The John Trigg Ester Library

JTEL Board of Directors Meeting 10/13/2010

Agenda:

Roll Call

Minutes from the September 8 board meeting

Officers' Reports

Opportunity for Public Comments

Old Business:

  • Readers on the Run wrapup & overview
  • state Designated Legislative Grant status
  • community revenue sharing status
  • nonprofit application: status and review
  • Martt and Mölders recognition
  • procurement policy
  • collections policy
  • liability insurance
  • library office

Opportunity for Public Comments

New Business:

  • bylaws
  • grantwriting workshop
  • capital campaign organization & planning (grantwriting, long-term support, Alaska Community Foundation, payroll deduction plan deadines, etc.)
  • budgeting
  • construction & design task list

Opportunity for Public Comments

Events:

Next meeting: Friday, November 12, 2010

BOARD MEETING MINUTES

Call to order 7:02

Attending: Greta Burkart, Nancy Burnham, Roy Earnest, Deirdre Helfferich, Monique Musick

Guests: Hans Mölders, Trey Simmons

Minutes from September 9, 2010

Eric: Move to accept minutes

Nancy: second

ACTION: unanimous

OFFICERS' REPORTS

President’s Report:

Signed a notarized land purchase- contract with ECA, Will pay off by October 24, 2010

Attended grant writing workshop Sep. 20-24: Intense, 50 hours of work, Want to set-up a post-workshop meeting. Workshop taught:

  • How to find grants
  • How to interpret
  • Propose
  • Letter of inquiry
  • Do not “roach approach”
  • Got a manual for all of it
  • Access to Grant Station for one year: Has all kinds of details and links, Guidelines and tutorials too
    • How to register for a DUNS number
  • Wants to do a workshop for the board. Was a great experience
  • Was not tuition waiver eligible- $60 fee, In addition to $999 expense

MOTION: Nancy- reimburse Deirdre $60 fee

Eric: second

Unanimous

Received Mel’s recording CDs. Did work on CD covers, Will have them

Sent e-mail to Stutzman: Jeff Mart has been backpedaling on $10,000 figure. No response, Need to call and follow up

State Legislative appropriation: Does not end June 2011- we have five years, Reassuring because it is a reimbursement grant not an upfront income

Lots of e-mail communication this month

Visited USKH:

  • Plans were too late for dirt work this year
  • Discovered that there may be additional survey points needed
  • Probably getting billed- the Sep. ones were not sent out

Annual meeting-

  • Will discuss under new business: Draft agenda, Timeline estimate (Revise as needed)
  • List of meeting packet contents, Annual report contents, What needs to be at meeting

Vice President’s Report:

One insurance bid from Ken Murray. Will seek out competing bids. Request was for general liability, Intended more for us than the property. Needs clarification on what we are looking for. Premium quote: $950 annually, Really involved

Amulic- reportedly the only company that will insure a rural location with trees in 100 ft.

Legislative grant requires liability insurance before any work begins, Any contractors must have workman’s comp

Will continue finding quotes

Monique: paid that at PhotoSynthesis- seems reasonable

GVEA probably isn’t giving quotes because of the price of copper, Now that we know we have a better timeline we can approach power and driveway needs in due time

Public Comment: Trey Simmons-

Debbie (Red Fox) mother has been collection Alaskana first editions and wants to donate them to the library. She is also interested in a donation- possibly a major one. She wants an Alaskana section dedicated to her mother. Wants to bring her mother to the annual meeting. Need to verify her interest in donation- and our non-profit status

Treasurer’s Report

  • $870 deposited
  • $607 to checking
  • Two transfers of $1500 of savings to checking
  • $135 t-shirt sales
  • $1100 Readers in the run
  • $142 donations
  • Dividend $4.80
  • $100- seed money

Expenses

  • List of checks- attached total $1,832.58
  • Including ECA land payment, rent, expenses, events
  • Savings- $13,601
  • Checking- $2,487.98
  • Gulliver’s $290.25

Secretary’s Report

  • Purchased postcards
  • Purchased, wrote and (mostly) distributed LiBerry thank yous
  • Purchased Nolo “How to form a non-profit” book, Led to bylaw and 1023 “adjustments”: Many hours involved

OLD BUSINESS

Readers on the Run wrap-up

  • It went great: Just made the weather, News coverage on channel 11
  • 42 runners, Beautiful day, good spirits
  • 7-8 volunteers
  • Quiz from Stanley was well received
  • Good poetry too
  • $575 in fees
  • $135 in t-shirts
  • $1000 in pledges
  • $1730 total income
  • $468.58 expenses
  • Net $1261.42: Up from last year ~$400
  • Recommend additional spotter on Old Nenana and Ester Creek. Hans had some trouble with some drivers. There were supposed to be boy scouts to help there. Need at least two spotting
  • Next time involve the EVFD- at least inform ahead. Had intended to....

