Jan

January APA Utah Executive Board Meeting Draft Minutes

1. Welcome and Opening Remarks (5 minutes)

• Call to order – 12:03

• Welcome message by Jason Boal.

  • Want to get items to people a week in advance. If anyone has items for their presentations or that they want an action on, let Jason know and get those items to him a head of time so that we can use people’s time efficiently. Let Jason know if you have updated events with the group you are working with. Trying to get action items and what to expect out of future meetings ahead of time.

• Introductions: Favorite experience over the holiday break

  • Jason Boal – President

  • Nicole Masson – Executive Manager

  • Scott Hill – Volunteer Liaison

  • Bruce Parker – Professional Development & Ethics Officer

  • Chris Hupp – Programs Director

  • Meagan Booth – Vice President

  • Taylor Jensen – Area Rep for Salt Lake and Tooele

  • Mackenzie Johnson – EPG Coordinator

  • David Rodgers – Secretary

  • Jamie Baron – Area Rep for the Wasatch Back

  • Cody Christenson – Southwest Area Rep

  • Wilf Sommerkorn – Legislative Co-chair

  • Tippe Morlan – Past President

2. Approval of Agenda and Previous Meeting Minutes (5 minutes)

• Review and approve the agenda.

• Review and approve minutes from the previous meeting – David Rodgers

  • Motion – Chris Hupp. Second – Meagan Second. Unanimous approval

3. Updates and Reports (20 minutes)

• President’s Update/Report

• Vice-President’s Update/Report – No Report

• Secretary Update/Report – No Report

• Treasurer Update/Report

• Past President Update/Report

• Professional Development – Spring 2025 AICP Exam Prep will be getting under way in the next few weeks. Sessions are being retooled. Want to talk about the best way to get the word out about those study sessions. Want to recognize those who have been successful in Fall 2024.

• Legislative Update/Report – Bills are starting to show up, more will trickle out in the near future. Bills out right now are not the main bills, expect the currently revealed bills will be changed substantially. Don’t expect the main land use bills to show up until mid-session. Will continue to monitor and send updates on bills as they come out. Will use email blasts and other ways to get information out. Expect lots of bills even though several bills have been passed without time to implement them. Any priorities from the speaker? Says needs to be more emphasis from the state to tell the locals what to do. Unknown if that will hold throughout the session. The governor’s office continues to work cooperatively, will see if that contrasts with the speaker. Not expecting a big philosophical shift.

• Programs Update/Report – The fall social went well. Got lots of good feedback from various individuals. Want to do a summer social, in the middle of planning that. Have events planned up through June, including the Spring Conference. Working with the area reps to have different events quarterly. Kicking off the pilot mentorship program either at the end of the month or early next month. Have 5 mentors this round, will have more in the fall. Spring conference planning is well under way. Lots of interest in the mentorship program. Currently have two mentees that are having a hard time placing mentors. One is looking for a female mentor, Tippe suggested Claudia Loayza. Used to work for the state, now works for a non-profit. Also looking for a male mentor for a public sector planner mentor. Jason suggested Josh Yost. Jamie suggested Christy Ostima for the public engagement mentor.

• Communications Update/Report

• Executive Director’s Update/Report

• Past President – Tippe needs reports from the last year from everyone to put in the yearly report. Just needs to be a few sentences, try to get to Tippe by the end of the week. Do we have any outline? Up to the discretion of the person. For example, programming will be different from legislative. If you created an outline for the fall business meeting, that would work for the yearly report.

• Area Rep Reports – Tayler Jensen will be doing a march madness bracket in Salt Lake/Tooele and will send the info to other areas. Will give info to Nicole to send out.

• Volunteer Planner – Working hard to get the emails for all the Planning Commissioners through the state. Will be having a meeting the first Monday in February at 5:00 pm. Haven’t got a lot of responses but will try and build it up and provide content and training.

4. Discussion Items (30 minutes)

·         2025 Budget – Attached 2025 Budget Draft includes amount budgeted, the amount spent, the differences between the two, and the differences between 2024 and 2025. Red is increasing the amount; Green is decreasing the amount. The shared budget is a working document that will be updated. Provides a statement of activity by month to show what was spent through 2024.

§  Feedback on identified expenses. – Bruce commented on the increase to Professional development and emphasized his appreciation. If you have any feedback on the budget allocations, let Jason know and updates will be made to help everyone achieve their goals for the year.

§  Question about Fall conference, $71,000 was shown, is that sufficient? Spring usually costs about $20,000 and the Fall costs about $40,000. With the grants that have been provided, the amount spent has been increased. Grants cover almost all the costs except for food. Not sure how long grants will last or how to specify how much will be received. Conference costs are included in general revenue.

