Minutes of the Board Meeting of the Needle Arts Guild of Toledo

April 5, 2007
The Board of the Needle Arts Guild of Toledo met at 6:30 pm at the home of President Marianne Mussett on April 5, 2007. Marianne opened discussion of our nominations for the Gold Thread Award. Our chapter nomination is due by May 5, 2007. We will discuss potential candidates at the monthly meeting. We want input from experienced members who have attended seminars about what qualities they look for in the award winner.

Anna Kerlin advised that we have invited TBG Volunteer Coordinator, Cindy de Saint Victor to our potluck in June to discuss volunteer opportunities at TBG. We will ask members to update our email list with their email addresses. We will try to forward TBG emails to all email members, in order to assure that in short notice situations information gets distributed to as many members as possible.
TBG has volunteer opportunites on May 10, May 11, May 12, and May 13 during the annual Plant Sale. Gardening organizations do not have to do any additional volunteer work because they already do garden work. Our group can volunteer to do weeding and other garden work during the week.

Marianne advises that our By-Laws require approval of an Annual Budget. We receive about $650 income annually from dues. We need to decide what it is most important to provide to members for their money. How to cut expenses? The show loses money. Marianne, Maria and Karlyn will meet as a Budget Committee and use our last annual report as a starting point.

Su Pellitieri says that our next newsletter mailing will beat the postage increase. We have discussed internet options for disseminating information in the internet in lieu of a mailed newsletter. Some members will want paper newsletters and we will always provide this. It is possible that we could charge those members a surcharge for that service. Su will investigate over the next few months ways to adjust her format so that we can try other options, such as posting to a blog. Marianne will announce the sample blog that she created to the guild for them to try out and give us feedback.

Treasurer Karlyn Thompson reported the following balances in our bank accounts: $2044.61 in the checking account, $1330.39 in the savings account, and $2000 in the newly opened CD, for a total of $5375.00. Expenses recently approved included reimbursement to Donna Cairns for needlework kits mailed to the Brooks-City Base medical facility in the amount of$112.42, and to Su Pellitieri for newsletter expenses totaling $97.00. At our monthly meeting we will ask if we want to continue to send kits to military as part of the Outreach.

Regarding the Membership Committee, Marianne has asked Karlyn and Donna to work together to save steps in membership administration. Su has been asked to be a member of this new Membership Committee in charge of maintaining the roster. Future rosters are to have renewal dates listed for each member.

The board discussed ways to reduce the costs associated with our annual needlework show. In recent years, we have rented 16 banquet table sized tablecloths, incurring approximately $80.00 expense each year. Su advises that Hancock fabrics will be closing their Airport Highway location in the coming months. When they do their clearance, we will investigate purchasing fabric for tablecloths. Marianne has a contact who might be liquidating catering supplies and might have tablecloths. She will investigate potential purchase. Printing costs are a large part of our show expense. Diane will ask for guild members to help with publicity for the show. We will try to get someone who will print the show booklets for free.
The meeting was adjourned. The next board meeting is scheduled for May 3, 2007 at 6:30 pm.

Respectfully submitted,
Annette Meyer Hill