Operations Meeting 5/3/04 Notes
Participating: Seth Atwood, Phil Denisch, Kat Dillon, Lisa Goodwin,
Margot Keyes, Evan Nappen, Tom Parker, Amanda Phillips, Karen Pratt, Adam Rick,
Brian Sullivan, Alan Weiss
- Announcements
-
Seth A needs to step back due to family obligations. We need a new
Publicity Director to carry on.
-
Adam R announced the board election, urged everyone to go vote. E-mail
data@fsp with any issues.
- Upcoming Events
- 5/10 - GONH legislative shoot-out, Amanda attending
-
5/13-5/15, Las Vegas NV, FreedomFest, Seth & Jason organizing,
Jason speaking, 6 FSP participants attending the booth, need banners, will have
sign up forms, FSP business cards, etc
-
5/21-5/23 - CO LP convention,
James Reyes is speaking on a panel with Boston T Party, Amanda P will contact
James & help prepare him for some of the tough questions that might arise.
-
5/21 - Fresno, CA, RLC conference, Varrin organizing & speaking
-
5/23+ Randall's Walk to NH
timeline, details, etc, should mostly be on the forum. Lets send him t-shirts,
shoes, gift certificates, etc. Lisa will look into generating sponsorships
& support for Randall. People can donate to the walk via Paypal. (Info is
on the forum.)
-
5/27-31 Atlanta GA, National LP convention. Alan organizing.
Justin, Doug, Jason, Chris, Amanda, Keith, Trevor attending. Will sell
t-shirts.
-
6/6 - Evan is doing outreach at a knife trade show. Evan shared lots
of tidbits about why the knife rights community should be receptive to the FSP.
- ?/? Killington Airlift, Amanda organizing
- Friends of the FSP
-
We have a large community of people who do want to help. (Phil owns up
to being "just a Friend".)
-
We should encourage Friends to join & support their Local Groups
so they will provide some continuity as Local Group members move to NH.
-
Also, we will send fundraising letters to the Friends as part of the
campaign. We can also ask Friends to volunteer their time. Refer them to the
How to Help FAQ.
-
The
Friend sign-up page is functional.
-
Friends in NH are very helpful in relocation assistance. (Welcome Wagon)
-
We should hook the Friends into the Greeter program.
-
Friends can become Participants; all it takes is a little government
persecution to push them into joining the FSP.
-
NH Friends are a new third category, as their role is very different
from the out-of-state Friends.
-
Brainstorming on the name for the NH Friends, came up with lots of
good suggestions. All agreed to think on it. Settled on Pioneers the day
after the meeting.
-
Activist
Activator Kat reports that all is going well. We have lots of jobs
& volunteers.
-
NH Guestbook Cal requests
(through Karen) that we find a link for the NH Guestbook on the main page.
Amanda will ask Tom.
-
Welcome Wagon the forum
poll didn't get a lot of responses, but those that did seemed to like the name
Welcome Wagon. Amanda reluctantly agrees we will go with the hokey name.
-
Lisa suggests that we have an announce list sign-up sheet at all of
our events. Margot reports that she has one. Margot will send it to Tom to put
on the operations page for all to rip off.
-
PorcFest Phil wants to
know if there's a spot on the forum for ridesharing? Someone suggests that we
create a Message Board devoted to the PorcFest. Everyone agrees it is a good
idea. Amanda will create the new forum.
-
Website suggestions it's difficult to notice the Member Center.
Can we do something to draw attention to it? Someone reminds us that when
everything is of high importance, then nothing really is. Amy is redoing
Alan's website, perhaps someone can ask Amy for a suggestion here. Also,
someone mentions that the Donate & Join buttons aren't really prominent.
-
Next Meeting third Thursday, 5/20 at 9 p.m. Eastern.
Operations Meeting 3/18/04 Minutes
Participating: Jean Alexander, Seth Atwood, Tim Condon, Phil Densch, Doug
Hillman, Dave Mincin, Keith Murphy, Tom Parker, Amanda Phillips, Karen Pratt,
Adam Rick, Brian Sullivan, Alan Weiss
- Budget for Fiscal Year 2005 (April '04 - March '05)
There is concern about accurately projecting revenue, as there is no
historical data. Point was made that there was some information gathered during
fund raising for the vote, which collected approximately $9 per person.
Jean and Karen introduced the idea of trigger points for budgeting
purposes, with spending levels tied to YTD revenue collected. We could either
change the spending percentage for various areas, or add in lower priority
items. Amanda opened to the floor for questions and comments.
