September 2016

The September 6th meeting of the Board of Directors was called to order at 8 pm at the home of Jay Wilensky and Marie Trontell in Whitehouse Station. We began without a quorum but reached one at 8:10 pm. The minutes are written in logical order rather than chronological or agenda order.

Present: Kathi Caccavale, Joanne Cronin, Grover Kemble, Allan Kugel, Elizabeth Lachowicz, Lindsey Meyer, Jay Wilensky, and Barrett Wilson (officers and trustees); Pat Brangs, Ken Brody, Christine DeLeon, Lori Falco, Paul Fisher, Deborah Graham, George Otto, Pam Robinson, Mark Schaffer (committee chairs).

Absent: Mike Agranoff, Mike Del Vecchio, Lois DeRitter, Bob McNally, Mitch Radler, Sandie Reilly, Chris Riemer, Ed Roffman, and Leigh Walker.

NO MOTIONS THIS MONTH

ADMINISTRATION REPORTS

Secretary

The August minutes were approved as corrected.

Treasurer Written Report

Chris was absent but his written report stated that all’s well, financially speaking.

President Written Report

Barrett had nothing to add.

OLD BUSINESS

NERFA Subsidies for 2016 (continued from the July minutes)

(NERFA = NorthEast Regional Folk Alliance)

We discussed who’s going and who’s getting a subsidy. Sandi will get a subsidy. Elizabeth isn’t going. Jay & Marie are going but declined to accept a subsidy.

Pam is NERFA volunteer coordinator and said that if the FP wants a table, we’d have to staff it. The purpose would be to raise awareness of the FP among performers, agents, producers, and members of other organizations. In 2014, the table cost $85 and required lots of volunteers. No one present volunteered to staff, so we probably won’t have a table this year.

NEW BUSINESS

Nominating Committee Formation

Barrett called for volunteers for the committee, which has many positions to fill for 2017. Deborah, Jay, Lori, Barrett, and Mike A. (in absentia) volunteered to form the Nominating Committee for 2017, with Deborah as chair. The task is notable this year as we’ll need to fill four officer and three trustee positions prior to December’s General Membership meeting and election. Three of the current officers (Barrett, Elizabeth, and Chris) are term-limited and the fourth one (Lindsey) is stepping down in order to chair the new Archives Committee. The three trustee positions are three-year terms and the current trustees may choose to continue for another term. Those trustees are Grover, Mitch, and Allan.

Valentines Show

Elizabeth reported that the show will be held on Feb. 3, 2017 and the snow date will be the following Friday. We need a producer ASAP, as Nov. 15 is the cut-off date for PR and band commitments. The producer’s job includes putting the jazz ensemble and the boogie band together (if the producer chooses to continue the same format), lining up performers, scheduling rehearsal dates and snow dates, creating & submitting PR, etc. Grover pointed out that musicians would have to clear two dates, not just one, as one would have to be a snow date. (In 26 years, only one show’s been moved to the snow date.)

MUUF Auction

Kathi said that October 16 is the deadline to submit donation descriptions to MUUF. The live auction and the silent auction kick-off will be on November 5.

COMMITTEE REPORTS

Minstrel Staffing Written Report

Deborah reported a serious issue with lack of volunteer support for the Minstrel. She has tried revamping the jobs, which hasn’t helped. She and Amy are getting frustrated by the lack of response and Amy is considering quitting. Perhaps we need to cut the shows to twice per month instead of weekly. Getting in free is not working as an incentive. She didn’t want to make further procedural changes until Mike A. can participate in the discussion.

The two hardest jobs to fill are bookkeeper and kitchen.

Bookkeeper job:

Several people agreed that the tally sheet is too complex and it’s too much to expect a volunteer to tackle it. Deborah suggested that since Mike A. makes the contracts, maybe he should pay the performers himself and find people to do the tally sheet.

Kitchen job:

We discussed whether the kitchen makes enough income to justify continuing to offer food. If we count free admissions and ticks given to each food volunteer ($18/person) plus the kitchen overhead, it’s a wash. If it’s a wash, the question arose: why are we offering food and agonizing over lack of volunteers? Deborah plans to cut food and coffee service prior to the show and only offer it at intermission. Christine supported everything that Deborah said, since she (Christine) has already cut food at Open Stages for lack of volunteers.

