Mentor The Newsletter of Arisia, Incorporated -- Number 116, June 2002

Announcement

The eboard is seeking nominations for conchair of Arisia '04. Anyone interested in being conchair must communicate this to the eboard by the end of the July business meeting (July 14).

Minutes of the May Corp. Meeting

• Date, Time, and Place

Tuesday, May 14, 2002. McGuire residence, Malden MA.

• In Attendance

Colette Fozard, Lisa Hertel, Michelle McGuire, Tom Murphy, Paul Selkirk.

• No Meeting

Quorum not being reached, the meeting could not be called to order.

• Vice President's Report (Colette Fozard)

1. Hotel contract is in final form, will be signed next week as our sales rep is ready to go out on maternity leave. On behalf of Arisia, I sent her a Vermont Teddy Bear and she loved it, and asked me to pass along her thanks. She liked it so much that I think it will be a toss up as to whether her kid ever gets his/her hands on it! :-)

2. Payments to the dealers for their losses at Arisia were finally received, approved by the EBoard, and checks have gone out. Total losses from this year's con were: $1,636.63

3. Grant Committee: as a small correction to Brendan's last month's President's report (as printed in Mentor), JerseyDevilCon has applied for a grant, they haven't finished the process. Their application was based on estimated at-con numbers (they were the first week of April) and since I didn't get the application until well after con, I have asked them for updated real numbers, and am waiting to hear back from them. They are the only grant on table right now.

As a general note to the corporation: I will be departing Monday for six weeks in the DC area as I was awarded a paid congressional internship for a month, and then will be back in MA to take 2 summer classes. As such, I will not be at the next two corporate meetings due to schedule conflicts. If any member needs to contact me, e-mail me at vp@arisia.org. I don't want it to seem like I have dropped off the face of the earth, I am still chugging away at Arisia business.

Minutes of the June Corp. Meeting

• Date, Time, and Place

Sunday, June 9, 2002. MIT Building 66, room 168. Called to order 2:57PM.

• In Attendance

Paul Selkirk, Skip Morris, Nicholas Shectman, Traciy Fogarty, Angela Bowen, Lisa Hertel, Tom Murphy, Brendan Quinn, Linda Nee (new member), Bryttan Bradley (non-member).

• Proxies

None.

• President's Report/Eboard Report (Brendan Quinn)

We have signed a two-year contract with the Park Plaza, with an option for a third year. [N.B. The Clerk notes that it's actually a three-year contract, with an option to cancel the third year.] When I get a copy back from the hotel, with both our signatures on it, I will get a copy to the clerk for the corporate files.

At this point, there was a discussion of the Exhibitors' Contract clause in the hotel contract. Some people found it confusingly written, although our lawyer has determined that it did what we wanted it to. A suggested rewording was submitted; if approved by our lawyer, it may be written into a contract addendum.

I was hoping to be able to make an announcement about the Clambake today. I can say that we're looking at the Cape Cod National Seashore. Hopefully, there will be an announcement about the date and location sometime this week. We're planning for the weekend after Worldcon; if not, the weekend after that. This will be open to everyone who worked on the con last year, from gophers on up.

• Vice President's Report (Colette Fozard, via email)

As I believe has already been reported, we have a signed hotel contract with the Park Plaza for 2003, 2004, and 2005 (if we want it). If we grow a lot next year, we have the option to cancel for 2005 up to 90 days past next year's con.

There has been no activity in the Grant Committee. JerseyDevilCon acknowledged receiving my request for more updated info, but hasn't had a chance to do it, so I am waiting for that to come back before sending the grant info to the committee for consideration.

As before, the Executive Board is accepting nominations for Con Chair '04 until the July 16 corporate meeting.

Anybody need me for anything, please e-mail me at vp@arisia.org.

• Clerk's Report (Paul Selkirk)

Please sign in. Dues are $6 at this meeting, or $4 afterward. New members gain voting rights after attending one meeting; this meeting counts. Reports are encouraged to be submitted in writing, to avoid gross transcription errors.

The Clerk regrets that he has screwed up the past few months, and Linda Nee was not actually appointed CIC.

The con and corporate websites are up and running, and somewhat current.

• Treasurer's Report (Nicholas Shectman)

Arisia currently has $49,680.33 in all of its accounts, divided as follows:

A03: $ 2,845.60

A02: $22,375.62

Grant Fund: $ 1,777.39

Snow Fund: $15,000.00

General Fund: $ 7,681.72

I have not had time in the last two months to properly supervise the A02 treasury effort, due to two deadlines one of which was two weeks ago and the other of which was yesterday. I am now turning my attention to A02, as I understand that there is concern about payment of certain expenses. I can report that there are several out of sequence checks, and that there has not been activity at the bank in the A02 account in the last month. This leads me to believe that there are checks which have been cut but not received, and I will be looking into this in the near future.

