February 2008 Board to Board
Los Angeles, CA
Board to Board meeting for WSBT and WSOBFebruary 15, 2008
Four Points Sheraton, Los Angeles, CA
Opened with the we version of the Serenity Prayer at 9:07am
In Attendance:
Kim Sherwan MWRT WST
Lawrence Matlock ASRT
Trevor Scheilbe PNRT WSBT Secretary
John Bodkin WSOB Chair
Bobbie Harmon TAL Acting SWRT/ Vice chair
Nicholas Lynn ERT
Patty Flannigan Paid Director of Resource and project development
Bruce Watson ANRT
Carl Warlick PSRT ChairTom Phalan WSOB Treasurer
Earl Henderson WSOT
Hayward Hunt WST
Theresa Neighbors WSOB Secretary
Kathy Jo Rango WSOB Vice Chair
Willie Bailey WSOB Director at Large
Chairs opening remarks
John: Good afternoon it is good to be here and to be of service.
Carl: Thank you all for showing up and being on time. Sorry we left you out in the hallway for five minutes while we were in here. Please review the agenda; we added a few items that we will go over. We added; K-theme and logo for 2009, L-Cant get the HFC1 Southern Ontario (English).
Supplemental reports or questions:
John: Was there a no report submitted by our new director Richard L.
Earl: I did not get a no-report or a report from him.
John: He is missing tonight and by what circumstances I am unclear. We were hoping to introduce him tonight. He had no report. We are sorry about that.
Items for discussion:
CAWS O 2008
Patty: 27 people are registered, the first cutoff date is April 1st. Anticipated room reservations were not achieved yet, based on the fact that we just added a change. Which we will now be reporting weekly, we had to add an additional 220 rooms. This increases our exposure. There is great opportunity for us to capture the amount of rooms that we say we will. If we achieve 70% of the room guarantee they will give us additional concessions. I am concerned about the 25,000 on there; we don’t have 450 gallons of free coffee. Hayward and I are brainstorming to change some of this concession, I will give them back some coffee and they will give us some other things we can value. Our recent change is regime has assisted us in reducing our coffee consumption. The treasurer and co-treasurer are in line in understanding what we need. They are clear that we need two meetings; we request that we have two meetings on anything that is a spending request so
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that we can throw it out at the team once and then ask all the questions we want and have it back. I am meeting with them on March 7th and with the hotel also. The room use is problematic; they only have two other rooms. Kelly and I have a call for this Monday where we will do our preliminary plan for the layout of the rooms.
John: A number of registrations for today was 47, from mid-February that is still short of where we would be on a reasonably successful year?
Patty: I don’t know because we have not said the deadline should always be February 1st. I am right on the edge of making that as a suggestion of a referral to the convention committee. We cannot make projections; I need to make orders now.
John: My sense of things in the past is that by February for a really robust event, we should have all in about 250 registrations about now.
Patty: People go by the deadline; there are only a couple that send it in when they get the registration form.
John: So you are saying it is only because of that change in the day, we will probably be back on tract.
Earl: there was always this push to get the artwork and registration form for 2009 done, so we could get them at SLC on the table. We should think about save the date cards. This would give them more time to negotiate their programs, entertainment, and the stuff that is on the registration form that might be more applicable. Instead of trying to rush something just to get it on the table. Do we spend a lot of money and all this rush to get them out ahead of time for 27 registrations? When most of the registrations get sent out at the delegate mailings or picked up at the conference?
Carl: I think that the problem we are having is that we are not getting the registrations out at the convention itself and we are getting them here at the conference. I know previously when we have gotten them out at the convention people have registered on site at the convention. You pick up a lot more at the conference. If we can get them out in a timely manner then we can get them out in May and not in August. Just like for Memphis we had to go with the 99$ special way after the deadline because we did not get the registrations out in time for the convention. We need to get the artwork earlier and get them out at the convention on time.
Earl: I am sure that was a topic on the convention committee that was rolled around a bit. I am sure we will be talking about the logo for that registration form.
