November 2020 Board of Directors Meeting Minutes and Activity Reports

MORE Board of Directors Meeting Minutes

November 10, 2020, 7pm

Location: Virtual Due to COVID-19 Restrictions (Zoom)

• Meeting Attendance
  • Ernie Rodriguez - President
  • Peggy Flaxman - Executive Director
  • Tom Howe - VA Advocacy Director
  • Rob Lowe - Membership Director
  • Sharon Maloid - Activities Director
  • David Beugelmans - Vice President
  • Dave Magill - MD Advocacy Director
  • Neil Blake - Treasurer
  • Mauricio Carvalho - Trail Boss
  • Not Present – Andrew Melito – Communications Director

• Financial Updates
  • $9.9k revenues including $3.1k from the MORE Store and $6.1 in general donations. 
  • $10.4K of expenses, $4.5K of ED costs, $1.5k Fall Camping Trip, $1k for MORE Trails, $1.2k for Prizes and Swag, and $1.3k MORE Store expenses for product fulfillment. 
  • Restricted - increase of $2.2k
    • $20.2k of revenues including $12k for Bacon Ridge, $2.4 for Patuxent (IMBA grant), $4.5k to Grants Working Capital Fund to reimburse costs for River's Edge.
    • $18.1k of expenses including $15.9k for General Working Capital (Patuxent) and $2.1k for Bacon Ridge.
  • Cash balances
    • $195.4k restricted
    • $212.7k general funds
  • PPP
    • Ernie: Communicated again with bank, which confirmed MORE is not accruing interest. That will start once forgiveness process becomes available.
  • Dave M: Moved for modification such that MoCo Epic expenses in 2020 are not charged to MoCo Reinvestment Fund.
    • Motion Passed without discussion.
  • Accident insurance with SPOT (not usually provided by non-profits or mountain biking organizations)
    • Ernie: This is a private insurance company that wants to sell us insurance that we can sell members.
    • Board agreed that we should not pursue.
  • Combined Federal Campaign participation (may not be feasible)
    • Ernie: Given the costs, we are at a point where we end up paying more money for audit or review than we expect to take in in contributions, so MORE will not pursue this for 2021. An audit would be $7000-$10000
    • Neil: An audit would take a lot of time and we don’t have the structure set up.
    • Ernie: Application fee and listing fee is also burdensome.
      • People give us money anyways. They don’t get credit through work, but people still support us.
    • IRS Notice
      • Ernie: Received letter from IRS about 2018 taxes not being filed. Thought accountant would file, but they didn’t do it. We wrote a letter for forgiveness, but they came back saying they didn’t receive anything.
        • We have submitted the letter again for relief from penalty. We are a nonprofit and we don’t pay taxes. Fine is now at $3050.
        • Neil: The IRS has been disorganized due to COVID and you need to submit 2-3 times for them to receive it.
        • Ernie: The only way to send it to them is via a fax.
        • Neil: Interest has only been about $120 so far. These penalty waivers are apparently never denied. So we might as well go forward with the request again.
      • Membership updates (Rob)
        • 333 Member Transactions
        • 16486 in Fees Collected by IMBA.  
        • 3357 in Estimated IMBA Fees ($12 per Annual, $1 for Monthly).
        • 99 New Joins
        • 234 Renewals
        • Large Donors - 39 @ $4550
        • The Membership Drive from IMBA Side, Social Media via Peggy and Signs in Parks are working!  
        • We've already surpassed all of last year by I think $6k and same time wise we are actually $14K ahead.  
        • I do think November may be slow as we did see a stream of early renewals due to the membership drive.  For reference we only have 37 manual renewals due in November.  Versus October we had 184 to start with.  
        • I've been putting a LOT of thought into Loss of Members.  Some months we only loose a 3rd, other months...we're higher, like this month near 66%.  However over the next 2 months of reminders we typically see another 50% of the missing renew where if we start at say for example:
        • Sept 2020
          • 101 - Prior to Start of Month
          • 78   - End of Month
          • 56   - Post 1st Month
          • TBD - Post 2nd Month - I'd assume another 5-10 and within 4 months we'll be 30-35'ish.  
        • 1/3 Loss sure doesn't feel great but I have no idea of what the Loss/Recovery rate is for organizations like ours. I definitely see we DO recover users later.  We get some users returning after 1 year to 6+ years.  Some months we see a few return other months like this give us 20+.  We had 51 come out of Lapsed or Expired this month.  
        • Any ideas for things to bring members back in are worth thinking about.   Please feel free to bring them to me for discussion.  Well, that doesn't involve face to face large gatherings.
      • Board Elections
        • Election schedule (posting, nominations, counts, report) (Ernie)
          • Post mid-November
        • Finding Candidates/Recruitment Strategy – get call out via THN/Special Email to Members to run/Social
          • Peggy: Going to send email to BOD with list of other staff positions to fill in addition to the board
          • General agreement to put out general call to members to submit for board positions and open staff positions
        • Events
          • Planning for Strategy Meeting
            • Peggy: Wants to know who does planning for strategy meeting
            • Ernie: Usually it would be Steve and me sitting in living room coming up with plan.
            • Ernie: We will do a Doodle poll for a strategy session meeting.
            • Dave M: Struggles with idea of doing a board strategy session AND transition meeting. Doubts he will participate in both of them. Also doesn’t think this is a year for a strategy meeting because they can’t do it in person.
            • Ernie: We will do a small survey of people on the board.
          • Planning for Transition Meeting
            • Dave M: Aren’t we a month ahead of this because we don’t have the new board members.
            • Ernie: Historically it has taken place of January BOD meeting.
          • Trails
            • Maryland (Dave M)
              • Trails are in fantastic shape
              • Lots of people out on trails and remarkable amount of workdays
              • Liaisons are spending money and spending it wisely
              • We have three counties in our area that are first planning their first ever mountain bike trails: (1) Calvert County has opened up their four parks and said to do trails; (2) Queen Anne’s County on Kent Island; (3) Arlington County is acknowledging that they need to do something for bikers. We are in a period where we want to capitalize on recognition that trails are really important for people.
            • Virginia (Tom)
              • Trails are in great shape.
              • Fountainhead they planted some trees
              • Lake Fairfax below all trails off
              • Wakefield had big trailwork day
            • REI
              • Peggy: Ernie met with several REI employees to give update on what MORE did with REI grant and to give peak on projects we are going to do
                • Their projects came down to Rosaryville and Meadowood.

