray does our web content, he needs updates on all trips from the coordinators for the website. We should all begin using the website to communicate to membership. Post items to the forum or send it to Ray to post on the calendar (as content mgr) … either action prompts the system to send out a notice to everyone.
Question if PayPal ever loses any payments … Chris thinks it’s more reliable & secure than your average bank. Folks are using it – and Chris has been making the payments. If anyone wants to use PayPal for trip payment they contact Chris (treasurer@skibuddies.org) and he sends them an invoice + 4% fee.
Membership:
Vince as taken over membership, and it’s going well. 26 new members.
Need to verify that all trip coordinators are members; some past coordinators haven’t joined since 2005.
Need to work on the duplicate newsletter mailings that went to couples this time around.
Likewise, some folks are supposed to only get email version of newsletters.
Coordinators can email Vince to find out if folks signing up are members.
Website notifies you if you’re a paid member or past due when you log on.
Newsletter:
Carl Wilson (victorspaw@comcast.net) produced the first newsletter of the season, and is now looking to start the next one. Inputs are due to Carl Friday, 11/26, for the December issue – so it can go out by 12/2. Type up your stuff over thanksgiving weekend.
Jeff Roberts trip didn’t get into the last newsletter since he missed the deadline. It will be included this month.
Trip reports are now moved to the website – and newsletter will be only trip stuff.
Encourage members to use the website more --- verify the address stuff there, etc. Include something in the newsletter on all the new capabilities. Put something in newsletter about how to use the newsletter – and go to website. Trip leaders can decide whether they want phone numbers or personal emails, etc. Web contact through contact page and avoid spambots for security.
PDF membership list on website (in the members-only section) and send out as part of December newsletter (if Vince can do when he gets back from Africa) or else we’ll mail separately in January.
Chris suggests maybe getting a corporate account through Kinko’s to allow Carl to handle electronically. – and Chris will set up an account - then Carl can
Current plan is to send out the normal paper newsletters at the beginning of the season, then switch to electronic-only issues for Jan-Feb-March. During those months we’ll send out a postcard reminder that the newsletter is available on the website.
This seems to be a good compromise between publishing the newsletter electronically – (saving $500-$800 per newsletter) and providing members with the paper copy most members still prefer. This should make for a smooth transition.
Treasurer Report
Chris requests to know how officers who get trip credits wanted to use them for accounting purposes. Chris will handle all the trip credits and notify appropriate trip leaders.
Chris has a draft of 2006 Profit & Loss – and Fred helped audit it yesterday. Everything looks really good – and Fred agrees the credit card payment is really useful. Current balance: $29,594. To finalize the P&L he needs the January 2007 bank statement, which should be back to Chris in next week or so. When that complete, Chris will send the final copy out.
Biggest expenses: trip credits ($730), advertising & newsletter ($2100 each), potlucks ($1700) and for Crystal Mt member appreciation ($6300).
Next season we decide to start the previous year P&L at the beginning of the season (August). Important to know where we are with money – so we can spend more. Banner ads might be another way to generate income.
Chris sent out trip pricing guidelines – and seems to be helping.
There is a new International transaction fee for using credit cards (6-7% which we’ll have to start charging for trips in the future). American Express doesn’t do it – but as non-profit we can’t get one. Free to use your personal card if you’d like and avoid the charges.
Decide there should be a back-up for the club bank account.
2007-08 Planned Trips/Trip Ideas:
All non-members who want to go on trips need to sign a liability waiver and pay a non-member fee of $10 per trip.
All members are reminded that they need to sign the liability waiver on-line at the website.
December 2007:
12/13-16: Manning Provincial Park, B.C. (Craig Mabie, Mark Pollock) - GOING GREAT! After October potluck, Craig added 2 additional 3-bdrm cabins (higher price of $199 for those); 40 people..
January
1/12: Member Appreciation at Crystal (Bud Wright, Elaine Field) – $20 for new members; $45 deal members; we’ll still lose $ per person. Half full on the bus – but expect to fill it up.
1/12-20: Aspen Gay SkiWeek (Shilpen Patel): Coordinated with SAGA North and Full. shilpenp@yahoo.com.
