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BAOC Board Meeting

Date: (Wed.) Jun. 13, 2007
Location: Menlo Park, CA
Event Directors: - 650.906.9672, - 650.248.9595
Type: Quarterly meeting of the Board of Directors -- 7:00-10:00 PM; pizza will be available at 6:30 -- All club members are welcome


Present were: Trinka Gillis, Steve Beuerman, Everett Beuerman, Jean Beuerman, Matthias Kohler, Brad Wetmore, Bob Cooley, Nick Corsano, Mark Blair, Scott Aster, Jeff Lanam, George Minarik, Jay Hann, Nancy Lindeman, Gela Siganevich, Derek Maclean, Kelly Wells.

1. Approval of Last Meeting Minutes – Nick Corsano

"Jan Hann" should be changed to "Jay Hann".
Section 8 of the previous meetings minutes should also have included the exact wording of the proposal on tax-exempt status.
The previous meeting's minutes were approved with the changes above.
It was decided that Jeff Lanam will only publish approved minutes in the Bulletin. However, the highlights of the most recent board meeting minutes can be published in the next Bulletin after being run past Nick Corsano for review.

2. No Email Votes To Report On

3. President's Report – Nick Corsano

GCO is back with two new club leaders—Dave Takacs and Ellie Lightfoot. Two meets are planned for fall. We will post their meets on our website when they have been announced.
Mark Prior, the Adventure Racing Coordinator, is moving to Europe. He recommends discontinuing the position. Since our policy refers adventure racing companies to other organizations for help with the orienteering part of their events, it doesn't seem necessary to have this position anymore.
Peter Graube is taking leadership of the EPunch duties, but has not taken on the title of EPunch Director.
Congratulations to Rex Winterbottom on the conclusion of the Spring Sprint Series.
The USOF Annual General Meeting will be held on Friday, August 10th in Colorado. BAOC may get six delegates. Nick will be one.
33 club members attended the Annual General Meeting at Sunol. The discussion brought up two concepts that many participants felt were particularly important: park access and volunteer development.

4. Event Coordinator's Report – Brad Wetmore

Related to volunteer development, Brad Wetmore said that several events coming up will have co-course setters, including Bayfront, Tamarancho, and China Camp.
Mark Prior also held the position of North Bay Event Coordinator. Since he is departing, that position is also being vacated.
Events for 2007 are almost all planned. A few may be added in the fall. The Stanford Orienteering Club can't apply for the permit for that event until the club is reformed in the fall.
Brad is starting the 2008 planning process. He wants to return Joe Grant to the last week of April. Some things worked well for 2007, some didn't. Will try to spread out events more so we don't have the feast/famine situations during the year. He is holding weekends open when GCO may have events. His goal is to have at least one forested 7-course B-meet a month.
As currently scheduled, there will be 35 days of orienteering in 2007, plus two volunteer appreciation days. This includes seven Ski-O days. Two to three days may possibly be added to the schedule.
He still plans to publish online the schedule of events that are in progress but not yet finalized.
We lost the use of Big Basin, unless we are willing to stay on trails. Club should recontact Big Basin after a period to see if there are subsequent changes to policy. According to Jeff Lanam, Little Basin, formerly owned by Hewlett Packard, is being transferred to the Peninsula Open Space Trust. It may eventually be transferred to the State Park System. This area is too small to map for a B meet, but adjoins our Big Basin map, and might be a good expansion area if we are allowed back at Big Basin.
Brad is reminding all Event Directors and Course Setters about the volunteer checklist that is posted online.
We used to have auto liability on our insurance plan, but we no longer do. This means that the driver's own insurance is exposed. The club could also be exposed. He recommends that we avoid using shuttles until this is worked out, or hire third-party shuttle services. The driver of any shuttles, if not third party, must be licensed and insured. Morgan Territory is the only event on the schedule that is planning to use shuttles. Brad will find out what other clubs are doing about this.
The driver's/owner's insurance has always been primary. The insurance that USOF used to carry was to cover any excess, plus the club's exposure. That was dropped for the USOF member clubs in 2007. Brad is in conversation with the USOF insurance agent to see what can be done, but no word yet.
Jeff Lanam mentioned that San Jose is the jumping-off spot for the 2008 Olympic team, and suggested that we invite the team to one of our events.

5. Treasurer's Report – Steve Beuerman

The club has $46,000 in the bank now. We are still expecting back the $250 deposit for Twin Peaks. We are on budget for 2007, but a lot depends on the A-meets.

6. Mapping Report – Bob Cooley

He spent three days at Spring Lake, repairing the map. Vladimir Zherdev is at Boggs Mountain. That will be a 14 square kilometer map when it is finished. When he finishes at Boggs Mountain, he will start working on Pacheco Pass. That will also be about 14 square kilometers when it is finished, and it isn't too steep.
There was a small fire at Boggs Mountain, but Bob repaired the map. Bob will be adding more areas to Skyline. No progress has been made on the Knowland Park map.
GCO wants to improve the Granite Bay map and has asked for our help. They may pay for the photos and base map, and we may pay for field checking. The existing map is so bad that it can't be fixed. The map will be about 5 square kilometers.
Jeff Lanam suggested a new park near Calero (Canada del Oro). Bob hasn't approached them because he doesn't know their attitude toward off-trail use. Also, the new area is slightly inaccessible because of poison oak. We could map more of Calero, but course setters seem reluctant to use areas far from the parking lot, so the unmapped areas may not be used.
Scott Aster mentioned that we have permission to map and use the Boy Scout Sierra Camp at Spalding Lake, near Yuba Gap and Cisco Grove. It is an undeveloped Boy Scout camp. Scott will send the letter he has, giving the club this right, to the club secretary.

