November 2017

Call to Order and Approval of October 5 Minutes: President Dave Puryear called the meeting to order at 3:38 pm. The minutes of the October 5, 2017 meeting were approved as submitted. Other board members present included Leslie Altick, Marolyn Imaoka, Todd Makler, Alan Polish, and Susan Zhang.

Holiday Party Dec 17: Dave reported that Virginia Lyons has agreed to organize the December 17 Holiday Party. Todd will provide Virginia with the breakdown of expenses from last year’s party. The charities involved with the Toy Drive say they need more gifts for older children (older than toddlers). They suggest gift cards from Target (or something similar) as a popular solution for this age group.

Elections: Because the National Tournament starts on Thanksgiving this year, the Unit will need to open its election polls sooner than normal. The polls will open the Monday before Thanksgiving. Profiles need to be submitted to Nancy Kehl by November 12.

2018 Budget: Todd suggested that a few changes be made to the 2018 budget based on actual results, before its submission to the Board for approval at the December meeting. Table fees are proving to be lower than budgeted in 2017, in part due to lower Unit Game totals. Also, no second outside speaker is planned for 2018. Therefore, Todd suggests lowering the revenue projection for 2018. Discussion centered on whether changes needed to be made now to avoid the deficit this change will cause, or whether to absorb the deficit next year. Several possible revenue generating ideas surfaced, but there is not enough time to develop business plans to size them. Because the Unit has had several strong years leading up to this deficit, the Board agreed to absorb the deficit in 2018 from our strong reserve position, rather than making expense cuts or fee changes under short-term pressure. The Board also agreed to use 2018 to better analyze the underlying factors behind the revenue decline and investigate any necessary actions for 2019.

Reports: President’s Report – Because of the Monterey Regional, the owners of the Wednesday evening game have requested that the Unit cancel the Jan 3, 2018 evening game. The Board concurred. The Bridge Center was cleaned two weeks ago and the directors report that things are definitely better. The recent Non-Life Master tournament was a success, but required a lot of work. Dave will investigate with IFES to better detail exactly what the process will be should IFES book an event after the Unit has already scheduled a sectional or other event (e.g., who is required to find additional parking, who pays, which locations?), The hard drive crashed on the most recently acquired directors’ computer. Dave authorized the emergency purchase of a solid state hard drive and a service for backing it up.

Technology Committee – Jody reported that she has yet to meet with the Corvette Club members who coordinated their club’s migration to their new website software platform. She noted that she had also been approached about mounting a flat screen display in the Bridge Center that displays members who have achieved a milestone or played very well recently. As there are both technological and security issues involved in evaluating these requests, she believes a volunteer is needed to lead the effort. She will continue to focus on the higher priority task of migrating to a new web platform.

Treasurer – Todd noted that the revised 2018 budget will be presented to the 2017 Board in December. The new 2018 Board will ratify it in January.

Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 4:32.

Next Board Meeting: The next Board meeting will be on December 7 (not December 14)