EMSBo DMeeting Minutes020118
EMS
Board of Directors
Meeting Minutes
Meeting date: 02/01/2018
Call to order:
A Regular meeting of the Board of directors of EMS, was held at 687 McKinley street, Suite #1; Eugene OR on February 1st, 2018. The meeting convened at 6:14 PM Kevin Forsythe presiding and Ben Hallert as secretary.
Board Members in attendance: Jeffrey, Karen, Ben, Kevin, Jher, Piotr
Board Members not in attendance:
Quorum present? Yes
Also Present Were: Joe, Tanda, David
Approve agenda, and previous minutes.
Agenda:
- Call to order
- Approve the agenda
- Review previous meeting minutes
- Officers Reports
- President's Report
- Secretary's Report
- Treasurer's Report
- Old Business/Action Item Review
- Karen will negotiate with Marcel regarding the future of the CNC Master Notes
- Ben will see if he can put up a front-end or Laser Web server up of some sort to the K40
- Ben will remind the membership that Amazon Smile exists
- Clif will inquire with the landlord about the outdoor placement of the compressor and dust removal system
- Joe will reach out to the membership to seek interested parties to perform lectures and produce content
- New Business
- Pet policy at EMS
- Increasing membership dues
- Trash service
- EMS promotional materials
- Improvements to electronics room
- Conducting a census/review of dues-paying members and turning off key access for non-paying members (if there are any).
- Request to allocate space for a rock tumbler (Beatta)
- Improvements outside electronics room (Joe)
- Emeralds Baseball team fundraising/PR opportunity.
- Shop needs
- Software mission (Jher)
- Action Items Review
- Adjournment
Approval of Agenda: Motion was made by Karen and seconded by Kevin to approve this meeting's proposed agenda.
The Motion carried with unanimous approval.
Approval of minutes: Motion was made by Karen and seconded by Piotr to approve the minutes of the 1/03/18 meeting.
The Motion carried with unanimous approval.
Officer's reports:
President
Kevin spoke with the landlord. Our new 4 year lease moves from 1,200 to 1,300 this year and next, then 1,400 for a year, then eventually 1,500 per month. Jher inquired as to the fee for breaking the lease. They're installing the ham station and it's coming along swimmingly.
Secretary
NOTHING.
Treasurer
Piotr will not be able to perform treasury functions because of severe personal time constraints. He is hoping we can find someone else to take on this responsibility. Tanda volunteered to assist with the treasury work, Piotr will coordinate the switchover to Tanda. Ben asked if this would be a good example of a situation where services can be rendered in exchange for membership.
Clif reported via email that we have slightly more than $1,000 in the account and about $200 in bills to pay.
Old Business/Action Item Review
Karen will negotiate with Marcel regarding the future of the CNC Master Notes
Karen mailed Marcel asking if he could formally donate the CNC Master Notes in exchange for a tax receipt. Barring that, she asked if we could receive assurances that money invested in it wouldn't walk out the door if he chose to remove it later. With open-ended permission in writing, she hopes we'll be able to move forward. Piotr asked how long we should wait. Karen noted that Tom is ready to work on it now.
Ben will see if he can put up a front-end or Laser Web server up of some sort to the K40
Ben got homing on the K40 working and feels he's close to having Laser Web online as a working interface.
Ben will remind the membership that Amazon Smile exists
Done.
Clif will inquire with the landlord about the outdoor placement of the compressor and dust removal system
Joe has a plan to place them inside the space in sound-isolated boxes so we no longer need to install them outside.
Joe will reach out to the membership to seek interested parties to perform lectures and produce content
Joe has organized a talk on the 13th titled 'How to disconnect from the grid without freezing in the dark'. He has placed ads in the Register-Guard. He hopes we can do these every couple weeks and reports that the ad in the Eugene Weekly has generated a lot of foot traffic. He will film the first talk. Joe will provide the message to Ben that he'd like to send to the discuss list. Kevin said we may need folding chairs, Joe has a source of chairs and David White volunteered to help haul them. Tanda suggested we post to the Eugene Emerald as well.
New Business
Pet policy at EMS
Some members have come to Kevin expressing discomfort at free-ranging dogs in the space. Kevin asked David if he would be willing to leave his dogs in the truck. David noted that they are service animals. Karen shared her experience with other organizations and described how many people will seek a rule to avoid speaking with others. David told her that if someone's uncomfortable with the dogs, he's willing to tie them up or put them in his truck on request. Jher asked if David might leash the dogs in a designated area. Jeffrey noted that he had experience with the dogs wwandering around when he was grinding metal and expressed concern with the safety of that situation. His son is also afraid of dogs and he would like to have some way to either know that they're here or to know where they would be so he could manage his son's experience.
Karen asked if David would be willing to tie them up during open hack night and David agreed, but then noted that his service dogs are protected against any restrictions in the space. The group shared concern about the animals free-roaming versus under his direct control. Jher asked where the designated leash point would be and David noted to northwest corner. Joe has had the experience of the dogs bumping into him while he was operating the table saw.
The consensus of the group was not to establish a new policy, but to ask that David secure the dogs if other people were in the shop or equipment was being used.
