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Minutes Of The WCPCA Board Meeting, Monday, June 11, 2012

Location: Home of Dorothy Soper

Attendees: Miriam Aiken, James Cloutier, Maggie Keenan, Josette Green, and Dorothy Soper

Guest: Easther Chigumira, Zimbabwe, U of O Graduate Student, Department of Geography

  1. Welcome!

  2. Easther Chigumira talked about the Board Governance class that she took at the U of O and how her attendance at our board meetings and also being chair of the Tariro board have provided her with board experience, which is a class requirement. The U of O Department of Planning, Public Policy, and Management offers the class in partnership with Pacific Continental Bank.

    Keith Beyer and Dorothy attended the ceremony that concluded the class. WCPCA received a certificate from Pacific Continental Bank in recognition of our contribution. This will be Easther’s last meeting with us. She will be returning to Zimbabwe for a year of work on her dissertation and she will return to U of O in September 2013.

  3. Updates:

    1. Joe Hindman volunteered to be the WCPCA representative at the Minneapolis meeting being organized by NPCA, June 29-July 1. He is well qualified to represent us since he was a representative for the Northwest Region on the NPCA board.

    2. Treasurer’s report. Dale is in China. Dorothy shared the OCCU statement with the board. There is over $28,000 in the BBMF and we will receive about $1,100 in distributions from the fund soon; there is about $1,700 in the checking account, and $4,000 in the savings account.

    3. Tee shirt sales. Four more shirts were sold since the last meeting. We need to push sales prior to the parade at the Eugene Celebration in August.

    4. Membership. No news.

    5. 2013 International calendar order. Dorothy spoke to a woman with the Madison group and we were informed that the printer will directly mail large orders to organizations. We should have our order by the time of the Eugene Celebration.

    6. WCPCA website pages. Dorothy and Miriam are revising and updating the web pages. Primary effort has been on the membership pages since some people had complained about the difficulty of updating records or renewing their membership. Dorothy is working of revisions to the Peace Corps 50th pages and a photo of the celebration at the plaza on March 1, is included as well a picture of the 50th tee shirt that James designed. Still to be added is a map. There is a section with links to articles about the Peace Corps 50th that appeared in local publications. Maggie will add some snappy icons for some links. Miriam is updating the Links page and the News page. There is currently some overlap and the News page may be incorporated on other pages. Dorothy is working on the Business page, which will have links to minutes of the meetings, treasurer’s reports, and a section about the Beryl Brinkman Memorial Fund and our 501 (c) (3) status.

  4. Plans for summer/fall activities:

    1. Country Fair, July 13-15. Andrew Dempsey-Karp is coordinating. Six (6) volunteers are needed for our part of the booth in the Community Village section. Four have come forward, and Andrew will also be working. James moved and Miriam seconded a motion to fund $102 for the camping pass and volunteers’ day passes. Motion carried. Peace Corps literature will be distributed and there will be a WCPCA banner. There will be a sign-up sheet for people to indicate an interest in the Peace Corps and/or WCPCA.

    2. Campout, August 2 – 5. Sam Greer is coordinating. (See email in NOTES.) Currently there are 25 registrants; the goal is 50 to 55 registrants.

    3. WCPCA Picnic, August 18, 3:00 pm – 6:00 pm. Dorothy and Josette are coordinating. It will be at the home of Bob Watada and Rosa Sakanishi. The program will include two speakers: Kerry Davis, Vanuatu, 2009-2011, and Jennifer Knowles, Macedonia, 2009-2011.

    4. Potluck, October 12th. Maggie and Josette are coordinating. The hosts will be Nancy and Walt Meyer.

    5. Potluck, December. Maggie and Josette are coordinating. Photos of PCVs at their site will be shown as before. There will be an effort to get different people to submit photos.

  5. Eugene Celebration (August 25-26) planning. Dorothy is coordinating applications and planning. The theme is “Raising the Roof”, to benefit Habitat for Humanity. We’re registered for a booth in the Community Causeway. Please look at the EC’s website for a listing of participating organizations: http://www.eugenecelebration.com/causeway.html.

    We’ve applied to be in the parade. Please read the requirements for parade entries in the note section of this agenda. Dorothy sent an email to Wayne Thompson asking if he would be willing to manage the transport of the taxi for the parade; so far he has not responded. Organizers have asked that participants in our section wear host country costumes or the JFK tee shirt.