During the kitchen discussion, the main points that emerged were:

• • Keep food – audiences expect it and most venues offer it.

  • Stop serving food – we can’t get volunteers.

  • Eliminate food for a month to see if it triggers more volunteers.

  • Survey other folk music venues before discontinuing food.

  • Intermission is an important time for new people to socialize with us over cookies and coffee.

  • Contact former volunteers to find out why they’re not volunteering.

  • If we don’t want to (or are unable to) volunteer any more, maybe we should change the way we’re doing things. We should survey the membership in a newsletter article, asking for input and comments, since we really don’t know what people want unless we ask.

  • We should volunteer at Minstrel because it’s a significant part of who we are as FP members.

We’ll continue this next month when Mike A. is here.

Volunteer Appreciation Event

Deborah announced that she secured the Madison Elks Club for Sunday, October 16 from 2 – 6 pm. She’s currently looking for a caterer.

Newsletter Written Report

George thanked Kathi for printing and mailing out the newsletter and for fixing the layout on the address page of the paper newsletter. The new, flipped layout avoids accidental shredding by the Post Office’s sorting machine.

Swingin’ Tern Written Report

Leigh was absent.

Special Concerts

Written Report – UkeFest

Written Report – Special Concerts

Special Concerts

Aug. 5 – Muriel Anderson: 91 tickets were sold. The concert lost $168 including ASCAP/BMI and insurance costs.

Sept. 23 – Calan: ticket sales are moving along.

Sept. 25 – Roy Book Binder house concert sold out in 24 hours.

Nov. –Lil’ Rev house concert: in progress

Dec. 3 – Prairie Home Companion concert with Sanctuary Concerts:“still nebulous”

Dec. 16 – Yearly Benefit Concert…….discussion followed:

Yearly Benefit Concert

The FP’s yearly benefit concert is set for Dec. 16 and we discussed what to do with the proceeds. Last year’s beneficiary was MUUF and we donated the full $1,500 to them and they didn’t charge us the usual $500 rent. We discussed whether to dedicate the proceeds to MUUF again this year, keeping in mind that we donate every year to their own benefit auction, FP performers volunteer to play for MUUF, we pay rent for every event, and we have a sound relationship with them. Benefits of donating to MUUF are that it creates goodwill, rent is waived, we have access to their mailing list for the event, and MUUF people will attend the show. If we choose a different recipient this year, we would need to pay rent. Kathi suggested a benefit for the Swingin’ Tern sound system, which desperately needs an upgrade. (Open Stage still needs the Minstrel’s old equipment for use in the Terrace Room.) Barrett took a straw poll, which indicated strong support for the S&T idea. We also discussed splitting the proceeds between S&T and MUUF. Admission price: in the past, the price has been $10 (plus the creel) but since it’s a benefit, people would probably expect to pay more. We discussed $10 or $12 but there was no strong feeling either way. Pam will reach out to Leigh to see if S&T’s interested and will move forward on it before our next board meeting.

UkeFest

Pam reported a very successful weekend with 116 paid attendees at workshops and over 130 paid people at the Saturday night concert (170 including press, guests, and volunteers). Not counting unsold T-shirts, UkeFest lost a little over $400. Attendees came from as far away as Seattle and she received inquiries from Virginia to Canada. She wanted the board to be aware that UkeFest is now financially 2/3 the size of Getaway, not counting Getaway’s camp fees which go directly to the camp. Due to last minute visa issues at the Canadian border, Manitoba Hal was delayed and uncertain of arrival time or if he’d arrive at all. Christine DeLeon, Jeff Rantzer, and Dave Kleiner immediately prepped to fill in on stage (Christine and Jeff) and teach class (Dave). After Pam contacted a U.S. Senator, the visa issues resolved and Manitoba Hal arrived in time. Pam thanked all her volunteers, Christine thanked Pam for an excellent production, and Pam was roundly applauded. Bravo to all!

