WORT Committee Reports to Board of Directors September 2006

Finance/Annie Courtney

The Finance Committee met October 9.

We reviewed the First Quarter financial reports (see attached.) Everything appears to be on track. There is very little Income activity in the First Quarter, we will know more after the upcoming pledge drive. Expenses are in line with expectations.

We discussed some matters pertaining to QuickBooks and the financial reports. Currently budget data is only entered for the whole year; this makes the data reported in percentages of the budget hard to understand for anyone not working with the reports on a regular basis. It's possible to enter the data monthly, Annie would like to work with Jerry on moving toward that system. She'd also like to consider revising our very lengthy Chart of Accounts. These are rather esoteric matters and a sub-committee may be formed to deal with them.

Audit field work is done. Norm will keep us posted.

Our investment accounts are now established at Custer, we have over $201K in our portfolio. We turned our attention to the liquid funds in checking and Money Market accounts. Heartland CU is our day to day financial institution, we have our business checking there and a Money Market account that serves as a reserve fund when the checking account balance is low. It is handy for Jerry to use to make deposits as it's just down the street. However, they do not offer the best interest rates. We have a couple other money market accounts and a checking account, that pay even lower interest rates. There is general agreement that we should find the best interest rate available locally and move these funds.

Norm volunteers to check local financial institutions to find out what their current interest rates are for Money Market accounts over $50K and business checking. He will contact us via email and we will decide on where to move the money. Norm will also check with CSW to see if we could move their payouts to a different financial institution. Scott suggests that we document the "donation" we make to Heartland by accepting lower interest rates that we could receive elsewhere. We ask Norm to talk to our Heartland contact and ask them if they can do better.

The committee discussed upcoming business, the audit and the mid year budget revision. We agree that if there is no pressing business in November we will not meet.

PROGRAMMING

Brett Lemke

See separate report

EVENTS

Brett Lemke

Taken from notes by Katy Tomlinson – Thanks again!!

Blood Drive – 10/30/2006 @ The Orpheum Theater with WYOU and the Red Cross. We will be showing the movie “Buckystein”. Norm has been volunteering a good amount of his time to get this going. It will not involve a lot of staff effort; They will be dressed up as vampires to “take your blood”. Help will involve organization & signups, you can sign up for shifts online at www.wort-fm.org. Set-up will begin at 6:00 & the Red Cross will be making the signs. Fruit & cookies will be the only expense, and we will have a donation jar to help cover the cost. The poster will show when they start and end & they will not turn people away but they might not get cookies or the 40 minute movie.

Pledge Drive – Answer Phones! As of this meeting, 72 crucial shifts remained.

EVENTS, continued

Birthday Party – Dec. 2.

Ladies Must Swing – Waiting to hear from them

The Kissers – May not do it for how much we’re offering, and we have not asked them yet. They are a rocking evening band with a large draw.

Trying to find a bluegrass band; Sparetime Bluegrass Band is being considered, but we still need to discuss this with Sybil. Programmers will talk about it.

Caravan G.S.E? – If Ladies Must Swing say no.

Harmonious Wail – Another suggestion

There may end up being just two bands. We will also have a raffle and Table Tent Trivia.

Willy Street Fair Re-Cap: We have had a meeting with them already. The WORT stage was very successful this year. We didn’t answer the question about beer sales, but got very good vibes from them.

One issue was that some of the bands didn’t play long enough – As they had written in their contract. The .357 String Band, The Dials (who apparently wanted to give Cyn Cyn & The Pons a chance), and Awesome Car Funmaker (due to the fact that they barely spoke between songs). We would have been an hour short on material if it hadn’t been for the rain. The consensus was that this is unacceptable, and I would like to bring this up at the board meeting.

Planning on meeting for strategies on keeping the bands going

Should we ask them for a set list?

Dave Zero has done contracts – has good relationships with artists

Contracts did not have the band’s complete contact info (Because of Wil-Mar) Normal stuff that should be on there.

Maggie has already contacted them about this – We need to let them know what is expected of them

This was also a problem in pervious years & it is selective. We want to fill the time we have so we could book different bands.

Commonwealth: It’s their contract, and they didn’t seem that upset about the situation. Passed it off to the stage managers.

There was also an increase in budget for the stage this year. Mission accomplished, but we need to keep this up to build up the stage in the future.

PROM (Public Relations Outreach and Marketing; formerly MCOC)

Peter Lipton

The PROM Committee met Tuesday October 10th at 6:30p.m.

