Minutes as modified from the Board Meeting, November 10, 2024
Attendees:
Bryan Wagner, Acting President
Dennis Greggio, Treasurer
Carol Blotter, Acting Secretary
Jane Leu
Ken Morley
Meeting was called to order at 12:00 p/m. (Items with * are topics for next month’s agenda)
Technology Update: The process of interfacing with the Communications Manager seems to have not worked effectively last month. Again, the process is that anything the Board wants to have sent out via the web goes to the Board Technical Liaison first. That person will edit and forward to the CM.
* It was suggested that the Board consider having brief phone discussions, texts or emails about time critical information so that it doesn’t have to wait for the next Board meeting.
Treasurer: No major changes in income and outflow. $2,000 for the retreat deposit has been paid and the funds moved appropriately.
Discussion about whether $200 a month might be too high for the giving process, given the uncertain nature of economics right now.
Treasurer agreed to monitor the impact and will revisit with the Board quarterly for the Board’s reevaluation.
Teachers: Meditation support Sundays will end at the end of November.
Next year’s topic for the sangha: Teachers will ask the sangha what topics they’d like to investigate in January
There will be a sitting on Christmas Day.
The teachers officially endorsed the BGR giving plan.
Dorothyanne Coyne will offer a paragraph a month for the Monthly Summary Announce on a book or books from David’s Library.
Scholarship discussion (see Retreat Review).
Giving Plans:
* Next is a vote from the sangha. It was discussed to have another discussion possibly first to include those unable to attend the first time.
Board Members and Rotation:
Jane Leu resigned from the Board as of December 31. The Board accepted her resignation and thanks her for all her work. Jane was encouraged to please, please, please stay involved.
Sangha Committee: The Board confirmed its understanding that the Sangha Committee works with the Board’s oversight and thus, all decisions must be agreed to by the Board.
Bryan will follow-up with Arlene.
* Should the Sangha Committee have a liaison to the Board to report every month – or how should oversight be managed?
Tech Liaison: Jane agreed to be the Tech Liaison for the Board for the month of December
Retreat Update:
Thanks to Kenneth Gourlay for all his work getting the registration and funds processing in place.
There is more work to be done to have scholarships available.
The retreat managers, Carol and Karen, will manually manage registrations and interfacing with the Treasurer to match registrants with their payments.
The teachers and the Board need to promote the retreat. February 15th, we need to commit to a number of attendees (we will be financially responsible for that commitment). If it’s too low, we might lose the rooms. We can always add to that number as reservations grow. Karen and Carol will monitor that and keep the Board informed.
* General Discussion:
Concern over the delays in communicating with the sangha started a more general discussion of the Board’s role – to rubber stamp or to lead the sangha. How does the Board feed, sustain and grow the energy of the sangha? How does it interact with the “organism” of sangha, that living, breathing energy that creates space for all of us?
A suggestion was a longer Board specific retreat to deal with deeper issues.
Also, wasn’t sure where the Teacher/Board group meeting stood? Planned? Whose responsibility?
Some suggestions were made to the Teacher Council about possible avenues for continuing talks. Also it was suggested that the dharma talks be made directly relevant to what’s happening communally.
Technical Liaison Announcements (to be sent to Carol):
Apology for non-hybrid meeting – Dennis will write
Reminder for Board nominations – Carol
Summary of discussion of BGR and the starting of the funding – Bryan
Meeting was adjourned at 1:15 pm.