Meeting Minutes - January 2008

Present:  Maewyn, Kudrun, Brilliana, Brighid, Valgarth, Ariella

The meeting was caled to order at 2:25 p.m. on Sunday, 20 January 2008 at Maewyn's home

Officer Reports

Arts & Sciences

• Valgarth's report is in and he's done as A & S officer
• Brilliana would like to step down as Herald and take over, if the group approves.
• Brilliana left room to check potluck contribution, and was voted into office. (All ayes except the person who made the motion--just for irony's sake.)

Exchequer

• Don't know whether the 4th Quarter and Domesday have been submitted.
• Maewyn's emails have not been answered. We may have to create the reports ourselves.
• Valgarth recommended certified mail if necessary. Seneschal needs to sign Domesday, so we need the buffer time.
• Kudrun will call her tonight, because it has to be in the mail to the Kingdom Exchequer by the 25th (Friday).
• Maewyn has done some legwork finding us a new bank. Merchants Bankand Marine Credit Union are the front-runners.
• Seque about Patriot Act and signatories having to be verified in person, and Kingdom/Regional Exchequer having to be signatories, and those two things clashing may trip up us switching banks right away.
• Maewyn will try to set up a savings account to earn at least a little interest on the money.
• Kudrun and Ariella will meet at Associated Bank on Thursday afternoon to draw out enough money to set up the new account, and then take it to the new bank. Maewyn will have things set up at Merchants Bank.

Herald/Pursuivant

• Domesday is in.
• Office of Book Herald is pretty wasted on the group this small because everyone who wants a badge/device/name already has it.
• She would like to step down for everything except the vocal parts at Autumn Rose and any other events.

Seneschal

• Cybele asked her to inform the group that D.T. was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He'll be undergoing radiation and chemotherapy.
• For the longer term, Cybele and D.T. are planning to move to a condo. in Winona to make living easier. They would appreciate help moving when that time comes.

Thrown Weapons Marshal

• I'ts too cold to practice unless we travel to other groups who have winter sites. Jara, for instance.

Webminister/Chronicler

• The new calendar is up; Kudrun has tested it a little. Basically, anyone with a valid login can submit an event to the calendar and have it posted in real-time--i.e. they don't have to wait for the Webminister to manually edit the calendar file and upload it.
• More calendar features are in the works, including adding driving directions and maps tabs to the event popup window.
• Ariella is handing off the Chronicler archives to Kudrun today. [insert appropriately cheesey movie villain laughter]

Youth Minister

• Brighid has received absolutely no information from any level of the SCA re: who is doing background checks, how much it will cost.
• Valgarth moved to table the whole issue of having an official group Youth Marshal until the official word has come down.
• Maewyn brought up Kudrun's idea of alloting group funds to pay for the background check whenever the who and how much has been settled. That saves us time.
• Move to create the official office so that we can allocate funds. Ayed with one nay.
• Brighid nominated for the new office. Ayed with one nay.
• $50 allocated for the Youth Marshal fund by general assent.

New Business

Event:  Autumn Rose

• Bronislava's health are currently preventing another round of Autocrat brain-dumping.
• The question of having a viable Feast Steward for A.R. had been raised in December. The current consensus is that distance and communication difficulties make it pretty unfeasible for Vitaliano to be Steward again this year.
• Maewyn volunteered to take that on. The general consensus was that an overly complex/expensive feast is not what we want. "The Peasants Feast" was suggested. Maewyn will start researching recipes/redactions/translations.
• Last year, the Equestrians had until a certain date to let us know whether they would attend, b/c of the extra insurance. They didn't, but we will try again. This should be done through their Marshal.
• The Sahara Desert Dancers would like to come back in memory/honor of Karl. Bronislava will take the lead on that.
• Some folks from Coille Stormeil have volunteered to help out. Valgarth pointed out that Hawthorne really seemed to enjoy Marshalling; we will specifically ask him if he's interested in doing it again this year.
• Mystic Dragon has volunteered to help with Security again this year. (Do we have a contact person there?)
• As usual, this is a demo. But do we want to do anything with the "demo" part of it.
• Brilliana would like to see more Artisans' Row. How do we draw attention to that? Line of sight kind of thing. Valgarth pointed out that the interest has been dwindling over the past few years.
• Plan to ask Aine if she would be willing to organize one like she did at Novice's Day.
• Ariella's spiel about asking people face-to-face (not just posting a shout-out on the web) to perform, display, participate. After receiving and affirmative, it's important to follow up in the week or three before A.R. so that we aren't wondering the day of who will actually be there.
• Brilliana would like to hand out event flyers (mundanely and at SCA events) this year to drum up interest. Kudrun volunteered to typeset these, and would like to know who's definitely attending what events, so that that she can hand off flyers.
• Kudrun will put the event on the Northshield Calendar.
• Will reuse leftover tokens from last year. Valgarth will check into how many we have left.

Other New Business

• Brighid's husband received his clearance to move to the U.S. from Canada. He's interested in picking up rapier again after he settles in.
• No one has been nominated to be Chatelaine because those folks move away. We can't think of anyone we want to get rid of, so no one is still nominated.
• There has been no interest in reviving the office of Group Marshal (for heavy weapons).
• Various Change of Officer forms filled out and signed. Although her former office will be empty until further notice, Brilliana will notify Kingdom Herald for courtesy's sake.
• The next two meetings will be held at the La Crosse Public Library. The first will be held in the big room, the next will be held in the Trustees' Room because of a recital scheduled for the big room.

The meeting was adjourned at 3:49 p.m., and followed by a potluck featuring Scottish eggs, chili, venison and barley, fruit, homemade wine, cheese and sausage, stromboli, chips, and freshly baked bread.

Page last updated:  16 March 2008