Increasing membership dues
Our rent is going up, it's time to figure out if we're going to increase our membership. Kevin asked if a $5 membership increase would be accepted. Jeffrey noted that we had previously discussed a 75% consensus requirement. Jher noted that this is the best time to broach the subject because of the rent situation. Piotr asked that we consider the size of our buffer when considering what our requirement is to grow. Joe discussed a quadrant model of pay/no pay, willing to pay increase/not willing to determine whether to pursue this.
Trash service
The question is whether or not to subscribe to formal trash service or to exchange trash removal for membership in lieue of dues. Joe described a trash sorting/recycling effort to ease the process of disposing of waste. Under the old Sanipac model at the waste station, three trash cans were $12.50 to dispose.
Piotr suggested eye-height signs to avoid people throwing recycling into trash or vice-versa.
EMS promotional materials
Kevin suggested that we construct a go-box so we can quickly set up a booth or display. We could have pamphlets, 3D printed stuff to hand out, and other tchotchkes to hand out. Piotr has PCB vouchers he's willing to contribute. Ben suggested reaching out to the membership to get more tchotchkes.
Improvements to electronics room
Kevin has been working to set up the Ham station and feels theres real room for improvement in the electronics room. Joe has some ideas for adding shelves. Joe is concerned about the ceiling strength situation and suggests putting in a reinforcement board. He would like to add more wall bench space in there.
Kevin moved that we approve a $100 budget for Joe to install a 3' deep desk across the eastern wall of the office with a shelf above it. Jher seconded it.
Karen abstained from voting. All others voted aye, the motion passes.
Conducting a census/review of dues-paying members and turning off key access for non-paying members (if there are any).
Tanda feels this is a logical part of the treasurer transition tasks. Piotr agreed.
ACTION: Ben will provided treasurer with requested unique key-in data
Request to allocate space for a rock tumbler (Beatta)
Go for it.
Improvements outside electronics room (Joe)
Joe reported on his work expanding the benches. He fixed the exhaust fan and the garage door (which now opens all the way). Remaining items are to wire the compressors and to buy some plywood. Tanda estimated $75 for three sheets. Joe said Clif has a source for $18 a sheet.
Ben moves that we approve another $100 to Joe's shop improvement budget. Kevin seconds.
The vote was unanimous, the motion passes.
Emeralds Baseball team fundraising/PR opportunity.
Jeffrey described the fundraising possibilities at the baseball team. We can receive up to $4 from each ticket sale if we can set up a fundraising agreement with them. He's called the folks at the team and received positive response. but he's not sure about what the options are. Karen has gotten the impression that the fundraising is based around purchasing and re-selling baseball tickets which is problematic. Another option: we give them three dates and get a link to sell discount tickets. We wouldn't need to pay up front.
ACTION: Jeffrey will reach out to the membership to see if there's interest in doing a membership-organized baseball night.
Shop needs
Our Shop Needs list appears to be un-tended.
ACTION: Jeffrey will make a shopping trip.
Software mission (Jher)
Jher has been doing social media outreach. City Synth is happening in town tomorrow, an effort to transform the city of Eugene into a giant musical instrument. It will use the fiber network to broadcast high-bandwidth data across town in some fashion. He cites this as an example of the kinds of large projects that are done around town that we should be involved with.
He asked if we have officially adopted Slack. His concern is that if the name of the organization is being used in conjunction with any software, that the organization has agreed to use it. Tanda explained that we have many different presences on the internet (Twitter, Facebook, etc) and that we should establish an understanding that opening accounts in the name of the account be done so with the approval of the board. Karen noted that the example of Slack is not public facing, it's private-only. Jher expressed concern that the organization as not adopted the tool officially. He also is concerned that we may be giving information to third parties in the case of tools like Slack versus the self-hosted software we use already (like the Wiki, Wordpress, etc). Jher is concerned that we are hosting private information on third party servers. Jher requested that Matter Most be considered as an alternative because it can be hosted by the organization. Piotr asked to see Matter Most demonstrated as he has heard bad things about it. Jher noted that was just one option and would like to see others considered. Karen expressed her own concerns about a self-hosted system because of the ongoing maintenance costs. Every time you add a new piece of software, you accept additional tasks. Jher came back to the concept of 'Software mission' and felt that we should have the most accessible tools to the greatest number of people. He also wanted us to be able to make modifications to software. Kevin suggested that we be open to be presented. Piotr felt that hosting Slack on an alternate server served the interests of the group because it removed a single-point-of-failure in case our online infrastructure failed. Jeffrey suggested that we back up our Slack presence on a regular basis. Jher also spoke to the benefits of interoperability. Ben agreed, noting that Slack has APIs and clients on many platforms.
Action Items:
Kevin:
Piotr:
Jeffrey:
- Jeffrey will reach out to the membership to see if there's interest in doing a membership-organized baseball night.
- Jeffrey will make a shopping trip.
Karen:
Ben:
- Ben will generate a report on which users are using the door system
Clif:
- Clif will inquire with the landlord about the outdoor placement of the compressor and dust removal system.
Others:
- Joe will reach out to the membership to seek interested parties to perform lectures and produce content.
Adjournment:
Jeffrey moved for adjournment and was seconded by Karen.
The vote was unanimous and the meeting was adjourned at 8:25PM.
____________________________ ___________________
Secretary Date of approval
Eugene Maker Space
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