October 2020 Activity Reports

• President – Ernest (Ernie) Rodriguez
  • Help Peggy design and order Trail Supporter t-shirts for trail work
  • Participate with Trails Committee
  • Meeting with Queen Anne County attorneys to discuss issues with proposed Memorandum of Understanding for trails 
  • Attend American Trails webinars
  • Meeting with DCMTB to restart conversation with NPS and other non-profits for programming at Fort Dupont
  • Canvas trail liaisons for project opportunities for REI funding and general fundraising in 2021
  • Interview on Bikenetic podcast for MORE Trails
  • Worked with Howard Flaxman and Peggy to register MORE and sMORE's trademarks
  • Howard will also provide recommendations for utilizing TM on MORE's website
  • Send personal "Thank you" emails for donors
  • Post trail work and ride events on MORE's calendar
  • Send old position descriptions and recommend new position descriptions to Peggy 
  • Participate on pre-work and trail work days at Wakefield Park
  • Participate on pre-work and trail work days at Locust Shade Park

• Executive Director – Peggy Flaxman
  • MORE Trails
    • Continued Registration for participants
    • Updated Leaderboard Weekly
  • Membership drive
    • social media push
  • Attended IMBA Local Meeting
    • Met with REI, began prioritizing grant focus for 2021
    • Met with Prince William Co Trails Coalition
    • Met with Potomac Heritage Trail Group
    • Met with Trails Committee regarding Brookfield Park
    • Met with DCMTB regarding Fort Dupont
      • Working with Scott Fultong (DCMTB) and Jessie (DC Parks & Rec) to support youth ride
      • Contacted NPS, DCPR, Mayors office, etc. to setup meeting 
      • Defined 2 short term goals for Fort Dupont
        • Support Jessie’s group (need water bottles, some basic consumable bike part (tubes, etc), need access to NPS bikes)
        • Setup Fort Dupont cleanup/trailwork day
      • Board Position Descriptions
        • Worked with David/Ernie to define positions that may be open for 2021 (attached)
      • Work Days
        • Attended 3 trail work days to connect with liaisons and volunteers
      • Other ongoing work
        • Website
        • Continued updating “Where to Ride” info on website including addition to donation language and SEO information
        • Updating donation language on each trail page
        • Liaison Best Practices Document
        • End of Year Giving Campaign (email/social media)
          MORE Store Reporting assistance for Neil

