Meeting opened at 11:10AM, with a moment of silence followed by the Serenity Prayer
Roll Call:
In Attendance:
Bruce W. – Atlantic North Regional Trustee
Lawrence M. – Atlantic South Regional Trustee
Nicholas L. – European Regional Trustee
Tony D. – Midwest Regional Trustee – WSBT Chair
Trevor S. – Pacific North Regional Trustee
Carl W. – Pacific South Regional Trustee
Jay F. – Southwest Regional Trustee – WSBT Vice Chair
Bobbie H. – Trustee at Large
Earl H. – World Service Office Trustee
Hayward H. – World Service Trustee – WSBT Secretary
John B. – WSOB Chair
Kathy Jo R. – WSOB Vice Chair
Willie B. – WSOB Director at Large
Tom P. – WSOB Treasurer
Patty F. – Paid Director, Director of Operations, Office Manager
Teresa N. – WSOB Secretary
Opening remarks:
Welcome everyone I’m glad and it’s a pleasure to be here today.
We have four new agenda items for the Office board:
Item (G) – Follow up on the WSOB Vice Chair’s report.
Item (H) – Retention of counsel pro-bono and interface with the WSBT legal committee.
Item (I) – Status of approved literature.
Item (J) – Conflict of interest with paid employees.
Supplemental reports:
I appreciate everyone getting their reports out in a timely manner. Does anyone have any questions or additions to anything listed in the supplemental reports? Yes. On the WSOB Chair’s report the date is incorrectly stated as 2006, the secretary will correct it to say 2007 for the archives.
We don’t have an agenda item specifically on where the fellowship is financially; did anyone have a question or addition on that? Yes. Just an announcement on travel expenses; if you need any assistance with them just let the office know. Remember that we must have proper reporting in this area. Some of the most widely used online services for booking airfares doesn’t always have the lowest prices, because they do not work with all the airline companies. Remember the finance committee at the conference does not have all the same information that the WSO has.
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You will need to have your proposed budget to the WSO by May, because the office is required to put out the budget in SR14.
I have a question for the WSO. A member of our board saves $200 in flight costs by staying after the quarterly meeting until Monday, but gets charged $100 for the room night. Do we look at this as a net savings of $100? The WSO looks at the WSBT as a yearly expense of $45,000. There is always some fine tuning to be done to the budget. This year the CAWS Convention is in the Midwest region, so that regional Trustee’s budget requires more travel than in years where it is not. So the question is does all the convention related travel come from the MWRT budget? No, the WSO will just let all expenses fall where they may then looks at the totals at the end of the year. Really the convention travel should be a common expense to the trustees, because next year’s convention will be in the Pacific North region. The WSO is not particularly concerned with any individual trustee expense, but more over what the trustees total expenses look like at the end of the budget year.
The WSO will speak to the budget concerns no matter what the issues may look like at the conference. Does this agenda address the concerns with 7th tradition donations out of the regions? Yes. We have updates since the first reporting. The WSO wanted to make sure that both boards are in tune with the reporting and that we all support each other. What kind of impact do we all have as World Service volunteers with respect to the 7th tradition? Also what kind of custodial guidance is concerned around that? Well if we look at the 70/30 split, and the more we keep it a part of our message everywhere we go the better it will look. We found some urgency in the 7th tradition numbers and saw that it was enough to say something about it. Since the initial reporting there has been donations received from the Southwest region to help but we are still down from the budget about $3800. It is a driver for us to heighten the pitch for increased 7th tradition, especially in a year with so many special projects for the WSO. There are special projects like the NADCP (Drug Court), Literature Translations and other things throughout the year that require funding that wasn’t sufficiently allocated. The WSO wants to make sure that we are all aware of the urgency of this; it’s not a bad urgency. The urgency is in a good way that we can have an impact and believe it to be a positive one.
Agenda items
A – Update on HFC II
What is the ETA? The Marketing plan, Pricing and roll out of the book
Before this discussion begins you will notice in the WSOB Chair’s report that it was more specific as to date ranges then the Paid Director’s report. I know this is really an area of large concern. The entity that is really driving this process is the WSO. The Paid Director will be better equipped to speak about vendors and documents changing hands in a more detailed way. The WSO has given you a timeline that we intend to adhere to. Our commitment is still to deliver this book in time for the convention in Kansas City, so the fellowship can have and purchase it.
