Local Clay Notes

Local Clay Meetings for 2004 : January 14th, March 11th, May 12th, September 16th, and November 17th

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The following are the minutes from the January 8th, 2004 Local Clay Board Meeting

In Attendance : Don Clarke, Frank Gosar, Kay Irish, Mary Briggs, Barbara Ward, Robert Wolchock, and non-Board members Dan Schmitt, Rhoda Fleischman, Michael Fromme.

Budget : Kay opened the meeting with a chart of the past year's budgets to which was added the "actuals" from the material that Barbara (Treasurer) provided. There was a line-item discussion of each category which is summarized as follows :

• President : small amount to cover any supplies and/or phone calls. $25 requested
• Secretary : covers all "snail-mail" of announcements, minutes, and annual directory plus coping costs of these plus membership applications, etc. $270 requested.
• Treasurer : small amount to cover any supplies and/or phone calls. $10 requested
• Clay In Education : funding for community outreach. Given absence of Committee Chair (resigned) there was discussion which resulted in a request for $1200.
• Insurance : ClayFest now covers 100% of liability insurance; therefore, item was eliminated.
• Membership : covers promotional-type materials such as the brochure. $80 requested.
• Empty Bowls : FFLC funds all costs of this fundraiser; therefore, no funds were requested.
• Workshops : after some discussion (see below) decision was made to increase the funding and a request was made for $2000.
• Legal : covers cost of Assumed Name registration. $20 requested.
• POBox : shared expense (with ClayFest) of post office box. $19 requested.

The discussion resulted in a proposed budget which is outlined in the following table :

CATAGORY	2003 BUDGET	2003 ACTUAL	2004 BUDGET
PRESIDENT	$ 25	0	$ 25
SECRETARY	$ 216	$ 296	$ 270
TREASURER	0	0	$ 10
CLAY IN EDUCATION	$ 1173	$ 700	$ 1200
MEMBERSHIP	$ 80	0	$ 80
EMPTY BOWLS	$ 10	0	$ 10
WORKSHOPS	$ 1458	$ 908	$ 2000
LEGAL	$ 20	$ 20	$ 20
POBOX	$ 19	$ 19	$ 19
TOTAL	$3,001	$ 1,994	$ 3,624

The budget was approved as requested. Given the current carry-forward bank balance of $ 4,880 this means that we have $ 1,256 held in reserve.

Committee Reports : Kay then requested that each Committee Chair give a brief update.

• Empty Bowls : Mary Briggs gave an overview of the current plans for the annual Empty Bowls sale. Given all the changes within FFLC since the last event a number of those involved are new, but Mary sensed an excitement that was reassuring. While there is no firm date for the sale, there is consideration of April 2nd (again a Friday Art Walk). Frank mentioned that this was the day before opening of Saturday Market and it may prevent a number of local potters from attending the opening reception given for them. It was also noted that the sale has become so established as an annual event that there may really be no need to continue to have it on Friday Art Walk days. Further, the event attracts so many people that it literally sucks the customers from the other galleries.

  This year the White Lotus has dropped out as the site of the sale and FFLC is investigating alternatives. There are now two large (~ $10,000 each) sponsors who want to ensure that the location is "appropriate" to their clientele and supports their objectives in funding the event. A number of places in downtown are under consideration, but nothing is final.

  FFLC would also like to increase the number of bowls as they sell out every year. Frank mentioned that there is a limit to the number of bowls that can be expected from the local potters and noted that perhaps FFLC should consider developing another fundraising event rather than continuing to attempt to increase the number of bowls. Mary noted that last year FFLC added both wood-workers and glass-blowers to the mix in an attempt to increase the number of bowls.
  
  Mary also notes that FFLC will be attending the January 14th Local Clay meeting to discuss this with the membership.
  At this point it appears that there is another Throw-a-Thon planned at Club Mud. The date is not yet firm, but is currently planned to be Saturday, January 31st.

• Workshops : Based on last year's funding, Frank had planned to do three workshops. He has already confirmed these as follows : (02/22) Sue Roden at Club Mud, (02/29) Ricky Bellinger at Club Mud, (03/13-14) Hank Murrow at his studio. Given the increase in budget for the coming year, Frank will hand off to his successor other possibilities that he has been considering.

• Clay In Education : Kay gave a brief overview of the funding guidelines. Mary asked if it would be possible for this outreach to provide funding support to buy a equipment, but the general consensus was that this was not within the scope. Kay mentioned that a number of schools are closing down their art programs due to funding and getting rid of their equipment, and that perhaps this could be an avenue for inexpensive equipment.

• ClayFest : Robert noted that the first Steering Committee meeting for the 2004 show is on January 22nd. He mentioned that he has been working to fill all the openings and has had some success. For those of you still interested in volunteering to help manage the show, the openings can be seen online by visiting http://www.clayfest.org/chairs.htm where each position as a job description.

  Robert mentioned that there was some discussion about alternative floorplans being considered including the introduction of "group booth" space (these options can be seen online by visiting http://www.clayfest/cf04.htm and following the links). There was some historical discussion about "group booth" space and the pros and cons thereof, but no conclusions as any changes are the purview of the Steering Committee.
  
  Rhoda reminded the group that ClayFest is required to donate a portion of its revenue back to Local Clay and asked for a status update. Robert assured her that at one of the first few meetings the 2003 show's financials would be reviewed and the Steering Committee would vote on an amount to transfer to Local Clay. There was some discussion regarding whether ClayFest should dictate which function (ie : Workshops, Clay In Education, etc) gets the funding or whether that should be up to Local Clay. Despite my careful attention to the discussion, I cannot be sure how this dialog ended other than that ClayFest would provide funding.

ByLaws : Don broached a question regarding the last section of the ByLaws (Article XI, Section 3) relating to approvals for expending funds. The current ByLaws state :

Section 3.
A) Treasurer and one Board member may authorize expenditures up to $100;
B) A quorum of the Board of Directors may authorize expenditures up to $500;
C) Expenditures of more than $500 must be approved by a majority vote of a quorum of the membership.

Don was concerned because he is constantly co-signing checks for sums considerably larger than $100 (which he presumed to be the limit for he and Barbara to sign). There was discussion regarding the meaning of the word "authorize" which Don felt meant " sign a check for " and others felt meant "budget" for. Either way, the group agreed that the current wording was somewhat ambiguous and voted unanimously to add clarification to this section. The amended ByLaws now read :

Section 3. For all expenditures not expressly included in an approved annual budget :

The portion in bold has been added for clarification, the remainder was not changed. Since ClayFest is a function of Local Clay and all funds transfer in-and-out of the Local Clay account, it was agreed that the annual ClayFest budget must also be approved by the membership in order to comply with the ByLaws.

Committee Openings : Kay said that there are still a number of positions open mentioning specifically Clay In Education and Workshops. Barbara said that she may be moving next year and thought it would be appropriate to have a trainee for the Treasurer position. Anyone interested in getting involved should contact Kay (kayirish@softhome.net or 541-935-4327) as all openings will be voted on at the upcoming January 14th general membership meeting.

At this point there appeared to be no further items to discuss and it was moved and approved to close the meeting of the Board of Directors.