Draft Excom Minutes

Excom Meeting – January 14, 2010

Present:

Carol Meyer Marilyn Kaminski Brian Rogan Rahul Ramachadran Steve Berrick Margaret Mooney James Frew Chris Lenhardt Rob Raskin Michael Goodman Patricia Huff Chuck Hutchinson

1. Adoption of Minutes

Meeting called to order at 2:06 PM

Two sets of minutes needed approval. Chris Lenhard raised a point of clarification for the november meeting which was subsequently adjusted. Chris Lenhardt made a motion to adopt and Marilyn Kaminski seconded. There were no objections and the minutes were adopted by acclamation.

2. Committe Budget Adoption

Carol Meyer reported that the Executive Committee in principle approved the committee budgets as they were drafted but were not officially adopted pending resolution on the infrastructure policy question. There currently are two committees that are eager to move forward on their work plans. It was recommended by Carol that the budgets be voted on today so that committees could move forward with their workplans.

Margaret Mooney began by describing the education budget request. Monies already in the budget can be used for funding events such as the SACNAS program attended by Tamara Ledley. President Frew put forward a motion that the budget amount be approved and that the budget be rewritten to reflect the new use of the funds.

Michael Goodman put forward a motion to accept the request, Marilyn Kaminski seconded. It was approved by acclamation.

Rahul Ramachandran described the IT&I budget that was submitted by Karl Benedict, the previous chair of the committee. It was felt that the proposal was good but that required more clarity as to how the monies requested would be spent before it could be approved.

There were no representatives from AQ so Carol Meyer gave the overview. One stipulation that the Executive Committee placed on the budget was a requirement to find matching funds for the interoperability workshop is being proposed. Since that time Gary Foley of EPA has matched the $20K that is needed. There was some concern that the amount they were asking for was higher than the norm but there is recognition that the AQ Working Group has been a bright spot for the ESIP Federation.

A larger conversation ensued over how conference costs, travel etc. were allocated, especially for speakers. It was felt that there should be some sort of codification of how it is determined as to what fees were waived and for whom.

Rob Raskin moved to adopt, Marilyn Kaminski seconded. The budget was adopted by acclamation.

3. Winter Meeting Debrief It was agreed that the Winter meeting was a successful meeting. On the last day there were still over 100 people in attendance which is not historically what has happened. Content has a lot to do with how strong attendance is on the last day. There was a definite interest in the joint wrap up session, which was not as well organized as it could have been. At the DC meeting, attendance is boosted by the large number of local attendees.

There was a sense that the joint session could have had a stronger focus. There had been themes in the past but this is first meeting that a theme had been well developed.
The question was raised on whether or not it be worth doing proceedings or other ways to document the work being done, possibly an analysis of the meeting's outcomes.
It was felt that having a post meeting documentation of what happened and an analysis of how effective it was to meet the pre meeting objectives.
A suggestion was made that Carol and Brian put together a meeting planning template that will help outline goals, objectives and outcomes for each meeting.

The problem of making a quorum was addressed. There is a plan by the Constitution and Bylaws Committee that the governance plan be looked at very closely. It was felt that there will be a need for a bylaws change in time for the summer meeting in order to resolve this problem.

Carol suggested that it might be worth looking at the strategic plan and look a little deeper as this issue is addressed.
Rob Raskin brought up the idea that it may be that the organizations may no longer exist or that we no longer meet their needs.
It was determined that this issue needs to be brought up as an excom item for discussion.

There was a concern about the poster session space. Most of the issue seemed to resolve around space and the historically high number of poster and demos which were presented.

4. Other Business

There was no other business to be discussed. Steve Berrick motioned to adjourn, Marilyn Kaminski seconded. The meeting was adjourned at 2:54 PM