Annual General Meeting Meeting
Doubletree Portland Hotel
February 1, 2010
ATTENDING: Arthur Aldridge (OSFCI Treasurer), Davis Beeman, Judith Anne Bunteman, Jeffrey Cowley, Debbie Cross, Aaron Curtis, Sam Justice (OSFCI Attorney), Melvin Krehbiel, Rick Lindsley, Tammy Lindsley, John Lorentz (OSFCI President), Brigid Nelson, Andrew Nisbet III, Michael Pinnick, Ruth Sachter, Dave Schaber, Renee Schaber, Mark Sharp, Debra Stansbury (OSFCI Secretary), Pat Steed, Marc Wells, and Paul Wrigley.
Proxies (held by): List unavailable at this time.
OSFCI membership was accepted by Robert Altomare, Davis Beeman, Judith Anne Bunteman, Antonia Cabal, Jeffrey Cowley, Marilyn Holt, Jaki Hunt, KC Humphrey, Dave Moreland, Brigid Nelson, Sue Renhard, Matt Riley, Jennifer Rosenberg, Andrew Ross, Mark Santillo, Renee Schaber, Mark Sharp and Emily Wyqued. (D. Stephe Raymond accepted the invitation to join OSFCI after the meeting.)
There were not enough people present or represented by proxy to pass any bylaw changes (40 members were represented, one of those arriving late, out of 83 members total).
The meeting called to order at 7:34:43PM, approximately, by OSFCI President John Lorentz, who gave a short summary of the purpose of the meeting.
I. Minutes of Previous Meeting
There ended up being two versions distributed of the last year’s minutes (John had forgotten that Debra had already distributed minutes from last year’s meeting, and transcribed the recording a second time). The version that will be posted to the OSFCI web site will contain all the information from both versions of the minutes.
II. Treasurer’s Report (Arthur Aldridge)
Copies of the report (account summaries and an income/expense statement for the last several months) was distributed. Recent items dealt with included a charge for a rental truck damaged during the 2008 OryCon (the books were closed and all remaining 2008 money transferred to OSFCI before the rental agency billed us for the damage), and a fine that was paid to the IRS (and later refunded). This latter happened because Arthur accidentally printed and sent in a blank page with the 2008 return rather than the completed form, and the IRS didn’t like that. Once they got the completed form, they refunded the penalty we’d paid.
Thank to Aaron’s help, we have an annual insurance liability policy that covers us for both the 2009 and 2010 OryCons (since they’re only about 49 weeks apart) and GameStorm in between. It saves us money over purchasing event policies and it also included trucks rented for events.
John requested that, since is this the annual meeting for OSFCI, we need to have a 2009 calendar year financial statement. He also requested an updated 2009 budget, so that we have information to put together a 2010 budget. Arthur will do so–so far, everything has been well under what was. (The updated budget will be posted on the OSFCI web page.) Paul asked why the account summary didn’t include the Clayton fund. Arthur doesn’t have access to that account. (He depends on the reports submitted from the Clayton fund for their financial information.)
Rick: When do the events have to close their books? John: It varies by event. It’s usually about six months after that event ends (rather than one fixed date that covers everyone). It’s usually specified in the management agreement. Ideally, we’d have a financial update from each event at every Board meeting.
There were no more questions, and the Treasurer’s report was accepted.
III. President’s Report (John Lorentz)
Thirty years ago last December, seven people met to hold the first Annual General Meeting of OSFCI.
Since then, hundreds of people have been members of OSFCI or worked on an OSFCI event or charitable fund. OryCon and GameStorm are mainstay events in the Pacific Northwest, and OSFCI has sponsored Westercons, Potlatches, Smofcons, Left Coast Crime, even a World Horror Convention. We’ve done pretty darned well.
This last year was an excellent year. GameStorm kept growing. OryCon, after worries that the Thanksgiving dates would hurt attendance, bounced back instead with one of the largest number of people that we’ve seen in years. (I’m very happy about the partnership that we’re building with Kumoricon.) And OSFCI’s finances have settled back to an even keel and the future looks bright.
Having said that, it’s worth reminding people that OSFCI and its events have been built on blood, sweat and volunteers, and that continues to be true. We always need people to help with the dull OSFCI stuff–negotiating contracts, dealing with taxes, buying and maintaining the equipment that the events use year after year. I hope people remember that and keep offering to help.
IV. Election of Board of Directors
John: If OSFCI is the dull stuff, the Board of Directors is the really dull stuff. These are the people who run the corporation during the year–deciding on the bids for chairing events, approving expense items, etc. We need people to do this. People are elected to two-year terms. Since we elected six people two years ago, we have six people whose terms are expiring this year. We can elect up to six–sometimes in the past in this situation, we elected five and then the Board appointed one to serve until next year, thereby trying to get back to a 5/5 rotation. Other times, we’ve gone ahead and elected six–it doesn’t really matter.
The four continuing Board members are: Beverly Block, Kamila Miller, Michael Pinnick and Marc Wells. The directors whose terms are expiring are Arthur Aldridge, Aaron Curtis, Tammy Lindsley, John Lorentz, Andrew Nisbet and Debra Stansbury. John: Do people want to elect six, or elect five and appoint one to try to get back to the 5/5 cycle? (The meeting decided to elect five people.)
The following people were nominated for the five slots:
- Arthur Aldridge
- Aaron Curtis
- Rick Lindsley
- Tammy Lindsley
- John Lorentz
- Andrew Nisbet
- Debra Stansbury
There were 39 people represented (either in person or by proxy). It takes 20 votes to elect someone to the Board.
Andrew: What are the requirements on the number of Board members? John: The Bylaws state that we can have as many as 10, or as few as three, Board members.
While the ballots were being counted, Andrew spoke with James Fiscus on the phone, who reported that the Endeavour committee has already received 42 books to be considered for the award in 2010, far more than they’ve ever received before (and there still might be more to come).
Paul reported the results of the Board election. Aaron Curtis, John Lorentz and Rick Lindsley were all clearly elected to the Board. There then was a three-way tie for the next spot (where the meeting had decided to elect only two people): Arthur Aldridge, Tammy Lindsley and Debra Stansbury (all of who received more than 50% of the vote). There were three ballots discarded that had six people listed, as well as another vote that said “Tammy/Rick”, and the counters couldn’t determine which they wanted to vote for. The vote counters suggested that the Board appoint all three of those people to one-year terms. The meeting decided instead to elect all six of those people to two-year terms on the Board.
V. New Business
Debbie Cross announced that she and Paul Wrigley would like to retire from running the Susan Petrey Fund in 2012. They will run it until then, and they’re hoping that by announcing this now, other people will come forward to take it on. (Ideally sometime soon, so that the person/people who take it over would be experienced by the time Debbie & Paul retire.) (Paul: Preferably someone under 50, so they will run it for at least the next five or ten years.) The alternative is that the Fund’s assets would be donated to the Clarion workshops.)
Rick: Would the new people have to be OSFCI members already? No, but this would bring them “OSFCI points” to make them eligible to join OSFCI.
VI. Adjournment
The meeting was adjourned at 8:15PM.