Lawrence Sister Cities Advisory Board
January 13, 2010
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MEMBERS PRESENT: |
Bill Keel, Jon Josserand, Bob Moody, Kelly Herndon, Michael Kennedy, Linda Hyler, Ken Albrecht, Darrel Ward, Gina Ross, Kathleen Hodge, Darrel Ward |
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MEMBERS ABSENT: |
Lynn Ground, Dennis Christilles, Bob Schumm |
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STAFF LIAISON PRESENT: |
Cynthia Wagner |
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PUBLIC PRESENT: |
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The regular monthly meeting was held in the city commission chambers at City Hall at 5:30 on January 13, 2010. Chair Keel announced the presence of a quorum.
Darrel Ward was welcomed as a new member of the board.
Review of Minutes (Josserand)
A number of corrections and additions were made to the December 2009 minutes and they were approved as corrected.
Review of the Accounting Documents (Herndon/Ground)
Herndon indicated that she has met with Boley and the bookkeeper. They are working on wrapping up the 2009 transactions and transferring functions to Herndon. Two recent membership deposits have been made. Bank account paperwork to reflect the new officer names has been signed. Some similar paperwork needs to be filed relative to the Eutin trip account at the credit union.
The bookkeeper has informed us that she will not be doing our work for 2010, but she will be working a bit longer winding up 2009 and on transition. Herndon is working on obtaining new bookkeeping services.
A meeting recently occurred with Wagner and other city staff, the trip coordinators, Herndon, Keel [others?] relative to the transfer of trip accounting functions to the city. $2,000 of initial trip deposits from Hiratsuka trip participants are ready for processing with this new arrangement.
The board discussed the current format of monthly accounting sheets used to review board accounting. Because of the transfer of trip accounting functions to the city, and the transfer of student scholarship monies to the Douglas County Community Foundation, it might be possible to simplify the information provided to the Board. Herndon will be exploring this idea.
Scholarship Committee (Keel)
The committee met before the holidays and considered ten applications from the 2010 Hiratsuka participants. The committee made six scholarship awards. Two awards were for $850 (50% of the program fee, the maximum allowed under board policy) and four were for $500. The committee determined that the four other applicants did not have sufficient financial need to merit an award. This information was communicated to the trip coordinator before the holidays.
This recommendation totals $3,700 of scholarship recommendations. Based on board policy, total scholarships for this year should not exceed $6,000 (25% of the fall balance of the scholarship account). The committee adopted a working guideline that no more than approximately 60% of this authority be available for the 2010 Hiratsuka exchange, with the other 40% being retained pending the possible 2010 Eutin exchange. Their recommendations approximated these guidelines.
20th Anniversary of Hiratsuka Exchange (Ross/Kennedy)
Ross indicated that the planning committee had met recently.
James Hilliard will be the chair.
The first step will be to establish actual dates for the exchanges. It is anticipated that Hiratsuka participants will visit Lawrence in the spring of 2010 and Lawrence participants will visit Hiratsuka in the Fall of 2010.
Fundraiser (Moody)
Additional information was provided about the costs of the decals. The price has gone up once again. The price for 500 and 1,000 decals was discussed. A motion was made to purchase 500 decals. The motion was approved.
Report from Friends of Eutin (Albrecht)
Jason Crawford, the new trip coordinator for Eutin, has been measuring the interest in a possible Eutin exchange this summer. He is also exploring possible changes in the program which might increase the attractiveness of the program. He is in Eutin currently, and has made one previous trip there, to discuss with school officials some of his ideas.
2010 Budget Proposal (Hyler)
Hyler distributed the proposed budget request for calendar 2011 for submission to the city commission. Discussion occurred, and Hyler will redistribute the budget for further consideration next month.
Membership recruitment (Josserand)
Josserand discussed the status of letters which were mailed in the last month regarding membership. He has requested time at the next meeting to discuss membership recruitment in more detail.
The meeting was adjourned.