What is the ETA? – Kansas City
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The Marketing plan
As you may know it is being contributed to by members of the subcommittee who have helped to construct the book. Because they are most knowledgeable of its content, the flow, the way it looks and the marching orders from the conference. The WSO felt the board needed their participation. Although we recognize the publishing responsibility as that of the World Service Office Board, we didn’t want to disclose anyone from the process. On the other hand we don’t want whatever process we are in the middle of now to impede the timeline or goals for delivery. The marketing plan is as yet unclear. You might have considered whether or not we should put out a hard cover book with the first run. When you really look at the marching orders from the conference, the HFC II was to become the primary book or text that we use because of the updated stories and refreshed message. It would probably be the book of choice for this office moving forward. We believe that HFC II was the book of choice from the conference not to replace but to enhance our message and that is the one we intend to sell primarily. That being said we have a flow from a business standpoint of inventory that is going out every month to a list of customers. Our initial plan is to print paperback books. We can always initiate a contract that allows us to print a limited run, numbered, limited edition, embossed. That is where the marketing plan is today. One of the ideas that came up is if we put HFC II on our new book, then we should put HFC 1 on our other book. Though this hasn’t been approved yet the artwork will reflect a number one somehow on the original HFC. This could possibly make anything without a roman numeral a collector’s item or a hard to find type of publication and therefore worth more in the market place. We have not created a marketing plan that addresses anything more then the necessary flow of our business plan at this time.
Pricing and roll out of the book
The goal was to get $7 for the book, but people are paying $9. I face this in my own business, “if they would pay $9 why wouldn’t we take $9”. Should we run a special at a lower price and then raise it later or keep it higher now and then lower it later? Our feeling at the office is place it right in the middle and that HFC II would be our primary text, this is what we sell it for, and this is how we intend to treat HFC II. We don’t feel that it should shift very much in that regard. None of this has been voted on yet. This came from analyzing how much we actually made from all of our book sales. How many books we sold and for how much, also reviewing of AA study of their own books was used on how they are going to raise their prices. Well they have discovered that they are not charging enough for their book so if we are 1/8 their size and our book sales at $9.95 it is the right price. The prices of chips were lowered when I started working at the WSO. Wasn’t that because there was a need expressed by the conference for that? No, the WSOB voted to do that because we were loosing sales. The thought was maybe the chips were being outsourced somewhere else. When the chips prices were lowered it did not increase sales at all. So the feeling is to just keep it where it is now. What are the thoughts about sales in Europe? The UK just managed to get a pallet of HFC I and it took 15 years to get them. Do you mean CAUK 15 years? Yes, but four years of that was in negotiations. When I look at the HFC book in the UK it says $20 in US dollars and 10 pounds. The AA big book is 8 pound 20, or $16.40. Does the office think of anything by way of promotions or asking the areas in the European region to group together and buy some books? Or are we still going to go with “this is what it costs” and they are thinking it is still $20 dollars? Well they just bought 1000 of the HFC
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I something like 20 cases. Should we even bother with HFC II? Yes. Is the HFC II going to be able to go on sell before May? Maybe, they already get a discount on them at the H&I price. Have you considered getting some presales out of the European region? Yes. Presales are a strategy of our marketing plan. Absolutely there is a lot of thought about how to distribute all of our conference approved materials abroad. We look at volume discounts and volume air cargo to selecting a vendor, printing and where to house inventory overseas.
Rollout, finally the office will look at presales and see what deals we can make. The primary goal is to see how we can replenish the book fund as quickly as possible. We have a fulfillment center that may work and this seems the best option, they could get shipping at a much larger savings then we can. The problem has never been the cost of the book; the problem is the duties and shipping. With a royalty agreement in place, the infrastructure is set to perhaps select a vendor. Then it is a matter of just producing it, in your case, domestically and then to distribute it. What is the cost of printing? About 0.90, hopefully we can do it for about 0.55. Also it may depend on how we negotiate our contract with a vendor. We can commit to a certain amount over a certain time, by that way they are not all produced at the same time. AA books are going up in price; they have a price for the hardcover and a different price for the soft cover. When we say $9 is it for the soft or hard cover? $9.95 for the soft cover book and $12.95 for the hard cover book. The cost of producing it is higher it is around $3.50 to $4.00 a book. If we do the same amount of hardcover books as last time it is around $5.00 each to produce, but we are not going to do the same one as we did last time. We sell hardly any hardcover books. But we have about 150 people in the fellowship who will buy the hardcover book. I am almost finished proof reading this book and believe that it may be used as a book study guide. If that is true then our hardcover approach is going to have to change and we have to be available for that data. How many books do we need to buy to get that rate? We would have to buy about 5,000 to get any type of discounted rate. I think how many books we buy are up to the office; I am more interested in this meeting in talking about timelines and marketing ideas. I was just asking so that it didn’t come back to us and say we don’t have any money because we bought too many books. It is very unlikely that the office would spend that much money with out asking the trustees first. We can’t spend that much without asking your approval first.
