Minutes of Genesee Free-Net Board of Directors Meeting

May 27, 2004

Flint Area Convention and Visitors Bureau

Flint, MI

PRESENT:

Vahid Lotfi, Board, Chairman

Larry Porn, Board Vice Chairman

Kay Schwartz, Board Treasurer

Gary Viele, Board

Les LeMieux, Board

Jerry Preston, Board

Chad Cramer, Board

Scott Gifford, Board

Sol Johnson, Board

Georgia Kitchen, Board

Harvey S Sherman, New Board

Also present:

Kenny Thomas, Staff

Call to order 5:17pm. Meeting conducted by V. Lotfi.

Chair Vahid Lotfi introduced Harvey S Sherman as candidate for a Board position. Harvey has been with UM Flint about 10 years and organized the Audio Visual office and is its administrator.

Kay Schwartz moved that Harvey S Sherman be accepted as a new member of the GFN Board. Jerry Preston supported. All Board members present voted in the affirmative. The motion passed.

Vahid announced that Pat Peterson indicated she wished to resign as Board Secretary due to increased work load. He requested nominations for the position.

Les LeMieux moved that Solomon T Johnson be elected Board Secretary. Jerry Preston supported. Johnson agreed to serve and was elected to the position of Board Secretary.

Officers' Reports:

Chair:

Vahid commented on a possible new location for the GFN servers discovered by Jerry Preston. Rumors of a change in the GDL and FALCON relationship is of concern. Chair Vahid emphasized the need for official notification before a formal process of finding a new location but the Board needs to be aware of being impacted. An ad hoc committee was appointed to investigate possible alternate locations for the Free-Net servers.

Vice Chair:

Larry Porn distributed a handout of Member Service Initiatives that have been considered by the office staff as ways to improve service to GFN members and solicited additions from the Board. Larry indicated that the initiatives be considered a complement to the Board Public Relations campaign.

Jerry Preston had time constraints and requested time to comment on the possible relocation site. The site is on Exchange Drive in the old EDS building which will be the national data center for GenTec. The facility has a massive set of UPS batteries and fiber optic access. These were up and running. GenTec chairman hinted at free space for the GFN servers for a little recognition on the GFN Web. The facility has high security and questions of accessibility arose. Jerry suggested that the Board tour the facility and agreed to see if he could arrange to have next month's Board meeting at GenTec. Jerry had to leave around 5:45pm.

Returning to the Vice Chair report, Larry Porn again stated that the Member Service Initiatives in the handout were meant to mesh with the brochure distribution, the PR campaign and the Web design efforts. Board help may be needed in implementing some of the items listed. Board consensus was that Larry should proceed with his work.

Kay Schwartz asked Vahid if he knew of instructional education students who may be available to make “Video Professor” type instructional CDs. Kay can offer facilities for use but not her time. Harvey Sherman will check at UM Flint to see if instructional CDs can be made there.

Scott Gifford wanted to contact the GFN office about a user training seminar but could not find the GFN telephone number in the phone book. Kay will check with Jerry about getting GFN listed.

Larry Porn distributed a printout of brochures distributed sorted by organization. The printout had about 85 entries. Vahid complimented the distributors on their efforts.

Secretary:

No report.

Treasurer:

Kay Schwartz provided handouts summarizing, on cash basis, GFN assets and liabilities as of 4/30/04, budget status of income and expenses from 1/1/04 through 4/30/04 and comparison of income/expense with the period 1/1/03 through 4/30/03. She also provided the Board with an excerpt of BKR Dupuis and Ryden accountants' report of operations for 2003 on an accrual basis. Kay noted that the decrease in assets was close to the $4000 cash basis figure she had projected. She commented that expenses are fairly predictable whereas income is not. Larry Porn commented on the possible shift of some December 2002 income into 2003 due to GFN office closure over holidays preventing timely bank deposits.

Kay reported that IRS Form 990 and the State of Michigan Solicitation form had been filed. She requested some database stats from Larry for assessment of membership trend.