    Dorothy is hosting a meeting at her house on Saturday at 10:00 am to discuss planning for the booth. Evangelina Sundgrenz is coming. The goal is to have plans in place by the end of this month. The board agreed that a country-of-service map should be used again, with a larger map. Colored pins will represent both former and current host countries and RPCV visitors to the booth can insert a pin at the site of service. Miriam will contact the people who worked at the booth last year to see if they are willing to help this year.

  6. Agenda items to suggest for the northwest groups’ regional meeting at the campout in August. Daryl Johnson, the Northwest Regional Representative to the NPCA board, will chair the meeting. In lieu of reports from groups on what the groups are doing, the following two items have been suggested:

    • Technical side of organizing an RPCV group: website, newsletter, membership database, and

    • Fundraising

  7. NPCA topics.

    1. There has been no direct response to an appeal for an Advocacy Coordinator.

    2. No response to the request of participation in the Mentoring program. See June newsletter for background information.

    3. Pat Wand reported that the NPCA is going to sponsor short term visits to Peace Corps host countries that will include an in-country tour and an opportunity to meet and work with an on-site Volunteer. Tour costs would be about $2,500 - $3,000.

    4. The NPCA is helping the Baylor College of Medicine to identify female Peace Corps Volunteers who were in service from 1961 – 1989 to take part in a survey regarding the incidence of breast cancer. This is a follow up to recent studies that show that rats experience a reduced rate of breast cancer as a result of taking chloroquine, the active ingredient in the malaria medication used by PCVs during that time period. Information about the research is available at:

      http://www.theabramsoncenter.org/en/programs/chloroquine-for-cancer-prevention

  8. Review of PCPP projects.

    Four Oregon PCVs and one Washington PCV have posted projects on the Peace Corps Partnership site. So far this year, WCPCA has awarded $1,335 in total for two PCPP out of $2,000 budgeted and these projects are listed on the website. See list at top of next page.

    Kenya, Community Cereal Bank, Bostian B., OR, #615-198, $2,841 needed

    Ukraine, Community Playground, Jasperson A., OR, #343-328, $3,538 needed

    Vanuatu, Rural Water System Development, Karr N., OR, #461-050, $4,487 needed

    Ukraine, Integrating Technology and Language, Valles, D, WA, #343-340, $2,342 needed

    Rwanda Hand Washing Stations Johnson B., OR, #696-017, $206.03 needed

    The board voted to fund the Kenya Community Cereal Bank at $500, and the Hand Washing Stations at the full amount needed of $206.03.

  9. Planning for the July newsletter. Dorothy is coordinating. Articles are needed by June 22nd in order to assemble the newsletter before Dorothy goes out of town. (This is a corrected date: originally the request was for Monday, June 25th. The board will be notified of the change by email.)

  10. Board meetings.

    July 30, Monday, the next board meeting;

    No meeting in August; the previously scheduled August date was moved forward to July; and

    September 10th, Monday, will be the first fall meeting.

    All meetings will be at Dorothy’s house.

NOTES

APPLICATION CRITERIA FOR THE EUGENE CELEBRATION PARADE

The Eugene Celebration Parade will be limited to a maximum of 100 entries. The parade committee reviews all applications. The committee reserves the right to choose only those entries that meet the criteria established in this application. Please complete your application with as much detail as possible, as acceptance of your entry is based only on the information you provide.

The entry should have the following:

  • Entry is well designed and has an exceptional central theme or idea. We need to get your message in 20 seconds!

  • Entry incorporates the parade theme.

  • The entry is fun, clever, and well received by the audience. It should make us want to stand up and cheer.

  • Entry easily travels the parade route, turns corners and fits under traffic signals. Entry meets size restrictions and safety regulations. The height of the entry needs to easily pass under trees and traffic devices encountered on the Parade route.

  • Recorded or live music, use of instruments, chants, or other audio is effectively used by your entry.

  • There is an interesting, unusual and exciting routine performed consistently throughout the parade route.

  • Costumes are original in nature, unusual and/or well designed. Props are inventive and are large enough to be visible to the audience.

CAMPOUT

Email from Sam Greer on 6/8 is below. Our goal is to have 50-55 people register for the campout.

Thanks Dorothy for getting the schedule onto the WCPCA site; the other group's didn't post it, so the only way folks will see it is on the Eugene site.  We have 22 paid adult reservations for a total of $440 returned to the WCPCA coffers so far; I expect to see more Boise reservations next week since I was just there 2 weeks ago. And I will see a number of the Portland RPCVs June 22-25 at their Silver Falls campout and will recruit more of them for the August gathering.   We Coastals intend to use up all the rain in the next week or two so there won't be any to worry about in August!        Peace, Sam

Respectfully submitted, June 13, 2012

Miriam Aiken, Secretary