January 2019 Board Notes

Date:

01/08/2019

Attendance:

Board Attended: Andy, Megan, Kevin, Robert, Michelle, Jay, Tristan
Board Absent: Kim
Observers: Kat, Lauren, Troy, John Koniges, John Hermanstorfer, Alli Cassel, Diana Sneve

Notes:

Anime Twin Cities, Inc. Board Meeting January 8, 2019

 

Waterbury Building: 1121 Jackson St. NE, Minneapolis MN 55413

 

Agenda

  • Open Session
  • Coordinator Updates
    • Anime Detour
    • Charities
    • Clubs
    • Community
    • Media Relations
    • SOS
    • Finance
  • Ratify- Financial Assistance Vote
  • Equipment Request- Warecamp
  • Discussion on the Limit for Future Givings (Follow-up from last meeting)
  • Update on Policy Indexing

If there is anything that you would like added to the Board Meeting agenda please email me and I will make sure to make the appropriate changes. If there is anything anyone would like to speak on an agenda item please either attend the meeting or send a statement to atcboard@animedetour.com  or to atc_secretary@animedetour.com

 

Open Session

  • None

Coordinator Updates

Anime Detour

  • We just had our staff meeting
  • Registration is similar, if not slightly ahead of last year.
  • Working with our Marketing team to get posts that highlight areas of our convention (ex. MCTC parking)
  • Working on developing younger children’s programming. Renewing our focus on this. Letting families know that it is more affordable for them.
  • Our guest roster is finalized!

Charities

  • We had a very successful food drive on Saturday’s staff meeting. The Hotel heard about our drive and brought in 15 boxes of food and bags. We have reached out to second harvest to see if they are willing to come pick up our donation. We will receive a letter from them detailing our donation and how many people it will feed. They are excited that we are still collecting donations.
  • Hasn’t had a chance to set our first meeting date yet. Should have a date soon.

Clubs- Update via AD Meeting

  • Things are going well. We have a quote for 15 people to go to Cedar Point on the last weekend in July. If you would like to go please reach out to Erick. The cost is $100 per person including hotel and entry to both the coasters and the water park in the hotel.

Community

  • Business cards were ordered and we should have those by the 18th of this month.
  • We have registered for our Convergence Room Party for this year. We have our staff set up for the event.
  • Have not filled out our registration for the Anime Detour Room Party, will be working on that and getting it submitted soon.
  • We sent in the recommendations for the proposed update to the Equipment Request document. That is on the agenda for later this evening.

Media Relations- Update via Email

  • Working on getting the email newsletter up and running, should have that up by next month. If you have any updates or cool news to share please send them to Age.

SOS- Update via Email

  • Have a couple of potential dates for this year’s June Akihabara on hold at the DT Park Place. Once we have selected a date, the contract will be sent to the Board for review.
  • The next event is Outpost Anime on January 26th. In the process of getting flyers out to the community and lining up staff for the event. If any board members or fellow coordinators would like to have a presence at the event, please let Heather know. She can provide a table or put out any flyers that you may have.
  • With outpost coming up, hoping to get an individual web page made for that event just like we have for the Akihabara. As well as post an update to the main SOS page content.
  • Have a request out to Funimation for screening permissions for 2019.

Finance- Update via Email

  • Bank Balances as of 1-8-19. Remember $2,100 of the LEG Fund is allocated to finishing Chris Ayres’ Teeth. Haven’t had a chance to connect with Anton to see where we are in that process.
    • General Account: $265,561.16
    • Education Fund: $1,054.62
    • LEG Fund: $11,765.18
  • As we agreed upon last month, I have contracted Acacia Wiley (the individual from Propel who had completed our filings in the past) of Accounting Angel LLC to complete our Form 990 for the period ending September 30, 2018. I have supplied all of the necessary documentation and I know that she is currently working on the forms. The filing is due February 15, 2019 and I expect that we will be able to meet the deadline without having to file for an extension. Once the forms are completed they will be provided to the board so that you can review them if you chose prior to filing with the IRS.
  • On an interesting note: this past convention cycle was the first time we really utilized our square capabilities. We received a year in review from Square. For the 2018 calendar year we brought in a total of $86,421.34 in net sales (a total of 1097 transactions). Not surprising our best day of the week was the Friday of the convention (4/6) with total sales of $35,512.19. This included walk up registrations and merchandise sales. Saturday (4/7) netted $15,168.79. Sunday (4/8) netted $28,167.86 (the majority of which being charity auction proceeds).
  • If you have any questions please reach out to Kim.

