GIAC Monthly Meeting Minutes: 03/02/2000

Minutes of the Greenbelt Internet Access Cooperative Monthly
Meeting, March 2nd, 2000



Preliminaries



The meeting was held in the Conference Room of the Greenbelt Police Station. Gilbert Lee President, presided over the meeting. The meeting began at 7:02 p.m.


Board Members and Officers present:Gilbert Lee, Bill Dupree, Neil McLeod, Peggy Bates, Shawn O'Neil, Patty Merryman, Mary Camp, Doug Love.


Guests and/or members: Ray Stevens and Brian Davis


Presidents Remarks

It is seven o'clock let's start with the secretary's report.


Secretary's Report



Ace VoiceMail at $14.50 per month with a $15 setup fee was picked to be our new voicemail with telephone pickup of messages paid quarterly or yearly. Our mailbox monitoring schedule will continue. An e-mail message will go out with the new voice mail procedures when the account is set up and the info packet is delivered. The issue about procurring a company credit card was tabled by a motion from Neil McLeod and seconded by Patty Merryman after discussion. The subject had to do with getting cheaper rates with auto payments for voicemail, but security, encumbering the corporation, and a high turnover rate of officers dissuaded this board to vote toward a tabling of the issue.

All four numbers into Chesapeake to get online function as local numbers so if you have trouble with one try another.

Chesapeake Issues Continued

Ed James made a generous offer to set up a DSL pipeline to his personal server to a fixed IP address inorder to implement CGI scripting, but since the goal of Greenbelt.com is to support its customers both regular and business, the board moved(Neil McLeod, Gil Lee) we insist the efforts made to fix our problems lay with the ISP.A private individual holding the keys to the system so to speak might not sit well with business clients. On a different note the board regrets the fact that Ed James has asked to step down from the Board of Directors.

So far the ISP has processed current workorders and GIAC is going to purchase a CD of Netscape's current Browser for setups.

Vice President's Report

Doug Love has agreed to contact Neal McFarb of the New Deal Cafe about a Cyber Cafe. The next PC/Internet related class will be 5 Easy Utilities, April's class will be PC & Windows Basics by Bill Dupree. Mary Camp hopes to set the year up so there is a rotation of classes and Cyber Cafes


Treasurer & Membership Committee Reports

With recommendations from Mary Halford a CPA, GIAC has made efforts to change it's accounting practices. The accounts manager and the treasurer now has a division of labor so no fraud is likely. Neil McLeod is bringing the old Lotus records into Quicken and then Peggy Bates will take over as accounts manager. This action will remove the need to outsource our bookeeping. Neil will get materials from the P.O. Box and Peggy will hold the keys to the files. The CPA also recommended we put some of the reserve into an interest bearing vehicle. Since the board had already approved the action the treasurer was asked by the board to implement a ladder type set of certificates of deposit at a local bank or credit union. A motion by Gil Lee seconded by Doug Love to accept the treasurers report passed.
Summary information for both committees can be found here .


Auditing Committee Report


The auditing committee metfour times and the chairperson is in Huston. Again with the help of Mary Halford the Auditing Committee is going over the books and making cash flow and trial balance reports. The past years are also being put into Quicken for consistancy and reporting capability by Neil McLeod. The audit should be finished April 1st. Thanks from the board and officers on the fine work done by this committee and volunteers.


Legal Committee


2/3 of the Legal Committee are on the Auditing Committee so they have been super busy. This is the reason we, GIAC could use some more help. E-mail us if you can help run down information on tax exempt status for GIAC.

Unfinished Business or Other Issues


The board passed a request for Nancy Allen, originator of our logo to post the logo on her site as part of her artist portfolio and link it back to greenbelt.com. Although the logo is now property of GIAC her request was well intentioned and the board found no problem with the request.
There was an e-mail vote on the DSL option offered GIAC customers. It was approved at the meeting, with the caveat that GIAC be precluded from direct phone company involvement.
Neil McLeod felt there was a need for job accountability. He proposed that a mechanism be put into place to vacate positions not being performed. The question brought forth a need to investigate our bylaws and existing procedures to see if we already have such a mechanism in place. Neil then volunteered to write a procedure and present it to the board.
There was a proposal to move our meetings to the second Thursday of the month. It was tabled until it is investigated how the move affects everyone involved and the difficulty of maintaining a meeting place.

Health and Welfare


Gil's wife and our Social Director is still on the mend keep her in your thoughts. Just imagine Gilbert's cookies at the meeting.

Next Meeting



The next monthly meeting is the first Thursday! April 6, 2000, at 7 p.m. at the Greenbelt Police station.


The meeting was adjourned at 9:22 p.m.

Remember help someone with your knowledge. You are smarter than you think !!!