April 2002 Board Meeting Minutes
	by George Bixby	April 3, 2002

Minutes from previous months meeting (April 3, 2002)

The meeting was called to order by Mike Francis at 6:50 pm at The Yard in Manchester, NH. In attendance were Mike Lussier, George Bixby, Peter Duffy, Dick Cadieux, Bruce Smith, Rob Greer, Patty Bixby, Marty Callahan, Lee Walsh, Mel Walsh, Phil Brown, Tom Blinn, Paul Michali, Gordon Gieck, Dana Sion, Mike Ventrella, Alan Goddu, and Rob Stager.

Mike Francis welcomed Dana Sion and Mike Ventrella to the meeting and asked the regular attendees to introduce themselves.

Mike opened the meeting with an update on the rescheduled Driver’s Ed event. He announced that NHIS would soon be in the process of expanding the north and south ovals to meet NASCAR's requests. Unfortunately, this work would be interfering with or April 19th Cabin Fever school. He reported that NHIS had offered the chapter a choice of two dates to replace the April date. He added that the Driver’s Ed Committee had settled on Thursday, May 30th for the Cabin Fever school, and long sleeve tee shirts would be given to students instead of the usual sweat shirts.

Mike also brought up that there had been a resolution to the issue of insurance for the event and asked Phil Brown to speak on the topic. Phil reported that BMW CCA has contracted Weisenberg as the club’s insurer. He added that the cost to the chapter to obtain coverage for driver’s ed events had gone up from $600 per each event to $960. Also, coverage for club racing was now $1450.

Mike reported that Dan Croteau had been appointed as club race chair for the chapter, at last months Driver’s Ed Committee meeting. Dan’s first task is to work out an arrangement, for a proposed club race in October, suitable for both us and the Boston Chapter.

Mike informed the chapter of correspondence he had received from the Genesee Chapter about an HSR (vintage sports cars) weekend, June 6th through 9th, at Watkins Glenn. Another piece of correspondence was from Marc Stretch about a resort area in Bridgeton, Maine. Marc is a member of the BMWCCA and invited us to hold a activity/social event in the area during the September to October 2002 time frame.

Mike Lussier was asked to give the treasurer’s report. He informed the chapter that we had no outstanding bills and the insurance was paid for the upcoming Cabin Fever school. Mike also reported that the chapter had about $10K of receivables (through PayPal) for the Cabin Fever school. Also, the chapter had to submit three (3) reports, including a financial, to BMW CCA by March 31, 2002. Mike asked that Mike Francis and George Bixby be available after the meeting for signatures concerning the treasury.

Next, Mike asked Peter Duffy to report on membership. Peter told the chapter that he had received some responses form his mailing to former members but it was to early to report on the results.

Mike Francis asked Patty Bixby to report on activities. Patty replied that the lunch and tour at Simon Pearce was all set. She added that meeting point for participants would be at the Macy’s parking lot in Bedford, NH. Patty included that George was surveying a nice route up to Queechee. She reported that John Cloutier was making arrangements to publicize the event in the next issue of the Profile and that a registration form should be included on the chapter’s web site. She asked if it was okay to have the registration forms and checks sent to the White Mountain Chapter of the BMW CCA care of her. It was agreed that the suggestion was the best way to handle it.

Because the Autocross got a late start this year, Mike asked Lee Walsh to report on the program’s status and any assistance he needed. Lee stated that he was looking for more White Mountain Chapter members to assist him in running the events. He reported that he was going to conduct an Autocross school for novices and asked for instructors to assist.

Alan Goddu was asked to report on the preparations for the annual Ultimate Drive or better know as the Susan G. Komen Drive for a Cure. Alan reported that the event is be held on June 27, 2002 at Drehrer-Holloway in Stratham, NH. The event starts at 10 am and he urged all chapter members to attend. He added that last year’s event was very successful and the folks at Drehrer-Holloway look forward to the chapter’s participation.

One item that Alan brought up was that Exeter Hospital (co-sponsor) was looking for a Local Hero (a breast cancer survivor) to attend the event. He suggested that it would be really nice if the Local Hero was a club member or associated with a club member.

Alan brought up a related issue. May 15th Exeter hospital is sponsoring a charity event called “Drive & Put for Show”. He said that he was looking for six (6) instructor or group one volunteers to help with the “Drive” part of the event. This would be assisting paying participants at a driving event to be held on the back rally cross course at NHIS and Dreher-Holloway would be supplying four BMWs to be used for the event. He added that notice for this event was on Exeter Hospital’s web site.

Mike asked the membership if there was any new business for the club to consider? Gordon Gieck asked about ways to jazz up the chapter’s web site and suggested changing the home site on a regular basis. There was some discussion about this and it was explained that the club’s webmaster manages the site as we have asked him. If we want to make some changes to the site, we can take them up with the webmaster and see how we get our best bang for the buck.

Rob Stager suggested the chapter pursue other opportunities at NHIS.

George asked if the chapter wanted to continue pursuing a working relationship with Tulley BMW. There was some discussion about this and it was left to George pursue but it was suggested the effort may be for not.

Mike asked if there was other new business for the club to consider? There was none and the meeting was adjourned at 8 pm.