From wb6yru at aenet.net Tue Aug 1 00:01:02 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] event conflicts Message-ID: <44CEFC2E.2060407@aenet.net> From the announce posting: > Join the San Jose Astronomy Association and Bob Ayers > on Friday, Saturday and Sunday August 25/26/27 for > more deep sky observing. Here we go again. This (at least some of it) conflicts with the Fremont Peak Star-B-Que on August 26. While that technically may not be a SJAA function, the SJAA supports it enough to have donated $100. Presumably a substantial number would like to attend both. We need to try harder to avoid conflicts. I know that isn't always possible, but we've been doing it a lot lately. Gary From robhawley at earthlink.net Tue Aug 1 08:12:57 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] event conflicts In-Reply-To: <44CEFC2E.2060407@aenet.net> Message-ID: <003601c6b57c$f8c5e9d0$0300a8c0@robathome> There are only so many new moon weekends in the year. The previous weekend conflicted with an SJAA Coyote event. Rob Hawley From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 2 15:35:49 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] CalStar registrations to start early Message-ID: <00a601c6b684$015eb4c0$0300a8c0@robathome> I have decided to enable registrations for CalStar effective August 9 instead of waiting to the 20th as originally published. I plan to make an announcement on this later today. Please make changes as appropriate to the SJAA website, calendars, Ephemeris HTML as appropriate. There are several reasons why making this change is the right thing to do. The date was originally based on a mistaken assumption that PayPal only permitted 30 days for a full refund. In reality it is 60 days. In addition there are some other reasons why the earlier date makes sense. This is the first time we have required pre-payment for meals at CalStar. The next Ayers party is scheduled about the same time as the CalStar registrations are currently published to begin. The code to process the registrations is fairly complex. Finally anyone sending in payments by check effectively only has about 3 weeks to do so under the current schedule. Since we have never restricted the number of people attending CalStar I don't see any fairness issue here. Rob Hawley From craigus at rocketmail.com Wed Aug 2 16:35:04 2006 From: craigus at rocketmail.com (Craig Scull) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: Note taker needed for upcoming board meeting Message-ID: <20060802233504.70218.qmail@web53812.mail.yahoo.com> Can someone please take notes via laptop (yours or you could ask to use Rob's) -- or by hand -- as I did for the first couple years. Another option would be to use a handheld voice recorder to record verbal summaries of the discussion at various intervals - e.g. it was just discussed blah blah blah... Trying to record the meeting would be difficult given the length of the table and surrounding noise unless you had multiple microphones. I appologize for the inconvenience. I should be around the rest of the year. Craig Craig Scull wrote: Hi SJAA'ers, I am going to be visiting family (I wouldn't call this "vacation") from Aug 3-16 so I am going to have to ask if someone else can take notes during the meeting on the 12th. When I return on the 16 I will have limited internet access because I will babysitting fulltime until Elena returns on the 22nd. I'll send out the "final" meeting minutes from last month in a moment. Craig -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060802/b448f442/attachment.html From craigus at rocketmail.com Wed Aug 2 16:37:55 2006 From: craigus at rocketmail.com (Craig Scull) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] 3 day August Willow Springs star party Message-ID: <20060802233755.83132.qmail@web53814.mail.yahoo.com> I sent the August Willow Springs star party invitation to several lists. If for some reason you did not get it, let me know. Craig -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060802/d260d20b/attachment.html From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 2 17:01:39 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Preliminary results of first distribution test Message-ID: <00b201c6b68f$ff0983b0$0300a8c0@robathome> I thought I would update the board on the data I have collected thus far. Ephemeris Mailed 7/25 9:30 AM 95139 (San Jose) 7/27 95123 (San Jose) 7/27 95947 (Greenville) 7/27 (may not be August issue) 94086 (Sunnyvale) 7/27 95050 (San Jose) 7/27 95020 (Gilroy) 7/27 95011 (Campbell) 7/27 95129 (san Jose) 7/27 95126 (San Jose) 7/28 92064 (San Diego) 7/31 94028 (Portola Valley) 8/1 94087 (Sunnyvale) 8/1 95124 (San Jose) 8/1 (2 responses) If all of the reports above are correct then it represents a delivery pattern that is hard to fathom. Clearly a lot of San Jose received the mail from the two San Jose trays almost immediately. Why did the 95947 and 94086 appear in the first deliveries and the two 95124s get delayed 4 days? I am about to send the database in for CASS certification and a general scrub (e.g. missing apartment numbers). The later needs only to be done once since any new addresses are now checked when they are entered. That process has already turned up one address problem. I would like to continue the experiment the next two months. Paul is changing the Ephemeris address page. I would like the September Ephemeris to have seals applied. With the CASS work that means we will have done everything for full automation except actually put the barcodes on. I would like Paul to print 50 extra copies that I can run a full automation test with. We should be able to use full automation for the October Ephemeris. At that point we can look at the data and see if this is all worth the effort. Rob Hawley From robhawley at earthlink.net Thu Aug 3 07:31:25 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: Note taker needed for upcoming board meeting In-Reply-To: <20060802233504.70218.qmail@web53812.