I hate to call them minutes….as that may label me the official secretary…. an office that someone else has been calf-roped into serving…

At any rate… here are the minutes from the latest board meeting…. from acting secretary Joe Collins….

HMGS-MidSouth Board of Directors Minutes/Report

Meeting June 18th, 2011
Board Members Present…
Joe Collins
Chris Edmondson
Kirk Harris
Scotty Reeves
Absent:
Mike Hicks

1st Order of business…

The board elected a new president…. Chris Edmondson
Original vote was 3 Aye/ 1 Nay/ 1 Not present… with Chris being the nay vote…
The Board promised him that he could wear a really funny hat as president… He changed his vote…
4 Aye / 1 absent.

Bryant Williams our outgoing president was nominated to be secretary… with unanimous approval.
He accepted the job via phone.

Scotty Reeves will remain treasurer by unanimous vote.
Pete Mancini will continue as Web Master by unanimous vote.
David Raybin will remain our legal counsel.

The board at this time expressed their thanks to the following outgoing members for their service…
Neel Woodall as secretary
Mike Randles as a Board Member
Brian Connolly as a Board Member

2nd Order of Business…
The board received a motion to give Pete Mancini $100 to offset the costs involved with being our Web Master.
The motion was seconded and passed 4-0-1.

3rd Order of Business…
The board expressed approval of the election format used this last year.  The board unanimously decided to use the same election format next year.

4th Order of Business…
Membership Report-
Scotty reported that membership recovered from a low of 35 last year to 102 active, paid members this year.  The board was pleased with the Nashcon strategy that allowed our rolls to be re-established.

5th Order of Business…
The board discussed HMGS-MidSouth outreach.  The board was somewhat disappointed with last year’s performance.  The board however decided to continue the program this year.  Outreach will include hanging posters in gaming stores, Nashcon NashCash, discounts to East Conventions, and hosting games at local stores in our area.  Clarksville was mentioned as an area to be targeted.  Other store locations and the schedule will be planned at later meetings.

6th Order of Business…
Conventions-
The board heard a motion to renew a Fall convention in Nashville.  After debate, the board decided to explore a contract with the Marriot for a Fall convention in the October/December time frame.  This will be a one day convention to bring Mid-South gamers back together, foster enthusiasm, and outreach to both board gamers and Fantasy/Sci-Fi players.  The Board decided to name the convention… Mid-South Games Day…. in order to reach out to other gamers.  The motion was seconded and passed.  Details will be announced later as the dates and contracts are worked out.

Nashcon:
The Board was pleased this year with the Nashcon convention.  While some areas still need attention, the convention was seen as a success for attendees.  While the convention received good reviews…. Scotty presented the financials and numbers..
Nashcon had 182 paying attendees… slightly down from last year.
Nashcon lost approximately $1482.00 this year.
Roughly $8.15/attendee.

Losses were due to the following:
1. The economy caused a small decline in attendance.
2. Costs were higher as we moved to a more tournament oriented strategy.
3. We were short on our room count due the economy and the lack of TillerCon attendees.

To remedy the situation the board decided to do the following…
1. Renegotiation of the Marriot contract.  Moving to a 2 year contract will save us approx $800 per year in costs.
2. Better management of the room/nights.  We now have a better plan to offset a possible room shortfall.
3. The Board voted to up the convention price by 5 dollars.
New price will be $25 for members, $30 for non-members.

These remedies were passed on a 3/1/1 vote.  (The first two were actually unanimous.)

The Board feels that these remedies will set Nashcon back into the “black”.  An added plus is that the TillerCon folks have expressed interest in coming back next year.  This is not settled yet, but is a good possibility.

The contract renegotiation is underway and close to completion.  Plans for Nashcon next year should be announced soon.

Siege of Augusta:

Old Business
The old Board undertook the difficult decision during the open membership meeting at Nashcon to sunset the Siege of Augusta.  In short, the folks running SOA were unable to organize the convention again for the coming year.  The old Board prudently secured the monies involved with consent and help of the SOA staff.

The current Board entertained a motion from an interested party to run the Siege in the coming year.  Great debate followed as to whether to reseed money to resurrect the convention.  Due to the time frame involved, the initial layout of monies, and the current state of the HMGS-MidSouth budget, the board decided on a split vote not to support reconstituting the Siege this year (3/1/1).  Instead, the Board decided to return the monies that rightfully belong to the Siege group to them for their use (minus a small amount that will be used to pay off an outstanding Web Hosting bill owed by SOA convention).  The seed money from HMGS-MidSouth will stay with MidSouth.

Further, the board decided that the SOA group should have the name Siege of Augusta to use as they see fit in order to reconstitute the convention on their own.  The Board expressed great regret at this decision.  The Board will certainly in the future explore a possible renewal of the relationship should SOA be interested and the financial situation improved.

7th Order of Business:
The Board unanimously decided to send personal thank you notes…. Yep, I’ll write them to our Nashcon Tourney Directors…But don’t feel too good…. they’ll just be emails!

Troy Fuller
Dr. Vandy Dave Cliffel
Photo Dave Crenshaw
Todd “the 40k Man” Perkins

You guys went above and beyond the call.  Thank you.

With this the meeting was adjourned….
Next meeting will be scheduled soon.

Joe Collins
Acting Secretary (and Board Member)
HMGS-MidSouth

Quick PS… The Board’s regret in the SOA situation is in not being able at this time to reseed/fund the convention.  The Board fully supports the SOA folks using the SOA name if they are able.  Sorry that my prose was not  clear on this.