Regular Meeting -- November 20, 2022
The Board of Directors held its regular monthly meeting at 2007 Bert Avenue, Austin, TX 78704, starting at 2:30 pm via Zoom. The following directors (constituting a quorum of the full board) were present at the meeting by Zoom: President Kathy Lee, Treasurer Penny Chambers, Secretary John McGarey. Executive Director Robert McGarey was also present at the meeting.
The Mission Statement was read aloud at the beginning of the meeting. The board read the July 2022 meetings minutes and they were approved as written.
finances. With the help of Larry the HPC received $85,000 from insurance while the repairs ended up costing $40,000. Larry is investigating a prefab home that could be aquired for $45,000 which is much cheaper than comparable options which are around $100,000. The mortgage on the center property got down to under $200,000 and paying that down is an investment. Paying $3000 early saved us $7000 in the long term. P&L statements should be done soon and Bob will send them to Penny.
Related Organizations. We have not heard from Miles about the Anomaly Archives. AHP membership is slowly increasing at about 1/day and we hope to convert some of them to paid memberships in the future.
Repairs. There is a new oven, there were some fence repairs, and GoodwheelChairs has a new computer. After paying for the mini-splits we have $76,000 in the bank. �Chris Griggesy is still painting and is now on the garage apartment. Jabo is going to paint the eaves.
Activities. Since Bob has been travelling activities at the center have been slow. In December Bob will be back at the center more consistently. In December Penny and Bob can collaborate on finances.
Changing Roles & Responsibilities at the Center. Noting that things slow down at the center when Bob is not around, Bob mentioned that many things only get done by Bob. It's not a sustainable business model to have so much dependence on just one person. �Bob historically has never wanted this center to be just about him and would like the center to have more independence, so Bob proposed reorganizing the center into a structure that enables things to occur even when he is unavailable. �
To do this Bob proposed that the board each take on a role that would please them and that they feel connected to. This would also give the board more of a sense of ownership over the center. This would be a step towards making the center more autonomous but Penny mentioned that this wouldn't actually progress any of the business of the center when Bob is unavailable. Penny will investigate what a working board might be like.
One vision of achieving this independence is to have money to pay someone to work as an executive director and as an assistant, although we could not at this point offer a competitive salary and to do that would change the nature of the organization.
Pretty much no one is coming to our workshops. Attendance has declined ever since Covid and Zoom. Given covid's continued presence, and given Bobs desire to not get covid, are these workshops still a sustainable business model for HPC? Bob asked some thoughtful questions: 1. What to do about attendance? 2. What to do about covid in the light of it not going away? 3. Should we adapt our business model in the light of covid?
Brainstorming Possible Solutions. Penny is going to work with Sammm next week, about calling people in Austin. The Staff meeting could possibly become a working staff meeting, and staff could possibly have assignments between meetings. Possibly we could research what other workshop based organizations are doing or read articles from consultants. Bob could possibly make a list of things other people could take over and do.
IHLRN. The conference was 2/3 the size of previous years. There were 22 people attending Bob's events at the conference including a workshop on rewriting family rules. The board talked about a workshop and a book about ambiguous loss and possibly we could have a book report on that in the future.
Since there was no further business, the meeting adjourned at 4:15 pm.
Minutes submitted by John McGarey, Secretary, November 20, 2022.