Big Rapids Area Junior Hockey Association

Meeting Minutes: June 26, 2014

A. Call to Order: Meeting called to order at 6:17 p.m. by Tim Blashill in the Bulldog Room at Ewigleben Ice Arena.

B. Board Members Present: Tim Blashill, Doug Workman, John Bednarz, Joe Spedowski, and Liane Couch

Board Members Not Present: Nancy Hogan, Sonya Andres, Jason Andres, Tara Lee, Susan Jones, and Tim Jones

Others Present: Lindsay Bednarz, Dale Couch

C. Agenda

1. May Minutes reviewed. Doug Workman moves approval; John Bednarz seconds. Minutes approved at 6:28 p.m.

2. Bookkeeper’s Report

a. John Bednarz provides an accounting of the amount in the bank account and the amount of outstanding checks written and indicates it balances. Lindsay Bednarz took the time to go through the checks written and verified amounts. As of the May bank statement, John and Lindsay’s accounting indicates a deficit of $286. b. Joe Spedowski questions if there is a debit card attached to our bank account. Tim indicates there is and that Jason Andres has it. John says he doesn’t want one. Tim thinks it is necessary to have one. c. Doug suggests that Tim put together a budget and have a discretionary spending amount in an account for Tim to access to pay for necessities. Anything spent out of that account would then have receipts turned over to John for logging purposes. Joe suggests having cash on hand for such things, but Tim would rather not have cash. Lindsay suggests creating a secondary account off of our organizational account. Doug would like Tim to explore putting a

1 budget together and have John ask if it is possible to have a separate account.

3. Proposed Amendment to Bylaws

a. Doug Workman advises a lack of progress. The bylaws are ready; the policies are not. The hope is that the policies will be done by the next board meeting. Doug believes the finishing up of the policies is best done by email. Once there is a consensus on the policies, they will be passed on to Liane for finishing. b. Doug advises he is still waiting on the fundraising policy suggestion from Susan and Nancy to provide a checks and balances for the transfer of cash from hand to hand. Joe indicates there needs to be an official exchange there.

4. Treasurer’s/Bookkeeper’s Report

a. Doug explains that Jason will remain in the treasurer position through the end of our fiscal year, which is June 30th. After that, he will stay on to assist Joe Spedowski in the temporary role of treasurer until someone is appointed officially. b. In the meantime, Doug suggests to Joe and John to get through the end of June once June’s bank statements is available, then take the QuickBooks file and set up the system how we want it. Joe asks to see what John has currently. Doug questions doing it now or after June. Joe indicates he can review it now. Lindsay indicates that all there is currently is through May. Doug thinks the bank statement should come in the next week and that it makes sense to wait and then turn everything over to Joe. c. John explains that creating a balance sheet for this meeting was impossible with the information he had available to him. d. Tim requests that any player payments or credits be provided to him in a concise format for ease of inputting into Thriva. e. John indicates there is a $700 outstanding check written from January to the Sault hockey association. Liane advises that was the registration fee for the Peewee team’s tournament, but that that check was written in November at the latest. Lindsay indicates there were three $700 checks written. Three teams went to that tournament; the two squirt teams and the peewee team. Jason is supposed to call the Sault association and find out the standing of that check.

4. 2014/2015 Projected Numbers

a. Tim Blashill advises the site is not ready yet for registration. There is still a complaint of people not receiving their monthly Thriva statements. Tim would like to see an email capability utilized through our organization’s website. Tim also wants to try to prevent

2 people from having double registrations. Doug asks if registration will be ready to go by mid-July. Tim will be submitting information to Thriva by next Tuesday. b. Tim now believes we are looking at having one peewee team for the 2014/2015 season. Liane indicates we are losing quite a few players. One player of the three that left last season may be back this season; but there are 3 definites and two probables that are leaving BRAJHA for other organizations. c. Joe Spedowski asks how many players have tried out for the J.V. team. Tim indicates there were 20 kids on Tuesday night. Of course, some of those players will make the high school team.

5. Fundraising

a.Liane states that with neither Susan nor Nancy here, can’t do much on the issue of fundraising. b. Tim advises John that a payment will need to be made shortly to pay the manufacturer for the IceDog cards.

6. MAHA Report.

a. Joe Spedowski that so much is in the works; which is all pending on the next meeting. There are new rules coming from USA Hockey which will then move on through MAHA. b. Joe indicates that he met with four of the MAHA board members who are trying to put dates together for districts and the play-in tournaments. All districts will be played by February 8, 2015; which means all play-ins must be done in January. However, with all this being done to allow multiple teams from the same organization to play in districts, the state tournament still allows only one team from each association to participate per level. c. Doug advises he is going to the summer meeting and that he submitted the One Goal grant. d. Tim asks Joe if anything has changed with the bidding process for districts. Joe indicates that process is likely to be the same as before and that bids are going to be due in August. e. Dale Couch indicates that all league games will have to be played prior to January. Joe indicates that Adray is planned for the weekend of March 20th through the 22nd. Dale is concerned about having dead scheduling space. Joe advises the dates will have to be locked in first for all the play-ins and districts. However, we may have to consider taking a break from participating in Adray. MAHA had originally planned on holding districts at a later date to allow for scheduling of play-ins, but now looking to have districts earlier.

7. Vacant Positions.

3 a. Tim indicates that Doug, Liane, and Sonya are only in their first year of their two-year term. b. Liane advises that Tara and Nancy have requested to be phased out of their positions. c. Liane asks if there are any leads for filling the treasurer position. Doug again indicates Tracy Pippin and Dawn Younge as potential candidates. d. Doug advises that a game plan needs to be established for the August membership meeting. He would like to have this meeting take only one hour if at all possible. Tim wants to offer a free skate for the kids as incentive to come to the meeting. Doug also wants to pull people in with the announcing of teams, coaches, and managers along with budget and fundraising information passed along. Liane will be emailing information out well ahead of time.

8. Open Discussion.

a. Liane asks if she needs to keep communication with the J.V. players ongoing. Tim advises that she is to include them. Doug wants to be sure that there be better communication between BRAJHA and CAHA to keep things from getting out of hand. b. John asks if there will be any open ice coming up. Tim advises there is not; however, there are some possible clinics planned for late July into August.

9. Coaching Curriculum.

a. Doug indicates that another meeting has to be set for the committee. Joe indicates that Joe Strohkirch told him that there was supposed to be another meeting set up.

D. July Board Meeting

Next BRAJHA board meeting will be Monday, July 14th at 6 p.m. in the Bulldog Room.

Adjournment moved by Doug Workman. Liane Couch seconds. Meeting adjourned at 7:36 p.m...