From the “You Couldn’t Make This Up” Department

From Pam’s report: “One of the news outlets has a ‘10 best things to do in NJ this weekend’. The Uke Fest was included, as was Bruce Springsteen's concerts. Somehow the info got mangled and I received several calls asking about Bruce Springsteen playing on the Morristown Green on Sunday and did our ticket price cover his show. What a hoot!”

Electronic Communications Written Report

Lori reported that she successfully switched our Constant Contact account to their new billing system for a savings of about $84 per year in addition to eliminating extra fees when a large number of events are open at one time. She said some pages will look different but that we’ll get used to the new layout. Barrett pointed out that, like Publicity, this is another “background” job that is vital to the FP but that isn’t very visible and he led applause for Lori for her great work.

Community Services Written Report

Pat said the FP did not participate in the July and August “Music on the Green” in Morristown because when we did it in June, the Project was assigned a table in an awkward location near a very loud band and many people just walked past the table without stopping.

Horses Sing None of It Written Report

Ken reported they apparently have a good relationship with the new owners of Cablevision. Hooray!

Minstrel Booking Written Report

Mike A. was absent.

Membership Written Report

Deborah had nothing to add.

Getaway Written Report

Mark said that Getaway is 90% sold out, with about 15 tickets left. Instead of a wait list, they’re considering just letting extra people attend, since space has opened up at the concerts due to changes in placement of chairs and speakers.

Publicity Written Report

Paul said that ArtPrideNJ (one of our major advertising outlets) needs performers for their 30th anniversary show on Nov. 11. Pam needs people to help administer the FP’s Facebook page. In particular, she needs help posting and monitoring the public posts.

Event Hosting Written Report

Christine had nothing to add. Anyone interested in performing in the Halloween Show, please contact Deborah.

Sound Reinforcement Written Report

Mike D. was absent.

Workers’ Compensation (ad hoc) Commission (WCC)

Barrett said nothing has gelled yet with the lawyers he’s contacted. He said that it’s important that the board hear current legal opinion and that we discuss this issue in order to reach a consensus and avoid contention. The FP currently pays around $2,500 per year for a policy that covers loss of wages for employees who may get hurt on the job. A major question is whether performers are considered to be employees or contractors and there's apparently a lot of ambiguity in the NJ law.

Barrett asked WCC members to give brief outlines of their thoughts. Some people repeated ideas already documented in previous minutes [searchable on this wiki].

The main points and comments from the committee:

• • We don’t have any employees but NJ law is ambiguous and we’ve received conflicting opinions from different parties.

  • Benefits are paid out based on a percentage of employee’s income received from the FP. A performer’s yearly income from the FP is minuscule compared to a regular employee’s salary.

  • We don’t want to risk not having coverage if we get sued and then find out we needed it.

  • Other venues don’t pay it.

  • Perhaps we shouldn’t compare to other venues, especially non-NJ clubs.

  • We could be liable for high court costs even if we won a lawsuit.

  • Lori said that if we choose to self-insure, we’d have to register with the government which would be very expensive. She also said since we don’t have Director’s and Officer’s Insurance and if there’s a lawsuit, we could be held personally liable.

  • George said insurers can’t tell us if we need it until we get sued, and then they’ll tell us. There’s no history of active litigation in our kind of venues but there’s always a first time.

  • We buy insurance for what we think will never happen, not what we expect to happen.

  • Mark said we need to talk to our insurance company’s legal department, not the sales department. If we get a statement from their legal department that we don’t need WC and then we get sued, we’re covered by the insurance company’s attorneys.

Non-committee comments:

• • Could ticks be seen as payment, making our volunteers into employees?

  • If we drop WC, get sued, and the state discovers we used to have it, that might work against us.

  • Let’s get D&O insurance now, rather than waiting till the WC insurance is settled. Any one of us can research this.

It’s a complex issue, to be continued…

Intentions and Resources (ad hoc) Committee

Bob was absent. There was no written report.

ADJOURNMENT

The meeting was adjourned at 9:54 pm. Next month’s meeting is at 8 pm on October 4 at the home of Pam Robinson and Bob Safranek in New Providence.

Respectfully submitted,

Lindsey Meyer

Recording Secretary