OPEG Meeting Minutes

Minutes for meeting of OPEG Board of Trustees 7-21-06 Conference Call

Present: Rob Fischer, Marsha Zabecki, Randy Leite, Jan Upton, Rick George, Chip Partridge, and Sandy Lock

Not present: Buck Buchanan, Debbie Crawford, and Kelly Burgess

Invited Guest: Nancy Hood

Minutes: Rob realized that he forgot to send out the minutes from the April 10^th meeting. He forwarded them to everyone via e-mail. Marsha recalled plans to review the bylaws at today’s meeting and noted that she did not see this on the agenda. Rob asked if by mutual consent if this task could be delayed until the September meeting; motion approved. Rob noted that the OPEG web page only has minutes through December 2005. He said he could send February minutes to Jan have loaded onto the web page. No one had any objections to the April 10^th meeting minutes, so they will stand approved as submitted with no objections.

Treasurer’s Report: Rob thanked Sandy for sending out the Treasurer’s Report to everyone and asked for an update on the status of the transition from Sandy to Randy. First, we looked at the June 2006 financial report. The net revenue through June 30^th is $3,293.38. Revenue for the year is $19,828.44 and expenses are $14,766.01. We have most of the revenue collected from the Spring Exchange. We have about $700 still outstanding. Sandy just sent a document to Montgomery County verifying our non-profit status, and once they receive that, they are going to process the checks. We’ve stayed pretty much within the categories, and even when we went over, it was little, generally within a $100, but the percentage over can be high because there was so little in those categories. It looks like we did very well. As far as preliminary figures for the Spring Exchange, it looks like we have spent approximately $8,191.91 and have generated $7,404.00 in revenues. However, that makes a net loss $787.91 for the Spring Exchange, but we generated an additional 49 memberships (total membership in Sandy’s e-mail is 165). Overall for the two conferences, Spring Exchange and Fall Workshop, we have a net revenue over expense of approximately $892.99.

Rob asked for clarification on the net loss of $787.91 on the Spring Exchange. Sandy indicated that she had already counted the expected incoming $700 as a receivable, so the $787.91 is the actual loss. He then asked if the 49 were renewals or new memberships. Sandy said that she would have to go back and review the file. Marsha noted that given that quite a few in attendance said they were new in the evaluation feedback that it was likely that a high percentage was renewals; Sandy agreed that most were probably new.

The group was pleased that budget projections closely matched actual expenditures. Sandy then mentioned that the checking account had 9,356.55 and the CD had $7,063.62, making the total cash available $16,420.17. The CD is only a 30-day CD, so it is pretty much ready cash.

Marsha noted that the Fall Workshop is more of a money-maker and the Spring Exchange is more of a celebration of the organization, so it is not that surprising that it did not make money. In addition, if we are bringing in new membership, that is money that we did not count on. Jan asked how difficult it would be to break it down between new and renewals; Sandy said she could check on Monday.

Rob asked about the total number in attendance at the Spring Exchange. Sandy thought it was in the 80s, and we had budgeted for the 70s, so we exceeded the projection. Marsha noted that there were 86 registrations prior to the session, and there were also likely walk-ins. Rob, however, pointed out that some on the list did not pay. Regardless, it appears that the projection for the Spring Exchange was more than met.

Rob asked Sandy to remind him of when a new budget needed to be approved. The next meeting is September 21, and Sandy indicated that this was the latest that we look at new budget, as our new year begins September 1 (which will be Randy’s start date).

Randy and Sandy are going to meet Monday (July 24) afternoon at 2 p.m. in Dayton to review the Treasurer’s tasks. Sandy is going to closeout the current fiscal year. They are going to review OPEG’s needs as well as what will work best for Randy with respect to the location of the accounts.

Program Committee: Marsha briefly reviewed the activities of the June 15^th Program Committee meeting. We debriefed about the Spring Exchange and thought it went really well. OPEG is a diverse organization, and we can’t please everyone, but we pleased a lot of people. There was a big request for more networking opportunities and to adjust our time for people who have to travel long distances. There was a lot of positive feedback. Not all the people who attended did an evaluation, so this is a problem. We clarified the event names: Spring Exchange in May and the Fall Workshop, and we need to be consistent in all our literature. We also think that we need to do another member survey. Chip is working on that and hopes to have it out by the end of the month for the Board to review. Jan has been updating the website. We want to test out some new ideas at the Fall Workshop such as having a mixer and roundtable discussions. We have a proposed topic, “Ethics in Evaluation,” and it sounds like something that people are going to be interested in from the response to this topic upon informally introducing it at the Spring Exchange. We’re looking at getting a good speaker who will draw in new members. We’re going to have a panel discussion and lunch roundtables. Today, we want to discuss the fact that we’re a growing organization and think that paying for a really good speaker will in the long-run be a good investment.

