July 2019 Board Meeting

MORE Board Meeting Notes | July 8, 2019

REI - Tyson’s Corner

 

Present at meeting

Ernie Rodriguez - President

Steve DonTigny - Executive Director

Tom Howe - VA Advocacy Director

Rob Lowe - Membership Director

Sharon Maloid - Activities Director (by phone)

Andrew Melito - Communications Director

Bob Caverly - Vice President

Dave Magill - MD Advocacy Director

Neil Blake - Treasurer

 

Agenda

• Finances
• Membership
• Communications
• President Updates
• MoCo Epic Updates
• Recognize email votes for Frederick Watershed trail work contract - approved
• Recognize email votes for Locust Shade trail work contract - approved
• Cacapon Trails update(WV) - members working under MORE umbrella to build trails
• BROT update
• Trailforks Search and Rescue feature 
• Trail.Care and Trail Karma donation programs

 

Status Updates

General Notes

• Recognize email votes for Frederick Watershed trail work contract for $58,500 - approved
• Recognize email votes for Locust Shade trail work contract for $48,000 - approved
• Trailforks Search and Rescue feature will dial 911 and share your location with others
• To help with this we need to contact emergency response groups we need to communicate this to them. These trails need to be approved within Trailforks to become available in the app before use.
• Trail.Care and Trail Karma donation programs is bringing in some donations, but we may need to figure out a better way to promote this feature.

 

President (Ernie)

• Assessing whether to continue being part of CFC - CFC rules require we have accrual based accounting which we can handle next year, however the rules require audited financial reports in lieu of financial review.  We currently pay $3,500 for tax preparation and review.  An audit would cost approximately $10,000 and may not be cost effective for the amount of revenue from CFC contributions.  We’ll revisit at the MORE transitional meeting late fall as we set-up for new board members after elections.
• Brent Goldstein, Divide and Conquer author will host a presentation and question and answer session at REI in Rockville.  The book promotes mountain biking in general and specifically his story of riding the continental divide from Banff BC in Canada to Antelope Wells at the US/Mexico border.  This is an inspiring book of friendship, commitment and accomplishment.  Brent and his wife donated $500 to MORE in support of mountain biking in the Mid-Atlantic. 
• Colin van Werkhoven is working for Under Armour FX Studios and interested in helping MORE.  Steve is talking to him about sponsorship opportunities at MoCo Epic in October.  Colin is Phil’s son and has been part of rides and trail work since he was a kid.
• MORE MTB guide for beginners produced by Alex at Little River Fitness was shared with the group. Questions were asked about how to distribute this piece when complete. The author is partnering with MORE to provide useful information to anyone wanting to explore or begin mountain biking. Bob suggested boiling down to a smaller format so that it works as a guide for bike shops to hand out. It would be a piece that’s handed out for those interested in starting to bike.
• Ernie read a report from Family Ride Program manager Elaine Hess
• New sMOREs site is live as well as the calendar events
• sMORE’s rides are currently scheduled at Wakefield, Lake Fairfax, MoCo, Patapsco, Bacon Ridge and occasionally at Meadowood
• We have about 5-6 rides a week and looking for more volunteers to expand
• Currently distributing new sMORE’s t-shirts to regional groups
• Solicited Public Relations thoughts on Family Ride from the board to expand
• Good turnout for SMOREs ride at Spring Fling and Summer Festival and would like more ‘newbie’ trails to ride on
• Interested in hosting a “Skills Clinic” for sMORE’s
• Interested in starting a “Weekend” sMORE’s riding program
• MoCo Committee work for planning, organizing, volunteer recruiting
• Attended summer festival at Lake Fairfax Park - $40 in donations deposited
• Helped with "Return to Earth" movie night - $226 in donations deposited 
• Sent "Thank you" donation emails and SWAG 
• Locust Shade trail marking with Martin and Howard
• Ordered additional SWAG
• Ordered additional sMORE's t-shirts
• Ordered sandwich boards for trail building and maintenance diagrams
• Posted calendar and social media rides and events
• Met with NOVA Parks regarding BROT status, may have to change plan for work due to historical artifacts
• Represented MORE at MICL/NICA Teen Trail Corps kick-off at Emmitsburg
• Attended and write letters of support for Potomac Heritage Trail Alliance for work at Lorton VRE and Great Falls National Park
• Applied for BOGS grant
• Assisted treasurer with 2018 financial review questions
• Participated in Trailforks webinar for Search and Rescue module to help EMS find riders in the woods  