• Vice President – David Beugelmans
  • Continued to support MORE Trails event
  • Finished first round of fender fundraiser
  • Promote second round of fender fundraiser, including DC designs. Total sales for second round = ~$2184 profit
  • Annapolis Area Trailwork/Advocacy
    • Prepare, transport and install additional boardwalks at Bacon Ridge
    • Attend southern Bacon Ridge scouting session
    • Attend bike ride with Annapolis mayor re: bike path connections to Waterworks
    • Coordinate for boardwalk install at Truxton Park

• MD Advocacy Director – Dave Magill
  • Supported Cedarville liaison in her first trail project (a turnpike)
    • Submitted $600 project request to Trails Committee
  • Patuxent
    • Led two trail clearing workdays
    • Helped with bridge construction
    • Contractor work inspections and finish work
    • Finalized and posted another RFP for 2.3 miles of trail construction
    • Visited a neighbor and secured approval for contractor and volunteer access to a remote portion of the trail
  • Participated in Trails Committee call
  • Toured Black Hills with MoCo Parks staff, discussed possible enhancement and status of various connections to other parks
  • Assisted in negotiating MOU for Terrapin park on Kent Island
  • Recruiting volunteers to speak regarding the role of trails in the Montgomery County General Plan
  • Worked with Ernie on updates to local trails in Trailforks
  • Site visit to potential future mtb trails in Calvert County, coordination with MORE SMMB and Calvert County Park officials
  • Continued work on new MoCo maps, including technical discussions with manufacturers

• VA Advocacy Director – Tom Howe
  • Trails Committee Meeting on Monday, 11/2
    • Discussed a request from the Brookfield Trail Liaison for a $2k contribution from the GTF to help Trails for Youth (TYO) raise funds to meet a matching grant from Specialized Outride
    • Brookfield will be enhanced with a teardrop shaped technical mountain bike around the permitter of the pump with technical wooden features from Progressive Bike Ramps (PBR) suitable for riders of all ages and abilities
    • TYO has approval from Brookfield and Fairfax County Park Authority to commence with the project
    • Total project cost is $32k; Outride grant is $26k; TYO needs to raise $13k as their part of the match for the Outride grant; TYO is actively fund raising and will meet their match with MORE's contribution
    • Unanimously approved a motion to move $2k from the GTF to a RTF for Brookfield in preparation to make the contribution directly to the Specialized Outride in order to help TYO meet their $13k match
  • Held Monthly VA/DC Trail Liaison Meeting on Monday, 11/2
  • Wakefield Park
    • Wakefield Trail Work Planning, Prep and Staging
    • Wakefield Trail Work Day Crew Leader on Saturday 10/24

• Trail Boss – Mauricio Carvalho
  • [_]

• Membership Director – Rob Lowe
  • Membership Processing  (333)
  • Reminder Notices Current, Lapsed, Remainder of 2020 Expired
  • Sent New Joiners List to Peggy for Posting Thank You to Social Media - Now Weekly'ish.
  • 2 Trailwork Days at Wakefield
  • 2 Prep Days at Wakefield
  • Prepping major cleanup list to IMBA

• Communications Director – Andrew Melito
  • [_]

• Treasurer – Neil Blake
  • $9.9k revenues including $3.1k from the MORE Store and $6.1 in general donations. 
  • $10.4K of expenses, $4.5K of ED costs, $1.5k Fall Camping Trip, $1k for MORE Trails, $1.2k for Prizes and Swag, and $1.3k MORE Store expenses for product fulfillment. 
  • Restricted - increase of $2.2k
    • $20.2k of revenues including $12k for Bacon Ridge, $2.4 for Patuxent (IMBA grant), $4.5k to Grants Working Capital Fund to reimburse costs for River's Edge.
    • $18.1k of expenses including $15.9k for General Working Capital (Patuxent) and $2.1k for Bacon Ridge.
  • Cash balances
    • $195.4k restricted
    • $212.7k general funds

• Activities Director – Sharon Maloid
  • No update