Agenda- Ratify Financial Assistance Vote

  • This occurred around the holidays. Mark P had emailed the board; we had approved his quote for airfare to make it to his ailing father. He wound up driving instead of flying and requested we donate a total of $544.00 covering the cost of fuel and a 2 night stay in a hotel. As this was comparable to the cost of airfare this was approved via email.

VOTE: Ratify Vote Via Email. All in Favor of substituting the quote of $544.00 instead of the previously approved amount for airfare. All Present. Motion Ratified. Kim Indicated via email this was reasonable.

 

Agenda- Equipment Request Documentation

  • Lauren- Our current rental policy states that there is a flat rental fee of $150.00 and a deposit of $200. The proposal is to add a statement that reflects if the value of the equipment is less than $1000 that the deposit is waived and the rental fee is set at 10% of the value of the equipment.
  • Andy- not wanting to see the deposit go away.
  • Troy- what is the fee that we charge if they are late to their scheduled pick up time?
  • Lauren- a flat fee of $75.00 if you arrive over an hour late.
  • Troy- could we have the deposit be the cost of the late fee. This would be something they would get back.
  • Michelle- like the idea of the deposit being $75 and the rental fee being at 10% of the value.
  • Andy- Lauren could you type up a revised proposal based on this discussion. I don’t want to vote on anything financially related without Kim’s input.

 

Agenda- Werecamp Equipment Request

  • Based on above discussion. Request was for consuite equipment, rental fee is set at $35.00.

 

VOTE: Tristan motions to approve Flip’s request for Werecamp, rental fee being $35.00 non-refundable and Deposit being $75.00 refundable pending return of equipment. Michelle Seconded. All in favor. Motion Passes.

 

Agenda- Continuation of Discussion on Limits to Charitable Givings given to members within our staff, or those that do not qualify for the LEG Fund.

  • Robert- would like to discuss a limit be set.
  • Andy- do you have any figures in mind?
  • Robert- This should start as a group discussion. Not sure what we have given in the past, but we should have this set in policy.
  • Michelle- there was some discussion at the last meeting, in the past we have given typically under $500 on a case by case basis.
  • Tristan- the highest we have gone is $500. Some of the givings raised some flags, so we should discuss not only a limit but also what qualifies or disqualifies an individual.
  • Robert- I would agree that $500 is a good number, we don’t want to just leave it at the boards discretion. We also need to make sure that we are doing our due diligence. Making sure that we specify what the money is to be spent on.
  • Lauren- Our policy for the LEG Fund states that we do not pay the individual we pay the debtor. Could we include a policy such as this for the general fund and any charitable decisions made?
  • Andy- this would address the method of giving the money, as far as criteria do we want to put that down in text or do we want it to be more vague.
  • Lauren- since this would fall under Charites, could we request the charities coordinator to draft criteria for the board to vote on versus us debating it here?
  • Andy- Kat, are you comfortable drafting something for us to look at?
  • Kat- just clarifying, my task is to come up with the criteria that would qualify or disqualify someone from benefitting from the general fund. Those that are not eligible to benefit from the LEG Fund (an example- staff) – in order to be able to assist those in need. When would you want to see this?
  • Andy- do you think we could revisit it at the next board meeting?
  • Kat- I will do my best.

Agenda item added to February’s board meeting. Revisit on charitable giving donations for those that are not eligible for the LEG Fund.