1/19-26 Austria (Gil) -- Total hotel, half-pension (breakfast and dinner) and ski lift for 7 days should be about ~$1200 per person. Flight and train from Zurich to Lech is not included (another $800-$1000 depending on flights). Joint trip with SAGA North, and 8 people have signed up and paid!
February
? 2/3-10: Gay Ski Week, Whistler (Lee Johnson) – Lots of interest. Shilpen has agreed he will take over from Lee for 2008-9 ski season since Lee isn’t doing it anymore. There will be a gay ski week next season – and may Mt Tremblat during Olympic year 2010.
? 2/15-18: Methow Valley (Cathy Jessup) -- Presidents Day Weekend, Westar is now “A Bend in the River Lodge”; newly renovated albeit prices are approximately 10% higher. Decided to make it dog-free since they only allow 3 dogs. 23 signed up; 5-6 paid, a waiting list already. Waitlist and payment due by Dec potluck.
? 2/21-24: Steven’s Pass Lodge 25th annual trip (Ray Blocknia, Chris Turcotte): full up and paid. Folks welcome to come up for day. Some discussion of a second place since this trip always fills up but Skykomish would be the closest available lodging.
March:
? 2/29-3/2: Mt. Hood Meadows (Jan Bennett & Scott Feest) - stay in Hood River, OR. Downhill & cross-country. Jan has lots of folks signed up at last potluck.
? 3/6-10: Red Mountain (Bud Wright) – stay at new hotel on the mountain. G&L Ski Week there that week, but no details. Arranged for 30 folks; 10-15 folks signed up. No deadline.
? 3/15-16: Mission Ridge (Jeff Roberts) –Same as Mark did it; everyone pay their own way; get a good deal through hotels in Wenatchee.
? 3/21-22: Heavenly, Lake Tahoe, CA (joint trip with SAGA North) – new trip added as reciprocal for Austria; Mark will contact by Ervan Darnell (cacheboy@yahoo.com) at SAGA – and will let him know this is the one that works best for us to attend.
? 3/28-30: Scottish Lakes (Lisa & Elaine) - The trip will be $240, all 36 people signed up but all on deposits. Expect this one to sell out.
April:
? 4/5-6: Mt. Bachelor (Shane Balleweg), has 1 house reserved; no idea of how he’s doing. Bud willing to help him since he knows the details.
Banquet:
? It was suggested to have a new location this year – Bud takes action to discuss with Lisa since she’s the banquet co-coordinator. The Garage was suggested since it could be fun to go someplace new.
Next Planning Meeting
The next planning meeting is scheduled for 7pm Tuesday, December 11 at Cathy’s.
Directions to Cathy’s House
The address is roughly 11th Ave SW @ SW Austin Street. Take 99 to the 1st Avenue S. bridge and exit immediately. Turn right after the exit, then left onto West Marginal Way SW. Stay in the left most lanes at the next intersection, and bear slightly left up the hill, which is Highland Park Way SW. Take the first right at the top of the hill, a right hand turn only lane, onto Holden St. Take the next right, 11th Ave SW, take the next right onto Austin, go 1/2 block to the gravel drive with the big green hedge on the left, turn left, drive to the end through the gate that has the house number 7505. My land line is 206-767-4648, but call me on my cell, 206-226-6759 if you get lost (many do). Cathy
MapQuest should be able to get you close: http://www.mapquest.com/
Greg takes the action to send out a reminder email via YahooGroups around December 4 - reminding folks it’s meeting time again. See you all then - when we start looking at trip proposals!
2007-8 Ski Buddies Officers and Volunteers:
- President: Mark Pollock
- Vice President: Cathy Jessup
- Secretary: Greg Snider
- Treasurer: Chris Turcotte
- Membership: Vincent Chau
- Newsletter: Carl Wilson
- Publicity: Fred Grant
- Web Master: Stuart Stoddard
- Potluck Coordinator: Tom Rowan
- Trip Leader Coordinator: open
- Banquet Coordinator: Lisa Sokanoff & Bud Wright
- Pride Coordinator: Gil Price