• Audit Fund

There was some question about the state of the audit. An auditor has examined the books, and found that some years were perfectly fine, and some years were a perfect mess, with the middle years being in the worst shape. It would cost us serious money for him to try to reconstruct the books, so Phi is doing it to the extent possible. The auditor has also advised us about things we should be doing with regard to prior year tax filings.

• Corporate Inventory Control (Linda Nee reporting)

On Saturday, July 27, we will have a cart-building party at Kim and Kevin's house in North Chelmsford. Anyone who is handy with a saw, screwdriver, or paintbrush is welcome to come. Plus, you can see just how adorable a one-year-old in safety goggles and ear protection really is.

I do hope to do some clean-out of storage before that happens. Anyone who has their own private equipment in storage may want to supervise what happens to it.

MOVED to increase the CIC capital budget [currently $1000] by $500, in order to put more things on wheels, and to put wheeled things on bigger wheels. MOVED to amend by changing the amount to $1000. Amendment accepted as friendly. Motion CARRIED on a voice vote.

• Arisia '03 Report (Skip Morris)

I'm still working on an AGOH, and should have an announcement soon. We had two parties at Balticon, thanks to Phi, Linda, and Paul. We're working on a budget. Lisa will be publishing a concom newsletter. Lastly, we're working on the computers in storage for a registration data entry sometime in the next month or so.

There was a motion last year to authorize the conchair to purchase a computer for registration. This was never done. MOVED to reauthorize the motion to allocate money for a reg computer. Motion ruled out of order, as it applied specifically to the '02 conchair.

MOVED to authorize $1000 for the purchase of a laptop computer for registration. MOVED to amend by changing the amount to $1500; failed for lack of a second. Main motion CARRIED on a voice vote.

There will be a concom meeting at Readercon, on Sunday afternoon.

• Database Committee

Rachel Silber has resigned as chair of the database committee. The executive board would like to thank her for her service, and would like to ask for a round of applause in absentia.

• Old Business

There was a motion to allocate $500 to spend on massage training, which motion was tabled to the next meeting. Motion left on the table.

• New Business

MOVED to amend Corporate Policy, to allow the Art Show to set their own rates. Motion FAILED for lack of second.

MOVED to amend Convention Policy section III, subsection c), by substitution with the following:

MOVED to table; failed for lack of second. Motion CARRIED on a voice vote.

MOVED to set as policy that the pre-reg rates shall be $25 through March 31 of the calendar year preceding the convention, $30 through November 30 of the calendar year preceding the convention, and $40 thereafter. Motion CARRIED on a voice vote.

MOVED to set as policy that the at-door registration rates shall be $40 for the weekend, $20 for Friday only, $25 for Saturday only, and $15 for Sunday only. Motion CARRIED on a voice vote.

MOVED to set as policy that the babysitting registration rate shall be the same as the prevailing adult full membership. Motion CARRIED on a voice vote.

• Announcements

Tom Murphy would like to announce his intention to seek the eboard's appointment as conchair of Arisia '04.

Anyone else who is interested in being conchair should nominate themselves before the end of the July corporate meeting (July 16).

• Meeting adjourned at 4:06 PM.

Membership/Subscription Information

Subscription to Mentor of Arisia is included with Corporate Membership to Arisia, Incorporated. Membership runs from September 1st to August 31st and costs $24. Dues are pro-rated on a monthly basis for members joining during the year.

Executive Board

Storage Facility Key Holders

Committee Members & Corporate Appointed Officers

Membership Roster

Calendar of Events

July 12-14, 2002
Readercon 14
Marriott Hotel, Burlington MA

Sunday, July 14, 2002 (tentative)
Arisia '03 Concom Meeting
Readercon, Burlington MA

Tuesday, July 16, 2002, 7:00pm
Arisia Corporate Meeting
Arisia storage facility, Somerville MA

August 29-September 2, 2002
ConJosé/60th World Science Fiction Convention
San José Convention Center, San José CA

October 4-6, 2002
Albacon 2002
Ramada Inn, Schenectady, NY

October 4-6, 2002
Trinoc*coN 2002
Durham Marriott, Durham, NC

November 2, 2002
Con*Cept 2002
Days Inn, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

December 13-15, 2002
Philcon 2002
Center City Marriott Hotel, Philadelphia, PA

January 17-19, 2003
Arisia '03
Boston Park Plaza Hotel, Boston, MA

ARISIA, Incorporated
Building 600, PMB 322
1 Kendall Square
Cambridge, MA 02139