GOVERNING BOARD WORKING SESSION

4:00 to 10:00 p.m., January 28, 2010

Riverwood Inn and Conference Center, Otsego, Minnesota

Introduction of Board members

Position Name Present?

Executive Board of Directors

Chair-elect............................................... Bert Tracy, Golden Valley................................... Yes

Chair........................................................ Pete Moulton, St. Peter....................................... Yes

Past Chair................................................ Bill Spain, St. Cloud Technical College............... Yes

Director.................................................... Dave Schultz, MDH............................................. No

Secretary/Treasurer................................ Stew Thornley, MDH........................................... Yes

Assistant Secretary................................. Uma Vempati, HDR Engineering........................ Yes

District Trustees

Central..................................................... Lisa Vollbrecht, St. Cloud (exp. 2010)................. Yes

Metro........................................................ Mike Bramwell, Champlin (expires 2011)........... Yes

Northeast................................................. Mark Proulx, Duluth (expires 2011)..................... No

Northwest................................................ Brian Bergantine, AE2S (expires 2012)............... No

Southeast................................................. Dennis DuChene, Faribault (expires 2012)......... Yes

Southwest................................................ Mark Sweers, MDH (expires 2010).................... Yes

At-Large................................................... Lyle Stai, Retired (expires 2012)......................... Yes

Councils and Committees

Administrative & Policy (APC)................ Jon Eaton, Bloomington (expires 2011).............. Yes

Conference (Conf)................................... Corey Lubovich, Hibbing (expires 2010)............. Yes

Minnesota Associates (MAC)................. Tony Belden, Engineering America (exp. 2010). Yes

Public Affairs (PAC)................................ Myron Volker, Owatonna (expires 2012)............ Yes

Training & Education (TEC).................... Chris Glassing, ACIPCO (expires 2010)............. Yes

Water Utility (WUC)................................. Pat Shea (expires 2012)....................................... No

The board members introduced themselves, adding information on their history in AWWA along with something others don’t know about them and what brings a smile to their face.

Stew Thornley – In addition to being an official scorer for Twins games, he is the backup to the backup as an official scorer for the Minnesota Timberwolves. Watching the Yankees win the World Series last year brought a smile to his face.

Corey Lubovich – His passion is music and has been a drummer for 30 years. Stew Thornley’s slide presentation on dead people brings a smile to his face.

Bill Spain – His passion is fishing. He is hoping to get a smile soon, especially if his son-in-law produces a grandchild for him.

Bert Tracy – He enjoys going to his cabin in the summer and shooting fireworks on the Fourth of July. Bert smiles and tries to have fun at anything he does, especially a recent e-mail he got on the meaning of the word shit.

Dennis DuChene – Dennis is a twin. A nice large sunfish coming through the ice brings a smile to his face.

Mike Bramwell – He loves going to his cabin, fishing, and golfing, which is what puts a smile on his face.

Myron Volker – Turned 56 the previous Monday. He likes music and photography. He used to scuba dive at Lake Superior. His six grandchildren make him smile, especially when he gets to leave the house and leave them there.

Jon Eaton – He is a pilot and used to handglide; handgliders think parachutists are stupid (and vice versa). Good food and a nice bed bring a smile to his face.

Chris Glassing – He is a professional tap dancer and does a little ballet. He enjoys playing with his kids, especially when they listen to them.

Mark Sweers – He is a Spartan (Michigan State). Pheasant hunting with his son brings a smile to his face.

Lyle Stai – When he was four or five, he made a vow to never get married. He will smile again when that ASSHOLE THORNLEY gets the cooler refilled again.

Pete Moulton – He turned 50 the previous Friday and his wife applied for an AARP card for him. His granddaughter brings a smile to his face.

Uma Vempati – He is from India via North Dakota. He learned how to say Uff-da (which sounds like Uma) after two months in Fargo but didn’t know that snow came down vertically until he came to Minneapolis. His three-month-old daughter brings a smile to his face.

Lisa Vollbrecht – She learned everything she knows from Lyle Stai. “I’m gonna do something great.” Her children like their mom and make her smile.

