NDCA Board Meeting – November 20th, 2016
Meeting called to order at approximately 11:30am by Shunta Jordan.
Members Present:
Shunta Jordan
Ed Williams
Chris Theis
Christina Tallungan
Aaron Timmons
Dave Weston
Adam Torson
Members not Present:
Shane Stafford (Tab Room Demands)
Sheryl Kaczmarek (Hosting Tournament in Boston)
Business
I. Filling Open Positions
A. Web Manager: Sheryl Kaczmarek
i. Jim Menick has kindly agreed to maintain the website for free. Sheryl will be the point person for communications with Jim.
B. Curriculum Coordinator: Chris Theis
i. Duties articulated. The Board adds the duty of coordinating the creation of the Novice Policy packet, to be constructed with the direction of the Board.
C. National Tournament Liason: Dave Weston
1. The Board discussed the possibility of marketing a new Congress division in future years.
2. Ed Williams agreed to seek out sponsorship support for the tournament.
D. Chief Financial Officer: Ed Williams
1. The Board decided to investigate the costs of hiring a CPA or other financial professional to fulfill the duties previously assigned to the Chief Financial officer. Ed will inquire with debate-connected financial professionals he knows to gather the appropriate information. If we hire such a person, Ed will oversee those finances and report back to the Board.
E. Conference Coordinator: Christina Tallungan
1. Christina will initiate the planning process and send an email soliciting input from the Board.
F. Public Relations and Membership: Shane Stafford (pending his consent to fulfill this role)
1. The Board reached consensus on the idea that the public relations position and the membership coordinator are closely related and can be merged in favor of having the new position of Conference Coordinator.
G. Other Board roles will stay the same
1. Coordinator of the Open Evidence Project: Aaron Timmons (with the collaboration and support of the rest of the Board).
2. Internal Communications Officer: Adam Torson
3. Chairperson: Shunta Jordan
II. Treasurer Report
A. $13,000+ in current funds
B. 30+ new Individual Memberships and several new Institutional Memberships
C. We have an outstanding liability to Chris Palmer. Ed moves and Adam seconds that we pay Palmer $600 – passed unanimously.
III. National Tournament
A. Dave will coordinate with Shunta and Tim on preparations for the National tournament.
B. In the past the tournament coordinator has paid our hotel bill using his personal credit card. This is permitted, but it is the sense of the board that asking the hotel to bill the NDCA directly is the preferable practice. Shunta will have the NDCA checkbook at the tournament in the hopes of paying the hotel directly at that time.
C. The Board has approved a season-ending Public Forum Award. The discussion of that award was tabled pending the opportunity to discuss with Shane.
D. We will need volunteers to staff a membership renewal and recruiting table, a table to provide information about the NDCA Conference, and to setup the awards ceremony. The consensus of the Board is that the Tournament Coordinator should schedule these tasks before we arrive at the tournament.
E. Hotel Fee
1. Marist has secured a hotel block for the 2018 NDCA. It is at the Westin Atlanta Perimeter North, which is 8 minutes away from the school. The rate is $109/night, which Ed and Shunta indicated was very competitive.
2. The Board discussed whether there should be a hotel fee, or whether requiring early payment might be a viable alternative to a hotel fee. The sense of the meeting was to avoid a hotel fee, but no action was taken.
F. Food Fee
1. The Board discussed whether to charge an individual food fee. This may not be relevant this year because in the past Weber has covered the food and provided exceptional hospitality. However, Tim Mahoney has suggested that we may want to maintain the food fee this year cover snacks like the ones provided at the 2016 Tournament.
2. The sense of the meeting is that rather than having an individual food fee, we should set entry fees to account for the cost of providing food for any given year. The Board withheld a final decision on the exact entry fees for each division until we can communicate with Tim to figure out what amounts are appropriate to cover the relevant costs.
3. The Board agreed that we should add an extra concession on tabroom to cover food for extra adults accompanying a team. Registration fees should cover food for only students and one coach from each school.
IV. NDCA Conference
A. The consensus of the Board is that we should host another NDCA Conference this year. It will be in Dallas on May 20th and 21st.
B. Christina will send an email soliciting suggestions for sessions this week.
C. Christina will coordinate with the Board to secure hotel facilities in Dallas which have larger capacity to accommodate the growth of our conference and offer expanded amenities.
V. Membership Records and Participation in the Listserv
A. Some of our membership records are spotty, e.g. some time ago we collected very limited information from lifetime members. The Board agreed to collaborate to update these records where possible.
B. There is some confusion about who receives Listserv emails. Historically it appears to be the case that individuals add themselves to the Listserv. The sense of the meeting is that new members should be automatically added to the Listserv, and can opt out if they desire.
Meeting adjourned at approximately 1:00pm.