Patty: There is at least 15 new ways to promote the convention that we are not doing, the fellowship is not that mature. The only way that the fellowship itself is anticipating finding out is the registration form itself. You need to have a pre-formed, form and the one that tells everyone that if we do it in that way. It actually would have to fall to the office; they could barely make a registration form. It is not good manners to say we
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would like you to have a save the date card and you have to have the next day. What I want is to move to online registration. This increases costs for registration, but makes it so that the platform is easier for all committees down the line.
Hayward: Is that schedule up today that we give to the convention committee?
Patty: Yes, it is just something we use to communicate with. It has to be a human being communicating with a human being. That is why 2009 not only has given us artwork, but are working on the registration form, so it will be completed.
Carl: Online registration is great for some people, but most the people who attend the convention like to walk away with a piece of paper in their hands. As regional trustees, without being pushy or bullish, one of the things we need to do it make sure that they are sticking to their timelines. Time and time again we have gone over the timeline when I was on the convention committee, along with Patty and KJ. We found the timeline works if someone is driving the process. You may need to follow up with the chair from time to time.
KJ: An option to accommodate would be to have a registration form at the convention, but it does not have to be finalized. Maybe we just have pre-registration as entertainment package, but it is not defined as a dance or band, ECT. We can make the one at the convention be a little more generic, give them a free something when they sign up, people like free stuff. Then conference can roll out what the actual entertainment is.
CAWS 2009
Patty: They are reporting as requested. The removal of the treasurer has not created the anticipated response, where we would get the reports that we were not getting in the first place. The memorabilia chair and the resort coordinator and they are going to have their registration form at the convention.
CAWS 2010
Discussion off the record
CAWS 2011
Bobbie: Evan A. is the chair for 2011. Myself, Terry and Michael and Steve and Wardell we are waiting for him to get together resumes. He will get them together and we will then do a conference call to select those people on the steering committee. Someone will forward to the office who will be on the committee.
Patty: Have terry not spearhead that now, we all chose him to be dully appointed in two positions. But I do not want him to push Evan to get those.
Bobbie: We will get the vice-chair to that piece.
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Carl: we have about an hour and 12 minutes to get it done.
Item E NADCP the conference, ST. Louis, MO
Patty: Bobbie and I will be the two WS representatives. We are going to invite some other people for the local participation. Our participation is not only about spreading the word of Cocaine Anonymous, but about education of the local PI. So it is a quantifiable and renewable event that would happen in their area, there is a drug court in every state. Our materials will be updated and you will have a report by your next conference call.
Hayward: We have all our books and the booths done?
Patty: No, we will have all that available for you at your conference call.
Bobbie: Yes, we have been talking that out and we have something different. Something that will be more like a handout, we think it will be better that a book.
John: I heard that the UK has recently discovered a resource and may want to tap into your experience. Is that happening this year?
Patty: We don’t know, we just decided today that we are going to invite them. Their first drug court opened January.
John: What I love about this is that two or three years ago we decided to go to drug court cause we knew it was important and now all this is happening around the world. Now having been there before we are even more ready for this.
Bobbie: we plan on inviting Russell, so we can not only train him, but we can milk him. The UK has been doing some stuff like this for the last few years. Their PI is really something.
Patty: They have a 15 pound budget for their PI.
Bobbie: There is no way we cannot benefit from Russell being there with us. Now at the same time we will be able to train the MO area and take it to other areas from there.
F Events:
Earl: I put this on the agenda for Patty. This was in her report that you all read.
G Tom –Cash flow asset managements
Patty: This is about what we want to talk about, going into long term CD’s.
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Tom: We addressed this a little last night. I don’t think where we are at right now, we don’t want to take any risks with the money we have now. I think, bank insured for that which basically covers a years worth of operating expenses is a good place for it. This year turns out to be SLC kicks it in the butt and brings in a good number and we continue to be ahead in 7th tradition and another third profitable in a row. We would have $100,000 that maybe needs to be dealt with in a different way than we have been dealing with it. We have been dealing with insured money market accounts, which are a very low interest rate, but you know to earn another 2 or 3 thousand a year is not worth risking the principal.
Patty: The money will remain where it is now, but be aware that we will be bringing some ideas in August.
John: this does not mean in August that we will make a decision. It is very much in your ball court on financial planning. We will show you some opportunity, by way of Tom’s research and you may decide to do more.