7. A-Meet Planning Committee Proposal – George Minarik

A-meet committee
October 13th and 14th, 2007 – Boggs Mountain
June 20, 21, 22, 2008 – Tahoe 3-day. Friday sprint at Northstar, Saturday a middle-distance event at Northstar, and Sunday a classic-distance event at Northstar.
Fall 2008 Boggs Mountain or O in the Oaks, 2- or 3-day.
Fall 2009 Pacheco Pass A-meet
Proposes that we host the U.S. Team Trials in May 2009. It will be a three-day event with a sprint at Spring Lake, and middle- and classic-distance events at Boggs Mountain.
None opposed.
Motion passed.

8. Changes in EP Procedures – Trinka Gillis

Peter Graube has taken over the leadership of EPunch. Rosemary Johnson is his second-in-command.
We are working to make the job more streamlined. Some of our changes:
  • Event Directors need to contact Peter a minimum of three weeks in advance to "request" EPunch at their event. The ED should tell Peter what they have in mind so the handling of off-standard meets can be negotiated. Preferably, Nick Corsano would announce this so it carries more weight.
  • The meet directors/course setters need to understand the complications of off-standard meets. Off-standard, for example, is an event that uses more than one type of software, requires more than one laptop or has odd features, such as skipped controls. We aren't saying that we won't run these types of events, only that the ED/CS need to be aware of the difficulties they cause and be open to compromise.
  • A second set of EPunch equipment is being purchased, which will be used for East Bay events. The two sets of EP equipment will be stored with the equipment director for that region when not in use.
  • One EPunch volunteer will be assigned to run EP for each event. A peer-to-peer relationship will exist between the EPunch volunteer for that event and the Course Setter/Event Director. (This may take a while to put in place.) Other volunteers will be used so that person can still run a course.
We need to train more people on EPunch. Peter suggested asking the ED to give us one of their volunteers to train on EP.

9. Joaquin Miller Training/Picnic, July 21st – Nick Corsano

July 21st at Joaquin Miller
Rosemary Johnson is the Event Director. There will be training/food/courses. Nick suggests that the training and picnic should be for club members only, with the afternoon courses open to the public. The training will be directed toward different skill levels (Beginning–Intermediate and Intermediate–Advanced).

10. Membership Form Survey – Kelly Wells

119 of 247 members have offered to help out at meets, based on their membership forms.
A committee will be formed to work on a club survey about volunteering.
We may change the check boxes on the membership form.
We need to recruit more volunteers and keep critical people from burning out.
Scott Aster suggests that we publicize the list so Event Directors know who to call for volunteers.
Kelly Wells and Steve Beuerman will figure out what to ask for the survey, aimed at finding out how people volunteer and what they get out of volunteering.

11. Incorporation Update – Nick Corsano

Incorporation is moving slowly. The incorporation form is simple, but the form for tax exempt status is long and complicated. Nick will need to collect info from all Officers and Directors regarding address, job description and hours spent. The club secretary will have special responsibility at the first meeting after the incorporation.

12. 2007 Western States Champs Update – Scott Aster

Boggs Mountain A-meet.
The ranger hasn't put any restrictions on them. Scott Aster has failed to find a headquarters hotel or a Saturday night dinner location. There are lots of camping and scattered small hotels in the area. One small hotel in Cobb may be the event headquarters, and the pizza place may be the dinner location. Has some volunteer crew chiefs already lined up. The park ranger is easy to work with.
George Minarik called Boggs "The best orienteering in California."
Mark Blair says, "We now have our own little Mt. Pinos."

13. Directors' Reports

Publicity – Nancy Lindeman
Tony made a flyer for Boggs Mountain that advertises no poison oak. She is hoping to attract a lot of locals to the event.
Scott Aster put a half-page event in ONA.
Jeff Lanam suggested the flyer be made available to club members to distribute.
Membership – Kelly Wells
847 people are registered on the BayONet. We only have about 245 club members.
[Ed. note: That's the number of people on the monthly schedule mailing, not the BayONet.]
He suggests updating the EP archive so that the BAOC club name doesn't show up if someone isn't a current member.
Event Quality
No director's report given.
Nancy Lindeman pointed out that running out of maps at an event is very bad and affects event quality.
Kelly Wells pointed out that LAOC is using pre-registration to get a pre-count of attendees, and wondered if it would benefit us.
Juniors – Jay Hann
Took first group to the Interscholastic Championships in Maryland March 31st to April 1st.
Success on multiple levels.
Training
Steve Gregg is planning training for Joaquin Miller.
Bulletin – Jeff Lanam
Jeff Lanam invited anyone interested to write the "Training Tips" for the Bulletin. Steve Gregg hasn't written any in a while.
He reminded EDs that volunteers don't get credited if no event write-up is submitted.
The Bulletin is going out at the end of the month. June 20th is the deadline for submission.
He is looking for articles of general orienteering interest that can be shared with other orienteering groups.
Postage is decreasing.
Outreach – Scott Aster
Some requests from Scout and youth groups have gone unfulfilled. He invited them to come to the next event instead.
A private middle school in Occidental has requested that someone map their campus and teach them how to orienteer.
Website
No director's report given.
Nancy Lindeman loved Van's report on BAOC web usage statistics, and suggests he put it in the Bulletin.

14. New Business – Nick Corsano

Next meeting Tuesday September 11th, one week after labor day.

15. Adjourrnment

Adjourned 9:48 pm

Respectfully submitted by .