Draft Excom Minutes

ESIP Federation Executive Committee Telecon – May 13, 2010

Present:

Carol Meyer
James Frew
Brian Rogan
Chris Lenhardt
Karl Benedict
Marilyn Kaminski
Rob Raskin
Steve Berrick
Chuck Hutchinson
Michael Goodman
Patricia Huff

The meeting was called to order at 2:05 PM

Adoption of Minutes

Karl Benedict moved to adopt the minutes as drafted and Chuck Hutchinson seconded the motion. The minutes were approved by unanimous consent.

ESIP Federation Summer Meeting Update

The summer meeting has come together nicely with two of three plenary speakers confirmed. The technical workshops have filled up with only three open slots remaining. There are a total of 17 workshops offered at this point. On the breakout session front, some groups have outlined a full list of sessions while others have not got a full agenda at this point. However, there have been some good conversations. We are expecting to have an Executive Committee meeting on Monday night. Carol will send a follow up email to see if the meeting can occur at 7 PM.

The registration has been slow, following the typically pattern for ESIP Federation meetings. People are beginning to think about registering and we expect the usual flurry as the early registration deadline approaches. Carol expressed her appreciation of the work Chris Lenhardt and Bruce Wilson in preparing for the meeting. They have secured partial sponsorship for the poster session/reception. This has been supplemented by Northrup-Grumman. Chris thanked Carol and mentioned that they are, at this point, just tying up loose ends and that the plans are moving smoothly at this point.

An ESIP 101 session will be offered at the summer meeting for new ESIP Federation community members. The session will be developed in conjunction with the Partnership Committee.

The University of New Mexico (Karl Benedict) will be hosting the 2011 summer meeting in Albuquerque.

Committee Budget Requests for FY 2011

This year, the Finance and Appropriations Committee is trying to be ahead of the curve on reviewing proposed committee and working group budgets. The template for requests for FY 2011 has been put in place. We would like to have a request in hand by June 30th in order to expedite the process. The early deadline would allow for budgets to be considered during the summer meeting.

Final Srategic Plan Review & Metrics Task Force

A review of the strategic plan is needed, particularly as it relates to metrics. Carol gave a review and mentioned that it was important to look at progress that has been made to date and evaluate how we are doing as an organization.

As a first step, it will be important to see what we have done to meet the goals/objectives set forth in the strategic plan. In addition, there is a great need (both organizationally and in the community) to be able to express how funded activities benefit sponsors.

Carol proposed the creation a subcommittee comprised of Executive Committee members but also open to others who were interested looking at the process. Chris Lenhardt mentioned that the idea behind the strategic plan's metrics was to push some of it out to the working groups, committees and clusters and have them collect the metrics that could be collated into a report. There was consensus that the full Executive Committee would tackle the strategic plan metrics at the outset, with input from various bodies within the ESIP Federation.

Karl talked about how the groups could get an idea of how many folks attended the track and what was discussed. These metrics would be useful as a gauge to participation. Rob added that it might be to tie the four strategic goals to the committee reports that are submitted following the meeting. In addition, it was suggested that the budget template be refined to reflect the relationship between the proposed budget and the strategic plan alignment.

It is important to get this information collected by the July meeting. It could function as a midyear report. Carol took the action to request a mid-year report from all committee, working group and cluster chairs regarding their year-to-date progress on their activities as they relate to the strategic plan.

Impact metrics or informal “nuggets” have been accumulated by word of mouth and then staff follows up by requesting more information. Chris asked if there were a quick and easy way to collect information. Brian agreed to work on a simple template form to collect this information from partners. Carol suggested that the form could be simply asking the questions of Who, What, When. Where, How, Why.

Jim Frew suggested that the committee needs to take it upon itself to see if we are getting the proper information once any responses have been collected. Once we learn anecdotal information, we need to question further about the specifics of the metrics.

Other Business

Carol had a couple of updates:

We have been asked by EPA to submit a proposal for full review for summer meeting support
We have submitted a report to NOAA for continued funding.
Michael Goodman has been busy with travel but has a simple draft outlining potential governance changes. Carol will follow through with sending it out to the other committee members.