Spending policy-Earl
Earl: September 2007 at the conference, the WSBT passed a spending policy and guidelines for transfers. I emailed this out the board some time ago, it is basically what we are trying to do is give the WSBT in this document a better tool to execute the responsibility of financial oversight. At the same time, not tying the WSBT board up with a lot of unnecessary motions that often time need to be done on line. I want to go over this and possibly have some motions to bring forward. Do we want to do them tonight or have some time to process and bring the motions to the board meeting?
Carl: The motions should be at our WSBT meeting.
Earl: Does anyone have any questions or additions?
I –Delegate mailing
Kim: I got mine electronically and I thought it was awesome. From my discussions with Robin, it seems a great deal of money was saved so I think it was great. My question is; can this be posted to regional yahoo groups.
Patty: No it cannot be, because it still has full names. That is why it is encrypted. The conference committee could start not using last names except in internal documents.
John: Or that there would be a scrub for that purpose.
Carl: I talked to Tony and Jay and they did not get one and Jay is concerned about that.
Patty: When someone contacts you and says they did not get one, have them contact the office immediately because it means that we do not have correct contact information.
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Nicholas: I got the mailing three times and all three times it is zip locked. I called the office and cannot get one that is not locked, so it will work for apple. I got my printed copy three days before I got here. I applaud the efforts, but it is locked.
Patty: The email has a password to unlock it.
John: What the office can learn from this is to QA this before it goes out. I am very happy that they managed to get this out. I attended the pacific south regional caucus. The trustee collected the most current contact information and got that to the office. Carl was able to get the most updated list for us. If you could think about getting us updated contact information to us we can get that updated faster.
J-Euro office/hub status
Nicholas: I asked everyone to tell me how many dishes they got and I confirmed what they got with the office, it astounded me. The UK over the last five years bought over $51,000 worth of literature. They paid $15,000 to get it there. The rest of them only spent 2000 in total for all of it. So logic says that probably, the hub would be logical to have in the UK. We pad it and send it in bulk, so we are not spending 35% of the income of the fellowships money to ship it. Russell has been looking around at how much things would cost and it would be expensive, so the idea would be to ship things. At the next quarterly hope to have a plan and the plan would be to have a fulfillment center and to work out a number of shipments and to pad it in large quantity. Whoever wants the stuff pays the office and then the fulfillment center fulfills the order, then that would establish consistency. What upsets me, even thought they are shipping in thousands-I was in a meeting and three newcomers stood up, sorry we do not have any new comer chips they are on a ship somewhere. You cannot say that to a newcomer, that is unacceptable. We took into account how much hired help would be. I have talked to Patty about that, but it does not matter because everything is 3 times the amount there. The shipping is not a profit center, but it shouldn’t be a loss center. This also links in how they pay; this fulfillment center will allow them to pay in the currency they choose to. Everything will get cheaper then. If HFC 2 is the new money maker we need to get it over there, when it is there the people buy it. An office at this time is too expensive; the rest of Europe does not contribute enough. You have the illusion that the world is all over the World. This way it is only about 20%, we won’t have to sell the HFC 2 for $20 each. If we get 2000 books, they will be sold. If they are already in Europe then it will encourage all the other countries to buy them more. This also ties in with something I have been talking to Earl about, a proposal to open an account in Europe that can accept local currency that you have control of. That only the office can take out funds and ship them to America at no cost. At any time any bank in UK can charge a minimum of $60, weather you transfer 5 or a million. I know for a fact that there is $20,000 over Europe that they are not sure what they can do with it, which is for another discussion. It is all over the place at the moment and I want some feedback. Having done lots of email because they are free, the fulfillment center seems the logical way to go. On the next report I will remove the word office and keep only fulfillment, because that is the way to go.
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Tom: Why don’t we just print them over there?
Patty: They won’t print them over there without a fulfillment center to put them. The actual problem is storage.
John: When we want to prioritize something around here, we have proved we can do it.
This is what they call a quality problem in business; it is tragic that we cannot act faster.
This whole punitive thing, tell me about the charge thing again.
