USDA Executive Committee Pre-Annual Meeting

USDA Pre-Annual Meeting Minutes – June 21, 2005Page 1 of 11

UNITED SQUARE DANCERS OF AMERICA

USDA Executive Committee Pre-Annual Meeting

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Doubletree Hotel

Portland, Oregon

Meeting called to order at 9:07 a.m. in Portland, Oregon.

INVOCATION: Given by Charlie Holley

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE: Led by Jim Weber

INTRODUCTION OF NOMINEES: No new nominees present.

ADMINISTRATIVE ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Pat Herndon reminded everyone to switch on the microphone before speaking during the meeting and switch it off when finished.

MINUTES OF WINTER MEETING:

Motion was made by Lyle Beck to approve the minutes as printed, seconded by Mark Grumbine. No discussion. Motion approved.

TREASURER REPORT:

Bill Flick distributed several pages of the report. The question was raised if it could be possible to receive this report the evening before the meeting in order to be able to look it over in more detail before presented. After some discussion it was approved for filing for audit.

NEW AFFILIATE APPLICATIONS:

Charlie Holley stated they received an application from the East Central Ohio/West Virginia Square Dance Association that has 300 dancers and 7 clubs. All the paperwork has been filled out and mailed to the President.

Parliamentarian stated the standing rules say that no more than 4 votes is authorized in any one state and in this case this is a multi-state organization so it would not really fall under that guideline.

Motion was made by Charlie Holley and seconded by Michael Streby to accept East Central Ohio/West Virginia to the membership. Motion approved.

OFICER REPORTS:

President Report – Nothing further to report.

Vice President Eastern Region – Houle's were not present but the report is in the packet.

Vice President Central Region – Charlie Holley read a portion of his report to explain why he went over budget somewhat. They mailed out 37 information packets to all of the Central Affiliates and Non-Affiliates encouraging them to use the materials and to download others from the USDA Website. Included in the packets were prescription cards and credit card applications.

Vice President Plains Region – Nothing further to report.

Vice President Western Region – Nothing further to report.

Secretary – Nothing to add to report except I would please ask that when you do speak on the microphone to state your name first.

Historian – Nothing further to report.

Information Officer – Lyle Beck added two additional comments - USDA saved $500 this year because we do not have an ad in the Program Book for this convention. Portland did not contact us and I did not think of it until February, I contacted them and they said no it was too late as the book had already gone into proof, and your organization was contacted two or three times. I asked whom they contacted and they did not know. Next year we will watch more closely and attempt to get an ad in the book.

This year we did not feel we had the money to mail out the packets of News Releases. We prepared several and they are posted on our Website only and next year I would like to start mailing them out again. I feel that if we go through the work of preparing the News Releases, with your help, they should be circulated. With an electronic mailing list we can distribute many that way. We did send out a packet of six News Releases to the Affiliate Presidents a few weeks ago.

Past President Report – Nothing further to report.

Parliamentarian – Nothing further to report but just want to make a comment on attendance at Executive Committee Meetings. A member of the Executive Committee who is absent from an Annual Meeting or two consecutive regular meetings without justifiable cause shall be put on probation. We need to determine if members absence are justifiable or if we need to put them on probation and we are making you aware that this is what the by-laws state. If they were to miss a third meeting they would be subject to the Executive Committee's recommendation to the Board of Directors for their disqualification of future office in the USDA.

Motion made by Charlie Holley to table this matter until the Winter Meeting, seconded by Pat Herndon. Motion approved.

Insurance Coordinator Report – Due to the absence of Loraine Backus, due to health problems, this report tabled until later to give her report time to arrive via overnight mail.

Credit Card Report – Joe Vaccari – A few items of emphasis, we have received several new application forms from the bank and they are available for distribution. All previously issued application forms are still being honored by the bank. Several Press Releases were put out, with the help of the Information Officer. If this program is to grow, we need the help of the Affiliate organizations and dancers and that is the reason for these Press Releases. Open credit cards have dropped 285 in the past year and in the past 3 years have dropped 948 and we are not getting any new cards issued.

Charlie Holley raised the question of whether the interest rate is the reason for not obtaining new credit cards or losing some of the present cards. Joe stated he did not think so and that the reason is that most of the dancers have enough credit cards and do not need any more credit cards.

A suggestion was made that possibly we could get a local San Diego representative of MBNA attend our Winter Meeting in January to give us advice on how to promote the credit card.

