September 2016

Call to Order: Dave Puryear, president, called the meeting to order at 3:36 pm. Directors Leslie Altick, Peggy Chen, Paul Davis, Marolyn Imaoka, and Jody Williams were also present. The board approved the minutes of the August 11 meeting as submitted.

Weekend/Evening Usage Committee: The committee has made progress, but has concluded that this project needs a volunteer to move the scheduling of a weekly event forward. The board is in favor of investigating a class to offer IFES members, such as Learn Bridge in a Day. This event too needs someone to drive it forward.

Firecracker 2017 Update: Many of the plans for the 2017 Firecracker hinge on whether we can secure parking for the dates we select. The Buddhist Temple does not set its calendar until January. Should they have a conflict with the dates we can secure from ACBL, we must investigate truncating the tournament, or see if we can park on the Hetch Hetchy easement. Gill is exploring each of these options.

503/507 Challenge Update: This joint tourney with San Jose is close enough now that the board will ask directors to start promoting it at regularly scheduled games.

NLM Tournament Update: The October Non Life Master tournament also should be promoted at regularly scheduled games now. Signups to date have been comparatively light. The board hopes that discussing it at games during the week will stimulate interest.

Reports:
President: John Schwartz’s name has also been placed in nomination to the Board of Directors. His name will be on the ballot. There was no consensus in the feedback Marolyn obtained from club owners about how best to use the additional storage space we are renting from IFES. However, the county food inspector told us that we could not serve food in that area. Paul noted that he thinks the center can be permanently setup for 47 tables. This means that Gilbert would not have to setup additional tables each week. Marolyn will check with club owners to see if this is acceptable in order to realize a $200/month savings for the Bridge Center. A motion to continue paying the $500/month in rent to IFES for the additional space passed. The Finance Committee had proposed several options for returning some of 2016’s surplus to the club owners. Again, there was no consensus among club owners on which was the best approach. Changing the threshold for the 2nd director may be the most palatable. The Finance Committee will report back on the effect of reducing the threshold to 20 tables, and separately, increasing the payment to the second director to $150.

Technology Committee: Jody and Marolyn reported that many of the uploading problems with Pianola have been resolved. Now Pianola will be extended to the entire Wednesday night game and potentially to other games. Jody will talk with game owners to determine where next to expand. The benefits to the Unit are the information players receive, the online directory, and the email messaging. Marolyn will clarify to players what information they will get for free and what additional information is available for $10/month. The directory will not be introduced until all games are using Pianola.

Finance Committee: Leslie reported that thanks to the creativity of our volunteers in planning extra events and speakers in 2016, and the success of the Firecracker, the Unit is projected to be substantially above budget for the year. Similarly, the first draft of the 2017 budget projects another surplus for the year. There are several assumptions that need to be adjusted, most likely reducing that estimated surplus. However, we have more clarity planning for 2017 now that the Firecracker was a success in our new venue.

Education Funding: Paul reported that the Foundation has already received donations within the first two weeks since notifying Unit members of its existence. The Board again thanked Paul for his countless hours of work in establishing the Foundation.

Carpet: Peggy was not able to get a reasonably sized sample of the carpet to test its ability to handle stains. The one she had identified was available in carpet squares and after consideration, the Board thought it better to seek a regular wall-to-wall carpet, because of all the wear and tear sliding chairs would exert on squares. Peggy will continue her research as well as determining the cost of Scotch guarding a carpet of the size needed.

Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 5:20 pm. The next meeting will be on October 13.