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <002b01c6b709$804063d0$0300a8c0@robathome> I will please send me your write-up on willow springs Rob Hawley _____ From: sjaaboard-bounces@sjaa.net [mailto:sjaaboard-bounces@sjaa.net] On Behalf Of Craig Scull Sent: Wednesday, August 02, 2006 4:35 PM To: sjaa Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: Note taker needed for upcoming board meeting Can someone please take notes via laptop (yours or you could ask to use Rob's) -- or by hand -- as I did for the first couple years. Another option would be to use a handheld voice recorder to record verbal summaries of the discussion at various intervals - e.g. it was just discussed blah blah blah... Trying to record the meeting would be difficult given the length of the table and surrounding noise unless you had multiple microphones. I appologize for the inconvenience. I should be around the rest of the year. Craig Craig Scull wrote: Hi SJAA'ers, I am going to be visiting family (I wouldn't call this "vacation") from Aug 3-16 so I am going to have to ask if someone else can take notes during the meeting on the 12th. When I return on the 16 I will have limited internet access because I will babysitting fulltime until Elena returns on the 22nd. I'll send out the "final" meeting minutes from last month in a moment. Craig -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060803/eeaf3807/attachment.html From craigus at rocketmail.com Thu Aug 3 09:00:12 2006 From: craigus at rocketmail.com (Craig Scull) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: Note taker needed for upcoming board meeting In-Reply-To: <002b01c6b709$804063d0$0300a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <20060803160012.47019.qmail@web53810.mail.yahoo.com> Ah yes, fantastic... I'm hoping on a plane in a couple hours but will respond to this in a few days when I get a chance Rob Hawley wrote: I will please send me your write-up on willow springs Rob Hawley --------------------------------- From: sjaaboard-bounces@sjaa.net [mailto:sjaaboard-bounces@sjaa.net] On Behalf Of Craig Scull Sent: Wednesday, August 02, 2006 4:35 PM To: sjaa Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: Note taker needed for upcoming board meeting Can someone please take notes via laptop (yours or you could ask to use Rob's) -- or by hand -- as I did for the first couple years. Another option would be to use a handheld voice recorder to record verbal summaries of the discussion at various intervals - e.g. it was just discussed blah blah blah... Trying to record the meeting would be difficult given the length of the table and surrounding noise unless you had multiple microphones. I appologize for the inconvenience. I should be around the rest of the year. Craig Craig Scull wrote: Hi SJAA'ers, I am going to be visiting family (I wouldn't call this "vacation") from Aug 3-16 so I am going to have to ask if someone else can take notes during the meeting on the 12th. When I return on the 16 I will have limited internet access because I will babysitting fulltime until Elena returns on the 22nd. I'll send out the "final" meeting minutes from last month in a moment. Craig _______________________________________________ SJAABoard mailing list SJAABoard@sjaa.net http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060803/68a1ed32/attachment.html From areopagus125 at yahoo.com Thu Aug 3 15:28:31 2006 From: areopagus125 at yahoo.com (David Smith) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Preliminary results of first distribution test In-Reply-To: <00b201c6b68f$ff0983b0$0300a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <20060803222831.20470.qmail@web42406.mail.scd.yahoo.com> --- Rob Hawley wrote: > 95124 (San Jose) 8/1 (2 responses) Chalk up a third response for 8/1 at 95124. -- David __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From robhawley at earthlink.net Fri Aug 4 10:38:24 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Results of address scrub Message-ID: <003b01c6b7ec$cce78e50$0300a8c0@robathome> A surprisingly interesting result. The extra checking that we bought seems to have been valuable. A number of addresses turned up as undeliverable including some in 95123. That may explain why those deliveries were so delayed. None of the university addresses or NASA addresses verified. The postal tools just do not seem to like these addresses. I will cull these out for first class mailing. I suspect that USPS is able to deliver to Ames even though their tools do not know its location. The rest of the database is CASS certified. Rob Hawley From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 9 15:57:42 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Notice of renewal received Message-ID: <004701c6bc07$38ed5a30$0300a8c0@robathome> I received a letter from the insurer containing our new policy on CD. As far as I can tell this is not a bill. Since it is time to renew this would be a good time to add director's liability (assuming we are still inclined to proceed with Willow Springs). Rob Hawley From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 9 17:17:23 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Membership stats for August Message-ID: <005f01c6bc12$5af5f6e0$0300a8c0@robathome> Current Memberships How many memberships expire in which month Last SJAA Meeting 7/8/2006 Report Date 8/9/2006 Jun-06 12 Jul-06 9 Aug-06 12 Sep-06 19 Oct-06 15 Nov-06 14 Dec-06 19 Jan-07 17 Feb-07 25 Mar-07 23 Apr-07 11 May-07 25 Jun-07 57 Jul-07 18 Aug-07 17 Sep-07 4 more than 13 months 9 complementary 30 expiring 21 paid(current) 285 email delivery 17 Labels Generated 307 S&T Members 187 New Members since last meeting 10 current + complementary 315 records in DB 386 ****************************************************************** What year did members join? paid only 2006 35 2005 53 2004 68 2003 34 2002 18 2001 9 2000 1 < 2000 57 Specified 240 84% Not Specified 45 total 285 ******************************************************************** In the last year which members did not renew? 2006 0 2005 14 2004 20 2003 10 2002 5 2001 0 2000 0 < 2000 10 Specified 59 87% Not Specified 9 total 68 *********************************************************************** Recent count history Combined Current Paid Complementary New Members 8/17/2005 311 282 29 10 9/14/2005 315 286 29 5 10/12/2005 312 284 28 10 11/9/2005 319 290 29 8 12/14/2005 322 293 29 7 64 in 2005 1/11/2006 328 298 30 9 (includes 2005 members) 2/10/2006 321 292 29 5 3/8/2006 325 298 5/11/2006 323 295 28 8 6/7/2006 318 290 28 3 8/9/2006 315 285 30 10 Rob Hawley From pkohlmil at best.com Sat Aug 12 13:53:46 2006 From: pkohlmil at best.com (Paul Kohlmiller) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] September Ephemeris Proofing Message-ID: <000901c6be51$6d246d10$0800a8c0@PKHPXPP> Dear board people: please check the new Ephemeris at http://ephemeris.sjaa.net/0609/EphSep06.pdf This version is expected to go to the printer on Monday. Note the back page has been modified to match USPS regulations. Paul and Mary Kohlmiller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060812/f650a96d/attachment.html From wb6yru at aenet.net Sat Aug 12 16:59:51 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] SJAA finacial report Message-ID: <44DE6B77.2050600@aenet.net> Craig wants a written record of the financial report. So, for the record, as of August 12, 2006: CD 1 5,076.34 CD 2 5,167.51 Checking 8,175.76 Obs. Fund CD 3,100.51 PayPal 348.65 Savings 403.18 Petty Cash 86.50 ------------ TOTAL accounts 22,358.45 Our liability insurance is coming due later this month. Assuming we don't change anything and assuming they don't raise our rate, it'll be $1140. Have we received a renewal bill from them? Jim gave me the IRS notice about filing form 990 and I'm sending it in, (this happens every three years.) Normally we don't file form 990 because our annual gross receipts never exceeds $25,000. That may change soon, it was $23,322 last year. Gary Mitchell From jvn at svpal.org Sat Aug 12 17:31:01 2006 From: jvn at svpal.org (Jim Van Nuland) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] September Ephemeris Proofing References: <000901c6be51$6d246d10$0800a8c0@PKHPXPP> Message-ID: <44DE72C5.6E98@svpal.org> Paul Kohlmiller wrote: > > Dear board people: please check the new Ephemeris at > http://ephemeris.sjaa.net/0609/EphSep06.pdf Hi, Paul, Looks Good. I found two glitches. 