Bakersfield Smooth Dancers
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NATIONAL SMOOTH DANCERS, INC Board of Directors Meeting — Minutes September 2, 2006    Fresno, Ca.

President Kathy Sachse called the meeting to order at 8:44 a.m. and asked Hartune Neffian to lead the members in the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag.

The following members were present at the roll call:

Los Angeles - Tina Van Zandt                                San Fernando Valley - Bill Krambo

- George Zimmermann                    Bakersfield                         - Bill Landry

Visalia              - Hartune Neffian                            San Diego                         - Al Folkrnan

Palomar           - George Mozes                             Golden Gate                      - Herb Chow

Fresno             - Kathy Sachse

Gorgon Lloyd and Bill Dean were absent. Wandalee Dimond sat in for Al Folkman when he left early. Phil Brown sat in for Herb Chow when he left early.

The Home Office Secretary read minutes of the March 25, 2006 meeting. It was moved and seconded that the minutes be accepted as read.

Kevin McCready reported that there was nothing beyond the listed on the revised agenda to be reported to the Board.

Membership Report:

Los Angeles                               87                       San Fernando Valley 40

San Diego                                  135                     Bakersfield                          193

Golden Gate                               75                       Visalia                                   98

Palomar                                     36                       Fresno                                  90

State Total                               754 An increase 61 since reported at the Board Meeting in March of 2006.

Old Business:

(a) Convention – 2007 – Visalia

Visalia reports that they are working on it. Contracts have been signed. Loth Carr and Stan Medina are Co-chairs. They will be doing a presentation at the Monday morning Farewell Breakfast.

(b)           Convention 2008 – San Diego

Kay Ryan and Wandalee Dimond are Co-chairs. They are holding meetings and working on themes. They have concerns on costs and parking. Rooms will be $155.00 plus tax and parking will be $18.00. They want as many people there as possible. Their format is the same as prior Conventions. The hotel provides the floor as part of the contract.

(c)           Convention 2009 – Open

San Francisco is not in a position at this time to put in a formal bid for 2009. They are having concerns on finding a location, which can provide the sufficient size and yet make the package cost affordable.

(d)           Hartune Neffian filled in information on costs to purchase, store, transport, install and maintain flooring. There was a general discussion on the subject. Some chapters brought the matter to their members. A number of the chapters indicated that they were not interested.

It was agreed that the subject would be dropped.

 

Chapter Reports:

Los Angeles:

They have 87 paid members. At their 3^rd Sunday dances they have 30-40 participants. At the Black & White Ball the have 35-40.

Their Coronation will be January 26-27 and will be held at the Sheraton Four Points Hotel in Arcadia/Monrovia.

San Diego:

They have 135 total members, including 6 Life Members. They also have 3 honorary members. Dues are $30. And the have a one-time initiation fee of $10. Their normal events include monthly socials, weekly dance classes and the local Senior Olympics (not in 2006). Most activities are the same as last year.

A Significant addition last year was the preparation of a policy and procedures manual. A major benefit to the chapter was their website. They have a public area and a member's area, which is protected with a password.

Golden Gate:

Their membership is stable. The chapter is solvent. Their socials are well attended with 120 – 160 people. They have a dance lesson taught by a professional teacher before each social. Phil Brown, speaking for himself, suggested that all chapters be involved in each convention. Each chapter would be assigned a convention event.  There would be a chapter in charge making the assignments and providing a budget. The question of how the income or loss would be distributed was discussed. The Board Member will bring this back to their chapter for discussion.

Palomar:

They have 6 new members. They have started beginner's dance lesson, which has helped in the increase. Past Queen Dana Sharon convinced a newspaper to do an article on Ballroom dancing. They received many calls from that. Members assist the beginner's lessons by dancing with students

They lost their lease at the Grange Hall. They are meeting at the Oceanside Country Club. As a condition country club members are permitted to participate.

San Fernando Valley :

They have 40 members and are financial solvent. Social activities are basically the same as last year. Their convention was financially successful which greatly contributed to their stability. In January they began holding half hour dance lessons prior to the monthly dance. Its too early to tell if it will help attract new members.

Their members feel it is prudent to continue insurance coverage at this time.

Bakersfield:

They have dance lessons each Tuesday. The first session is free. The others are intermediate and advanced They are charged for. The instructor is a paid professional from Fresno.

Practices are held at the Grange Hall.

Their membership is at 193. Bill Landry indicated that it might be getting too large.

Visalia:

Membership is 98, an increase of 15 since the last convention. Dues are $36 per year. The financial condition of the chapter is excellent.

The social events are basically the same as last year. Annually they recognize members who have made outstanding contributions to the Chapter. Awards include an Achievement award, Most improved dancer and others. They have five music persons who rotate their services.

