Minutes of the Thanksgiving Science Fiction Society Business Meeting

Date: January 21, 2023, 2pm

Location: TSFS Discord channel #january-2023-business-meeting

Attendees:
Michael Houghton (Herveus), President
Sam Hogan (Poryshkin), Treasurer/Chessiecon 2022 chair)
Dave Montouri (Dave/Evan(damont)), Registration
John Weller (Diamond Mystic)
Eric Fleischer (DrGandalf)
Marilyn Mix
Keith Lynch
Yakira Heistand
Meg Hogan (Saria)

Agenda:

  1. Set next business meeting date
  2. Treasurer Report
  3. Officer Elections
  4. Where do we go from here?

Next Meeting: February 26, 2:00pm. Meeting venue will be determined later.

Election of Officers:
Candidates:
President: Michael Houghton
Vice President: Marilyn Mix
Treasurer: Sam Hogan
Secretary: Dave Montuori
Trustee: Fred Blonder

The slate that Herveus originally presented had Meg Hogan for vice president. Meg was willing to continue unless someone else stepped up. Marilyn Mix had expressed interest in the vice president office at the December meeting, so Meg was replaced.

The revised slate was accepted by unanimous acclamation

Treasurer Report:
Poryshkin delivered his report early because he would be offline during the meeting for personal reasons.
We have in the various accounts a total of $6,986.21. There is an outstanding check for $1000.00 which is not accounted for in that total. [This is the check he wrote to Delta that hasn’t cleared yet.]
Hotel contract issues: In mid-December, the hotel audit of their guest room block revealed several guests previously unaccounted for. This brought the contractual obligation between TSFS, Inc and Delta Hunt Valley by Marriott down to $9,107 (previously, it was about $11,000). In mid-late December, I sent a check for $2000.00 to the hotel, and as mentioned above, another $1,000.00 last week. This brings the total owed to the hotel to $6107.00. The Go Fund Me set up to account for that is funded at $4703 of the $11,000 goal. This includes all funds collected either through GFM directly, or in the form of check donations at the convention itself. The GFM has seemingly stalled-only one donation for about $25 in the last week. It was pointed out to me that as a general rule, fundraisers should be publicized weekly. I think we haven't been.

Secretary report:

Dave reported that the November and December transcripts have been posted to the usual place: https://www.scadian.net/evan/TSFS/

Discussion:

GoFundMe needs to be publicized more. The treasury balance will cover the outstanding hotel bill. Additional money is needed for continuing expenses. Marilyn mentioned that on the Chessiecon Facebook page, the GoFundMe info is in a pinned post, but we should post reminders. Everyone is encouraged to spread the GoFundMe info in their various venues. Dave suggested updating the GoFundMe status periodically, with photos, for example.

Where do we go from here?

  1. Working capital: We need $6K to put on a convention.
  2. Convention staffing/Volunteers: Even if we can get funding, there is still the issue of staffing. Keith Lynch is available for staffing. John mentioned that we need something to increase the feeling of involvement by our community. Dave observed "Unless we have significantly more staff for the "next" convention, we're going to run into the same problems we did for 2022."
  3. We did not sell any 2023 memberships. Dave has a short list of people who would like updates on the status of a 2023 convention once we have any.
  4. Herveus: So, to address the elephant in the room: at this time, we are completely incapable of considering putting on Chessiecon in 2023. Several people sadly concurred. We cannot keep the con alive on hope.
  5. Some discussion of even being able to get a hotel. Hunt Valley would be reluctant. We have a contract and $1000 non-refundable deposit with Lord Baltimore. Do we owe anything else to LB? Yakira will call Lee to discuss.
  6. Disbanding TSFS: Storage room, Post Office Box, etc. Need to check the bylaws and bring in the Trustees. Joanna Dione, Marc Drexler, and Fred Blonder.
  7. Discussion of what is in the 5x10 storage room: Mugs, T-shirts, Art show panels, stuff for video gaming, a screen, bollards and chains, registration stuff, printer. We need a current inventory or consider downsizing or disposing of unneeded items.
  8. Herveus: I think we can formally decide for the record that Chessiecon 2023 is not going to happen. I think that we can also note that we feel the time has come close out the corporation. And the formal execution of that close out needs to be done "by the numbers".
  9. Vote to dissolve or not at the next business meeting. This will give us time to prepare for an orderly shutdown.
  10. Yakira offered to ask BSFS if we could use one of their Zoom accounts. Zoom would be a better forum for that meeting than Discord. Use the Zoom recording and caption/transcript feature to assist in capturing meeting notes. John volunteered to proofread the transcript. [Marilyn will write the minutes from that.]
  11. Widely publicize the meeting. Herveus, Yakira, and Marilyn will head this up. Herveus set up a group DM to organize this.

Meeting adjourned 3:10pm

Motions:

Action Items:

  1. Marilyn: Frequent GoFundMe reminders on social media
  2. Poryshkin: Frequent status updates on GoFundMe.
  3. All: Promote the Chessiecon GoFundMe through various means.
  4. Yakira: Call on Monday to find out if TSFS has any other obligations to the Lord Baltimore hotel. Report findings to the meeting Discord channel.
  5. Yakira: Ask BSFS Board of Directors for permission to use a Zoom account for the February TSFS meeting. Report findings to the meeting Discord channel.
  6. Herveus: Speak to trustees about future of TSFS/Chessiecon.
  7. Herveus/Poryshkin: Inventory the storage room
  8. Herveus: Determine steps for dissolving TSFS per bylaw