Board Activities

Timber Framers Guild Board of Directors
Conference Call Minutes

Attendees: Joel McCarty, Rudy Christian, Brenda Baker, Will Beemer, Leon Buckwalter, Al Anderson, Grigg Mullen, Kenneth Rower, Rick Collins, Curtis Milton, Laura Brown

Agenda Items:

Corrections to Minutes of last meeting

Will recommends that the minute-taker bind the financial and committee reports to the minutes. We direct that it be made so. Joel will post year end financials on the Members Only section of the web site, and make sure that this information also appears in Scantlings in a timely manner.

Sponsorship Discussion (Ken Rower)

Ken makes some introductory remarks about concessions made to sponsoring firms. He is troubled that we are crossing a line, while recognizing that sponsors want recognition, but we should not be allowing ourselves to be used for advertising.

We agree to modify the sponsorship program in the following ways:
    -- Do not co-mingle logos on banners.
    -- Do not include sponsor materials in the registration packet.
    -- Will will add an opt-out box to the registration that will allow attendees to remain off the list given to trade show (and other) folks who ask for it.     -- 'Banner ad' will morph to 'banner announcement.' We will limit the display on the tfg to the logo only, and embed a link to the sponsor's web site behind it.

Reports of Officers

Brenda had two questions, one about Joel's interview with second home magazine, and the projects/ events schedule, which we will defer to the Projects report.

Joel adds he is doing a high school tour of Benson Woodworking and Northcott Woodturning on Monday, and looking forward to it.Plus, the Allenstown Meetinghouse event (sills, then roof) awaits bids from a potential contractor.

TFG Trademark has been registered as of 11/22/2005 for a period of ten years. We do have a budget on the table, and financial reports. The summary financials are all quite positive. We are planning on approving this budget or something like it at our February Face-to-Face Meeting.

Reports of Committees

Human Resources- BSmith Letter, general discussion. No action.

Finance: CAM is working on some proposals with folks from outside the Board regarding CD reinvestment, lifetime membership funds, and more. He may have some proposal ready for discussion at our next meeting.

Education: no report, but some clarification. Education is distinct from Curriculum.

Nominations: Election Results

Leon Buckwalter, Laura Brown and Curtis Milton were each re-elected to another three-year term. We received considerably (111) fewer votes by implementing solely by mail. Exec Comm will be selected at the Face to Face.

Projects: report attached. CAM talked for a moment about the RMC event, which is in process and showing good vital signs. Grigg Mullen will be hosting a small VMI-aided event first week of April. Brief discussion about using retained earnings on the development side . . . (how) would that pay off? Promotional brochure? Longer discussion about the 'in house project' concept that has showed up on the radar before. Will spoke highly of the Mountain School event as a model; we should review the video (in April).

Curtis and Rudy and Will will work together to brainstorm an in-house event template.

Brief Suriname report from Rick, overwhelmingly positive. 'Smooth operation' 'logistically worked out really well' 'we had all the people we needed' 'yeah it was perfect “they were ecstatic'. Rick was broadly satisfied with our performance, and with the performance of our hosts. There is no doubt in Rick's mind that we should get involved in something like this again. Soon. Before we forget what we have learned. Rick would like to spend next year working on codifying this so that it doesn't get away from us.

There will be a detailed written follow-up heading in the direction of the Board.

Looks like Chris Koehn is doing agreat job with the LISEC project, Sept 20-30.

Conferences: Report attached. Western coming together nicely thanks to David and Will. Format change discussion went along for some time, will be announced (for discussion) at the Members Meeting in April. No action before 2008 (How's that for forward-thinking?)

Publications: Joel will attach the minutes of yesterday's call.

Membership: getting wicked close to 2,000! Brief discussion of lifetime memberships. Curtis will continue to explore, and report back. Membership application discussion more data! Leon will continue to work on this with Will and Joel. Joel will repair the membership@tfguild.org mailbox.

Scholarship: Will needs to review the finances before he determines what is available for April and beyond.

Curriculum: not enough energy left on this call for this discussion. Will will talk more with Gordon before long.

Unfinished Business

Confim F2F dates, MHT 16-19 February 2006. Susan Witter is planning to attend. We think that is way cool.

Accolades to Will for his distance learning proposals. Flashy stuff, but pricey.

Next meeting, 1900h EST, Wednesday, 4 January 2006

Agenda Items and reports due Wednesday, 28 December 2005

Adjourn 2118h, with relief

Report from Sue Warden

December 2, 2005

Here is all the news, gossip and tidbits from the Becket office for the month of November.

New Members: 27
Current Membership: 1931

New Journal Subscriptions: 4
Current Journal Subscriptions: 145

As of November 1st we have only lost 406 members for the year. Which is not bad but being a curious sort of girl I always wonder why people wouldn't renew. Maybe at some point and time we might do a mailing to all non-renewing members to see why. Maybe we are missing something that could keep them as members and help current members also.

Store Sales - $6,352.45. We have sold 60 of the New Joinery Books, along with 43 J&D Vol 1 and 37 Historic American J&D.

Store sales continue to roll along at a brisk pace with an average of 4 to 6 thousand per month.