1) At the top of page 3, right corner, the continuation note overlays the first line of text. That could my version 4.0 of Acrobat. 2) in the list of SJAA e-mail addresses, there is a question mark (in place of apostrophe) in the address for memberships. Worse, there should not be an apostrophe -- that's needed for a contraction or for possessive case. -- Jim Van Nuland, San Jose (California) Astronomical Association JVN's web site From robhawley at earthlink.net Sat Aug 12 17:37:40 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] September Ephemeris Proofing In-Reply-To: <44DE72C5.6E98@svpal.org> Message-ID: <006001c6be70$af61e1c0$0500a8c0@robathome> > 2) in the list of SJAA e-mail addresses, there is a question > mark (in place of apostrophe) in the address for memberships. > Worse, there should not be an apostrophe -- that's needed > for a contraction or for possessive case. > Represents membership questions. Paul stuck this in a couple years ago for me. Rob Hawley From areopagus125 at yahoo.com Mon Aug 14 11:12:48 2006 From: areopagus125 at yahoo.com (David Smith) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] October meeting topic Message-ID: <20060814181248.24636.qmail@web42401.mail.scd.yahoo.com> Dr. Stahler's talk for the October meeting will be entitled, "Why Are There Stars?" -- David __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From robhawley at earthlink.net Mon Aug 14 12:27:19 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Discounted First Class Message-ID: <008601c6bfd7$a937fb50$0500a8c0@robathome> The board asked me to check into the rates for using presorted first class. We do not qualify as the minimum count is 500 pieces. http://pe.usps.com/cpim/ftp/manuals/qsg300/q230d.pdf If anyone has any further questions on the mail here is a link to the detailed guide for everything postal. http://pe.usps.com/cpim/ftp/manuals/dmm300/Index.pdf Rob Hawley From jvn at svpal.org Mon Aug 14 15:50:28 2006 From: jvn at svpal.org (Jim Van Nuland) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] October meeting topic References: <20060814181248.24636.qmail@web42401.mail.scd.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <44E0FE34.2673@svpal.org> David Smith wrote: > > Dr. Stahler's talk for the October meeting will be > entitled, "Why Are There Stars?" I've upadated the calendar page . -- Jim Van Nuland, San Jose (California) Astronomical Association JVN's web site From wb6yru at aenet.net Tue Aug 15 15:53:20 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] director's insurance option for SJAA Message-ID: <44E25060.7020805@aenet.net> At the last board meeting, we were talking about adding the director's insurance option to our general liability. I haven't got an exact quote yet (there's a formal quoting process to go through), but it will likely be in the neighborhood of $600 to $800 on top of the current $1140 annual premium. I haven't got the forms yet, but among other things they want the outside occupations of the officers and directors. So, if we want this option, don't be surprised if I ask for some personal info. Anyway, the bottom line I suppose is: given the increase of between $600 to $800, do we still want the director's liability option? Keep in mind, if we get the Ayers land donation, that by itself will add $400 to our general liability premium. Altogether, we're talking around $2100 to $2300 annual insurance premium. That's very significant for a club like this. Gary From rnapo at znet.com Tue Aug 15 16:21:58 2006 From: rnapo at znet.com (Rich N) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] director's insurance option for SJAA References: <44E25060.7020805@aenet.net> Message-ID: <001201c6c0c1$9b7a6a30$51f61345@180edt> We could split the $400 between the board members. I thought getting the Ayers land was a major reason for taking the directors insurance. I think we need to wait to see if we get the land. Rich > At the last board meeting, we were talking about adding the director's > insurance option to our general liability. I haven't got an exact quote > yet (there's a formal quoting process to go through), but it will likely > be in the neighborhood of $600 to $800 on top of the current $1140 > annual premium. I haven't got the forms yet, but among other things > they want the outside occupations of the officers and directors. So, > if we want this option, don't be surprised if I ask for some personal > info. > > Anyway, the bottom line I suppose is: given the increase of between $600 > to $800, do we still want the director's liability option? > > Keep in mind, if we get the Ayers land donation, that by itself will add > $400 to our general liability premium. > > Altogether, we're talking around $2100 to $2300 annual insurance premium. > That's very significant for a club like this. > > Gary > > _______________________________________________ > SJAABoard mailing list > SJAABoard@sjaa.net > http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard > From wb6yru at aenet.net Wed Aug 16 00:19:39 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] director's insurance option for SJAA In-Reply-To: <001201c6c0c1$9b7a6a30$51f61345@180edt> References: <44E25060.7020805@aenet.net> <001201c6c0c1$9b7a6a30$51f61345@180edt> Message-ID: <44E2C70B.2050003@aenet.net> Rich N wrote: > We could split the $400 between the board members. > > I thought getting the Ayers land was a major reason for taking the > directors insurance. I think we need to wait to see if we get the land. > > Rich Why should board members pay for liability insurance due to the club owning land? If that were the case, who would want to be a director? It would be better to pay that out of the money we get from the observer subscriptions or whatever else income we figure out that comes from the land. If the directors are going to pay for anything themselves, it should be the director's insurance premium. And I'm personally not in favor of that for pretty much the same reason. This is a volunteer organization. Volunteers don't pay to be volunteers. If we have to, we should hold more fund raisers. It bothers me that large insurance expenses like this have become necessary. Club liability insurance used to cost only a couple of hundred not that long ago. This is what we get for being such a litigious society, suing over