Board Meeting Minutes

February 12, 2002

The meeting was called to order at 7PM by Stephen Souza on Tuesday, February 12, 2002. Present (9 total) were:
President: Steve Souza,
Vice President: Joyce Wilson,
Treasurer: Betty Weir,
Interrim Volunteer Recording Secretary: G Richard Yamagata,
Publicity: Barbara Slemmons,
Past President: Bob Bockwinkel,
Board members: Mary Lou Hernandez and Susan Peter-Thompson
Interrim membership chair: Tim Malone

MARCH CLUB MEETING and OFFICER ELECTION

The March Club Meeting will be the Annual Club Meeting. The event will be held on March 12 at 2424 Rodin, the home of Stephen and Robin Souza. It will be a potluck event with beverages, paper plates and plastic utensils provided. A donation of $5 will be strongly suggested. Election of the officers (traditionally done at this bi-annual meeting) will be done by mail-in ballots sent to members that have paid dues. People that have not yet paid dues will be allowed to pay their dues and to vote for officers.

Betty Weir suggested that name tags be created for all club board members and officers for this meeting. All agreed that this was a good idea and could be done for under $4 or $5.

Stephen Souza was asked to invite all the newly electeds and selected candidates for the general election in November to attend the March 12th potluck meeting.

Stephen will be putting out the March club newsletter that be 4 pages in size and will inform the club membership of the March meeting.

It was discussed and generally agreed that the public should be informed in the publicity for the March meeting and that all are welcome to attend, regardless of political party affilliation. Specifically discussed were those elected to non-partisan offices, where these individuals could change party affilliations.

TREASURER's REPORT and MEMBERSHIP

Betty Weir gave the treasurer's report. The balances are as follows:
Checking account... $3700.96
CDs...        $8274.02
TOTAL      $11974.98

A due date of March 8th for mailing in dues and mailing in the ball

Stephen and Bob announced that next year's BBQ event at the Souza's will feature speakers for cooperatives in Davis and Yolo County. This theme was chosen because of the number of cooperatives that exist and operate in and around Davis.

Betty reported that paid membership stands at 271. This was an increase of 4 from last month's 267. Paid membership was noted to be down from last year, due to about 120 people that have not paid their dues. Betty reported that we do have telephone numbers for these unpaid members. Bob Bockwinkel volunteered the Lyon and Associates offices and phone bank to do a phone drive to get members to send in their renewal payments. No decision was made on this proposal.

DAVIS DEMOCRAT HEADQUARTERS and STORED ITEMS

Chris inquired about the Davis campaign headquarters. It was stated that a headquarters will not be openned until the next general election. She then stated that her family is in need of the space where the furniture and other campaign headquarters paraphenalia are stored. Bob Bockwinkel volunteered to speak to Harrison's about low cost storage for the campaingn headquarters paraphenalia, desks and equipment. Bob also suggested inquiring about donated office or closet space in the downtown area from Streng-Dowling. Stephen mentioned rentable storage from apartment complexes in Davis. He will also inquire into low cost storage with these appartments.

Mary Lou proposed that the furniture needs to be painted if it is going to continued to be used for future headquarters. Stephen suggested that the heaviest of the desks be sold off at a garage sale and that the club try to decrease the amount of items that need to be stored by the club through a garage sale. Some of the headquarters equimpment sold off could be replaced from donations or the lending of needed equipment or furniture by club members. This brought about a discussion that there are only 17 chairs owned by the club still in storage due to them being lost at previous events. Stephen reported the remaining chairs are all marked with DAC and should not disappear at future events. As for the garage sale, this could also be done as a fundraiser with club members asked to bring one item as a donation to the club to be sold at the garage sale. Various dates were discussed for the garage sale, but no date was agreed upon. It was generally agreed that this item should be discussed as an agenda item at a future meeting.

SCHOOL BOARD CANDIDATES FORUM

It was noted that the next Democratic Club event on October 23rd was announced today in the Davis Enterprise this evening (Oct 2). Stephen proposed for the photo shoot to promote this event, that the candidates pose in front of the Susan B. Anthony building. Barbara modified this idea to invite the Davis High School Democratic Club members for the photo, instead of inviting the candidates. Don Winters will be asked to coordinate the DHSDC members for the photo shoot. Stephen will get the signs of all of the school board candidates, so they will be present in the shot with the students in front of the Susan B Anthony building. There was one strenuously strong objection to this plan on the grounds that the Democratic Club will be indirectly promoting any registered Republicans running for school board. It was discussed that this was a non-partisan election and this should not be a direct public issue. The Davis Democratic Club sponsoring of this forum was stated to be a public service to the community of Davis. Stephen and Barbara both agreed that there needs to be the photo shoot and another press release in the paper before the October 23rd school board forum.

NOMINATION FOR OFFICERS

A list of 18 people gleened from the current roster of present and past Davis Democrat Club members was submitted for contact in efforts to recruit people to the club board. It was agreed that people that do not pay their dues will not be invited to serve on the board or as an officer. Payment of dues will be requirement to be a member of the board or serve as an officer. After discussion by all present, four of the names were dropped and replaced with another four. At the end of the meeting two more names were added for a total of 20 people to be contacted by Stephen. Offices that have nominees for election in January are Treasurer -- Betty Weir and Recording Secretary -- G Richard Yamagata. Offices that need nominees are President and Vice President. Another office that needs to be considered to be reactivated is Corresponding Secretary, who will be in charge of writing thank you notes to invited speakers that participate at meetings and letters of condolence to club member families. Stephen will go through and contact the 20 names that remain on the list to attempt to find nominees for the offices and for board positions. It was noted that at least two of the board members seem to have become too busy to participate at the meetings and they will have to be replaced. It was also quietly suggested that having more board members was not a bad idea with 390 names on the list of past and present members.

NEW BUSINESS

Bob pointed out that the club has planned out ahead of time a list of annual events that show the club has long term stability. These events include the Christmas Party at Doug Kaplan's, the Annual Champagne Brunch At Jim and Marla Cook's, Davis Democratic Club Ice Cream Social at Teresa and Jerry Kaneko's, and the Davis Democratic Club BBQ at Stephen and Robin Souza's.

It was mentioned that someone should contact Hue Freeman for he was placed in charge of coordinating the club Christmas party in abstentia and no formal acknowledgement of the appointment has been forthcoming.

Barbara Slemmons announced a coffee at her home on Saturday, Oct. 27 at 1 to 3 PM for Christopher Cabaldan. [Please note that I need phone number and address for the web site to announce this event to the public]

Barbara and Stephen agreed that the club web site address should be noted in the next club newsletter.

The last announced new business was a proposal by Barry. He would like to see the club stand against the US congressional bill that is being proposed stating that anyone that has supported a terrorist group not only presently, but any time in the past, will be designated a terrorist and subject to investigation with suspension of civil liberties. Barry was invited by Bob, seconded by Stephen, to write a resolution to be endorsed by the Davis Democrat Club in the event that this bill reach the floor of Congress for a vote or should be passed.

With no other new business or announcements, the meeting was adjourned at 8:22.

Minutes submitted for revision, correction and addition by G. Richard Yamagata.


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updated by
G.Richard Yamagata. Last updated: October, 2001

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