Marsha then turned over discussion to Nancy Hood, who she had invited to participate in the Board call because Nancy had been doing a lot of behind-the-scenes work on the upcoming Fall Workshop. She asked if any of us was familiar with Michael Morris. Rob recalled that he does the journal for the ethics section for the AEA. Nancy then pointed out that he is a Community Psychologist at the University of New Haven in CT. His major research interest is the ethical challenges faced by program evaluators. In addition to all of his qualifications, one person on the AEA listserv recommended him as a humorous and engaging speaker on the topic on ethics in evaluation. With Marsha’s blessing, Nancy went ahead and asked him if he would be interested in being a keynote speaker, and if yes, what his cost would be. He is interested, and he is available. He already provided some excellent ideas via e-mail discussions. Nancy prepared a rough budget, which totaled $1,138 (includes modest honorarium of $750 and low travel costs as he will be coming from AEA meeting in Oregon). She and Marsha had already discussed increasing conference fees $5-10 per participant and/or having 5-6 sponsors pay $100-200 each to cover the additional costs of paying a national speaker. We are also hopeful that by having a national expert that it will attract new memberships to OPEG. After some discussion, the Board decided to increase the Fall Workshop conference fee by $10, which would raise it to a total of $75. Rob said he has seen Michael Morris present at AEA, and he is an excellent speaker. We are going to go with his suggestion of presenters bringing case studies so that participants actually get hands-on experience. As soon as this finalized, we need to post on the web page. There was consensus to lock him in as the keynote speaker for the Fall Workshop (November 6).

Marsha then asked about scheduling the Spring Exchange date. She was encouraged to go ahead and set date for the Fall Workshop.

The morning is going to be the speaker and panel discussions, then lunch, and the breakouts will be in the afternoon. We have the rooms reserved and have a lot of flexibility. We now have three content areas: HIPAA, IRBs, FERPA, and one room is open. Our next Program Committee meeting will be August 14 at 10:00 via conference call.

Membership Committee: Will defer discussion since Debbie is not present. Normally our next activity besides events for bringing in new members is our mailing which occurs in late December to early January for standard renewals. We will discuss this in September.

Other Business:

On-line Membership Information and Membership Survey - Rob asked Chip if he was working on updating information on-line and a membership survey. The objective of the on-line membership information is to make membership application on-line rather than mail-in. In addition, members would be able to update their information. The current system is inefficient and problematic (e.g., can’t read handwritten e-mails and they change quite frequently). Will also enable OPEG to increase communication with members. The membership survey would provide needed information on a variety of topics that would facilitate OPEG planning.

Election Chair, Award Chair, Newsletter, and Membership Committee Chair - These are activities that we are going to need to deal with in the spring. These were ad hoc last year, but it would be better if we could go ahead and identify Board members to take on these roles. Award Chair handles Service Award and Recognition Award; it would be a good idea if someone could have this responsibility and be on the lookout for possible nominees. Chip pointed out that he had previously offered to serve as Election Chair. Rick said he would revive the newsletter. This would be another opportunity to promote the Fall Workshop; he has plans to send it out as a PDF e-mail rather than snail mail (we would also post on web page). Need to verify that Debbie wants to continue as Membership Committee Chair, since she has been doing it for four years. Chip said that he thinks she wants to continue, especially as he has offered to assist her. Kelly (not at meeting) was nominated to be Award Chair; Rob needs to follow up with her.

J&M Business Solutions - Rob got a list of companies in Ohio that provide association management services, and he contacted several. J&M was the most responsive to date. Services are menu driven. They provided hourly and monthly rates ($700/month for 20 hours/month and any overage would be $36/hour). Sandy pointed out that if we used less than 20 hours/month, there was no savings. In addition, the monthly rate is only $1 less per hour than the hourly rate. At the $700/monthly rate, the total would be $8,400/year, and OPEG does not currently have coverage of this expense in the budget. Sandy’s shop, Child Focus, is absorbing much of the costs of managing OPEG. We certainly can’t fund $8,400, so the question becomes should we have them do specific tasks that can support Sandy. Sandy explained that her group is willing to continue helping OPEG, but the Fall Workshop, Membership Drive, and Spring Exchange take a lot of time, so the Child Focus staff needs additional assistance; they do all the mailings, registrations, and send out invoices. All the expenses are reimbursed. However, their time is donated to OPEG, and it becomes overwhelming because they are already working 40-50/week on their regular work. Help just with the conferences would make a huge difference. They mailed out 700 announcements. The Fall Workshop and Spring Exchange occur within a tight timeframe. Ricky offered to take on the mailings (includes Save the Date, Letter from Rob, Membership Brochure, meeting registration form for Workshop and Exchange plus Membership Brochure). In addition, if we can get on-line registration set-up this would also help. Randal (webmaster) said he could handle this. Currently, we pay $90/month for web page maintenance. Costs may go up with on-line registration, but we should at least find out.

Rob noted it sounds like we first want to try an in-house solution before contracting out with J&S or other management group. Another problem is that we may be a small client and may not be viewed as a priority. Nonetheless, as OPEG grows, we are going to need to have a “face” somewhere; currently, we have things going to various places. Eventually, we are going to have to look at having a “central identify.” Throughout the year, we should be thinking about aspects J&S could handle; could possibly start out with small task to test them. Tabled commitment to J&S or other professional service at this time.

Another brief discussion item was P.O. Box which is in Columbus. Debbie collects the mail and forwards everything to Sandy. Bank statements, etc. will now go to Randy. Going to discuss options with Randy, as he may want to make a change that would make things easier for him. Sometimes changing addresses is a problem with registrations, especially for state offices, so we may not want to change the P.O. Box, but may want to begin shifting certain types of mail directly to treasurer or Sandy.

Next meeting: September 21, 2006 at 10:00 a.m. Maryhaven.

Summary of Needed Follow-up:

1. February Minutes - Rob needs to send to Jan for posting onto web page.
2. On-line registration: a) Need update from Chip on progress/status; b) Jan will check ability of Randal (webmaster) to handle and if there will be additional costs.
3. Rob needs to follow-up with Kelly (not at meeting) regarding her nomination as Award Chair.
4. Meeting at Maryhaven – Rob needs to confirm with Steve that space will be available.

Submitted by: Jan Upton