Comment: Focus on primary mission of FSP and concentrate spending there.
Question: What's our most effective tool? Outreach/word of mouth #1,
advertising, less effective.
Question: What's in the budget for promotional items? Will we buy mailing
lists? Yes, Doug already has Libertarian list for MA.
Are we budgeted for direct mailings? Yes
Comment: Local groups can absorb costs for printing, travel expenses.
Comment: There used to be a recognition page recognizing donors. Is it
still on the site? It was a good motivating tool. Yes - in
archives.
Back on budget, four largest areas are administration, travel, advertising
and printing. Supporting details for expenses included in these areas were on
separate page of budget spreadsheet. Totals are not set in stone. If Board
approves the trigger points up front, we can just automatically update spending
limits as revenue goals are reached.
Question: Where are we on C3 status? Beginning application process. May
not happen until 2005.
Suggestion: Keep history of all donors, but make current donors more
prominent
Request from Jean: resend budget items by tomorrow for various areas, but
rate 1-5 for how important.
Question: Does budget include FSP office in NH? Not in the plans at this
time.
Question: Official address in still in NV - why not NH? Incorporated in NV.
Question: Should we have Karen sign some type of fiduciary agreement? Left
open (for the record, I don't mind)
Question: Does budget have provision for misc. expenses that come up? Yes,
reserve fund to be set up.
- Upcoming Events
NORML convention April 22nd in DC. Will we get table?
Freedom Fest May 13th -15th in Las Vegas. Seth and Jason attending, along
with members of local group.
LP convention end of May in Atlanta. Doug getting table.
Killington Airlift- arranging a flyover to drop NH care package to town
manager. Need a Porc on the ground. Seth working on publicity. Get a Union
Leader reporter in the plane?
Question: Anything planned for April 15th Tax Day? Not a FSP project -
can't protest legislation, but could hand out literature for FSP outreach. Can
Keith coordinate local groups so we have visibility?
State conventions coming up. Local groups in best position to track and
bring to FSP's attention.
NRA meeting coming up April 16th and 17th in Pittsburgh. Tim would like to
have a presence. Dave Mincin may be able to arrange with local group.
Republican Southern Leadership conference and Young Republicans meeting in
FL. Young Republicans may be a better target group.
Suggestion: We need a new position - events coordinator. Counter: Have
liaisons gather that info and set up speaking engagements.
- Activists' Center
It's up and running. We need to get more groups interacting on the forum.
Comments - local groups use Yahoo - all discussion stays within the group.
Suggestion, share solutions, best practices and get ideas on the forum, use
Yahoo for internal planning and discussion.
Dave Mincin requested that he be updated on the status of volunteers he
finds for various projects. Suggestion: Put together a spreadsheet of
volunteers and the projects they've been assigned to so we can monitor
availability. Alternate: have Dave follow up by e-mail with person requesting
volunteer to ensure they've been contacted and status in the project.
Porc Fest: Will we do volunteer recognition at the event? Amanda working
on a project.
- Publicity Director Update
Lots of outreach events in progress.
Trying to organize our media contacts. Please send Seth the info for any
media contacts you have.
We're working on endorsements from celebrities & notable libertarians.
Personal contact is the best way to get these. If you know anyone, please
contact Seth. Seth has a spreadsheet he's using to track the progress on all
the endorsements & contacts.
Suggestion: Put Seth's spreadsheet on the web somewhere. Counter: It has
personal information & may not be appropriate.
- Redundancy, train your replacement!
We need redundancy so when something happens to one of us, someone else can
step up and handle our jobs. Also so we can go on vacation or take care of our
day jobs without leaving the FSP hanging. Amanda asks that everyone begin to
look for their replacements from within their core volunteers. Look for people
who show initiative, teamwork, enthusiasm, motivation, & dedication, and
start to train them in what you do.
- Operations Reports
The Board asked for Ops reports from Amanda before every board meeting
(second Saturdays of each month). Amanda put the last ops report together off
the top of her head. For future ops reports, please send Amanda the info on all
your accomplishments throughout the month. Send her a note with "ops report" in
the subject line. You can send her this info throughout the month as you think
of it. Also, Amanda will send out a request for ops report info a week before
the board meeting.
Next meeting - 1st Monday, 4/5/04, 9 p.m.
