Board Minutes September 2024: Difference between revisions
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* Chair: | * Chair: | ||
* Minute-taker: Adam | * Minute-taker: Adam | ||
== Approval of Agenda, Minutes, Reports (29 min) == | == Approval of Agenda, Minutes, Reports (29 min) == | ||
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We asked for volunteers to help with the routine audit, and received 9 responses! These need to be reported on at the AGM. | We asked for volunteers to help with the routine audit, and received 9 responses! These need to be reported on at the AGM. | ||
=== H.R. & Ops Committee Report (8 min) === | === H.R. & Ops Committee Report (8 min) === | ||
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=== Winter Biking grant update (3 min)=== | === Winter Biking grant update (3 min)=== | ||
* | * | ||
* Sarah reports that city is reviewing the proposed changes. They have been clear that it is meant to be for winter biking supplies only, not covering any administrative time or costs, Sarah acknowledges Coreen's concerns that there will be some staff time involved. The other option is to return the funds. Alex feels a cycling skirt might have niche appeal, Coreen concerned the items have not been sampled & etc-- Sarah responds that its with the city now. Keith has been working on building up bikes. | * Sarah reports that city is reviewing the proposed changes. They have been clear that it is meant to be for winter biking supplies only, not covering any administrative time or costs, Sarah acknowledges Coreen's concerns that there will be some staff time involved. The other option is to return the funds. Alex feels a cycling skirt might have niche appeal, Coreen concerned the items have not been sampled & etc-- Sarah responds that its with the city now. Keith has been working on building up bikes. Alex feels that in general if the board is going to working on operational stuff, it would be better to be running these things past staff earlier-- they may seem "Scroogish," but they do have a lot of experience in these things-- Sarah did circulate this to staff and board 1wk before submitting to City. | ||
** | ** | ||
=== Tracking of | === Tracking of any other grants-in-progress or grants-in-planning (4 min)=== | ||
* | * | ||
* | * Re CoE 20 Bike Clinics project, Coreen reports it has generally been proceeding well. Colin feels this could be covered in Fundraising Committee in Future. | ||
=== | === AGM Planning, Board Recruitment, and Retreat Planning (5 min)=== | ||
* | * | ||
* | * October 27th may be too early for auditted financials. Will do November 3rd. Adam will book a space and send notice to members. Keith and Marcel will contribute paragraphs to an annual report to be put together by Colin. Board retreat should be w/e of Nov 16-17 or 23-24, and we can talk about the agenda for that later. | ||
== New Business == | |||
=== | === Budget Discussion (Sarah - 8 min)=== | ||
* | * | ||
4 Scenarios were circulated to staff and board | |||
* | |||
* | *Scenario 1 is a balanced budget (BE has a surplus of $111.80 at the end of 24/25). It assumes that all staff salaries and hours remain the same in 24/25 as they were in 23/24. Keith and I considered written feedback from Alex as well as a feedback provided by Coreen at a budget discussion meeting to generate the revenue and expense projections. We used Scenario 1 as the basis for the other 3 scenarios. | ||
* | |||
*Scenario 2 assumes that we increase staff salary costs by 10%. The board would have to determine how they wanted to assign those increases- no assumptions were made on that point in the scenario. It uses the same revenue and expense projections as Scenario 1 as raises won't affect the revenue generated and only staff expenses increases. It leaves BE with a deficit of $17,888.20 at the end of 24/25. --Is this sustainable? Maybe, according to Keith's analysis. Sarah less sure. | |||
*Scenario 3 assumes that we decrease staff costs by 20%. No assumptions were made on how those costs would be decreased. It assumes revenues will fall by 10% as a result of cutting hours. This would leave BE with a surplus of $36,111.80. The Finance Committee notes that when the board decided to end the ED role, the board also motioned to pay for admin help. This scenario envisions that BE would be in a position to pay for such help at end of fiscal next year. | |||
*Scenario 4 assumes that we decrease staff costs by 40%. No assumptions were made on how those costs would be decreased. It assumes revenues will fall by 20% as a result of cutting hours. This would leave BE with a surplus of $72,111.80. This scenario envisions that BE would be in a position to hire an ED at end of fiscal next year. | |||
