Houston Polymer Clay Guild
Board meeting minutes
Saturday, June 16, 2007

The meeting began at 12:00 noon. Present were: Rebecca Wells-Stout - Vice-President and Demo Coordinator, Ronalyn Hurley – Treasurer and Membership Coordinator, Paula Kennedy – Secretary, Merry Maynard – Publicity Coordinator, Meg Marchiando – Education Coordinator, and Carmen Anderson – Member-at-Large. Absent was President Bob Wiley

Rebecca chaired the meeting in Bob’s absence.

Ronalyn gave the treasurer’s report: We currently have $9,292.16. Four members have paid their dues via PayPal. Ronalyn handed out a list of expenses from fiscal 2006-7 for the board members to review to aid them in preparing an estimate of their expenses for the current year. She needs each board member’s estimate by the end of the month to prepare her budget. Specific budget items discussed included national guild dues and the need to design and print a new brochure. Ronalyn will pay the national dues and Merry and Paula will work on the brochure.

As membership coordinator Ronalyn announced she will begin bringing a sign-in sheet and name tags to each general meeting.

Upcoming activities were discussed:
July 21 meeting – there are no demo plans yet. It was suggested that we contact other guilds to explore the possibility of exchanging demos. Other clay guilds and non-clay guilds may both be options. (Secretary’s note: At the general meeting Paula agreed to demo her “glass tile bracelet” using glitter inlays at the July meeting.) The summer challenge project “a container” is due at the July meeting.

August 4 Hands on Houston at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft (HCCC) – Bob, Rebecca, Meg and Paula will attend the event.

August 18 HCCC Gathering of the Guilds – Bob, Rebecca, Merry and Carmen will represent the HPCG. There will be no regular HPCG meeting in August.

Classes: Oct. 5-7 Sherilyn Miller. Jill Kershner has had a conflict arise and will not be able to host the class at her
home. Meg is looking for a new location.
Nov. 10-11 Lynne Schwarzenberg. The class is not yet open for registration. The class fee and location
are still to be determined. Meg needs to draft a teacher’s contract send it to Lynne. She will use the retreat
contract as a guideline.
The formula for determining class fees was discussed. Rebecca made a motion that class fee be set at total cost to the guild divided by minimum number of students with an approximate 15% discount to those students who sign up for the clas within 2 months of the opening of registration. In addition, non-member fee will be the member fee plus the cost of membership dues. The motion was seconded by Paula; the motion passed.

Clay Days at Webster Hobby Lobby. Bringing a work light was recommended. Topics are:
July 28 – bugs
Sept. 8 – beads
Nov. – Christmas ornaments.

Converting the library VHS tapes to DVDs was suggested. Paula has a friend with video equipment who may be able to help us.

Ronalyn proposed setting up a Yahoo group for just the board members where we could store files and reports for easy access. It may also allow us to have our own email or instant message group. There were mixed feelings about the success of a new group, but all agreed we need more discussion time that the one-hour monthly meeting allows. Ronalyn will set up the Yahoo group and via email we will coordinate a time to have an on-line chat meeting.

The meeting adjourned at 12:55 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,
Paula Kennedy, secretary