Minutes January 2010

DGS EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETING

MINUTES

January 5, 2010

The board of directors for the Dallas Geological Society for the term 2009-2010 met at Desperado’s. 

ATTENDANCE

DGS BOARD OF DIRECTORS:

J. Sirman Hollabaugh, President

Patty Abney, First Vice President

Ta Li, Second Vice President

Patrick Lowry, President-Elect

Mark Larsen, International Committee Chairman

Vince Smith, Secretary

Matt Wilson, Treasurer

Mike McConnell, Treasurer-Elect

CALL TO ORDER

Sirman called the meeting to order at 5:39 P.M.

CONSIDERATION OF LAST MEETING’S MINUTES

The meeting minutes from the December 2nd board meeting were considered. Ta motioned for acceptance while Patty accepted a second motion after one correction was adjusted.

CONSIDERATION OF MEMBERSHIP APPLICATIONS

No new membership applications were up for consideration. 

TREASURER’S REPORT

Matt presented the board with results from the Christmas party. Approximately 130-140 people attended the party. A full accounting report was not finished. Preliminary results indicate that expenses exceeded income by $1000 for the Dallas Geological Society portion. 

Matt also presented an accounting record for the inflow and outflows since October 25^th. Per Matt’s report, income was overwhelming exceeding the expenses for this time period for nearly $7,000. After the bills are paid for the Christmas party, the expenses will eliminate this excess. 

Vince asked about the current state of the membership dues. The report presented dues for the 2009-2010 since October 25^th being $375. Dues from the membership are grossly lacking and a grand number will be presented at the next meeting.

Vince also made a recommendation to see a treasurer report broken down monthly for the calendar year or fiscal year to see a more long term financial state of the society.

Sirman made a motion to accept the treasurer’s report and Vince seconded the motion.

UPDATE ON LUNCHEON SPEAKERS

Patty updated the luncheon speakers for the next three luncheons. January’s luncheon speaker was scheduled to be Roger Wallace. Mr. Wallace is the Vice President of Pioneer and was to speak on America’s Natural Gas Alliance (ANGA) and its mission to increase appreciation for the environmental, economic and national security benefits of clean, abundant, dependable and cost efficient American natural gas.

The speaker for the joint luncheon in February is David Paddock. Mr. Paddock is employed by Schlumberger. He will present a topic for both the geophysical and geological society that deals with 3D seismic and rock properties. 

Our president-elect, Patrick Lowry, has willingly volunteered to be the guest luncheon speaker for March. He will present the DGS with a topic on Geo-modeling. 

UPPDATE ON SOUTWEST SECTION

The DGS continues to search for speakers for the Southwest Section Convention in May. The first ad for the convention appeared in the AAPG Explorer and is also mentioned on the DGS website. Registration for the convention should be setup soon to allow for ample time in early registration. The Southwest Section Committee was meeting January 12^th. The agenda was to shore up critical areas such as speakers, publicity of event, entertainment for social events, and field trips. Mike Grace has offered to lead his widely popular canoe trip down the Brazos River. The SWS Committee was in search of a bus sponsorship to the entry and exit point from the Dallas area. 

UPDATE ON INTERNATIONAL SPEAKERS

Mark Larsen informed the board that the family dinner in December was large success for drawing non-DGS members. 37 were in attendance that included 22 DGS members and 15 guests. The guests were mostly children of the DGS members. 

The January speaker is Dr. Oldow from UTD. He will talk about the “Application of Terrestrial Laser Scanning in determining the pattern of late Pleistocene and Holocene fault-displacement from the offset of pluvial lake shorelines in the Alvord extensional basin, northern Great Basin, USA.” 

Mark also asked for clarification for travel costs for the out-of-town speakers. In the past the DGS has paid for speaker’s expenses, but was not clear what was allotted for each year. He requested the board allow the international committee a budget of $200 to $250 per meeting twice a year. The amount would pay for airline fees, hotel charges, and meals up to the limit. Sirman asked the board to allocate $500 towards the international committee to be used for guest speaker expenses in a reasonable and prudent manner. All the board members voted in favor of this request. Should the international committee use more than the $500, the international committee chairman can submit a request to the DGS board for more funds. If the $500 per year budget for the international committee speaker is not used, the money is not carried over to the following year.

UPDATE ON CHRISTMAS PARTY

Ta reported to the board that the DGS Christmas party was considered a success. The event was well attended and numerous compliments were expressed for the planning of the party. Accounting records were not completed at the time of the meeting, but preliminary results were reported during the treasurer report as early noted. 

UPDATE WEBSITE RELATED ISSUES

Vince brought to the board’s attention dues for 2009-2010 period has been lacking severely. Many members have been honest and paid dues. The reason for the lack of dues is from the transition to the new website database. Members were added to the database and automatically given a membership expiration date of one year regardless of payment. Sending dues notices could not single out members that did not pay dues. The difficulty resides in knowing who honestly paid and who has not. The expiration date can be adjusted with a password key held by the website designer, Schipul. However, collecting dues for this time period would be nearly impossible with the next dues period rapidly approaching.

A second website issue involves the addition of new members. An anonymous user can register on the website to become a “user.” To fill out the full fledge application on the website and become a “member,” one needs to have a user name and password. After having a user name and password, the application is available to be filled out. Users are not aware of this backward’s step. The website needs to bypass the initial security to fill out the application so “users” see the full application on their first visit and apply to become a “member.” “Members” are held in an “application pending” status that can then be approved by the board. 

NEW BUSINESS

The Dallas Geological Society is represented by 8 AAPG delegates. Our membership total allows for this number on the national level. The board is requested to seek interest from current DGS members to become an AAPG delegate.

Lastly, the board is seeking a replacement for the secretary position. Vince accepted a job out of town and would not be available to fulfill his complete secretary duties at a distance. The board will be asking members to stand in the secretary position for the last few months of the 2009-2010 board term. One possible suggestion was Deanna from Encore. 

Sirman adjourned the meeting at 6:39 P.M.

Addendum

The board is asked to implement changes in the Patty Holyfield teaching award. Dianne Brownlee from EMGI, who manages the application process, requests a few changes to the process. One, she would like to suggest the DGS give two awards ($2500 each), at different grade levels.  One award would be for elementary levels (grades k-5), and the other for secondary (6-12).  This will allow encouragement and support for deserving teachers at the elementary grades and the higher grades.  Also, this way, the winner of the higher grade level award would go forward to the AAPG national award contest as the DGS candidate.

She would also like to revise the scoring rubric we have used in the past, to suit two rather different types of teachers.  And how about recruiting a new 5 member committee for each award, rather than have one committee do all the work?  Another idea--perhaps each member would get a few applications, and each member's choice would then be evaluated by the whole committee?  That would cut down considerably the chore of identifying the best candidates (last year we had something like 35 qualified candidates!).

 Lastly, the DGS officers are asked to recruit themselves and other members to have a strong interest in teachers and educational outreach, be interested in discussing this topic, and help recruit a committee.

The board is currently discussing this subject on email and asked to respond to Diane before the end of January.