every little ridiculous thing. Shame on us, and shame on stupid judges that award huge damages on them. Gary >>At the last board meeting, we were talking about adding the director's >>insurance option to our general liability. I haven't got an exact quote >>yet (there's a formal quoting process to go through), but it will likely >>be in the neighborhood of $600 to $800 on top of the current $1140 >>annual premium. I haven't got the forms yet, but among other things >>they want the outside occupations of the officers and directors. So, >>if we want this option, don't be surprised if I ask for some personal >>info. >> >>Anyway, the bottom line I suppose is: given the increase of between $600 >>to $800, do we still want the director's liability option? >> >>Keep in mind, if we get the Ayers land donation, that by itself will add >>$400 to our general liability premium. >> >>Altogether, we're talking around $2100 to $2300 annual insurance premium. >>That's very significant for a club like this. >> >>Gary >> >>_______________________________________________ >>SJAABoard mailing list >>SJAABoard@sjaa.net >>http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard >> > > > _______________________________________________ > SJAABoard mailing list > SJAABoard@sjaa.net > http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard > From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 16 09:16:44 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Draft August Meeting Minutes Message-ID: <003c01c6c14f$5df4a890$0500a8c0@robathome> Mike - I was not able to get notes on the calendar discussion. Please supply whatever text you feel needs to be in the notes. Also please check the names under the telescope donation. Craig - You can use Word for the editing process if you are careful. That insures everything is correctly spelled. ======================================================= August 12, 2006 - SJAA Board Meeting Minutes - Rob Hawley ======================================================= July minutes were approved. ------------------------------------- Members present ------------------------------------- Mike Koop Rob Hawley Rich Neuschaefer Gary Mitchell Lee Hoglan Gordon Reade Dave Smith ------------------------------------- Treasurer's report ------------------------------------- CD 1 5,076.34 CD 2 5,167.51 Checking 8,175.76 Obs. Fund CD 3,100.51 PayPal 348.65 Savings 403.18 Petty Cash 86.50 ------------ TOTAL accounts 22,358.45 We felt that it was desirable that a CD expire in January. That way we could make a decision whether to roll it or to use it on Willow Springs expenses. Our liability insurance is coming due later this month. Assuming we don't change anything and assuming they don't raise our rate, it'll be $1140. We have not received a renewal bill from them, but we have a copy of the 2007 policy on CD. Jim gave Gary the IRS notice about filing form 990 and he will be sending it in, (this happens every three years.) Normally we don't file form 990 because our annual gross receipts never exceed $25,000. That may change soon; it was $23,322 last year. Rob expressed concern that the legal addresses of the club were not a board member's homes. Motion to change legal address the club to Mike' home. Contact for the PO will be changed to Rob's home. Pass Unanimously. ------------------------------------- Membership report ------------------------------------- Membership numbers have been relatively stable. Refer to the full report in the mail log Expiring 21 Paid(current) 285 Email delivery 17 Labels Generated 307 S&T Members 187 New Members since last meeting 10 Current + complementary 315 ---------------------------------------------- Insurance Insurance is coming due. Rob recommends we add Director's Liability. We don't have a current quote. Action - Gary to get us a quote {see follow-up emails on the board list}. ------------------------------------ Loaner scope program ------------------------------------- New donation received from Dix McGuire (the Earl Watts dob). This 18" needs some work. A proposal was made that Michelle update the scope. Some members expressed concern on the estimated $3000 cost. As a minimum Rob volunteered to replace the secondary next year. An parallel suggestion was made to raise money by selling unused scopes. ------------------------------------- Observational astronomy class ------------------------------------- Sept class will be on sketching. Mike is doing August class on Telescope types. ------------------------------------- ATM Class ------------------------------------- Usual 3 people attended. Gary sometimes shows up. Current game plan is to continue, but Mike does not feel that everyone will continue. ------------------------------------- General Meeting Programs ------------------------------------- Sept slide and equipment Oct Dr. Stahler's talk for the October meeting will be entitled, "Why Are There Stars?" Nov offer pending radio astronomy Nothing for December. Tried to get someone to speak on Lick IR, but having difficulty getting someone to commit. All agreed that July meeting ran too long and should have had breaks. ------------------------------------- Microphone Rich had problems with sound quality. Mike and I believe that mic setup should have been better ------------------------------------- Houge Star parties ------------------------------------- Last couple had good weather and well attended. We covered a lot of multiply booked nights. ------------------------------------- School star parties ------------------------------------- Nothing scheduled. ------------------------------------- Observatory committee ------------------------------------- {Craig's report} Friday night was well attended and skies were great. Saturday night was lightly attended and almost 100% clouded out. We collected around $120 for the porta'potty (includes PayPal donation). A 3 day party is planned for Aug 25/26/27 (fri/sat/sun). Before I left I had already received a dozen emails and my vacation message is currently handling the replies to people to let them know their registration is confirmed and also to ask them a few follow up questions - as well as to offer them one of the email addresses I am checking while on vacation, should they have any questions that need my attention. I will tally all this data into the reservations spreadsheet when I return later next week. There is buzz on TAC by some saying: "Is Willow Springs really as great as people say it is?" "Willow Springs is not as dark as Lassen/ Shingletown, but likely the next best thing" I'll email Bob and ask him what his survey revealed so you can report that, which also helps give us more insights into "the mind of Bob." The stickiest question for SJAA and our donor continues to be around the sustainability of demand and therefore financing. I think you already talked about the easement precedent issues that Bob was trying