Tony Belden – He married a woman whom he has known since he was 10. What makes him laugh is a story about John Selvog and Don Olson of Rockwell, who likes to light it up at night and once needed help getting back to his room, which was provided by John, who tried to take off Don’s boots and tucked him into bed. Don woke up as John was removing his pants and yelled, “No, John, no!”

Lisa won the prize, a Minnesota State, Mankato, hockey puck for having the best presentation, but Lisa passed on her prize to Tony.

Section Alignment with Association – Vision, Mission, Guiding Principles (Moulton)

Section Chair Pete Moulton talked about the shared vision between the section and the association. While the association focuses on being the leading authoritative resource on water, the section focuses on drinking water.

AWWA has several guiding principles that align with the section’s: commitment to public health; commitment to customer focus; commitment to honesty, integrity, and teamwork; commitment to sustainability; commitment to excellence, and commitment to diversity.

The section’s goals and objectives, which are in our strategic plan: provide educational opportunities, overseen by the Training and Education Council; promoting an active and diverse membership, led by the Public Affairs Council; identifying, developing, maintaining, and enhancing partnerships with others to leverage our resources, led by the Minnesota Associates Council; optimizing our organizational structure and administrative practices, led by the Administrative & Policy Council; promoting an effective legislative and regulatory environment for the water community, led by the Water Utility Council.

The section and association goals and objectives include:

· Creating a program to help recognize and thank utilities for their participation in AWWA.

· Increasing the number of volunteers on international AWWA committees.

· Increasing the number of applicants for international AWWA Awards.

· Increasing participation in the Partnership for Safe Water.

· Increasing the number of student chapters.

Seven Measures of Success include:

· Commitment to Purpose

o Customer Service Culture #1, #3

o Alignment of Products and Services with Mission #1, #2, #4

· Commitment to Action

o Organization Adaptability #2, #4

o Alliance Building #3, #5

· Commitment to Analysis and Feedback

o Data-Driven Strategies #4, #5

o Dialogue and Engagement #1, #5

o CEO Broker of Ideas

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Brian Bergantine Sings “Here Come the Yankees”

As a result of a friendly challenge with a Yankees fan prior to the World Series, Phillies fan Brian Bergantine was to sing “Here Come the Yankees.” However, Bergantine got cold feet and went to Wyoming rather than come to the board meeting and sing. In his absence, Vollbrecht presented Thornley with a pirate Tweety-Bird for his computer, provided by Bergantine.

General Training (Thornley)

1. Section/Board Structure – Responsibilities of Board Members

Thornley gave an overview of the section and board, outlining the structure and responsibilities of board members and the schedule of meetings for the year.

Board members are to provide agenda items, file a report for the consent agenda, and read the consent agenda before the meeting. Council chairs collect reports from their committee chairs for the consent agenda.

2. Robert’s Rules of Order

Board meetings are run according to Robert’s Rules of Order. One person presides, one person records the minutes, and business cannot be transacted unless enough members are present for a quorum.

A consent agenda organizes non-controversial reports, which can be pulled for further discussion during the meeting. A consent agenda saves time by having the information presented in advance.

Thornley discussed how to make and amend a motion.

Governing Documents (Vempati)

These are the legal documents that pertain to the operation of the organization. Brown distributed a CD-ROM containing the Minnesota AWWA governing documents.

Finance Primer (Thornley)

Income Sources: The conference is a major source of income for the section. Other sources include advertising, Water for People contributions, Young Professionals Committee fundraisers, grant money (such as money from the Minnesota Department of Health for the Drinking Water Institute), workshops (such as the Surface Water Workshop), district schools, and AWWA allotments. The AWWA allotment includes a regular allotment, assessments on section members, and an education fund assessment from registrations from district schools.

Expenses: Councils/committees, conference expenses, publishing of the Breeze, contributions for Water for People, technical and educational expenses. The districts have expenses for their schools, and the section has expenses, such as administrative support, board meetings and training, and expenses for the section office.