We discussed updating the community contact lists and noted that one contact that had been made to present WORT at the next group meeting of the Eastmorland Community Association in early November.

We discussed work on Genre Flyers in terms of writing copy for them and in terms of printing them and distributing them at appropriate events.

There was a report from an intern working with Nathan (sorry, did not write name) on promoting WORT News programming among student listeners.

The meeting adjourned at 7:30 and the next meeting is scheduled for November.16th at 5:30.

Personnel

Kathie Beckett

The Committee has finished Sybil's Personnel Review. We will share it with Board Members in closed session.

Norm's evaluation is in process.

The following is submitted for discussion and action based on the Personnel Committee's current and past evaluations of Music Director/Coordinator. The suggestions are drawn from volunteer and staff comments. The Personnel Committee has tried to formulate the concerns as expressed here.

Following up on several years’ worth of evaluations the committee has done for the position of WORT Music Facilitator, we propose the following to help the station continue its strong reputation for outstanding music programs.

FIRST Action Item: The committee recommends, that 1) because music is such an important and integral part of WORT; 2) because new technologies are changing the way we have done things in the past; and 3)because of the amount of music coming into the station as greatly increased, that the Board pass the following resolution.

Resolution: The WORT BoD encourages all music programmers to make every effort to donate at least two hours per month in addition to the time they spend on their programs, towards helping the music director carry out tasks that she considers necessary to maintain and improve the high standards of the music department

SECOND: addition to the Volunteer Handbook.

WORT has policies or procedures that help the station remove volunteers who are not living up to their “job descriptions” or supporting the station’s goals. Currently the only cause for immediate dismissal is if a programmer breaks a rule “specified, but not limited to” (pg 5).

There have been and still are instances where volunteers engage in troubling behavior of various kinds; (are not willing or able to learn to use the equipment to broadcast their show requiring staff support at the last minute; refusing to work with the station to improve their shows, participate in the pledge drives or work to improve the station through their programming). WORT has spelled out Progressive, Corrective Discipline in the Volunteer Handbook, Pages 4 and 5, but the Committee would like to add the following to the section on Discipline (page 4):

Page 4: PROGRESSIVE, CORRECTIVE DISCIPLINE Policy Statement

Action Item: Insert the following paragraph at the beginning of the Policy Statement:

“All WORT programmers are expected to maintain the high quality of their programs and to keep to the spirit if WORT. In order to ensure this, staff members who oversee volunteers have the authority to request changes in performance and the volunteer is obliged to go along with these requests.”

WORT’s disciplinary policy is one of progressive, corrective steps – “corrective” in order to assist the volunteer in changing his or her behavior. . .

FUNDRAISING:

Jane Richard

Pretty much summed up in the email sent to Board:

As you read in our September report, the Fund Raising Committee is launching WORT’s latest Major Donor Campaign. Annie and I will provide more detail and answer your questions at the Board meeting on Wednesday, but the basics are outlined below.

“Phase 1” of the plan is to send a targeted written appeal to supporters who’ve given at least $250 in one shot, asking them simply to consider raising their contribution for 2006.

We believe that a personal touch will make our plea stand out from all the others people will be getting at the end of the year. We’d like each board member to personalize about 10 of the letters with a note and to sign with his/her name.

Jim compiled a report with the names, addresses and sometimes affiliation of these supporters, which is attached. I'll bring paper copies to the meeting as well.

What we’d like you to do:

Scan the list for names of people you know, or agencies you have a relationship with—even tenuously

Send Jim or Jane your list of names: If only a few or none are familiar, some will be assigned to you

During the November 9 board meeting, you’ll be given about 10 letters to personalize and sign, which we’ll all do together during the meeting

What we’ll do:

Outline the plan and answer questions at the October board meeting

Give suggestions for personalizing the letters, especially if you don’t know the person

Write the main part of the letter

Organize and coordinate the mailing

Monitor results

Provide updates in our monthly report, and move on to phase 2

Thanks!

Jim
Jane
Annie
Maggie
Raechel

Citizen’s Advisory Board (CAB)

Glenn Mitroff

The Community Advisory Board met on October 3rd. After the report from Glenn Mitroff including outreach events and pledge drive preparations, the Board's action re: approval of the updated CAB Charter was discussed and the need for the CAB to further define "authorization". The idea of having some future meeting of the CAB at member John Keifer's farm was discussed (probably not until next spring or summer).

The first discussion re: updating the CAB bylaws resulted in some good progress towards completion. To be continued at the next meeting.

