Minutes from UAAB Board Meeting on May 13, 2000
Minutes from 8/5 UAAB Full Board Meeting
Meeting location was John Prokop’s home, 9:00 am.
Present: John Prokop, Dave Olson, Allison Howard, Lee Oler, Elizabeth Anne Rowe, Ward Stevens, Gary Sawyer, and Shannon Casey.
Absent: Dave Ball, Monica Jasso, Mike Coyle, Bryan Pierson, and Andrew Barcellos
The Minutes from the last meeting on May 13 were reviewed and accepted.
Treasurer's Report - Dave Olson reported current balances in checking and savings accounts. After limited discussion the Treasurer's report was accepted.
Alumni Night at Band Camp - Dave Olson will arrange for the Egee Refreshments for the break. We need people who are not playing to handle the refreshments and serve. We will recruit people at the event. Ward indicated his son will be there and can help. Shannon indicated the Alumni Pep Band will rehearse at a practice field a block from Bear Down Field. After everyone is there that will play we will move to our practice area. Dave Ball told John he will take care of phone calls to those that played with the Pep Band last year. Dave was not at meeting but John will get with him early next week to discuss results of this meeting, and our approach for the Pep Band in the Fall.
We don’t have a clear picture of need for large instruments, but we should have our new Bass Drum ready. We will probably need snares with slings or carriers, and a few tubas. Elizabeth Anne reported on her plans for improving the flip music folders and she will have them there for us to use. We will collect all music used that evening. Elizabeth Anne wants to spend some money on covers and windows. We concurred in her plans.
We further discussed the need to have a few people identified and available to serve as our band director. We have lots of qualified people we can ask. Alli Howard volunteered to do this on August 16. John will send e-mail messages to those in Tucson and surrounding cities to encourage their participation. These addresses are available in the master list of Band Alumni we received this week from the Alumni Association. More on this below.
August 20 Picnic - Bryan Pierson agreed to get to Himmel Park early to reserve our spot. Dave Olson and others will also get there early. Brian will also get the beer permit, bring ice and volleyballs. John will bring his grille. Dave Olson will procure the food, bring our banner, and volleyball net. John’s e-mail message, mentioned above, will also encourage attendance at the picnic.
Alumni Pep Band - As mentioned above, Dave Ball has agreed to coordinate and lead the Pep Band effort. He has not discussed the possibility of playing at the skybox entrance with University Officials yet, but we expect to again have this opportunity, although we must place a priority on playing around the stadium. We have yet to determine the rehearsal schedule, including place and time. The approach we finished up with last year, rehearse just before the start of tailgating seemed to be the most acceptable. We can again get a practice room at the School of Music. Shannon indicated we can expect to have the same arrangement as last year for seats and tickets - 25 seats behind the band. The home games we will play at are: September 9, September 16, October 14, October 28, and Friday, November 24. Homecoming is Saturday, November 11.
Ohio State Alumni Band here on September 9 - Dave Olson received a note from an Ohio State Alum indicating they would be here. John will follow-up on this and learn details. Alli indicated they were staying at the Plaza Hotel, but we know no other details. If possible we will try to tie in with them in some way. Perhaps we could even join our groups to play at tailgating. Whatever John learns will be shared with others on the Board.
Instruments - Our bass drum is being redone by Instrumental Music. John gave the new heads to Dave Olson who will get graphics on them. Dave will deliver them to Instrumental Music for completion of the drum. We expect the drum to be ready to be used on August 16. John will pick up the drum when completed. Dave has also made progress with Sousaphone bell covers and has a source for the silk screening. Based just on the cost of silk screening, 20 covers cost little more than 10. He will contact Hayden School supply in Phoenix soon to see if they can supply the covers, themselves. We also discussed possible trombone sleeves, but decided to hold off for now. John reported that he had a brief communication with Deon Hill at the UA about an alternative arrangement for signing out instruments. John asked about the possibility of some kind of rental agreement or other arrangement whereby individuals needing large instruments could just keep them through the Fall season. This would reduce our storage and transportation problems. If a fee is necessary it could be born by the individual, or the Alumni Band, itself. Deon responded that something might be able to be worked out, but for the larger instruments the fee including refundable deposit could be as much as $70. She also won’t know until August 13th what instruments are available. She will see what can be worked out after that and indicated she will do whatever she can to help.
On a separate note, we discussed the fee or deposit we will ask for instruments for homecoming. Last year we asked for a $5 deposit which was returned at the end when the instruments was returned. A few people asked us to keep the fee as a donation. A proposal was made that we change our approach and instead charge a small fee for such use. This is in recognition that most Alumni have several hundred, to several thousand dollars invested in their instrument. Those that borrow an instrument have nothing invested. There is considerable effort and trouble to arrange for and deal with this instrument business. We agreed that it is appropriate to ask for a small fee which will be $10 for the days rental of an instrument for Homecoming.