Operations Meeting – 4/5/04 Minutes
Participating: Seth Atwood, Eddie Bradford, Tim Condon, Phil Densch, Lisa
Goodwin, Doug Hillman, Keith Murphy, Amy Knickerbocker, Tom Parker, Amanda
Phillips, Karen Pratt, George Reich, Brian Sullivan, Alan Weiss
1. Ops Meetings
Amanda asked if twice/month was still good, or if we should
move our meetings to once/month. Consensus was that twice/month was good.
Also, we’re trying the free conference calling service. If
everyone likes the service and the quality is good, we’ll use the free service
from now on. (At the end of the call, everyone said they liked the free
service.)
2. Upcoming events
4/16, PA, NRA Convention, Phil will send a note to Rob (PA
Local Group)
4/16-17, Syracuse NY, American Arms Collector, Brian
organizing
4/17, Montpelier VT, VTLP convention, Amanda speaking
4/23-24, DC, NORML Conference, Amanda P and Paul Tripp (Drug
Reform Liaison) organizing
5/?, Las Vegas NV, FreedomFest, Seth & Jason organizing?
5/21, CA, RLC conference, Varrin organizing
5/27-31, Atlanta GA, National LP convention, Doug &
Amanda organizing
??, Killington Airlift, Amanda organizing
3. Booth Materials
Amy redesigned the tri-folds. They look great! Amy can have
them printed for free, 5-7 day turnaround. (Yay!) Amy will finalize new
tri-fold & ship to Brian S and Local Groups with upcoming events.
Amy has FSP info cards for us to hand out. Amy will send
some to Brian and Amanda.
New tagline: Live What You Believe
4. Welcome Lisa Goodwin, new Director of Development
Lisa has drafted new fundraising plan. We will distribute to
all when it is finalized.
5. FSP Communications – need ideas, thoughts, suggestions
Lisa: it should be easier to figure out who does what, have
a list of who’s who that cross-references forum names, yahoo names, etc.
Doug: we should encourage people to use their real names on
the forum.
Amanda: will add task list & directory to org chart
document. Will distribute the org chart when it is finalized.
E-mail announcements – low volume is good, but it’s also
good to keep the membership updated. We will send these every two weeks,
alternating between Jason & Amanda. Will help retain members’ interest.
Eddie: We should have local announcements for Local Groups.
Doug: Local Group Leaders are doing this.
FSP e-mails – Amanda will check again on the finance@ e-mail
address. Amanda will do an audit of all the e-mail addresses to make sure they
are forwarding correctly. Alan W & Eddie B need FSP e-mail addresses.
Question: Is there a graphics person? Yes – that’s Amy’s
realm. Amy requests that all mini-brochures go through her so she can review
for consistency in image & branding. Everyone should feel free to develop
mini-brochures, but they should run them by Amy before they go to the general public.
Suggestion: Videos make huge impressions. We should have
more videos on the site. A webcast fireside chat would be nice.
Question: how’s the free conference calling service so far?
Brian got dumped & had to call back in. Otherwise OK.
Question: how does the provider make money?
They sell conf calling with extra services for $.10/minute.
6. Non-Voters Status
Matt is still working through the postcards. We sent 2238,
received around 200 with Yes/No responses (most of these were Yes), received
200 returned to sender for bad addresses. After the postcards, we will
cross-reference the remaining folks against those who have updated their
membership info online. Then we may verify via phone calls & e-mails.
Amanda: I met a guy in Florida who said that he hadn’t
returned his postcard because he was too busy looking for property in NH. I
suspect there are others are in the same situation. The Participation
Guidelines don’t say anything about being required to stay in touch with us.
Doug: It would be a mistake to cull the list just because we
can’t contact someone. We should remove only the No responses.
Consensus from everyone on the call – agree that it would be
a mistake to cull the list.
Tim: The issue isn’t the number of members, but the
integrity of the vote.
Seth: We should continue what we’re doing & whittle away
a little at a time.
Amanda: agrees.
7. FSP Calendar
Discussion about the current calendar & its
effectiveness. Camparison with the LPNH calendar (www.lpnh.org/calendar.htm ) Agreement to
table discussion, look into options, & work it out off-line.
8. General Q&A
We should recommend books & movies about NH on our About
NH page. Suggestions: Our Town, On Golden Pond, Jumanji.
Possible celebrity contact == Dan Brown – lives in NH, wrote
the Da Vinci Code
9. Next Meeting – 4/22 at 9 p.m. Eastern. (Note: This month
it will be the fourth Thursday, not the third.)