Speaking of marketing, an interesting question was just raised. What about H&I? What about an H&I version? You have to have a special type of binding to put the book into the library. We are going to have to think about the quality of the book we produce, so that discussion is happening along with the H&I discussion. What about a study version of the book? I intend to move the matter of supply and demand that our business faces on a daily basis. We are sufficiently funded in our reserve to produce 25,000 paperback copies to meet that need. Then replacing that reserve quickly enough to respond to the anniversary year to do something more creative. The most important thing now, in my opinion, is to deliver it to the fellowship. If the quality of this product is compromised, if it is too rushed and is not right it will not go. You have the office’s commitment, this project is too important. We do not even have sales of this book scheduled until the 2007/2008 year. It is not even budgeted to sell anything until July 1st. It is also minimal sales budgeted. It wasn’t until HFC I was out 6 years did sales spike. I think our marketing plan this time and our communication will help that. The conference demands that we put the cost back into the reserve account for each book. There is a cap at $25,000, so we are impeded by cash flow on the sales of this book. Every time we sell a book we have to put those funds back
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into the savings account. Are the LCF committee concerns handled? After a discussion with a member last night everything is now handled. Are we ok with this HFC II flyer? It is not a flyer it is a working document that is for internal use only. An email was sent to the creator of the flyer stating it’s not approved artwork yet so please do not distribute this to anybody but he did anyway. It’s just another member trying to help carry the message. I am very grateful for this work being done. It gives the idea of needing a flyer without the information and one with an order form attached. There is nothing about this order form, for example, that is internationally friendly.
B – Literature translations, developing a process
The policy is drafted, distributed to the board and submitted to International Structure and Development committee, the chair of that committee reviewed it. There is a power point presentation that we can talk through or you can just accept that we are on track. The policy will be emailed to the board for review. You’re a trusted servant and we need to trust the people we put in place. If you feel you’re on track then I am ok with that. We committed to have a rollout of this policy and support of literature translations for the world convention in Kansas City. There will be a display booth at all future convention sites. This can show where our funds go to when members support World Services. The policy is written and we will get it delivered soon and hopefully WSBT legal will get a hold of it and see what they think. There is an administrative cost and we are going to have to boost the contribution program in order to support it. An article expressing this is coming out in the next News Gram.
C – New staffing at the WSO
We pretty much handled this at our meeting with the Paid Director. If no one has any questions we will move on.
D – CAWS Conventions 2007 and 2008
Having been the trustee on the 2006 and other conventions, we have not seen any contracts yet and we are concerned about that. I don’t think that the spending committee has had a chance and certainly the TNC hasn’t gotten any. You will have them shortly. This was discussed in my report on 2007. The committee certainly is a very willing and hard working committee; they just need a lot of direction. We have received some contract but they are not complete. It is our fault because the convention committee guidelines don’t give full details on the flow of things. The spending committee does not come back and say ok this is for speakers, entertainment etc…, we receive a budget for $3750 from the host committee, and their spending committee says it’s approved. Except the budget from the conference says its only $3500 so there needs to be a note attached saying where the other $250 is coming from. I have all of those notes back to the spending committee and they are meeting on Wednesday, I will be with them so that they can finalize that budget. Their current treasurer does not have all the understanding of that, even though we said it on site. We got a whole package before the board meeting none of that information was included. What can we do for 2008 and subsequent conventions to make sure that it don’t happen again? Well the 2008 committee is currently staying in great communication with the office. They have done this on all their regional convention memorabilia and that is
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when you are supposed to have gotten the information. I hear how are we going to support convention committees who are inexperienced in the future? I think that this starts with the referral process. Part of what we found that was broken was that spending committee references in the convention committee guidelines from conference did not reference appropriately the place in the World Service Manual. It is elusive and this may be where the treasurers are getting derailed. We need to write some referrals and do some work at conference this year to help support this for the future. The 2010 convention contract was sent to a huge number of members including the WST. Now the WST would immediately start working on this, but the WSOB has not received the copy yet. So the system of things is supposed to go: The Hotel Liaison forwards the contract to the WSOB so that some of the questions are answered. Instead it was sent to the WST, Paid Director and WSOB Chair only. So there is no confusion for the next WST that brings contracts to the Trustee Negotiating Committee (TNC) before it is time to do so. My thoughts were that the WST was on the office board, which is why the contract was sent to him. The WST is on the office board, but when he receives the contracts he automatically thinks to send them to the TNC. So it was sent before the WSOB looked at it. He does not have convention committee guidelines. The guidelines need to say specifically what the hotel liaison should do with new contracts. I understand what is being said, but remember the TNC conversation we didn’t like getting the contract(s) two days before they needed to be signed. That is why he sent them to us so we would be in the loop. I think the TNC commitment is a 72 hour turn around. Then maybe that is something we need to talk about because we did not like getting the contracts with only two days to review it. The speaker(s) slate got passed because it came to me and the board had two meetings to review it. The slate was sent in early and we had a chance to look at it. Well 72 hours is still not enough time to review contract(s).