to test/understand better, so I don't think we have any updates there. The toilet - no updates. You could possibly elaborate more on the point raised at the last meeting - private observatories, while adding complexity to the picture, could be the easiest way to finance the site - and could be as simple as 10x10 storage containers for some. {Rob's comments} Rob's main question at this point is whether SJAA as an organization will be able to continue to manage the property. He believed the money issue was not a concern. Sufficient interest has been demonstrated. Donors would subsidize the costs of the property, if necessary. He raised the concern that only Craig and himself had worked on the property so far. The rest of the board felt that there would not be a problem. Rob also re-emphasized how much acquiring the property would change SJAA. As two examples he cited the need for director's liability insurance and the need to file annually IRS statements. ------------------------------------- CalStar ------------------------------------- Reservations opened on Aug 9. The rate has been slower than last year. As of the meeting 42 people signed up. 37 meals sold for a total of $511. About half paid with PayPal. The rest are pending. ------------------------------------- Ephemeris distribution ------------------------------------- The next Ephemeris mail preparation will be Aug 17 at 7:30 PM Paul sent a copy of the new Ephemeris first page for testing. Paul is also running 50 extra copies of the Ephemeris this month so we can conduct full automation tests with USPS. Membership database was CASS certified on 4 Aug. Several errors were reported via some more detailed error checking we purchased. These have been corrected. The database will now be maintained with all addresses Standardized. Rob presented test plan for using full automation. He also demonstrated a tool for insuring the labels are put on correctly. The decision was made that we will not apply seals in this mailing. We will test the results of the changes on the Ephemeris address page and using standardized addresses before we add more complexity to the mailing process. ------------------------------------- Coyote star party ------------------------------------- Last party was well attended. Rob is doing BBQ again in August. ------------------------------------- Calendar ------------------------------------- {Mike please supply} 2007 calendar {Mike please supply} ------------------------------------- Evergreen Observatory Evergreen Observatory has working with SJAA as one of his goals. Steve Nelson proposed a plan where SJAA will train star party Docent on the facility's 8" dobs. The kids would then help out in school star parties. Steve Nelson was authorized to plan a docent-training program at ECC this fall if they are interested. These plans will be brought back to the board at Sept board meeting. This proposal Passed unanimously. The meeting was adjourned at 7:58pm Rob Hawley From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 16 09:33:16 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:34 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] director's insurance option for SJAA In-Reply-To: <44E2C70B.2050003@aenet.net> Message-ID: <003d01c6c151$ad9199b0$0500a8c0@robathome> I checked with my own insurance carrier this morning. My current policies have no coverage for my liability as a director. Basically the bottom line for me is that I would need coverage before we could move any closer to acquiring Willow Springs. I might be donate the money to purchase the insurance as a way of avoiding the alternatives. Yes insurance is our biggest expense. Keep that in mind the next time you hear a civil attorney bloviating on how they are helping society. Rob Hawley From wb6yru at aenet.net Wed Aug 16 04:51:35 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] director's insurance option Message-ID: <44E306C7.1020802@aenet.net> In order to complete the form for the director's liability option on our insurance, I need the "employment affiliations" of all the directors and officers. The application doesn't bind us to buy the coverage, but we will get an exact quote. If you don't want this info on the board's remailer, feel free to send it to me by private e-mail: wb6yru@aenet.net. Note: The spam-trap on my e-mail account may bounce back a challenge if it doesn't recognize your address. Just hit reply, that's all you have to do. (Sometimes the challenge takes a couple of minutes.) Gary From wb6yru at aenet.net Wed Aug 16 18:05:03 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Draft August Meeting Minutes In-Reply-To: <003c01c6c14f$5df4a890$0500a8c0@robathome> References: <003c01c6c14f$5df4a890$0500a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <44E3C0BF.8020503@aenet.net> Rob Hawley wrote: > ======================================================= > August 12, 2006 - SJAA Board Meeting Minutes - Rob Hawley > ======================================================= > ------------------------------------- > School star parties > ------------------------------------- > > Nothing scheduled. I thought I mentioned this, maybe you didn't catch it... There's one school star party scheduled for August 19 (at Presentation Center). Unfortunately this is in conflict with the Coyote star party. Gary From koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net Wed Aug 16 20:42:48 2006 From: koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net (Michael Koop) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Labeling Tomorrow Message-ID: <20060816213859.G78043@koopm.best.vwh.net> This is a reminder that we are doing the Ephemeris Labeling tomorrow at Houge Park starting at 7:30. I picked up the newsletters this Morning. Unfortunately, the softball game got rescheduled for Thursday, so I can not attend. I am dropping off the key and Newsletters with JVN tonight. He will be opening up for the Label party and the ATM class. Once the labeling is finished, please leave the newsletters with Jim. I will stop by in the morning on the way to work to drop them off at the post office. Thanks. Mike From koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net Fri Aug 18 11:18:15 2006 From: koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net (Michael Koop) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office Message-ID: <20060818120731.T19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> The Ephemeris was dropped off at the post office on Friday, August 18th at 9:46 AM. It seems that this is a good time to drop them off since I have never seen anyone else dropping off bulk mail the two times I have done it. I did not get the note about which "boxes" to pick up, and I'm not too sure about which ones you are looking for. Tell me at the next Houge park. Rob, you might want to ask if anyone gets any barcoding on their mail since we expect that they