The next CAB meeting had been scheduled for the first Tuesday in November which turns out to be election day. It was decided that the meeting should be rescheduled. Various possibilities were discussed. The discussion is still going on via email, hopefully to be resolved soon.

Ad HOC Long Range Space Planning Committee (aka Space “the final frontier” committee)

Justin Richardson

The Committee met 10/4 and 10/18/2006

The committee is exploring the following topics:

I. WYOU space share
a. Children’s Museum
b. Elsewhere
II. Augment the existing building
a. Build upward
b. Build/rent outward (across the street or behind the station, e.g.)
III. Short-term survival with existing space
IV. Totally new space
a. New construction
b. Moving

I. We will tell WYOU that we are not ready to answer their proposal to join them at the Children’s Museum. We simply need more time to consider all of our options. Meanwhile, we are compiling a list of pro’s, concerns, and additional information needed, related to joining WYOU in this venture.

II. Regarding building upward, the Potter-Lawson proposal seems not affordable now. In addition, broadcasting live shows during loud construction is not feasible.
Regarding building/renting outward, Norm talked to John Cuffle-Winneke (sp?) and Todd McGraff (sp?) who will keep us in mind for off-site storage space.
Harold Langhammer owns several State St properties. He has a building behind St. Raphaels church (the church that burned) that is currently empty. The church may buy it, but not for at least a year. This may be a good location for temporary or longer-term storage for WORT, and may also be a good place from which to operate, if we were to remodel our current building, for example.

III. We identified things that need more space now or in the very near future. If we do more youth programming, we will need more studio space. We may need this by Fall 2007. A possible solution to this is to set up a satellite studio at a high school.
WORT2 would require more space. We asked the Programming Committee to discuss the timeline for WORT2 at their next meeting.
If we increase staffing, we would need more office space. We need this now or soon; already short on office space.
Record library expansion. We have space to grow the CD collection for another 1 or 2 years. As technology changes, this space need may change or be less of a concern.
Parking. We may have a need for parking in 5 years or so, if/when Findorff has other plans for their lot.

IV. Nothing to report about new construction or moving.

Other items:
We would like to plan a “white-board session” with an outside facilitator (maybe Glen Fung’s wife) along with staff and other interested parties to determine our future space needs. Also, we will take a fresh look at how we use our existing space. Norm will ask the staff begin to assess their individual ideal space wants/needs.
As the committee reaches conclusions, it will make recommendations to the board as well as present dissenting opinions as appropriate.

Judith is still interested in being a member of the committee, and will try to attend the next meeting
Next meetings:
Wednesday 11/1, 5:00
Thursday 11/30, 4:30

ENGINEERING:

Justin Richardson

Committee met 10/13/2006

MCR UPGRADE (NEOTEK) STATUS

Carpet to be cleaned the in the Master Control Room. Cabinets and countertop are in. After Mel and Floyd’s scheduled live show from the MCR next week, we will begin installation work.

DAS SCHUH STATUS

Ready and in use. The light is on the same circuit as the larger room’s light switch. The room needs soundproofing.

CROSSTALK PROBLEM BETWEEN COMBO A & B

A wiring problem causes some signals to bleed across the studios and sometimes onto the air. We will check all lines for crosstalk. Perhaps this is somehow related to the webstream, since it did not happen before we were streaming.

WEB SWITCH

Laura will update the schematic drawing for the web switch so Ted may look at it to see if the wiring of the switch meets standard conventions.

BUILDING WIRING

We should map out the wiring in the building, that is, label every breaker in the breaker box. Some of the wiring configurations (e.g. light switches, wall outlets) are not what one might expect, due to the varied history of the building’s users and ways in which the rooms were adapted for various needs.

POWER INCREASE APPLICATION STATUS

While our application is pending, we are protected from others applying for the same increase/area. The FCC will notify us when the window for processing applications is open.

EQUIPMENT DATABASE

We decided to use pre-existing software instead of creating the database with MS Access. The open-source program “Help Desk” appears to have all the features we need, including allowing users to submit problems or questions.

AIR CONDITIONER AT TRANSMITTER SITE

Terry O. has a contact at MATC who does HVAC work. If this person is not interested or able to help us replace the air conditioned soon, we will hire someone to complete this mission-critical project.

EXECUTIVE: No report

REGULATORY COMPLIANCE: No report

BYLAWS: No report

Sister Station Radio Project Ad Hoc Committee: No report