August 12, 2013

Valley Fliers August Board Meeting

Meeting Commenced at: 7:00.

Present: Lawton, Patrick, DeWitt, Bryce, plus 5 members.

Excused: Vader, Botezatu

Approval of Previous Meeting Minutes

July meeting minutes were approved. The insurance survey mentioned in the minutes will be sent out soon.

Treasurer’s Report

  • See Alan’s handout. Two membershipsare still for sale, two new members attended this month’s meeting: John Eyre and Jon Gunnarsson.
  • 9534H flew the most this past month with 80 hours. It was a busy flying month.
  • A note about the month-to-month treasurer’s reports: the numbers reported are preliminary and may be adjusted as additional receipts come in.
  • Note to all members: if the balance on the fuel cards goes less then $1,000, they should call Alan DeWitt and let him know so that additional money can be added to our account. During July, the cards ran out of money temporarily. The total amount spent on fuel was $9,473 for the month.

There was a question from the members about the fact that the club pays sales tax. Alan explained the history behind our current situation and noted that the monthly dues are the only items that we are currently paying sales tax on.

Maintenance Officer’s Report

See Tom’s handout. The good news is that all four planes are back on line.

  • 759MA: a new starter has been ordered; a new voltage regulator has been ordered; and we’re going to look into getting a panel-mounted clock in order to meet IFR requirements. There also appears to be a fuel leak on the left-hand tank when the tanks are topped (no leak with our normal fueling of 30 gal/side). It is also overdue for a magneto inspection and overhaul. The overhaul costs approximately $500 and will take about a week. A 406 MHz ELT will be installed this Fall/Winter when demand for the plane is lower. The missing fuel dipstick has been replaced and a part has been ordered for the damaged elevator end cap.
  • 9534H: The copper particles in the oil filter have not reappeared. Subsequent oil changes have been clean. The pilot’s PTT switch has been repaired.

There was a discussion about ordering a 3-blade prop for 759MA took place in order to improve ground clearance and reduce the chance of another prop strike like 42043 had. Tom is going to look into propeller options to see what the different propeller radius will be with a 3-blade vs. a 2-blade prop.

There was also a discussion about spare headsets for club members. There are currently seven working headsets in the office. We may look into additional headsets if we can buy used headsets cheaply. The new headsets we had purchased previously were all stolen out of the office.

Safety Officer’s Report

The POH for 759MA has been scanned in and was made into a PDF. Bryce will send it to Lawton for inclusion on the website. The checklist and check-out quiz still need to be updated.

Patrick has been doing the weight and balance forms for the planes in Excel. He will update the Excel spreadsheet and email it to Lawton for the website.

Bryce will look into getting bumpers for the posts and walls so that if a member pushes a plane’s tail into a post, it shouldn’t damage the tail. Additionally, he will also finish repainting the lines used to assist in pushing the planes into the hangars. Patrick mentioned that the Auburn airport manager plans on resealing the blacktop next year, which will cover over those lines, and that there is a possibility that we will move the 182 to where the Fairchild is currently parked at some point in the future.

New Business:

Airplane Reservations: Lawton brought up that members aren’t being responsible for canceling their reservations when they don’t actually fly. The discussion was around VFR only pilots reserving the plane, and then sitting on the reservation until the weather cleared, preventing IFR pilots from using the planes. Additionally, a number of members haven’t been returning the planes promptly when their reservation is over so that the next member’s flight is delayed (and sometimes has to be cancelled). He suggested that there needs to be some punishment for offenders. After some discussion, it was decided that we’ll start with an email and ScheduleMaster emphasis program to try to remind members to update their reservations promptly.

Member Applications: The member applications process needs to be revamped as we’re not collecting enough personal information (copy of pilot’s license, medical, etc) for insurance purposes. Also need to have a signed copy of the Bylaw’s and a statement that the member will be responsible for the insurance deductible if aircraft damage is caused by negligence (currently there is a $300 deductible). John Eyre will work with Lawton on a new PDF-fillable-fields application that can be used for new members.

Insurance Survey: Lawton will send out the insurance survey to all members in order for DeWitt to receive the results prior to the end of the month. John Eyre will produce the insurance survey using a PDF-fillable-fields questionnaire. DeWitt will check on final questionnaire requirements prior to Lawton sending out the form.

Member/Aircraft Checkouts: Bryce will look into an online system to track which members are authorized to fly which aircraft and to record qualifying aircraft checkouts. Hopefully this can be tied to ScheduleMaster.

Club House Door Lock: There was a discussion of controlling the digital lock on the club house door to prevent access by members who have left the club. Lawton will look into the issue. John Gallo was the member who knows the system and initially got the club to use the digital lock, and the manual for the system is in the file cabinet. The problem is that the lock has an unknown interface mechanism and it’s difficult to delete/assign/change a member’s personal code when they join or leave the club.

Flight Time Drawing:

Drawing for flight hour won by: John Eyre

Meeting Adjourned at 8:50.