State designated grant status

  • Reimbursement account, lasts til 2015
  • Filed first report, Nothing to claim
  • Want us (designated person) to file reports monthly if anything to report; quarterly if not, Can file sooner either- max once monthly Wait until post-election to file again
  • Said straight up that we may apply again

Community revenue share status- ask to assign to someone else. November- request consideration for consideration, Request putting it on the agenda of the new board

Melinda does not want to run for re-election, Doesn’t want to continue on the board

Bylaws

  • Changes from Deirdre
  • Nolo
  • Did a great job
  • Bylaws took about 10 hours
  • Nolo- discovering a few application needs otherwise not planned on, Following the book’s suggestion
  • Greta has developed some board descriptions and estimated timelines: Deirdre is doing more than required right now
  • Need clean version of section 8
  • Funding of activities: Needs to match financials
  • Also that we need actual projected operating budget for new library, We can’t skate by with the old red building
  • Review is coming as soon as possible

Martt and Muolders recognition

  • Hans got a shelf
  • Jeff Mart will get a shelf dedication

Need a system of recognition for large donors. Move to post-annual meeting discussion

Procurement policy

  • Deirdre has reviewed- minor tweaks but overall great
  • “Trade region” and “local” may need defined. Pretty technical

Collections policy- on hold

  • Section specific to Gulliver’s
  • Sorting and donation policy
  • Needs feedback on things

Liability insurance-

  • State requirement
  • Must use approved contractors if using the grant money- they must have worker’s comp

Library office

  • Nancy left to avoid any conflict of interest
  • Frank and Amy discussed some: Should be able to get for cheap. Amy said that they don’t really want to rent it, Electric bills were a problem, Door needs fixed. Bit of rambling discussion. $300 to $350, We’d pay for the heating
  • Annex is available for $300
  • Brink/Hoener $550 includes fuel
  • Advantages- of Nancy’s:
    • Everything is included: heat, wi-fi, electricity
    • Convenient for Nancy and Deirdre
  • Disadvantages: Not identified with library, Not identified with library by membership
  • Grant, up to 5% can go towards operations (including rent)
  • Monique: My preference Frank’s place, association to library, Ester location, Dealing with contractors, Being in the building with the library
  • Eric: Logical above library, Office is upstairs, Location, familiarity
  • Accessibility, both upstairs
  • Heating costs could be significant at Frank’s: No non-electric heat upstairs
  • Fish bowl internet access- no extra costs
  • Cataloging collections- advantage with close office
  • Possible to maintain library hours
  • Seems like cost is more of an issue than location
  • If we can’t afford a $300 office how can we expect to pay for a 2,000 sq. ft. building?
  • Having a place of business is really important. The corporate office
    • Trey & Greta pledges $20 total
    • Deirdre pledges $50
    • Monique pledges $20
    • Now rent is $210
  • Will make final vote dependent on final cost estimate

NEW BUSINESS

Bylaws- discussed

Grant workshop- discussed

Capital campaign organization & planning

  • Alaska Community Foundation- held a conference call last Friday
  • Discussed a fund for the library
  • Allow online donations, payroll deductions.
  • Easy set-up
  • Don’t have to be your own non-profit to apply
  • An endowment, not a bank account
  • 1.25 percent management fee
  • Credit card fees apply
  • Educate donors on the process- and discourage credit cards
  • Building donations would be separate- we need immediate access
  • Benefit- commitment to the future of the library
  • Searchable by community- no Ester yet!
  • FNS Community Foundation also exists
  • The concept of an endowment is intriguing
  • The payout process depends on
  • Currently the donations are not managed by a “foundation”
  • We can give them a receipt and they can hold off until we are approved

Budgeting-

  • Nancy and Don are working on that
  • Construction and design task list
  • Part of grant workshop: establish goals and timeline, Everything that needs to happen to get there. Then create a budget narrative assigning timelines to these goals
  • Review Deirdre’s projections, comment, and see what’s missing

Comments:

  • Roy- the Alaska section may be highly coveted
  • Rare and odd Alaska books from Jane Williams
  • Jean Lester’s “Faces of Alaska” interviews
  • Possibly a highly competitive section
  • Sine- may not really be helping with the grant process
  • When people start seeing it happen- things will really start moving

EVENTS

Annual Meeting

  • Draft agenda
  • Timeline
  • Reduce bylaws change time
  • Project and do overview
  • Try and keep it short
  • Depend highly on annual meeting packet contents
  • Possible candidates
    • Ken Bloom
    • Sari Brainerd- can’t serve though
    • Judy Tripplehorn- has been invited
    • Nicky Eisman- invited
    • June Pinnell-Sephens
    • Lane & Janice St. John
    • Elzbeth
    • Amy & Joe
  • We have 5 positions to fill (and 3 people confirmed)
  • Have we satisfied our posting requirements? Yes!
  • Before the 10 day requirement
  • List for the annual report- need by Monday- to printer by Wednesday
  • Need bios from everyone else
  • Annual report will be big
  • Officer’s report- 3 minutes
  • All the contents are briefs, not necessarily copies of the policy
  • Deirdre has most done, Nancy will help review
  • Membership list will be as current as possible
  • Need volunteer hours, check list of volunteers

MOTION: Nancy- move to approve making 20 copies of the report for annual meeting

Eric- second

ACTION: Unanimous approval

MOTION: Move to adjorn Monique

Second: Eric

ACTION: Approved 9:26 p.m.

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