 

Agenda- Policy Indexing Update

  • This is a discussion on how these policies are to be presented. Not necessarily being handed out, but how can we make them accessible for our members.
  • Andy- Tristan, do you have an idea of how you would want this to look?
  • Tristan- not sure what it should look like.
  • Andy- well, we can start with what elements should be included.
    • Chronological
    • Date
    • Information about the policy
    • If it passed, or if the policy was re-written
  • Andy- could we assign categories for the policies? This would make them easier to find.
  • Kevin- a tag, or a grouping of anything you want.
  • John- a while back an email was sent to the board with a way to describe the policies. A way to have them posted on our website. If a future meeting were to overturn or update the policy, the old policy would have a strike through and redirect the person to the meeting that it was finalized at.
  • Andy- Tristan are you also proposing that we re-format the existing board notes? You had mentioned that they were inconsistent.
  • Kevin- we do take more verbose notes than other organizations.
  • Andy- If I’m understanding correctly, John you have something ready?
  • John- I do, I just have to approve the site to go live on the ATC page.
  • Andy- is this something that the board and coordinators could look at before its publically shown?
  • John- currently all posts are made on the back end where the admin posts their notes.
  • Tristan- no reason to change the existing notes. What do we do if the policy is too long?
  • John- create a short end version of the title and add that to the existing board notes indicating where that policy is located.
  • Tristan- there are several policies or decisions that need clarification.
  • Andy- could we identify those and work through them at the next meeting? Or start discussing them via email?
  • We had a set of 30 policies that were sent in an email and were voted on and indicated where they were in the original notes. Lauren to send that to the board.
  • Tristan- we should look through the documents and check for clarification and get things posted online.
  • Andy- is there anything else for tonight. What can we expect to be done by the next meeting? We have a lot of improvements to make on what we have presently.
  • John- once this is done, hopefully moving forward keeping track should be easier.
  • Andy- Do you want this added to next month’s agenda to review for clarification and to look at how it’s posted publically?
  • Tristan- adding a review of policies, and a demonstration of how they look online.
  • John- we also want to add multiple methods of communication.
  • Michelle- can we add our emails to the ATC about us page so if people need to get a hold of us they can.
  • Current harassment policy is listed on the ATC page, however we have no form that people can fill out and submit.
  • John- I’ve been working on a potential policy regarding the verbiage of how to handle complaints when a board member is involved.
  • Tristan- do we have a policy regarding closed sessions? Should we have a documented policy regarding them and repercussions of sharing that information?
  • Andy- I would hope that board members would hold appropriate discretion.
  • Lauren- is this concern about current sitting board members or once they leave the board?
  • Tristan- anyone that is party to a closed session.
  • John- how can we enforce this in the event that someone external is brought into a closed session?
  • Kat- here we are talking about a code of ethics, as board members we are agreeing to a list of ethical practices.
  • Lauren- when we had our board training there were certain issues that we discussed and wanted to also include an attendance policy for board members. Do you want to send me a list of ideas that I can work on to develop a list of ethics or expectations of board members?
  • Andy- that sounds like a good idea.
  • Lauren- send me your ideas and I’ll draw up some myself this way we can nail some of this down. Some other things to include are recommendations for Recusal (things that pertain to yourself when voting)- or conflicts of interest.
  • Troy- something I’ve been talking about and wanted to discuss for a while was how a conflict of interest could be perceived for any sitting board member to also be a department head within AD. There are two masters here
  • John- that should be a bylaws discussion.
  • Lauren- anyone can make a proposal for a bylaws amendment, they must send it to the board and have either 30 or 60 days to review it. Once that review process is finalized we have to give our members 30 days to review it and it will then be voted on the staff meeting following that time period.
  • Troy- how does that work if the policy is drafted at the AD level vs. the ATC level?
  • Kevin- AD level may be best; we wouldn’t want to overreach into the other smaller branches of ATC.

Agenda item added to next board meeting- Review of policies with demonstration of how they are to be posted online.

Agenda item added to next board meeting- review of Laurens recommendations for a code of ethics or expectations for the board.

 

Agenda- Quick thing

  • Kevin- ATC panel at AD.
  • Troy- potential recommendation, could ATC provide an AD for the program guide? Talk about the other branches of ATC.
  • Lauren- we have done this in the past.
  • This ad would fall under Age.
  • Andy to submit a panel for ATC.

Reminder added- Andy to submit a panel for ATC at Anime Detour.

Robert motions to adjourn. Jay seconded. All in favor. Public meeting finished 20:14