After the Board meeting, Kay and Vahid will write a check to pay Merit ($46,500) and write another on American Funds ($10,000) to maintain the checking account balance near the $10,000 level.

Committees' Reports:

Marketing and Outreach:

Garry Viele reported that brochures had been distributed to about 85 locations as described in the printout provided by Larry. A press release about GFN will be tied to the inauguration of the new GFN Web site design. Garry has the list of press release contacts.

Vahid suggested as a promotion offering members $10 off their renewal contribution for recommending a friend who becomes a new GFN member. Cited was the need for a “push” technology in contrast to the “passive” marketing approaches done heretofore. Standard Account members could recommend up to 6 mew members and renew their account free. Custom Account members could recommend up to 10 new members for free renewal of their account. Questioned was do we have a break even membership figure for profitability? Paying membership was estimated at 1100 for the 100 modems and 1 token that GFN supports.

Larry Porn moved that the Genesee Free-Net implement Vahid's proposal to provide the incentive to paid members to recruit new members for discounts to their renewal contributions. A limit of 6 new members may be applied to discount a Standard Account and a limit of 10 new members may be applied to discount a Custom Account. Motion seconded by Kay Schwartz. The motion passed.

Web Site:

Chad Cramer reported that the committee consisting of Vahid, Larry and himself met with Jim Barrell of Action Web Services. The committee was told that the company could not create the GFN Web for the amount proposed by GFN. Required would be $2500 for Action Web to do the work. GFN could not agree to that amount. Later, Chad received a quote reducing the fee to $1500 with Action Web making a $750 donation to GFN. A Web site shell would be produced with up to 12 pages and would take about a week to complete. Chad proposes that the Board accept the service as outlined. The completed Web would be handicapped accessible.

Chad moved that the Free-Net accept Action Web Services proposal to create a Web shell with up to 12 pages for $1500 with a donation of $750 being made to the Genesee Free-Net by Action Web Services. Larry supported. The motion passed.

Office Operations:

Larry Porn had nothing additional to report beyond remarks already made.

Systems:

Kenny Thomas announced a modification to the account creation program. Some characters which were known to be confusing in the passwords of new accounts will no longer be generated in account passwords.

A few “no tokens” messages have been generated for Montrose users. GFN has 50 to 60 members in the area. About 30 may be active users. Peak activity usually occurs around the start of the school semester. Kenny suggested that another of the 100 GFN priority modems be converted to a non-priority modem to alleviate the number of “no tokens.” Scott Gifford moved that 1 GFN priority modem be converted to a non-priority modem. Les LeMieux supported. The motion passed.

Naples FreeNet:

Les LeMieux provided copies the welcome brochure of the Naples Free-Net to supplement the writeup he sent to the Board. He commented on the similarities between NPN and GFN. Naples Free-Net has about 4000 members and makes money. Genesee Free-Net does not. NPN has lots of communication with its members and has extensive well staffed facilities for training its help team. When NPN members sign up, in person, with a picture id, at the NPN office, they receive a CD customized to set up their account on their computers. Les gave Kenny a CD containing the NPN set up program to see if GFN could develop such a CD. After the meeting, Kenny took a look at the CD and indicated that it looks like NPN is using a fairly straightforward InstallShield generated setup program to do all of the required setup tasks. Harvey Sherman will look into whether such a CD can be done at UM Flint and possible license requirements.

Amazon.Com:

Les LeMieux provided Board members a handout describing the Associates program of amazon.com. From a link to amazon.com on the GFN Web, members and visitors could click and purchase items with GFN possibly receiving up to 10% in referral fees. Board members were invited to check whether the program is something GFN might want to be involved with.

Adjournment: 7:05pm.

Next Meeting:

Jerry Preston contacted Don Doyle, president of GenTec, and they are pleased to host the June 24, 2004 Genesee Free-Net Board meeting. He agreed to take the Board on a 1/2 hour tour of the GenTec facility at 5:15pm and to provide space for the Board meeting. The address is 5225 Exchange Drive.

Respectfully submitted,

Solomon T Johnson, Secretary