Nicholas: They call themselves the how it were group, they say I am not going to put it on my personal credit card cause that is not going to look good. Until you come up with a way it is staying in our district to count. So we need to put into place something that does not go against the guidelines. They have been stuck.
Patty: We have told them they can mail a check, just like they did from district to area, but that does not seem to get to them.
Nicholas: If someone sends you a check for 1000 pounds, who sucks up the fees?
Patty: We do.
Nicholas: Ok I am going to phone Russell and tell him that, they will start coming.
Patty: The only way the office controls the way you buy from us is on purchasing chips, we cannot take that risk yet. Nick, although the delivery is going out on Wednesday for their recent order, just the chips.
Carl: This will also help us with our translations also, once it is over there. Thank you Nick, I think this will work out very well for us.
Theme and Logo 2009
Earl: I think the regional trustee should fix that.
Bobbie: I just read the steering committee minutes and the general committee minutes and they said it was approved by the world service office.
Patty: It does not say it was approved, it should say “if”, but she may have written it wrong. We love your theme and your logo is great for some items, but it is required for you to submit artwork for other uses. The only control we have in this area is, is this something we can actually use for long term profit. They have to make 25,000 on memorabilia, which is a 10,000 profit center. It is loved my many Coloradans and in discussion that they all understand what we are going to require.
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Willie: We did not hear any of that discussion about that. If they would have known that this artwork was unacceptable that would have changed last night’s discussion. I don’t think it would have passed if they knew that.
Patty: I did not know until now. I know because Beth told me, as soon as I saw it I said “what about that artwork”. I did not love it. But I cannot say that, this is not about artistic control.
Bobbie: As of February 10th there was discussion about all the work they had done on this logo. I was wrong, the theme was accepted and it was the logo that was still on the table. I know they worked hard on this, but something told me to ask for the logo. They did not ask me what I thought about it that was good. You noted what is marketable and what is not.
Kathy Jo: I believe when we have a convention committee that works really hard on something and they vote for it, that we support them but guide them. I worked on a committee and we were split evenly on the logo and we did not all agree on it. What I love was that the WSO put it with some other graphics and made some different renditions of our theme. Which then ended up on our memorabilia, so then we had our logo that some people just adored. It just didn’t work on something, it would not transfer well. WSO really helped out with this. It is really important for us to be supportive. I was grateful in 04 when they helped out us with ours.
John: It was not substantial unanimity when it came to our board. I think about CALA and the no gram like the program with cocaine spilling out onto palm trees, not probably my first choice, but that never ended up on any piece of memorabilia. So the risk is not a deal, I tend to be with KJ. Thank you for letting the conversation come here. This is their contribution and if it keeps them together it might be worth it.
Bruce: I like what you both said. I don’t like the logo; it does not convey an image of our fellowship. It looks like to me another fellowship or incorporates anther style or graphics. It does not convey to me the theme. If there are ways that the office might suggest additional artwork that could be used in memorabilia and that may work and we move on.
Can’t get HFC1 in Southern Ontario
Bruce: I got an email from the delegate in SO to find out when they can get this book.
They want to buy it as well as HFC 2.
Patty: Yes, they are going to be able to buy it. We did not finalize the purchase last night, but we have it on our agenda. The proposal I have on there is for 3000 hard and 3000 soft. The WSOB still has to meet to see if we are changing the title before we print it. We may not get that, we didn’t do the memorabilia for 2008. We didn’t do three other motions for the convention. So while HFC is a very good seller for me, but so it the money we get from SLC. So it may be two meetings before we get to that.
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Bruce: We are out now and they may be able to buy more in about 6 months.
Patty: Yes that sounds good.
John: It is on the table, the quotes are in. We were ready to tackle this last night, but we did not have enough information to know if we had enough artwork.
Patty: The problem is that the ISBN number is recorded to title.
Hayward: What is the charge to change that?
Patty: $100, which we have to do anyway.
Earl: Why would we want to rename it between the conferences?
Patty: Cynthia asked me to. The French book will be printed and done in one month, with the original cover. The second one will be April 1st. We are not going to send them to be fulfilled in Montréal.
Hayward made a motion to adjourn, 2nd and passed.
Meeting closed
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