These scenarios take into account no new fundraisers or grants. Colin hopes his committee could deliver something in this regard. | |||
Sarah would like to go the AGM with a balanced budget, she feels members deserve that. She also feels that continuing as an operating board is not sustainable long-term. | |||
Alex notes that he and Vaughan are at 25h, the minimum to qualify for benefits, so a reduction there would makes their jobs less viable. | |||
Coreen feels that staffing cuts would result in a greater reduction in income than what is in the draft budget. Also that potential revenue is underestimated, as evidenced by recently exceeding monthly target in various ways. | |||
Adam is a skeptic of quickly hiring someone external to the organization. Also skeptical that we were ever a governance board or had an ED that wasn't really more of a general manager, doing a lot of nitty gritty work, so suspicious of any spreadsheet showing that's possible soon. | |||
Marcel leans towards scenario 1-- would like to give a raise, having trouble seeing how in the numbers yet. Marcel thinks revenue could improve a lot if we were open more hours-- members are saying they'd like more access. Coreen says it's not necessarily that people want more shop hours, they just want more space on Saturday afternoons. | |||
Alex agrees a full- or part-time ED would be premature. The work of delineating staff roles will identify hours/roles that they can do that match a lot of those duties. They could work on this more when the summer rush cools down. | |||
Keith is struggling with the disconnect between 6 months ago when we thought that closing South shop would decrease revenue, which haven't come to pass. Why is that? Just an open-ended question. | |||
Sarah is mindful something Chris said at the board retreat about budget discussions, where there was much larger deficit than planned for. "They made the budget that they wanted to make, and there was a lot of hopes and prayers attached." We don't want to squander the hard work of achieving solvency. Coreen appreciates that, and feels our budget is now a lot closer to reality. She notes that it kind of burns to hear priorities re: an ED and a cash cushion rather than taking care of staff. | |||
Adam suggests something like scenario 1-- costs could still be cut through attrition, and a bonus could be offered if we exceed targets. | |||
Keith notes that a raise could be mandated in bargaining, and he'd like it to have been voluntary & genuine rather than forced. | |||
Colin supports something like scenario 2, with a commitment to fundraising to make it happen. | |||
Keith mentions the best way to raise revenue is to leverage volunteers, and the AGM is the best time to tell membership how they can best help us-- ex bike-building. Bike building is about 50/50 paid/vounteer-- volunteer should be higher. Alex and Coreen agree should mobilize more volunteer time-- but it will take staff time. And the volunteers aren't nearly so productive in that time. Do the paid bike builders really yield that much revenue over and above their salaries? Keith has looked at it in different ways and it's hard to say. For examples the hours they've all listed on bike tags only equals 50% of the hours they've been paid for. Coreen mentions that they do spend significant hours on shop maintenance in other ways. | |||
{{Motion | {{Motion | ||
|motion= | |motion= To pass scenario 2, with increasingly optimistic fundraising projections to make it balanced. | ||
|first= | |first= Colin | ||
|second= | |second= Marcel | ||
|yes= | |yes= Matt, Marcel, Colin, Adam | ||
|no= | |no= Heather, Sarah, Derek, Keith | ||
|abstain= | |abstain= | ||
|result= | |result= not passed. | ||
}} | }} | ||
It was determined to set a special meeting for Sunday, September 15th, at 7pm. Open to staff. | |||
== <i>In Camera</i> Session == | == <i>In Camera</i> Session == | ||
{{Motion | {{Motion | ||
|motion=To move <i>in camera</i>. | |motion=To move <i>in camera</i>. | ||
|first= | |first= Sarah | ||
|second= | |second= Adam | ||
|yes= | |yes= all | ||
|no= | |no= none | ||
|abstain= | |abstain= | ||
|result= | |result= | ||
| Line 252: | Line 234: | ||
{{Motion | {{Motion | ||
|motion=To move out of camera]</i> discussion. | |motion=To move out of camera]</i> discussion. | ||
|first= | |first= Adam | ||
|second= | |second= Sarah | ||
|yes= | |yes= all | ||
|no= | |no= none | ||
|abstain= | |abstain= | ||
|result= | |result= | ||
}} | }} | ||
== Adjournment == | == Adjournment == | ||
{{Motion | {{Motion | ||
|motion=To adjourn the meeting at | |motion=To adjourn the meeting at 10:03 pm. | ||
|first= | |first= Keith | ||
|second= | |second= Sarah | ||
|yes= | |yes= all | ||
|no= | |no= none | ||
|abstain= | |abstain= | ||
|result= | |result= | ||