§  Are we keeping a $400 allocation for each area? Looks like its showing as $250 pr quarter. Based on the actual amount that was spent. May have an expense that is in a different category. Let Jason know if we need to make any adjustments. Summer and Winter Socials will need specified allocations.

§  Review the budget and let Jason know your feedback. Jason and Bruce will talk about Professional development.

§  Professional Development, Bruce’s Request-

§  Faculty stipends of $1,000 per faculty member per spring and fall (Ali and Bruce), a total of $4,000.00. This recognizes the significant time and labor commitments being made.

§  Equality Utah has billed Bruce $1,000.00 for Olivia Jaramillo to participate in our Annual Fall Conference. The work of Equality Utah aligns with our professional development mission and ethical responsibilities.

§  Bruce has incurred costs each year to acquire study materials from APA and others that we use in the AICP study preparation sessions. For 2025 I propose a study materials budget of $600.00.

§  Recognizing the foregoing, I am proposing a Profession Development Budget allocation of $5,600.00 (including the Equality Utah payment) for 2025.

• • • Please review and return comments by 1/17/2025

·         Bylaws Update –

• • • Attached - Kelly Simons Report – includes feedback and recommendations. Creating more of a streamlined bylaws and do the heavy lifting with the handbook. It will have more specifics with policies. Intend to follow that direction with the new bylaws. Concept of the board members and what constitutes the board of directors. Not being done anywhere in APA. Proposal: Board members are elected, with half the board being up every year. Once the board is elected, the other responsibilities are appointed by the board rather than being elected themselves i.e. Treasurer/Secretary. This proposal stuck out as Jason was reviewing the report. Over the next month the board will provide feedback before the board comes back to revise the bylaws. For clarification: The elections would be for board seats, then positions would be given based on interest and capacities. Sort of know who is looking for each position, but it is decided by the board. May open additional opportunities for people to be involved in leadership without being intimidated by certain roles.

    • Attached – Updated Bylaws – current bylaws do not reflect Kelly’s suggestions. Tippe suggests reaching out to National APA ahead of time to make sure everything is supported by legal. APA uses our current model, while other nonprofits use Kelly’s model. Jamie discussed a hybrid model, where President and Vice president are elected, and other positions are then recommended by the board at large. Potentially helps with succession planning.

    • Emphasis to please review and return comments by 1/17/2025.

·         2025 Action Plan – Jason is working on this.

§  Please submit your Strategic Plan worksheets along with the 2024 report.

• Fundraising Initiatives: None

• Grant Applications: None

• Community Outreach: None

• New Proposals: None

5. Action Items (15 minutes)

• Conference Fees – Nicole

• Has done research with other chapter, we are low compared to other states, but we do two conferences, which is unique. It’s been several years since costs have been adjusted. Nicole went through and explained the proposed changes to the costs, including eliminating single day options. Adding retirees into the citizen planner category to help keep people involved. Have we ever explored the idea of having a multi-member professional tier? Not been considered before and not sure how it would be implemented. Willing to consider, but don’t want to lose money for putting on conferences. Want to look at it through the lens of incentivizing membership. If there is a cost benefit to membership as part of fees is something to consider. Don’t want to increase costs all at once, want to give cities time to adjust their budget. Jason asked for motion to approve conference rates for spring. Motion – Chris Hupp, Second Tippe Morlan. Motion passes unanimously.

• Topic Theme Discussion: Focusing on Rural and capitalizing on things Cache County does well, preserving historic character while allowing growth. Don’t want to have any groups feel excluded or deemphasized. Would like to have a shorter, snappier theme than the ones proposed. How much do we want to promote the rural nature without the urban area feeling excluded and vice versa. Balancing growth, there are some parts of the state that are not growing at all and may be either maintaining a status quo or declining. Suggest using the word change instead of growth. Leaning towards Balancing Change and Heritage. Tippe suggested Shaping the Future. Harvesting Balance in Fields of Change. Simple and catchy are what we are looking for. Wont vote on it today, will take it back to the committee to narrow it down for the board to then approve.

• Set deadlines for key projects

6. Open Forum (10 minutes)

• Opportunity for members to bring up additional topics

• Questions or concerns from the team

7. Upcoming Events and Key Dates (5 minutes)

• January 17th

  • Comments on Bylaws

  • Comments on Budget

• February 4th – Board Meeting

  • Bylaws – Action

  • Budget - Action

  • 2025 Action Plan – Discussion

  • Board Policy Manual - Discussion

  • Event Worksheets - Discussion

  • Budget Submission/Reimbursement Form - Discussion

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8. Closing Remarks and Adjournment (5 minutes)

• Summary of key decisions and next steps – Make sure to send documents and Action items to Jason ahead of the next meeting.

• Closing words by Jason Boal – Looking for help to improve the organization moving forward.

• Adjournment – 1:15 pm Motion by Bruce Second by Jaime