Vice President (Bob)

• Attended MORE Summer festival (cooked LOTS of burgers and dogs!)
• MoCo Epic committee meeting.
• Trailwork at Schaeffer, SGBP
• Evangelizing when/where ever... ;)

Treasurer (Neil)

• $500 contribution recieved for the summer festival via check
• Roughly $6k deficit for unrestricted funds, more expenses than donations for the month, mostly due to MoCoEpic expenses exceeding revenues for the month.
• Summer festival expenses were $970 which was under budget
• $40 donations from a member and visitor who used to live in the area 
• For MORE store sales, we’re not sure how to allocate $868 in costs for the store goods. It’s hard to track where it should come out of (ex. Waterworks T-shirts not getting expensed to the right place) Shopify tracks revenue, however the fulfilment vendor (Printful) has costs that we pay and can’t easily track or attribute within Shopify or Printful system reports.
• Dave suggested estimating the cost as the level of effort to track is too much of a lift to do. Over time the estimates can be refined.
• Ernie also suggested subsidizing the costs so that liaisons are not impeded by complexity. If we can encourage them to create their own merch, it will only help trail projects.
• Donations do not have this issue of attribution
• $811 additional Club Ride major donor shirts purchased - grey button up shirts
• Website maintenance came out to $440
• There was $10k (referenced below) donation that went to Fairfax (75%) and Wakefield (25%) for equipment
• General Funds
• Loss of $6,246 for June; YTD loss of 12,912
• Light general donations for the month offset by ED expense and summer festival expenses of $975
• Restricted Funds
• Net revenue of $3,205 for June, $36,369 YTD
• $27k of RTP reimbursements in 2019 for Rivers Edge, money was spent in 2018
• $10k donation from single donor
• $2.8k expense for signs for Rivers Edge, $2.8k MoCo (bridge materials), $1k pepco mowing
• (Dave) Pepco and Mont. Co are informally on notice after the end of this year unless they help us find a solution for mowing as the annual expenses mount over $6k. MORE is willing to be a partner and contribute but not take all of the costs.
• Of note, the $20k 2019 grant from REI was received and deposited in July.
• Unrestricted balance - $143,111
• Restricted balance - $205,137
• Our accountant has all information required to complete our 2018 taxes and review.  We are concerned with timeliness of document completion and filings.  The cost for our taxes and  accountant are $3,500 but only been billed a third so far, and not sure when the next billing will come in, making it difficult to plan for. CFC requires an audit which we are trying to get estimates to determine if the cost is worth the funds raised.  

MD Advocacy (Dave M)

• Waterworks expected to open in August
• Bacon Ridge phase 3 is awaiting on final approval
• Patuxent trails received MDE approval. The rest of the approvals should go through in a few weeks, after which building can begin.
• Finalized and execute $58.5k trailbuild contract for Watershed downhill trails
• The vote to approve entering into a contract with Greenstone Trailcraft in the amount of $58,000 was approved by the Board of Director via email vote in June.
• Participated in bridge building workdays on Seneca Greenway, overseeing progress and field planning for Seneca bluffs “lift and tilt” work
• Work on recruiting liaisons for Seneca Greenway, county portion and Little Bennett
• MoCo Epic Team planning meeting, test ride on proposed new 15 miler route
• Meetings with two MCRRC (Montgomery County Road Runners Club) board members to discuss coordination and recruitment of trail runners to MORE trail work events
• Schaeffer mowing
• Continued efforts to get MoCo Parks, Pepco or both to pick up some or all of the cost of mowing the Pepco trail
• Submitted testimony for MORE on MoCo Park’s capital budget, including high priority trail improvement, held field review meeting for possible bridge over Seneca Creek near Damascus

