September 2017 Board Meeting Minutes

Minutes – FNA Board Meeting – 9/11/17

Board Members Present: Sean, Betty, Susan, Deanna, Sara, Breinn, and Leah came a bit later

Others in Attendance: Pat Bradley, Fred Harper

Called to order at 7pm.

All Board Members signed Conflict of Interest Forms.

We reviewed the letter of support for the Bastion.

Each Board Member presented their updates:

Infrastructure (Breinn):

• We are putting a hold on Harvey Aid and possible co-sponsorship of the Ryan Place BBQ. They are moving forward with the original plan and we are going to come up with some other way to raise money that doesn’t interfere with National Night Out.
• Brought up the idea to resurrect the Block Captain Program from year’s past. Would like to be able to speak about tentative plan at next general meeting.
• Discussed FWISD Bond Proposal and town hall meeting schedule, as well as District 9 improvements slated in the 2018 City Bond. Also talked about the Bond hearing schedule for our and other districts.
• Parking update – in lieu of permit parking (which won’t be here until 2018 sometime), we would like to know if the City can do some striping and additional signage pending neighborhood input for those blocks closest to Magnolia. Also need to learn more about designating delivery truck hours and routes, and possibly an FWPD officer during those times to enforce it.  We need to check with NSI to make sure we are doing what we can as a neighborhood to help encourage/inform people to park in the garage.  Also, confirm what exactly TIF money is going for in the new hotel garage parking lot/garage.
• We discussed the green space and what needs to be done to keep it looking good
• There’s a City meeting coming up to discuss a temporary closure and re-striping of Allen for an additional bike lane

Public Safety (Pat/Sara for Geri):

• Sara read Geri’s notes and Pat gave us a National Night Out update. We need volunteers to help setup and need to confirm with David that he will be available to help.
• Susan made a motion to book a port-a-potty for NNO, second by Betty. Motion passed.
• We will be providing the fajitas, but neighbors are encouraged to bring a side dish (not just desserts) and there is NO ALCOHOL allowed.
• Kris Savage will be setting up a voter registration table at the event.
• It was mentioned that some of the neighborhood thieves could be watching us on our FB page. Block Captains were brought up again as a possible way to mitigate theft and keep neighbors engaged and informed.

Membership (Deanna):

• Melanie and Deanna will work together once a month to reconcile Paypal memberships and other income coming in. All Paypal payments go to Melanie’s email, so she will need some help differentiating which line items in the budget go to membership.
• Meeting program ideas should go to Deanna and there’s a particular interest in 15-20 minute presentations on “old home” stuff, like windows, door shifting, porch materials, etc.
• The Welcome Packet has been re-designed into a folder that holds all the useful neighborhood information. These will be delivered once a month and it was also mentioned that Block Captains could have potential involvement.
• Fred Harper suggested we get directional signage for meetings, since Southside Preservation Hall is a little confusing. Betty will be looking for arrows and other helpful signage to use on meeting days.  He also suggested name tags to be used at meetings and other FNA events.  Deanna said that plastic, magnetic name tags are only $8 and that Board Members should wear them.  We agreed that paper nametags and markers should be out before meetings for the general membership.
• Betty will set up a Google Drive for document sharing.
• Deanna, Betty, and Melanie will work together to stay up to date on membership communication and numbers.

Communications (Betty):

• Betty secured 12 quotes for newsletter printing and is concerned about what’s a reasonable expense. She has a new newsletter committee that is helping her put it together.  Stacy also backs her up on the web.
• Board Members should submit content to her every month to be included in that month’s newsletter. Festivus and Home Tour newsletters go to the whole neighborhood, while regular monthly newsletters only go to current paid members.  A motion was made by Leah for Board Members to provide content on the 2^nd Friday before the general membership meeting.  Second by Susan and the motion passed.
• We all agreed that we should invest in computer programs that help Betty and her committee design the newsletter – photoshop and indesign were recommended.

Promotions (Sean):

• Sean mentioned that we need better communication with other nearby neighborhoods and suggested we form two new committees under promotions: Events (to keep track of community events) and Business Liaison (to create relationships with local business owners – and hopefully tie into fundraising and events).
• Sean suggested we market more to people outside of the neighborhood and the Board agreed that we can use our National Historic District FB page to do that, considering it has a massive following of people outside of the hood.

Preservation (Susan):

• Susan’s goal for this year it to tighten up standards and guidelines on dealing with the preservation office. She mentioned potentially utilizing Block Captains to help identify concerns.
• We need a one-pager for realtors and perhaps signage for homes that are for sale to help buyers realize if they are contributing structures. We discussed getting in front of a local Realtor’s Association to bounce some ideas off each other.  This way we can be proactive in helping buyers understand the issues with buying a home in Fairmount, specifically if it’s contributing.  Melanie mentioned there’s a “historic district addendum” that is rarely used and should also be addressed with the Realtor’s Association for guidance.

Finance (Melanie):

• Brief update of reimbursement procedures, reviewed P&L Statement, past budget and proposed budget for 17/18. We went through the proposed budget line by line, suggested changes as necessary and approved the amended budget to be presented and voted on at the next general meeting.
• Our financial audit committee will be Angela Gaither and Breinn Richter.

Administration (Leah):

• Veronica Villegas should be asked to attend our Board meetings and will work under Leah.
• Leah discussed new meeting ideas and would like to figure out a way to create an asset list for all FNA materials.
• Leah suggested we reimburse Bonnie Blackwell for her Yard of the Month expenditures going forward, or provide the prizes ourselves.

President (Sara):

• We need a written description of committees for each of our Board functions, or even just a general guideline for a person or two to help each Board Member by Friday, September 22 at 5pm. We would like to announce and solicit the general membership for committee volunteers at the September general membership meeting.

Meeting was adjourned at 9:30pm