Mentor December 1995 Issue

Minutes of the Novemeber 29th, 1995 Corporate Meeting

As the Clerk was not present, Patrick McCormack filled in as temporary Clerk.

The meeting was called to order by the President at 7:45.

Present were Nicholas Shectman, Tim Roberge, Hal Haig, Jeff Jordan, Cris

Shuldiner, Randall Cohen, Christine Ivey, Ed Dooley,Patrick McCormack, and

Sheila Oranch (RS)

Proxies were presented from Joel Herda to either Ed Dooley, Phi,or Pat

McCormack, and from Jeremy Brown to either Tim Roberge, or Ed Dooley.

The Minutes were accepted with the following corrections:

The Eboard Meeting took place in November, not April.

The SCUM Grant was provisionally approved by the Grant Committee,not the

Budget Committee.

A Motion was made to transfer Sheila Oranch from Red Shirt to General Member

status. The motion was automatically tabled until the next meeting.

President's Report:

The President reported that there was no meeting in October due to lack

of quorum. He then presented a list of committee and other appointments. The

Long Range Planning Committee consists of Jeff Jordan (Chair), Pat Mccormack,

Cris Shuldiner. The Awards Committee consists of Pat McCormack (Chair). It was

explained that no further appointments were necessary to the Award Committee

since its only duty at present would be to arrange for the publicity for the

Order of the Lens Award at Arisia '96. Further appointments would be made

after the con. All the committee appointments were ratified. Tim Roberge has

been appointed as Corporate Inventory Control Officer again, and Marshal Ellis

has been appointed as Corporate Sales Officer.

The President then reported that the corporation has been served papers

in a civil suit. He reported that the Eboard is looking into our options. The

President went on to remind everyone that only the Eboard has the right to

speak for Arisia on this matter. Members are requested to direct any questions

put to them to the Eboard.

The President reported that he had instructed the Clerk to prepare a

Standing Policy book, to compliment the By-Laws. The Book will contain all

currently active standing policies of the corporation.

Due to their absences, there were no reports from the Vice President and Clerk.

Treasurer's Report:

The Treasurer reported that the books are coming along. He projected

completion of the process of straightening out the books in 4 more months. He

also reported that he was looking into changing the company that handles our

credit cards reciepts.

The Treasurer also announced that he wanted to change the month that the

corporation closes its fiscal year from August to December. He explained this

as being a sensible move in that it would reduce the number of important

buisness happening at the Annual Meeting, and it would allow each Eboard the

chance to set the budget it would be operating under for the majority of its

term in office.

Finally, the Treasurer announced the appointment of the following people

to the Budget Committee: Ed Dooley, Jeremy Brown, Dave Corveau, and Tim

Roberge. The appointments were ratified.

Arisia '96 Convention Committee Report:

Phi announced that the remaining 3 Concom meetings would be tomorrow

(Thursday, November 30th) at the NESFA Clubhouse, Wednesday, December 20th at

8 PM at Pat Vandenberg & Al Kent's house, and Friday, January 5th at 8 PM,

tentatively scheduled at the Park Plaza. The Con Debriefing is tentatively

scheduled for 2 PM on Sunday, January 21st at the hotel.

Phi didn't have up to date numbers for Prereg, but stated that the number

had reached 500 about 3 weeks ago. He then said that there were some

outstanding things that needed to be ammended in the budget, most notablely

Baby-sitting needed to be included. He moved to ammend the budget to add a

income line for baby-sitting fees of $700 and a cost line for baby-sitting of

$2100. A friendly ammendment was accepted that specifically tagged the line

items as nontransferable. After some discussion of economics of the situation,

the motion was passed.

A question was asked about the status of the comped membership list. Phi

replied that he was still waiting for a partial list from Andy Kaufmann.

Another question was raised regarding rumors that Security would be doing

nothing more than badge checking this year. Phi and Cris Shuldiner, Ops Div

Head, both responded that there was no truth to these rumors.

Arisia '97 Convention Committee Report:

Pat Mccormack submitted the following report:

First, I now have confirmation from all the guests. Some folks think you

shouldn't announce your guests before the coming con. I can understand that

for dealings with the public, but it never made much sense to me to keep this

from the Corportation. The Guest of Honor for Arisia '97 is R. A. Salvatore.

The Artist Guest of Honor is Bob Eggleton. The Fan Guests of Honor are our own

"founding fathers", the people for whose sins we are still paying. <G>

Second, it should come as no real surprise that the concom will be

structured in the manner proposed by the Long Range Planning Committee last

year, despite the fact that that ammendment wasn't passed. That structure

makes sense for the management strategies I want to employ, as it minimizes

the number of Division heads to the point where a Division Head meeting can be

held conveniently over dinner at a resteraunt. <G> So, the Divisions will be

Operations, Treasury, Member Services, Events & Exhibits, and Programming. I

have already filled the Division Heads for Operations, Treasury, and

Programming. I have also filled Registration/Pre-registration and Hotel

Liason. If you'd like to do something, talk to me. I'd like to fill the

Division Heads of E&E and Member Services, as well as a "Marketing

Coordinator", as soon as possible.

Third, someone started a rumor running around about a month ago that we

had lost the Park Plaza for '97. I've talked with Joel, and he says there is

no basis to this, even with the sale of the Park Plaza that was just

announced. Joel has talked with our convention coordinator at the Park Plaza

and he thinks that there won't be much of a shake-up in the management staff,

which bodes well for us.

Finally, I'd like to propose the following:

MOVED: That memberships for Arisia '97 be sold at $25 at Arisia '96 through

Lunacon.

The motion passed.

GRANT COMMITEE REPORT:

A Grant Proposal was recieved from SCUM at UMASS for $750 to help put on

Not Just Another Con. The money was to pay for the Guests travel and lodging.

Since a Grant Committee has not been formed yet, the Eboard sat as a

provisional Grant Committee at its last meeting and provisionally approved the

grant. The Treasurer spoke saying that he wasn't particularly happy with the

lack of details, such as what percentage of the con budget we were going to be

supplying. Phi responded that a good approximation seemed to be about one

third. Joe Ross questioned whether we had satisfied the necessary steps in the

by-laws to grant the request yet. Pat McCormack responded that it appeared

that the only true requirement we had to worry about was the ban on making

grants to organizations with restrictive membership covenants, and that that

restriction could be lifted if the restrictions existed for a good reason. In

this case the restrictions on membership were that a person would have to be a

member of the UMASS student body since SCUM was a student organization.

Several people suggested that we ask SCUM to print an acknowledgement of our

grant in their program book if possible at this late date. The motion passed

with 1 abstention.

New Buisness:

The President brought up the subject of meeting dates,stating that he

didn't see a particular need to have a meeting in December. Several people

responded that the con might have a few emergency pieces of buisness to take

care of before con. It was moved to set the next meeting for Sunday, January

7th at 3 PM,tentatively to be held at MIT Bldg 66. The motion passed.

For the first meeting after the con, it was moved to have it at UMASS on

Tuesday, February 13th at 7:30 PM. The motion passed.

Announcements:

Ed Dooley announced that he had been provisionally appointed to be

Division Head of Programming for Arisia '97. He said,"Arisia '97 Programming

is up and running. Currently we have 115 Program Topics and 31 Support/Cross

Over Items. An Idea Item Form is being given to the Clerk to be published in

the next issue of Mentor. It may be photocopied as needed. Ideas will be

freely confiscated."

The meeting was adjourned at 8:35 PM.