2008 ROCK Annual Business Meeting

January 26, 2008

Call to order / Welcome 
Brian called to order our meeting at 10:15AM.  Five members were in attendance. 

Old business

• RTF rockets: Russ Mozier made a donation to the Club of some Quest RTF kits. Brian noted that we approved a purchase and still need to purchase some additional ones.
• weather station: Review when we get to another field
• PA / air horn: Review when we get to another field
• Review / adoption of accident form: Made some adjustments to the form. Form adopted.

Officer reports

President

A look back at 2007 
Brian Coyle summarized the year from June�¢??s last club meeting:

• Overall, 2007 was a good year for ROCK.
• Paid memberships have been consistent. We had ups and downs in attendance but continue to see a core of regular flyers.
• Started our official second year on the Little Big Econ field.
• Had good TARC team involvement which went to the finals. We see  2-3 teams registered in Central Florida for 2008. 
• No accidents. 
• Minimized lost rockets by focusing on field conditions.

Because of the 50th Anniversary of NAR, we want to continue to work in the direction of growth- in attendance, in skill, and in serving the Central Florida region.  We encourage involvement in NARAM-50 to be held the last week of July/beginning of August in The Plains, Virginia.

We are very glad for the positive review and large picture spread in the Seminole Chronicle in January. We�¢??re grateful to be seen as a positive influence in service of our community.

NAR / 4-H Partnership   Brian has not have additional information about this partnership at this time.

Vice President

Main responsibility is to suggest competitive events for our monthly launch.  Russ is directing the NAR sanctioned competition for April at our field.  Winston will develop a list of other contest options for the remainder of 2008. If you have contest suggestions, please contact us.

Treasurer 

Submitted by 01/26/08 by Robb Haskins, ROCK Treasurer

2007 was a good year for ROCK. The club started the year with a beginning checking
account balance of $318, which grew to it’s current year ending balance of $460.78.

The club brought in $291.00 in 2007 in launch fees, club dues, and small donations.

Our total outflows were $148.95 with $40.00 going for section dues, and the rest paid out
to Tom Dennen for equipment repair items to the launch pads and launch system.

Net Inflow for the year was $142.05 bringing us to our current account balance.

2007 Balance Sheet available upon request.

RECOMMENDATION:
The necessary expenditures in 2007 created no significant impact to the club’s bottom line as they were rather small in nature. As we continue as a club, and with the desire to grow, we should not take for granted that the various monetary impacts related to our operation will always be so small. I recommend that we re-institute our raffle program, utilizing solicited and/or unsolicited donations in order to create another moderate, yet potentially necessary, monetary inflow for ROCK activities. Such inflow will help provide the club with a degree of financial flexibility in dealing with larger upkeep issues, or when pursuing avenues of growth.

• Links to site for purchase of club items.  
•  Launch card. 
• News items.

Needs fixin'(anything busted??)

Launch controller. Replace Launch switch.  We hope to connect with Dan Woller regarding an extra battery. Tom will get extra fuses for controller.

Brian also hopes to see an increase in launch attendance.  We discussed the size of our field as a limiting factor, and intend to giving priority attention location of another larger field. With an increase in the field size and hopefully a resulting growth in core member attendance, we then want to look at other forms of publicity to develop awareness.

In the meanwhile we will contact the NAR regarding launch announcements in Sport Rocketry and NAR.org website updates. (Tom) Other ideas include:

• Announce launches on ICflorida.com?
• Obtain store permission to place stickers on rocketry items to invite potential flyers.
• Officers have quarterly meetings for follow up.
• Monthly email announcements.

 Other items which weÃ?¢??d like to consider:

• Have a Porta potty on site.\
• Change the roster to include a list of mobile phone numbers for members on site to be able to talk with each other.
   

Nominations & Elections
No new nominations received, All current officers are willing to continue. Consent of meeting participants was to continue the officer roles.

Future plans for ROCK:

•  Roger volunteered to redo our club flyer. Tom is to send him the original.
• Search for larger field>>>Discussed this at length.  Carl perhaps has a lead.
• Web site FAQ:  Brian will look through last yearÃ?¢??s emails to locate recurring questions, make a list of FAQ items.  We will then place them on the website.
• April contest>>>Discussed under VP report, no new information at this point.
• Duplicate launch controller ? (from Tom) Vaughn brothers out of business.  Tom authorized to look at possible replacement controllers or cost to replicate the controller. Another suggestion to consider: Pratt controller.
• Contest records online (from Tom) We decided to place club record holder information online. Roger will place a module on the website for this.
• Roger will also set up an Ã?¢??opt inÃ?¢?? email notification for member information on the website.
• Solicit member requests (events/build day):  What to do for a build?  Suggestions included a contest for themed rockets:  Animal based, furriest rocket, ugliest, skinniest.
• What about bad weather days?  Set up for having a Ã?¢??back up to launch planÃ?¢??.  This could include experienced members showing particular techniques, have a repair day, or display of specialty items like high power gear.
• Raffle:  Prepare for this when we get to the point of having sufficient attendance.  The idea is that we want to use fun ways to raise funds, but also cost effective ones.  If we do not have a high attendance, then the raffle income could be minimal given the cost of kits, prizes.
  • Look for kits to raffle, look for other donations to raffle.
  • Other fund raising ideas from the floor included a build the Ã?¢??ROCK RocketÃ?¢?? contestÃ?¢??Brian created a Roc-Sim file for the rocketÃ?¢??we could make it a fund raiser.
  • Sell Range boxes with the ROCK logo.
  • Purchase other ROCK paraphernalia from the site- shirts, cups, etc.
     

Motions from the floor:  None.

General discussion: No further discussion.
Next business meeting date is set tentatively to Jan. 31, 2009

We Adjourned the meeting at 1:00PM

Respectfully submitted,

Tom

Tom Dennen
ROCK Secretary, NAR 80516