Mailing List - This continues to be a serious problem for us. We do not have a great number of recent graduates, and are missing a lot of people who have obsolete addresses. Our "short list" that receive our quarterly mailings is not up to date, and there is a problem with the list maintained by the Alumni Association that we use for our annual homecoming mailing. We received a copy of that current list, and it now numbers less than 3000 names. Many of the names on our short list are not on the larger list. Gary Sawyer reported that he was asked by the Alumni Association to come into their office to add names he gave them a number of years ago that they somehow misplaced. We’ve discussed this a lot, but we continue to be hurt by the policy that the UA Alumni Association will not add a person to their list unless requested by that person. Also, because of privacy concerns, we are unable to simply get lists of names and addresses, etc., from the School of Music and Dance. We must secure them ourselves and we have tried to do this through use of a specially designed card, turned back to us by students completing their years with the band. Unfortunately, last year we received back only part of the information we needed. This year we are adding a signature block which provides for authorization to add name and information to the mailing list. It will be important to get these cards to band members earlier in the season, and more clearly stress the need to complete these cards.
John presented an idea that we really need one person to head up all membership activities. This membership chairperson would provide overall coordination of membership, supervise mailing list maintenance, liaison with Alumni Association regarding their master list of Band Alumni, plan and coordinate our annual contributing membership campaign, liaison with UA Band to bring newly graduated band members into our organization, and manage our ongoing campaign to find lost Band Alumni. After a brief discussion there was agreement with the idea and Alli Howard volunteered to serve in this role. We accepted Alli in this new role. Thank you Alli, and you will have all of our support in this capacity. After adjournment of the meeting Elizabeth Anne Rowe volunteered to take on the job of maintaining our own "short" mailing list - individuals who are contributing members or have recently been active in some capacity, and who will receive our Quarterly Newsletter. We will discuss this task again and decide the best way to handle mailing list maintenance. Right now it seems logical to go this way, with Elizabeth Anne handling this mailing list. Dave Olson can continue to produce the Newsletter, using the most recent list provided by Elizabeth Anne. Gary Sawyer needs to continue to have a role in capturing names of recent graduates and use of the same cards we have been using. His work over the years with the Alumni Association has been very important.
John presented a suggestion that we start to provide each Contributing Member with a membership card. He showed everyone a card he created that has the minimal information needed and our Alumni Band Wildcat logo. It would allow us to write in the members name, show band year, i.e., 2000/2001, and have a signature by a Band Officer. There was concurrence in this idea. Further discussion also indicated we liked the possibility of also providing some kind of token gift for contributing membership, such as an annual new lapel pin. This will also be discussed again later.
Bulletin Board - Our board has been given to Deon Hill to arrange getting it up near the UA Band Office in the School of Music and Dance. As of our meeting we didn’t know if it is up. As we previously discussed, we will all share in keeping it up. Anyone visiting the building should check on it to make sure our materials are intact, and remove inappropriate material.
Upcoming Board Vacancies - We briefly discussed the fact that at Homecoming the following positions will be up for election: Treasurer, Secretary, Members at Large - vice Ward Stevens, Mike Coyle, and Lee Oler. We expect most members to be candidates for reelection. Monica Jasso has indicated she does not wish to continue as Secretary - so we will be looking for someone to assume this important role.
Marching Band Fundraiser - This years fund raiser will be held at La Placita Village, South Church Ave., downtown Tucson. The new date is September 30, probably starting at 6:00 pm. The Band will not march in as in the past, but will be playing. There will be a silent auction, as in the past.
Homecoming Newsletter: Dave Olson would like to get material for newsletter by our August 20 picnic. The target date for getting the Newsletter out will be September 23. Articles will include: President’s Message - John Letter from UA Band Directors - John Pep Band - John/Dave Ball Membership Approach - Alli Band Fund Raiser at La Placita - John Treasurer’s Report - Dave Olson Registration for Homecoming - Dave Olson Homecoming Schedule - Dave Olson Merchandise - Dave Olson Alumni Basketball Band Schedule - John Instruments for Homecoming - John Report on Band Picnic - We’ll assign to someone at Picnic Upcoming Calendar - Dave Olson ASU/UA Band exhibition preceding November’s UA/ASU Game - Shannon Casey/Alli Howard History item - John Correction for Drum Major Picture in last newsletter, identifying Ken Teel, 1957 - Dave Olson
We discussed a new approach suggested by Alli to more directly ask for Contributing membership dues. After discussion we decided that we can’t move to requiring a membership fee without changing the by-laws, and it will need much more thorough analysis, but we did agree to change the registration form to a mailer that will be included with the Newsletter. Dave Olson will look at how to do this.
Board Communication - John briefly discussed his frustration with his occasional inability to reach board members, and get feedback via e-mail and telephone calls. He asked everyone to please make an effort to be responsive. If you are going to be tied up for an extended period and not available for Board business, it would be very helpful to let John know.
Next Meeting - Saturday, September 23, 9:00 am., John Prokop’s home.
Meeting adjourned at 11:45 am.