Dec 16, 2021 CCFM Board Meeting- APPROVED
Board members present: Randy George, Rose Thackeray, Krysta Zabriskie, Karen Huard Board, Lila Humphries-LePage
Others present: Keri Ryan
Called to Order: 7:00 AM
Minutes from last meeting.
Approved
Updating Rules and Bylaws
Annual Meeting minutes have been released
Keri will create a draft with revisions to be reviewed and then updated
Keri requested a list of revisions sent to her so that she knows exactly what needs revising- Randy will do so
Karen asks that the minutes be sent to the membership pending approval at next meeting
Fee structure task force formation
Randy wrote up a request for members to consider volunteering to help for this
Keri will send out to the membership to try and get people involved
Holiday market special events /promotion
Keri cut down some Christmas trees and has put out promotion to get community involved decorating will raffle them off at the end of market
Krysta suggests asking Anderbell Acres to donate or we purchase some garland from them to decorate the barricade
Krysta will bring tables from the trailer
Lila will bring sound system and heater
Keri says that in the future we can leave the propane heater at the site
Karen asks about price of Times Argus posting
Keri says about $100-150
Randy, Karen, Krysta suggests spending the $$
Keri spend $10 of facebook event promotion post promoting through the weekend
Karen asks how many people see post after promotion
Keri guesses about 1700-2500 algorithm says but how accurate is it?
Keri will make event posting on instagram and will boost
Krysta suggests making an info picture to be reposted on social media
Kerri will make and post today
Lila asks that in the future we promote social media posts earlier in the week (i.e Monday before a Saturday market)
Krysta adds that it takes about 24 hours to get circulated and then runs at the top of the pages for 3 days afterwards
Keri reminds that she was out of town and typically does post earlier but that anyone can always post if they would like it to get out earlier
Progress on conversations with State
Randy asks if we are still waiting on approval for use 2022 summer
Keri reminds that she got approval for winter but is still waiting on summer
Randy asks if the exception for open flame is included in this paperwork
Keri says that use for approval form is pretty straight forward just for using parking lot open flame is through MPD
Randy will get in touch with Deb Farrell to move along open fire discussion
Keri says we haven’t brought up corn roasts, open hearth pizza, bean hole, BBQ
Karen asks what is the needs for us in this discussion should we be more forthcoming to them about what we want to do at market regarding open flames
John reminds that we have to start with Deb
Karen is concerned that we are not laying everything out at once in this conversation
John says outside of fire our issues are storage, emergency access (if we want to expand the summer market)
Keri says we cant use the back parking lot spaces that connect to the building
Karen adds leaving picnic tables over winter
Keri adds the music stage is still there but would be nice to be able to leave things
Krysta asks about permanent signage
Keri says we have asked and they said no
Randy adds that the signs are just semi permanent during market season
Randy offers to put together list (including a longer term agreement rather than year by year) of our needs/wants for improving the market and will send to Deb
Sales slip collection volunteer?
Suggestion made by Boots
Randy asked for more follow up from him on what he wanted to see
Boots thinks it would free up Keri from doing more essential work during market hours
Karen doesnt think it should be a membership volunteer job because that information should be confidential but adds that having it be confidential does hinder our ability to make decisions about how many vendors of an individual category we should have in a given season
Keri asks why someone else has decided what her workload should or shouldn't be?
Randy adds that any members can bring suggestions to meeting
When physical sales slips were not present Keri would follow up with email after market
John adds that if Keri could easily categorize sales slips and share with the board so we can see not who is making what but reports of sales by category
Lila asks if that hasn’t been done in the past
Keri reminds that we all have access to a spreadsheet with this information
Keri says it is linked to the boards email addresses
Randy will share that around with new board members
Meat, produce, cheese and dairy, other agricultural products and crafts are the categories in that sheet
Keri says in the winter she goes through these and breaks down the number of vendors in each category to understand better
Randy/Karen/John/Keri agree on the need for the board to see what is confidential information about sales slips
John says we can’t just start doing that without taking a vote before the membership and going into executive session every meeting
Karen asks if Keri could take the vendor names out of the spreadsheet and share it with us
Keri can do that but says we can probably figure out who is who
John worries that future boards may misuse this information and we must be very careful about what information would be helpful to us and would not violate other confidentialities
Randy says the whole board needs to review what information is currently available before making any changes
New winter applications
Schoolhouse Farm: chicken, pork, eggs (NO)
Rose, Krysta, Randy, John agree that we have enough in that category
Keri suggests we approve them as a substitute
John suggests that they reapply for summer market
Rose adds that if we use them for a sub and they come into market will we just have a saturated market of those categories
Lila says no
Paprika Catering: ready to eat food empanadas (APPROVED)
Randy says would be nice to have more prepared food
Karen adds that there are local ingredients included
Randy adds that there are a few farms listed although don’t really know of them
Karen asks if the local ingredients add up to more than 50% of her product
Rose asks agrees with scrutinizing this application on that merit but asks about other prepared food vendors and whether they are up to that standard
Krysta quotes application: 3 local ingredients or 50% or more of ingredients of product are local
John asks if we should run this by Gracie as a courtesy
Set time for follow-up with Keri.
Randy adds that under the previous board we had a letter of review written to Keri and left off on having a follow up meeting with it; outside of regular meeting so he suggests scheduling a separate meeting outside of board meeting
Randy will set up a doodle poll on better time for biweekly board meeting and setting up a time for follow up meeting with Keri
Randy adds that we need to review/update application so that she can send it out
Keri adds that as long as fee structure isn’t changing less to update
Keri had highlighted potential updates but may have missed some’
Keri says the sooner the better and Randy agrees
Randy says respond to inquiries that the application will be ready early January
*Keri asks if there is anything else that we want to do for this Saturday
John asks to ask Cops about hanging garland on the barricade
Keri says she will