Their Queen receives $200 to attend each coronation.

Fresno:

Their membership is at 90, an increase of 6 since State Board. The chapter is financially sound.

Fresno's Webmaster continues with the website. She now has provided a page for Visalia and Bakersfield. It also links to all other chapters.

Fresno provided each Board Member with a copy of their 2007 calendar.

Good of the Order: Nothing was offered.

Adjournment:

No further business being brought, it was moved, seconded and approved to adjourn the meeting at 9:50 a.m.

Respectively Submitted,

Kevin McCready,

At the Board and President's meeting I put out several ideas on how several of us in the Golden Gate Chapter think that convention should be changed. Because I was the one to put these ideas out and because each chapter needs to talk about them, at the Presidents meeting I said I would send each of the people there a reminder as to what the possible changes are and some thoughts as to how some of the changes could work.

Because 1 also put these ideas out at the Board meeting, I'm sending this to those representatives. I'm also including a couple of other ideas.

Most of these ideas are concerned with trying to save our members money and to save the hosting chapter a lot of work.

San Diego seems to be facing the same type of problem Golden Gate is, mainly the cost. Right now, especially if the convention is held at either end of the state, it is costing a couple close to $1,000 to attend. That is a lot of money and the cost may be causing some of our members not to attend.

Another problem for some members may be starting on Fri. It is possible that some of our members still work and can not get Fri. off.

A third problem is the amount of work needed to put on a convention. We already have one chapter (Palomar) that does not have enough members. LA is starting to indicate that when their turn comes they may not have enough members to do the needed work.

So, here are some ideas to try and address these problems.

I think it is possible to hold the convention in the same place every year, a place such as Fresno. It is kind of centrally located so nobody goes all the way from the north to the south, thus cutting down on travel time and cost.

In addition, a spot like Fresno is going to cost less than SF or San Diego or LA which will make the package cost less and probably the rooms. San Diego has said the room rate for the 200B convention will be $155 per night plus tax of 10 or 12%. In addition there will be a parking fee of $18 per day. As many of you know, the only place Golden Gate has found that is big enough will make package cost over $250.

I realize that each chapter can decide where they are going to hold the convention they are hosting, if we chose Fresno as the site for all conventions, the Fresno chapter has offered to help coordinate. In addition, once the contract was worked out, it would be the same for every convention because the needs would be the same. The only thing that might change over time is the cost. The contract would simply be on the computer and all we would have to do is call it up.

Obviously if a convention is held in central place, the hosting chapter will face a problem of transporting all of the decorations and sound equipment. But perhaps this is really not a problem. What it really means is that the decorations would have to be simple, not elaborate. Perhaps instead of spending money on decorations, the money could be spent on real flower arrangements. It could be worked out.

Another problem is the transportation of the sound equipment. Perhaps this could be solved by using the hotel's equipment or renting the needed equipment in Fresno.

Some might say that holding the convention in a place other than your home base means you are not publicizing your own area. This can be overcome by using banners around the ballroom. And anyway, San Fernando did not seem to have a problem last year when they hosted convention at Palm Desert.

A second idea was to stop having a single club host a convention. Instead we could have one chapter as the lead chapter but have all the other chapters take over the responsibility for one or more of the functions or events.

The lead chapter would come up with an overall theme. They would be responsible for relationships with the hotel. They would be responsible for printing the program. They would be responsible for the coronation night. Now the other chapters could be assigned other duties such as hospitalities (already happens), the Fri. night dance, the Sat. afternoon dance, the Sat. night dance, the competition, etc. Or perhaps a chapter could be responsible for a complete day, or making up and printing the state roster.

This way the work would be spread out and it would change from year to year. This way the smaller chapters who currently cannot put on a convention can be part of it.

Currently the hosting chapter sets a budget for all events. They would do the same if other chapters were taking care of that event. The lead chapter would give the other chapter a budget for say Sat. afternoon. The lead chapter would give the other chapter the general theme. Now the chapter responsible for Sat. afternoon can come up with a sub theme, they decide on the decorations and how they spend the money given by the lead chapter. If the Sat. afternoon chapter wants to spend more and make a bigger splash, they spend their own money and go for it.

There was some concern that this could cause some problems in communication. I don't see it. We all have e-mail. We are all reasonable people.

Some of us think that convention should be cut to two nights instead of three nights. This would reduce the cost by one nights stay at the hotel and would cut the work. However, to really make this work there would have to be coordination between Bakersfield and convention so that things like competition and meetings are spread between the two.

An example of what we might do would be to have Bakersfield hold the one and three star events and convention hold the two and four-star events