E – NADCP Conference-preparation for next year.
So far planning for this event is coming along well. Is the office staffed well enough now after the event to do the follow-up letters? We took that task away from the office the last couple of years. I think that is what we will be looking at this year. Support staff is available now and that is where that task should fall. I have been in contact with the NADCP outreach staff and there are some follow-up questions to answer. They are providing a room to the fellowships for presentations allowing up to three (3) hours of time and wanted to know our requirements, like how did we want the room set up, attendance number etc…? I want to provide the WSO with the contact’s information so that there will be no confusion on the arrangements. That’s great and to that HBO is airing a special on March 15th. The promotion of the site is being done by the CADCA, which we are not a member of and therefore not listed on their assessment and treatment referral groups list. I think that is a good idea to have this list at the office for reference.
F – News Gram editor-status and update
The interim NewsGram editor was interviewed and offered the position. There is a draft 3 of the NewsGram guidelines currently being circulating at the WSOB pending approval. What are we talking about when you say pending approval? At the trustee’s last conference call or quarterly meeting they met and requested this information.
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G – Follow up on the WSOB Vice Chair’s submitted report
We put this item on the agenda and had the chance to talk with the Paid Director about it. There was a paragraph in that report about the office staff being unable to fulfill requests made at board meetings. I do not wish to add anything about that.
H – Retention of counsel pro-bono and interface with WSBT legal committee
On a couple reports there was mention of the WSBT retaining outside counsel on projects for pro-bono. I wanted to make sure that you would include the trustee legal committee during these talks. I looked in the guidelines and it says on an as needed basis, so it is not clear that we are supposed to be involved. I think that where the office is retaining or looking for outside counsel we should at least know why. Well anytime the office board retains legal counsel we would hope that you would be informed of it, both through the minutes and WSOT’s involvement on the board. That you would have some input or oversight so that you could evaluate wither it was good for business. There is only a possibility that someone could provide legal services pro-bono, it is not real yet. On the issue of copyrights we have paid a lot more money then we have been paying because of the ten year period. When it comes to the office that we need to spend $2500 and I was only supposed to spend $500 then I start shopping around for the best deal. We do not qualify for the pro-bono that we thought we had, because the trustees have too much influence. The pro-bono companies that provide services for non-profit organizations will not do it for us because our members, “stockholders” have too much influence over decision making. Our traditions did not allow them to accept us as a client. The groups are our bosses they could completely disregard legal advice. I am still seeking for better rates. I am looking for a copyright firm that is a little less than what we are paying presently. If there is ever a need anything in Canada, I have a friend in Edmonton who is an attorney. Also my sister is a member of the fellowship and a practicing attorney in Calgary. She has done some corporate law also.
We may just be able to purchase a study guide book and perform these services ourselves. Something to reference so that when a firm provides legal terms we will know what it means. We are only calling the lawyers on an as-needed basis, their outfit manages our portfolio, and we are getting a service annually that delivers us a statement. This declares that we are protected and have been, here is the documentation to prove it.
I – Status of approved literature
That question came from the PNRT for the members in my region. A few years ago a combination of several pamphlets were approved to be combined into a new-comer packet. It was conference about three (3) years ago and I have not seen it since and wanted to know why? It got passed at the 2005 conference, not three years ago. In December of 2005 was the first time the office worked on it and created a draft a few months after. The first consideration was it is going to cut income on all other pamphlets and was the office going to have to charge $5 for this pamphlet. A referral was written which did not get processed for the 2006 conference to reconsider. Because I was out on sick leave it did not get processed through. So how will this impact the rest of us? It was my original referral that got this piece created, the conference did not provide what was asked for in my referral and it is not fiscally responsible. It is on the office to-do list we will get to it as soon as the convention is complete and HFC II is out. Are you going
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to get this out in SR14? Yes.
J – Conflict of interest with paid employees
I wanted to raise the question as to wither we are talking about the job performance of an employee? I might request an executive discussion. ***Off the records discussion****
Summary of discussion
From the discussion with our meetings with the WSOB Chair and Paid Director agenda item J. can be possibly narrowed down and more clarified. So that the WSOB can consider the notion of having paid employees that serve on other non-profit boards and how their service might impact CA as a whole serving on two (2) boards. Please take a look at how the office might interface and how the paid employees might interface with this issue.
Motion to close, 2nd, Motion Passes.
Meeting closed.
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