might be able to machine it now. Mike From robhawley at earthlink.net Fri Aug 18 11:36:45 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office In-Reply-To: <20060818120731.T19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> Message-ID: <002e01c6c2f5$42a6edd0$0500a8c0@robathome> We still have some kinks to work out in the labeling process. It was Jim and myself for most of the time. Gary joined us later and did most of the 945 box. I see you included some seals in the package. Based on your comments at the last board meeting we did not apply them. If we are going to take the time to apply seals we might as well go for the full Monty and barcode as well. Hopefully you got some plastic trays. It would also be nice if we could pick up some of the PO tray tags. They are printed on a thicker material. I used my tags this time since the barcodes were more readable. I will see what happens with this batch. Once we have some results we can make a decision whether I try to do a full automation test. > Rob, you might want to ask if anyone gets any bar-coding on > their mail since we expect that they might be able to machine it now. > Will do. I also am sending a copy to myself. WILL EVERYONE ON THIS LIST PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHEN THEIR COPY ARRIVES. Rob Hawley From rnapo at znet.com Fri Aug 18 11:41:23 2006 From: rnapo at znet.com (Rich N) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office References: <20060818120731.T19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> Message-ID: <002f01c6c2f5$e84ffc90$67f61345@180edt> Sorry. I read your reminder about the folding party and then forgot when the time rolled around. I was on the phone to my brother. Rich > The Ephemeris was dropped off at the post office on > Friday, August 18th at 9:46 AM. > > It seems that this is a good time to drop them off since I have never seen > anyone else dropping off bulk mail the two times I have done it. > > I did not get the note about which "boxes" to pick up, and I'm not too > sure about which ones you are looking for. Tell me at the next Houge park. > > Rob, you might want to ask if anyone gets any barcoding on their mail > since we expect that they might be able to machine it now. > > Mike > > _______________________________________________ > SJAABoard mailing list > SJAABoard@sjaa.net > http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard > From koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net Fri Aug 18 11:59:26 2006 From: koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net (Michael Koop) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office In-Reply-To: <002e01c6c2f5$42a6edd0$0500a8c0@robathome> References: <002e01c6c2f5$42a6edd0$0500a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <20060818125011.C19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> > I see you included some seals in the package. Based on your comments at the > last board meeting we did not apply them. If we are going to take the time > to apply seals we might as well go for the full Monty and barcode as well. Roger at Accuprint gave me those. He likes those since they are clear and have a perforation. I talked with him about our various options. Basically, we just have too small a delivery to take advantage of various labeling options. > > Hopefully you got some plastic trays. It would also be nice if we could > pick up some of the PO tray tags. They are printed on a thicker material. > I used my tags this time since the barcodes were more readable. > I picked up 7 trays and boxes, but I just pulled them from the top of the stack. I did not see the note about which tray type you were looking for when I went to the post office. From robhawley at earthlink.net Fri Aug 18 12:19:31 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office In-Reply-To: <20060818125011.C19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> Message-ID: <003201c6c2fb$3bc342b0$0500a8c0@robathome> > Basically, we just have too small a delivery to take > advantage of various labeling options. That pretty well sums up our entire problem. If we were sending 3000 instead of 300 we could 5 digit bundle and probably save a lot of time. It would also make it more cost effective to have Accuprint do more of the work. We are paying the minimums for CASS certification since the vendor measures mail lists in the millions. Let's see what happens with this batch. As I said if we seal we might as well barcode also. It took the 3 of us about 45 minutes (about 2 man hours) to label everything last night. I figure sealing would increase that by at least 50%. Rob Hawley From wb6yru at aenet.net Fri Aug 18 15:30:26 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: director's insurance option In-Reply-To: <44E306C7.1020802@aenet.net> References: <44E306C7.1020802@aenet.net> Message-ID: <44E63F82.7070707@aenet.net> I still need to hear from Lee Hoglan, David Smith, Bill O'Shaughnessy, Rich Neuschaefer and Gordon Reade. If you guys could please take care of this now while you're thinking about it, I'd really appreciate it. It will only take a minute. Gary Gary Mitchell wrote: > In order to complete the form for the director's liability option on > our insurance, I need the "employment affiliations" of all the directors > and officers. The application doesn't bind us to buy the coverage, but > we will get an exact quote. > > If you don't want this info on the board's remailer, feel free to send > it to me by private e-mail: wb6yru@aenet.net. > > Note: The spam-trap on my e-mail account may bounce back a challenge if > it doesn't recognize your address. Just hit reply, that's all you have > to do. (Sometimes the challenge takes a couple of minutes.) > > Gary > > From robhawley at earthlink.net Fri Aug 18 15:39:25 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Delivery Message-ID: <006001c6c317$2887a440$0500a8c0@robathome> Just to let you know I have gotten several replies this afternoon. I am checking with folks to make sure it was the September delivery they were reporting and not the August. Rob Hawley From pkohlmil at best.com Fri Aug 18 15:42:12 2006 From: pkohlmil at best.com (Paul Kohlmiller) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office In-Reply-To: <20060818120731.T19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> References: <20060818120731.T19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> Message-ID: <002e01c6c317$8c8442a0$a58cc7e0$@com> Did the printer come through with the extra 50 copies? Paul K -----Original Message----- From: sjaaboard-bounces@sjaa.net [mailto:sjaaboard-bounces@sjaa.net] On Behalf Of Michael Koop Sent: Friday, August 18, 2006 11:18 AM To: sjaaboard@sjaa.net Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office The Ephemeris was dropped off at the post office on Friday, August 18th at 9:46 AM. It seems that this is a good time to drop them off since I have