Expense Reports: This provides legal documentation of the expenses and is used to allocate the expenses to the appropriate committee or budgeted account. The expense report must include receipts for expenses over a certain amount and include the meeting/function/place. The latter is needed to determine the proper account to allocate the expense to. The report should explain unusual expenses and where to send the reimbursement check as well as a signature. A question was raised about what expenses are reimbursable, such as mileage to a section meeting. This is reimbursable if submitted if the member’s employer does not cover the expense.

The monthly financial report will contain a balance sheet and a profit-and-loss statement. The balance sheet shows assets, including our checking and investment accounts, and other assets, such as undeposited funds. The total assets must equal liabilities and equity. The profit-and-loss statement covers a certain period. Ours usually covers the previous and current calendar years. Next to the previous and current years is a column with the budgeted among along with a column showing the percent of the budget (vis a vis the current year).

The second sheet of the monthly financial report is the budget report. It contains the budget submitted by each council and committee. The bottom of the page shows the actual income and expenses, the budgeted income and expenses, and the percent of actual vs. budget. It also shows the target reserve, which is to be 50 percent of budgeted expenses, and the target operating fund, which is to be 10 percent of budgeted expenses. Below this is the current investment value. If the general reserve is above the target reserve, the excess will be put into the endowment fund, which has a goal of $180,000 to fund scholarships.

The reserve fund, which is held in mutual funds, allows us to have a cushion to deal with unforeseen events. The operating fund, which is kept in a checking account, allows for liquidity to cover ongoing expenses.

The financial report contains a page showing our five-year investment history and the status of various funds. We are approaching our goal of the value of the endowment fund, and the board will at some point have to discuss how to deal with excesses in target reserves.

Strategic Planning (Spain)

Spain led a session on strategic planning, reviewing the most recent version (2009-2010) of the plan.

The strategic plan looks at the section’s vision, goals, and objectives. She led the group through the current strategic plan and looked at an outline for the revision process. The governing board will meet in May to go through the entire revision.

Each goal and objective is assigned to a particular council, which is responsible for the oversight of the area.

The strategic plan contains a purpose, action items/tasks, and budget for each council and committee.

Committees and councils should update their areas each year when they submit their budget.

There will be a strategic planning session in Bloomington on March 26.

Forums

Vollbrecht brought up the three-day schools and that some schools may want to look at having their schools at a different time if their numbers have been dwindling in recent years.

Glassing talked about the Competitions Committee. Over the past year, the committee fulfilled its plan by holding a Meter Madness competition in each of the six districts and had all the district winners or an alternate to compete at the annual conference in Duluth. Five of the six had not attended an annual conference before. The winner at the annual conference, Harvey Maas of Duluth, will go to the AWWA Conference in Chicago this June to represent the Minnesota Section. The committee will hold a pipe tapping contest at the 2010 annual conference. Trustees are encouraged to hold competitions at their district schools and send the winning team to the section annual conference. There was discussion about sending the four-member winning team from the section conference to the AWWA conference to compete there. The water taste test held at the 2009 section conference was a success. Nine utilities submitted water samples with Moorhead Public Service winning the competition.

Belden reported that $17,700 has been committed in sponsorships for the 2010 Water for People concert, which will ensure a profit at the concert. The AWWA Regional Meeting of Section Officers (RMSO) will be held in Minneapolis at the same time as the concert, and the section will pay for attendees to attend the concert.

Belden discussed a benefit concert the Water for People Committee is planning. Rod Volker, a planner for WeFest, is using his Minnesota music connections to assist with the planning. The committee has lined up the Johnny Holm Band, which normally attracts 1,000 people to his performances. The concert will be held at the Medina Entertainment Center on April 17. The committee will also solicit sponsorships for the concert. Bullert pointed out that the Indiana AWWA section has been sponsoring concerts for about four years, and made a profit of about $30,000 last year.

Eaton is on the state advisory council for laboratory certification, and he has offered our section as a resource for training, which could be an opportunity for revenue as well as for additional members.

Meeting adjourned at 10:05 p.m.