Virginia Advocacy (Tom H)

• Request and received BoD approval to execute Locust Shade (Advanced Black Loop) Project Contract
• The vote to approve entering into a contract with Ironwood Trails in the amount of $48,000 was approved by the Board of Director via email vote in June.
• Locust Shade Corridor Clearing with Martin
• Working with Rob, Larry, Cathy, and Karl on possible RTP grant submission for Wakefield Park. In order to apply we need to scope that we can get approval and have the time to complete it. 
• BROT Update - Project on hold due to archaeological issues raised by the community 
• Wakefield Park - Dominion Energy was very receptive to fixing damage caused to trails by contractors.  This has been sorted out and point of contact has been identified. Fairfax County Park Authority facilitated by setting up a meeting with Dominion Energy, MORE and FCPA in August.
• MORE members living along the WV border in Winchester are working on building trails at Cacapon State Park in West Virginia.  The group is interested in Trail Labs and an Access grant from IMBA, asking us for help with using the MORE name and brand to help apply for grants. This group is already made up of MORE members and recipient of grant funding to build trails at Cacapon State Park.  The long term plan is to build the trails and community and then start their own chapter or affiliation with IMBA.

Membership (Rob L)

• June Membership Processing, July Expiring and June/May Lapsed
• 73 Membership Renewals/Joins/etc - Up by 8 from 2018, down by 26 from 2017
• $3092 - Down $300 from 2018, down $2200 from 2017.
• We’re averaging 15-20 new members a month  
• Spring Fling - Attended and helped with Setup, Sweeper on Ride, Teardown 
• Wednesday @ Wakefield - Course Marshall and ad-hoc trailwork - 3x
• Lead/Co-Lead on Thursday Night Rides at WF - 4X
• Trailwork Days - Wakefield - 2X + 1 Ad Hoc Afternoon

Communications (Andrew)

• Bike tags cards are complete
• Tagged 183 bikes between the Columbia and Ellicott City Race Pace
• Annual report, stickers additionally at Columbia REI
• Tom dropped off cards in VA at Spokes and REI
• MoCo Epics cards printed and distribution underway
• Will work on “Who is MORE” card which includes an update to the map and incorporating feedback on the copy
• Continuing to post via Instagram and will be linked to Facebook at the same time to connect the two channels. Will up the frequency of sharing other’s mentions to build MTBing community.
• Steady increase in Instagram followers, approaching 1k followers and are currently at 903
• Next Trailhead News is coming up, Andrew will work on that as a priority
• Spoke about submitting a survey to our members to learn more about why they join, what they want to hear from us, etc.. Group is open to this but Trailhead news should take precedence.
• Featuring our trailhead partners (for example FOPVSP) in a post to talk about and highlight who we work with.
• The group expressed a want to promote the podcast
• Bob spoke about topics for liaisons that help them tech-wise with building bridges and trails. Ernie mentioned tech tips are part of the newly redesigned MORE website. 
• Ernie asked for a library of pictures and videos for posting. Andrew will send out an email to liaisons and board for submissions that we can store and reuse.

 

MOCO Epic

• Java Cruiser will be the primary food vendor and provide a catering menu for us to pick from. Plan to also get 1-2 other trucks to offer other options for vegetarians and non-BBQ’ers
• Obtaining beer donations for kegs from different places. If we are able to acquire additional beer sponsors/donations we will be able to reduce or eliminate beer expenditures.
• Messaging for event is being pushed out for the event. 
• Budget is on track for how far we’re out from the event.
• 179 registrants to-date
• Detailed budget for the event has been posted to Slack, but hasn’t been approved by the board. Steve will bring the detailed budget to the board at the next meeting.
• New this year - Sweeps will be vetted by Michael Winings prior to assignment
• Also new this year - no 75 mile sweeps, the course will be divided into segments and swept to maximize support and effect