Much discussion was held regarding ways of promoting the credit card and all other services provided by USDA. Some of the suggestions will be worked on for use in the future years.

PRESENTATION:

President Jim Weber introduced Jeff Powell with YTB International who made a presentation about a possible fundraiser travel site.

YTB International is a publicly traded company based out of Illinois and they have created an on-line travel-booking engine for associations. They have modeled their program for non-profit organizations. YTB would like to partner with the USDA. The way they do that is take the Website and customize it to look like it belongs to USDA. They will create all the marketing templates, displays, posters, inserts, and website banner ads. They have a marketing team that has all those templates. This program can be used by anyone, not just members of the USDA. Friends and relatives of USDA members may also use this service. YTB would pay USDA 40 percent of monies obtained from people using this service to book their travel. The total cost of the program to get started is $349.00 of which Jeff and his partner each receive $50.00 commission. They will donate their $50.00 commission back to the USDA which means it would cost USDA $250.00 to get started. This will cover getting all the artwork done and getting the website customized. After that it is $49.95 per month. That fee covers hosting the website and making support for the booking engine.

Much discussion was held after the presentation and Jeff answered all questions possible that were presented.

This program will be discussed further later on under New Business.

Budget Report – Bill Flick handed out a Budget Overview to everyone. This was passed at the January Meeting. Several questions were raised about some budget items and it was explained that the budget is just a guideline and sometimes we need to go over budget slightly and there is no need to change it for that reason. A motion was not needed as this budget was approved at the January Meeting.

Youth CommitteeReport – Alitia Becker stated they submitted 4500 fliers to the Convention that were put in the packets for the Youth Trail End Dance. Alitia announced the name of the Youth Scholarship winner is Andrew Turpin from Arkansas and she made a big check to be presented on Wednesday. Andrew will be attending the Arkansas Technical University. Andrew will not be present at the meeting. It was suggested that the check be sent to Andrew and then at the Arkansas State Dance in October a "big" check could be presented to him so that pictures can be taken.

The 2004 recipient of the Youth Scholarship has not yet received his check because he has not sent a letter stating where he will be attending school. The Grandparents will be at the meeting on Wednesday with a letter of appreciation from the recipient.

Education/Publications Report – Bill Appel reported that he made up DVD's from the Youth Training Video.

USDA News – Nothing additional to report to their written report.

National Folk Dance – Mark Grumbine reported he had an adjustment to his written report. He stated he had four (4) State Coordinators out of 50 states, which was a bad response to his request. The ones he has are Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina and Arizona. If we want to make Square Dance the National Folk Dance, we need to get out and "bug" our Senators and Representatives to find out if they will support the issue or not. Senator Blanche Lincoln from Arkansas will introduce a bill when we get a Republican Senator from another state to go along with her.

A suggestion was made that we should forget about getting a Bill for Square Dancing as our National Folk Dance and put our efforts forwarded in getting more states to declare Square Dancing as the State Folk Dance in the states that have not yet done so.

ARTS Report – Charlie Holley reported that he couldn't believe that some on the Executive Committee did not know what ARTS is or what ARTS is trying to do. ARTS is going to be the lifeline for square dancing in the very near future. In the past three years since ARTS has gotten started,they have come a long way; but they are getting anxious to see some results of what they are doing. Charlie recommended that everyone read the ARTS report and go to our Website and click on the ARTS link and learn more about it because they need everyone.

Much discussion was held and questions answered regarding the USDA part in ARTS and what the goal of USDA is in ARTS.

Insurance Report – Lorraine Backus was not present because of illness and she sent her report, which was distributed. Several comments were made on what an exceptional job Lorraine does in her job as Insurance Coordinator. Jim Weber stated he had the audit of the insurance books and they were found to be in excellent condition.

Motion was made by Mark Grumbine to accept the Insurance Report and the Audit as presented. Seconded by Bill Appel. Motion carried.

Handicapable Report – Nothing further to report.