never seen anyone else dropping off bulk mail the two times I have done it. I did not get the note about which "boxes" to pick up, and I'm not too sure about which ones you are looking for. Tell me at the next Houge park. Rob, you might want to ask if anyone gets any barcoding on their mail since we expect that they might be able to machine it now. Mike _______________________________________________ SJAABoard mailing list SJAABoard@sjaa.net http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard From jvn at svpal.org Fri Aug 18 16:05:47 2006 From: jvn at svpal.org (Jim Van Nuland) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris Dropped off @ Post Office References: <20060818120731.T19561@koopm.best.vwh.net> <002e01c6c317$8c8442a0$a58cc7e0$@com> Message-ID: <44E647CB.4F9E@svpal.org> Paul Kohlmiller wrote: > > Did the printer come through with the extra 50 copies? Paul K Yes, there were a bunch left over, and Rob said those were the 50 for the post office test. If they are not used for that, toss them to me and I'll put them on the table with other clubs' newsletters. -- Jim Van Nuland, San Jose (California) Astronomical Association JVN's web site From wb6yru at aenet.net Mon Aug 21 00:32:23 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] director's insurance follow up Message-ID: <44E96187.7090407@aenet.net> Well, I'm finding this surprising--half the board has not responded to the request for employment info for the director's insurance application. Only three responded to the initial request and only one responded to the second request. I can think of three possibilities: 1) half the board isn't getting or isn't reading their e-mail, 2) foot-dragging for some reason, or 3) half the board isn't really interested in getting the director's insurance. Why the rush? I was hoping to get this application done in time to go into effect along with our regular insurance, but apparently that's not going to happen now. The deadline for our regular insurance premium is coming up in just a few days, I don't want to wait any longer. Gary From koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net Mon Aug 21 21:15:32 2006 From: koopm at koopm.best.vwh.net (Michael Koop) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephmeris Recieved in 95129 Message-ID: <20060821220717.N19865@koopm.best.vwh.net> I recieved the September Ephemeris Today, Monday, Aug. 21, probably around Noon, for zip 95129. There were no additional markings on the newsletter. Mike From craigus at rocketmail.com Tue Aug 22 08:46:31 2006 From: craigus at rocketmail.com (Craig Scull) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] August 12 , 2006 - Draft SJAA Board Meeting Minutes Message-ID: <20060822154631.49502.qmail@web54507.mail.yahoo.com> Rob's excellent minutes follow... I incorportated Gary's notes about the school star parties... please let me know if any additional edits are needed. I will send out the "final" version on Friday. Thanks / Craig ======================================================= August 12, 2006 - SJAA Board Meeting Minutes - Rob Hawley ======================================================= July minutes were approved. ------------------------------------- Members present ------------------------------------- Mike Koop Rob Hawley Rich Neuschaefer Gary Mitchell Lee Hoglan Gordon Reade Dave Smith ------------------------------------- Treasurer's report ------------------------------------- CD 1 5,076.34 CD 2 5,167.51 Checking 8,175.76 Obs. Fund CD 3,100.51 PayPal 348.65 Savings 403.18 Petty Cash 86.50 ------------ TOTAL accounts 22,358.45 Our liability insurance is coming due later this month. Assuming we don't change anything and assuming they don't raise our rate, it'll be $1140. We have not received a renewal bill from them, but we have a copy of the 2007 policy on CD. Jim gave Gary the IRS notice about filing form 990 and he will be sending it in, (this happens every three years.) Normally we don't file form 990 because our annual gross receipts never exceed $25,000. That may change soon; it was $23,322 last year. Rob expressed concern that the legal addresses of the club were not a board member's homes. Motion to change legal address the club to Mike' home. Contact for the PO will be changed to Rob's home. Pass Unanimously. ------------------------------------- Membership report ------------------------------------- Membership numbers have been relatively stable. Refer to the full report in the log Expiring 21 Paid(current) 285 Email delivery 17 Labels Generated 307 S&T Members 187 New Members since last meeting 10 Current + complementary 315 ---------------------------------------------- Insurance ---------------------------------------------- Insurance is coming due. Rob recommends we add Director's Liability. We don't have a current quote. Action - Gary to get us a quote {see follow-up emails on the board list}. ------------------------------------ Loaner scope program ------------------------------------ New donation received from Dix McQuire (the Earl Watts dob). This 18" needs some work. A proposal was made that Michelle update the scope. Some members expressed concern on the estimated $3000 cost. As a minimum Rob volunteered to replace the secondary next year. An parallel suggestion was made to raise money by selling unused scopes. ------------------------------------- Observational astronomy class ------------------------------------- Sept class will be on sketching. Mike is doing August class on Telescope types. ------------------------------------- ATM Class ------------------------------------- Usual 3 people attended. Gary sometimes shows up. Current game plan is to continue, but Mike does not feel that everyone will continue. ------------------------------------- General Meeting Programs ------------------------------------- Sept slide and equipment Oct Dr. Stahler's talk for the October meeting will be entitled, "Why Are There Stars?" Nov offer pending radio astronomy Nothing for December. Tried to get someone to speak on Lick IR, but having difficulty getting someone to commit. All agreed that July meeting ran too long and should have had breaks. ------------------------------------- Microphone ------------------------------------- Rich had problems with sound quality. Mike and I believe that mic setup should have been better ------------------------------------- Houge Star parties ------------------------------------- Last couple had good weather and well attended. We covered a lot of multiply booked nights. ------------------------------------- School star parties ------------------------------------- There's one school star party scheduled for August 19 (at Presentation Center). Unfortunately this is in conflict with the Coyote star party. ------------------------------------- Observatory committee ------------------------------------- {Craig's report} Friday night was well attended and