As you all know I spent most of the month of November working on the budget. My goal of course is to have all budgets (projects, conferences, etc.) to go into the Quickbooks program so that generating reports will be cleaner and more efficient. I have been changing the Chart of Accounts to accommodate these changes and 2007 should see our Chart of Accounts numerical. I think it is extremely important to see exactly where the money is coming in and more importantly where it is being spent.

I have also been working on advertisements for all of our publications getting new contracts out to our current advertisers and hoping to generate some new advertisers. It would be great to see publication expense being paid for more by the advertisers which would free up money from other areas to be used in different capacities.

As always I appreciate any comments or questions that will help the office and the Guild run smoother.

Becket Reports

TFG trademark had been approved and is now registered as of 11/22/05.

2006 Budget submitted for your review on 11/28/05.

Financial reports sent yesterday.

Curriculum update submitted for your information on 12/2/05.

Western Conference planning continues, with the speaker list just about final. Speaker's Agreements should go out next week, and the budget will be finalized. Promo flyer will be in the mail by early February, website registration should be ready by Jan. 1.

Election results posted on Nov. 21: Total votes cast: 609

Results: Curtis Milton: 500
Laura Brown: 494
Leon Buckwalter: 486
John Miller: 347

TTRAG members unanimously approved Old Salem (NC) for site of 2007 TTRAG Conference.

We should discuss the Lifetime membership deal. 23 new Lifetime members, including 5 Lifer family memberships, which accounts for $17,240 of our dues income for 2006. Also no decisions have been made on the other investments. I suggest when the next CD comes due in February we up it $25,000 and get a higher rate 1 yr. cd (4%), and do the same thing as each of the other 2 CDs come due.

Alstead Report

Too much going on. Imagine how busy Will is!

Please remember that Sponsorship issues and Ken Rower are first on our agenda for Wednesday's call.

Alstead Flood business is still very much a part of our lives, though most of the meetings and phone calls have moved to evenings. Guild members (and even founders) who are local have been stepping forward, and I can predict with some confidence that we will see a very nice community service project come together in the short term, that will not require Guild support, but will look remarkably like a Guild Event. Thanks again for your support in this area. Tough times in Town, but more good news than bad.

I am investing a little time in insurance issues this week; D&O and WC. Nothing earth-shaking, but time consuming.

Sponsorship materials are on hold at the printers until any changes you might recommend on the Conference Call can be implemented. This pushes our schedule around a bit, but we recognize the need for it, and we will adapt.

Suriname crew tools have been loaded into a container in P'arbo, and are expected to sail tomorrow, for arrival in Miami on the 20th. I think we will have a better experience that Bob and Donna did getting theirs returned, but that remains to be seen. At least they are fully insured.

Final invoice for the Suriname event should be ready to go out this week, I'll leave the event reporting to others, but it sure looked like fun, through SueEllen's pictures, and we did get everyone back in one piece. Happy client, too. A more formal 'what we learned this time, and what we are going to do about it' report will be forwarded to Projects and ultimately to the Board in due time.

Will and I did a couple of conference calls Tuesday with various players, Conferences and Publications.

I did a phone interview today for something call Second Home Magazine.

In Event World, the oft-delayed Brattleboro Bus Stop teaching gig has been postponed again until January. This may cause us to have to recruit a different teaching team, but we won't know for another couple of days.

The Gallatin Montana pavilion project brought to us by John Palmer is waiting on a grant award that will occur no earlier than March 2006.

Wyman Ranch Museum event, too ill-defined to be called a project, but enticing as a partnership with an architectural school, has been postponed until 2007.

The Bainbridge Island Memorial project that John Buday brought to us remains in fund-raising mode.

The Kentucky DOT covered bridge RFP that we published last month has not, to my knowledge, generated any interest.

The Indiana covered bridge project folks are having a meeting of their own Wednesday night to try to get real. Ed Levin has donated a timber take-off that leads me to conclude that this is an 8,000 person hour event.

The LISEC report is bound in with the Projects Committee reporting.

Glen James, Lissa Sasser and PTN are talking with me about a project with Matt Webster (of Ferry Farm fame) about a project in Jamaica.

Curtis and I are 6 e-mails and one phone call away from submitting a proposal to the Randolph Mountain Club for a Fall '06 event in northern NH.

The State of NH is at least mildly interested in a covered bridge for Alstead, to replace a concrete bridge that failed during our flooding. Competitive bidding, short span, long time line. It is possible they are just humoring me, but they have built others in this decade. The Commissioner was at least astute enough to point out that there had been a covered bridge at that crossing considerably longer than there has been a concrete/steel unit.

Gordon Macdonald has met with Mark Timmermans at Providence Farm out his way. No report yet. Sounds like a good partner/host though.

The copper downspouts on the Salem Pavilion have been stolen, and are, apparently, being replaced with white PVC. Or by electrically charged galvanized material.

We are moving our web site again, a process already begun, that Will and I are supporting in small ways. No idea yet when it will be complete. Ask The Experts will be shut down for a short period during the move, to ensure continuity.

I am certain to have overlooked something.