Long Term Care Report - Bill Appel stated that Long Term Care will be a good income project, but at this time we have not been able to generate any substantial amounts of income. The question was raised if we could send generic applications to everyone. That would be difficult because the applications vary in each state because of the insurance regulations. Jim Weber reported that on the back of our trifold is a preliminary generic application that will tell them (the company) what state and age bracket you're in and other basic information. From that preliminary application they are able to get quotes from three companies and they send you those quotes. You choose which one you are interested in and let them know. Then they will send you the full application, which includes a medical questionnaire. Applicants send in the completed full application, medical questionnaire and the first premium payment. At this point USDA receives $100 per applicant, whether your final application is declined or approved or whether you continue with the insurance or decide not to take the policy and cancel. They can turn you down or you could be issued a policy and you decide you don't want it and you will get your money back.

Badges – Joy Vaccari stated she had nothing more to report on the badges. The badge people have moved and their new address is The Badge Hut, Bobby and Arlene Kirkpatrick, 311 Monterrey Trail, Valley View, TX 76272, phone and fax is 940-726-3312.

USA Traveler Badge - Joy reported that Floyd & Judy Engelhart made 36 states, Mike & Mary Strub from Wisconsin made 24 states and they will be at the meeting to pick up their bars, Charlie & Kitty Holley received their 36 state bars today, Mike & Judy Downey from Omaha, Nebraska got 36 states. I have just received word that as of tonight we will have one couple that finished 48 states and will be getting their tickets to the National and that is Bill & Bobbi Shepard.

NSDC Facilities – San Antonio and future – Pat Herndon talked a little about the Oregon convention facilities. The meeting rooms were very nice. The agreement was to have 16 room nights for each of the four nights in the convention. We came up short on that but we had people staying Monday and Tuesday and that brought it up to about 100 room nights and they said that would be all right. We've since had quite a few cancellations and we're down to a total of 80 room nights instead of 100 and during the convention when we were suppose to have 64 room nights we have 54. They haven't said anything about that except I think they are retaliating by giving us small rooms.

The facilities in San Antonio are proving to be a bit more challenging than Oregon. Oregon has been extremely cooperative and helpful from the start. Several months ago I talked to the Housing Chairman for San Antonio and we talked about what our needs were and of course we had to get referred to the General Chairman for the meeting rooms. I explained to them that we need to know where our meetings are going to be so we can decide what hotel we want to have our room block in. We at least want to have our rooms in the hotel where our Executive Committee Meetings on Tuesday and Saturday are and we told them it was not as important where the Wednesday meeting was. We suggested that if the Wednesday meeting was at the Menger, that might be more convenient because NEC people could slip out of their meeting and come to our meeting for moment. I finally was able to contact Butch Hayes and at the time he couldn't tell me anything specific but he said he would try and negotiate with the hotels and have some information for us soon. I saw him this morning and he said he was still working on it. I told him our meeting was today and I needed to make a report. He said talk to the Housing Chairman about that and I said I needed to know where the meetings are so we know what hotel we want. He said their meetings were going to be in the Menger but the Menger is now already sold out. At this point I don't have anything concrete to report to you. We do have the registration forms to be filled out and turned in all together on Saturday. Hopefully they will have information on the meeting rooms by Saturday.

I will be talking with the people from Charlotte this weekend to let them know of our needs and see if they have some suggestions now or at least so they can be thinking about it.

SoundSystem – The sound is working fine. We had one cable that went bad and needs to be replaced. Because of that we may be short one tomorrow at the meeting. If we are short on the end of one of the tables, the people on the end of that table may need to walk in toward the middle of the table and give their report on one of the other microphones.

Bill Flick asked the question if ARTS would be using USDA Sound System for their meeting on Sunday.

Motion was made by Pat Herndon that USDA loan the sound system to ARTS for their meeting on Sunday. Seconded by Lyle Beck. Motion carried.

Ways & Means – Bill Flick brought along tee shirts, from the Houle's, to sell at the meeting. He also had a sample tote bag that would have USDA logo on it. He did not have costs of the tote bag.

USDA After Party – Charlie and Kitty distributed invitations to the after party for everyone to hand out. After Party will be Friday night, 10 p.m. to midnight, Hall E. We will have the sticks with the flag on to help fill up squares. We will have a sign in board as in the past and they will call in the order that they sign in. As the callers sign in we will fill out a 3x5 card with their name and address so that we have a current list of callers. Several of the letters sent out this year came back because of a wrong address. We have some directional signs that will be put up directing the dancers to the hall.

Showcase of Ideas – Michael Streby sent around a list for EC members could sign up for a time to work in the Showcase of Ideas. He also requested help on Wednesday morning to set up the booth.