Vancouver Community Network June 24 Board Meeting Minutes Present: Sharlene Smith, , Jason Currell, Amali di Silva, Ruth Tsukishima, Jonn Oldym, Jim Sayre, Sujay Nazareth, Craig McLachlan, Alexandra Samuel, Alison Curtis, Patrick. Staff: Peter Royce, Steven Chan Agendaadopted. Minutesof last meeting adopted. Coordinatorsreport (see separate report): a. Lots of staff changes. Our summer career placement has started. We have two trainees. Were interviewing replacements for Am Johal. Were now seeking a replacement for Vimmi as office manager. b. CAP. Were setting up new sites. If all the first round sites want to stay in for second round, would work out to about $4200 per site for second round. But looks like at least 25% will drop out, so well reallocate funds. c. United Community Services co-op has a project with the United Way to build a tool called information for change. The idea is that the social service agencies will be able to fuel and draw from this tool. Were working with them but our role isnt clear yet. Technicalreport (see separate report) Q&A: Patrick raised concerns about how to handle the problem of large accumulated inboxes. Steven responded that the ideal scenario is to scan and clean out daily. A lot of the problem is caused by spam we frequently get requests to cancel one account and start a new one in order to eliminate spammers. Committeeupdates: StrategicAdvisory committee: (Alison reported) Decided it is worth proceeding with application for sustainability funding from CAP. In the fall there will be a new round of CLN funding we may want to apply for. RE: Langara, still waiting to hear back. Financecommittee (Ruth reported): Potential transition issue because Vimmi is leaving at the end of the month and we may not have someone else lined up in time. Budgetdiscussion: Reviewedsummary comparing 2002-3 budget to 2001-2 budget. Re: Revenue - Weve increased the membership/donation component partly to offset Marnie Carons salary; part of the idea of that position is to do more recruiting. We may have been overly optimistic to anticipate $33k from gaming commission; it may or many not appear. Langara Students Union contract is still pending. Hopeful re: getting $15k from City of Vancouver. Hopeful re: getting more funding from Vancouver Foundation because weve owed them a report for some time, but Peter will finish it before his vacation this summer. Then we can apply for more funding. Volnet and CAP round I are both finished. Were already in CAP round II that money is assured; our problem is fitting the funding to the kind of spending we actually need to do. CAP round III figure (60K) is conservative. Involve BC (provincial funding) we arent counting on. Re: Expneses Our expenses have gone up, partly due to hiring Marnie. Contracts have gone down those were from Volnet and CAP. We spent very little on system upgrading this year but need to do more. Were increasing our PR budget materials are pending. The purple sample flyer distributed at the meeting is just to tide us over comments on content (not format/visuals) are useful. Estimated PR costs are based on specific anticipated costs of brochure and other items. Special project materials are just equip we bought for CAP participants money that came in and went out immediately, not really part of budget. Our budget doesnt take into account our surplus. However we could end up down by $66k if the gaming money doesnt come through. So it could be a cushion. Ruth raised the question of whether the gaming money should appear in our budget at all; Peter thinks not, now that the money has been frozen. Alison asked whether Marnie was going to produce a communications plan; Peter thinks this is a good idea. Jason asked whether, if we cut the gaming money, we are comfortable running a $35 k shortfall and covering it with the surplus. Alex expressed concern that this would be a bad way of using the surplus, and said shed rather see expense cuts or revenue increases in order to cover the missing gaming money. Jonn asked whether our current staff complement was adequate, but agreed that we shouldnt use the suplus to cover a shortfall. Jason asked whether the gaming money has to appear in the budget in order for us to apply for it if it becomes un-frozen. Peter says we are a little short on the office admin side but hopes that we can find a replacement for Vimmi who is both a strong bookkeeper and a willing office manager. Alison pointed out that the only places we can increase revenue is in memberships/donations or via new projects. Peter hopes we can increase memberships and donations; weve been very conservative in this budget. Hes also very hopeful that there will be more CLN money at some point. Alison asked how acceptable it is to have a conservative budget with a deficit. Ruth isnt sure needs to look at bylaws. Sharlene points out that this is an area of our bylaws where we just have the default bylaws, which dont provide a lot of guidance. Ruth says overall its not good to run a deficit, but its better than being optimistic about our revenues. Alex asked about whether we could get corporate donations or in-kind donations. Peter says this has been tried and not too successful, though we have had some success with companies that have a direct connection with VCN. Sharlene points out that while the Strategic Advisory Committee does consider possible directions for new projects, they arent responsible for really pursuing this. Peter, Steven, and the Strategic Advisory Committee all look for grant-seeking opportunities, but its not very systematic we miss some opportunities, and pursue others that may not be that worthwhile. Sharlene summarized the directions to the finance committee as: a) remove the gaming money b) recheck the PR and office supply categories c) review investment issues Amali pointed out that we didnt have depreciation in the budget last year, but included it this year. Ruth says we did this because this is an income not a cash flow projection, and this is a standard accounting practice. Alex suggested we give the finance committee a mandate to come up with a roughly break-even budget; perhaps by planning on staff cuts towards the end of the year if it turns out that the conservative budget was justified. Sharlene noted that this was always the goal of the finance committee this time around. Jason points out that this really is a project budget it isnt really a literal representation of how each dollar will be spent. Patrick points out that our wiggle room will diminish over time, so should give the committee some direction to produce a close to break-even budget. Ruth says she will look at how we can revise numbers to come up with break-even budget. Finance committee will meet one more time before next board meeting; next board meeting will approve final budget. So if anyone has any further questions please contact Ruth, Peter, or Sharlene, and they can include you in the next finance meeting. b. review current statement of financial position as at June 24 2002 First page shows where were at as of today. Jonn points out that we cant count on the casino money that is built into our current budtget. Ruth points out that if we take the gaming money out, we have a big shortfall for this year. Peter: weve had two unexpected things: (a) the gaming freeze, and (b) $18k phone line. But remember we had a $100k surplus last year. But we now have a much more rigorous budget process. Amali asked what the fundraising committee does in terms of raising money. Alison says it basically acts as a sounding board for Peterdoesnt really come up with policies. Peter says that right now the fundraising committee is looking at an HRDC program that could potentially be a source of future funding. 7. Next steps/updates/business/other items: WSIS: We have been accredited as an NGO to present to WSIS in October 2003. There are preparatory meetings leading up to that. Peter is assuming Mike Gurstein could represent us, but thats not cast in stone. Amali is also attending. A few other Canadian organizations have representation too. August 8th there is a provincial meeting on broadband infrastructure; Steven will be attending. Its linked to the Premiers Technology Council. Nextmeeting: July 22 at 6:30 pm (one week earlier than usual). Sujay will beaway; Craig will probably be away too. We need quorum to pass the budgetso please let Sharlene know if theres a possibility you wont be around.