Michael Goodman made a motion to adjourn, with Chuck Hutchinson seconding the motion. The meeting adjourned at 2:37 PM.

ESIP Federation Executive Committee Minutes – March 11, 2010

Participants: Karl Benedict, James Frew, Marilyn Kaminski, Chris Lenhardt, Margaret Mooney, Rob Raskin, Annette Schloss, Steve Kempler (guest), Carol Meyer, Brian Rogan

Adoption of Minutes

The meeting was called to order by President Frew at 2:06 PM. Marilyn Kaminski moved to adopt the minutes from February, seconded by Chris Lenhardt. The minutes were approved by acclamation.

ESIP Federation Contributions to GEO's Decision Support Project, Steve Kempler

Steve Kempler gave an overview of the Decision Support projects that Lawrence Friedl is involved with in GEO. GEO is looking for advisors for projects from within the ESIP Federation community. It is possible that there could be funding for these efforts, if the GEO team is successful in finding a match between the proposers and funding agencies. The deadline for submitting full proposals is May 1.

Carol felt that since many people hadn’t read through these proposals, that it might be worth creating an inventory of needed skills. If this work was done up front, more people might become interested. Because of time constraints, it isn’t clear many people would read through all of these proposals. One suggestion was to ask the proposers for specific skills needed when full proposals are submitted in May.

The Executive Committee is supportive of this effort but a path forward is not clearly defined. One approach might be to work on this through some our existing groups. (e.g. Water, Air Quality, Decisions)

Another approach might be to utilize the nascent ESIP Federation skills database. The database structure and interface is in place - additional fields (beyond IT skills) will be added to reflect the broad range of skills within the ESIP Federation and those being sought for the GEO proposals. Several clusters can work on identifying the expertise topics.

It was noted that several ESIP Federation partners were involved with the GEO proposals and others had stepped forward earlier to volunteer their help. It was also noted that it is important to support this project. We should try and populate as many of these proposals as possible.

Carol will follow up with Lawrence and Steve and ask one to join the Products and Services telecon scheduled for next week. There was general agreement to continue the process and engage the ESIP Federation into this worthwhile program.

Constitution and Bylaws Committee Update

The Constitution and Bylaws and Partnership Committees have caucused and agreed that the Constitution and Bylaws Committee will put together a proposal to make changes to the ESIP Federation's governance documents that are impacting its ability to self-govern. One Bylaw provision has been flagged initially to be studied by the Committees and others likely will emerge from their review. The "Simpson provision" would be removed first and then determine what other changes would be needed to remove partners from the rolls.

There have been a number of partners identified who are no long active due to grants no longer being funded or lost interest on their part. The ESIP Federation has changed from it earlier roles and that one goal is to truly define what is a partner. This proposal needs to be ready for discussion at the summer meeting so that partners are aware of the changes. The changes need to be framed so they are not threatening to current membership. A discussion document will be pulled together for the summer meeting.

The Executive Committee noted that this discussion could raise a number of other related issues. It will be important to consult with the early ESIP Federation leaders to ensure that support for the changes can be in place.

Summer Meeting Update

There have been a number of tracks put together including: Water, Teacher Education, Decisions, Data Preservation and, Energy. Air Quality is likely to have a presence too.

There have been plenary speaker invitations issued, including one to Tom Karl. There have been no responses as of yet.

Creative Commons Policy Update

Brian gave a quick review of the work on the Copyright Policy. He made some edits to it and it is ready to go for final review. The Executive Committee is declared done with its review period. The next step is to put out the policy for review to the membership for 30 days.

Update on Education Budget

NOAA is doing a one day Climate Stewards Workshop on Tuesday, July 20. The budget will devote more monies towards teacher support but is dollar neutral from the original proposal. President Frew moved to adopt the revised Education Committee budge, Karl Benedict seconded. The revised budget was approved by acclamation.

Other Business

With no other business, Margaret Mooney moved to adjourn, Karl Benedict seconded. The meeting adjourned at 2:57 PM.