skies were great. Saturday night was lightly attended and almost 100% clouded out. We collected around $120 for the porta'potty (includes PayPal donation). A 3 day party is planned for Aug 25/26/27 (fri/sat/sun). Before I left I had already received a dozen emails and my vacation message is currently handling the replies to people to let them know their registration is confirmed and also to ask them a few follow up questions - as well as to offer them one of the email addresses I am checking while on vacation, should they have any questions that need my attention. I will tally all this data into the reservations spreadsheet when I return later next week. There is buzz on TAC by some saying: "Is Willow Springs really as great as people say it is?" "Willow Springs is not as dark as Lassen/ Shingletown, but likely the next best thing" I'll email Bob and ask him what his survey revealed so you can report that, which also helps give us more insights into "the mind of Bob." The stickiest question for SJAA and our donor continues to be around the sustainability of demand and therefore financing. I think you already talked about the easement precedent issues that Bob was trying to test/understand better, so I don't think we have any updates there. The toilet - no updates. You could possibly elaborate more on the point raised at the last meeting - private observatories, while adding complexity to the picture, could be the easiest way to finance the site - and could be as simple as 10x10 storage containers for some. {Rob's comments} Rob's main question at this point is whether SJAA as an organization will be able to continue to manage the property. He believed the money issue was not a concern. Sufficient interest has been demonstrated. Donors would subsidize the costs of the property, if necessary. He raised the concern that only Craig and himself had worked on the property so far. The rest of the board felt that there would not be a problem. Rob also re-emphasized how much acquiring the property would change SJAA. As two examples he cited the need for director's liability insurance and the need to file annually IRS statements. ------------------------------------- Calstar ------------------------------------- Reservations opened on Aug 9. The rate has been slower than last year. As of the meeting 42 people signed up. 37 meals sold for a total of $511. About half paid with PayPal. The rest are pending. ------------------------------------- Ephemeris distribution ------------------------------------- The next Ephemeris mail preparation will be Aug 17 at 7:30 PM Paul sent a copy of the new Ephemeris first page for testing. Paul is also running 50 extra copies of the Ephemeris this month so we can conduct full automation tests with USPS. Membership database was CASS certified on 4 Aug. Several errors were reported via some more detailed error checking we purchased. These have been corrected. The database will now be maintained with all addresses Standardized. Rob presented test plan for using full automation. He also demonstrated a tool for insuring the labels are put on correctly. The decision was made that we will not apply seals in this mailing. We will test the results of the changes on the Ephemeris address page and using standardized addresses before we add more complexity to the mailing process. ------------------------------------- Coyote star party ------------------------------------- Last party was well attended. Rob is doing BBQ again in August. ------------------------------------- Calendar ------------------------------------- {Mike please supply} 2007 calendar {Mike please supply} ------------------------------------- Evergreen Observatory ------------------------------------- Evergreen Observatory has working with SJAA as one of his goals. Steve Nelson proposed a plan where SJAA will train star party Docent on the facility's 8" dobs. The kids would then help out in school star parties. Steve Nelson was authorized to plan a docent-training program at ECC this fall if they are interested. These plans will be brought back to the board at Sept board meeting. This proposal Passed unanimously. The meeting was adjourned at 7:58pm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060822/95d9f0cb/attachment.html From wb6yru at aenet.net Tue Aug 22 17:58:33 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] SJAA swap Message-ID: <44EBA839.5040408@aenet.net> Hi guys, We've got the SJAA swap coming up in early November, now's the time to start thinking about how to handle it. I'm re-writing the swap forms to reflect the fact that the "commission" is now a voluntary donation. I've heard several reports of people skipping out on us before, I suspect we'll see a lot more of that sort of thing now. So, how should we do this? We'll still have the sales sheet, but the bottom line will be a suggested donation instead of mandatory commission. Also, I'm thinking of having all sellers start the swap by filling out a "seller's registration" with their name and contact info. The idea being that they will know that we know they were there selling stuff, and hopefully their conscience will have more influence. What do you guys think of switching over to a table fee scheme, payable up front? That too would have to be a voluntary donation. This may discourage small sellers, but it would encourage big sellers. If we continue with our consignment table (without asking for a table fee/donation), that would make the smallest sellers happier. And we can continue to ask for donations based on sales or whatever. Any other ideas? I'll bring samples of the forms to the next board meeting. Gary From wb6yru at aenet.net Thu Aug 24 14:56:05 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Ephemeris delivery survey In-Reply-To: <006001c6c317$2887a440$0500a8c0@robathome> References: <006001c6c317$2887a440$0500a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <44EE2075.7010202@aenet.net> The Ephemeris arrived today, August 24. The zip code here is 95124. It's "clean," meaning there are no crinkles, no crushed edges, and no additional markings by the post office (i.e. no bar code). Gary From areopagus125 at yahoo.com Fri Aug 25 16:49:22 2006 From: areopagus125 at yahoo.com (David Smith) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: director's insurance option In-Reply-To: <44E63F82.7070707@aenet.net> Message-ID: <20060825234922.22390.qmail@web42404.mail.scd.yahoo.com> I work for Affymetrix, although it escapes me why they need to know that. --- David --- Gary Mitchell wrote: > I still need to hear from Lee Hoglan, David Smith, > Bill O'Shaughnessy, Rich > Neuschaefer and Gordon Reade. > > If you guys could please take care of this now while > you're thinking about > it, I'd really appreciate it. It will only take a > minute. > > Gary > > > Gary Mitchell wrote: > > In order to complete the form for the director's > liability option on > > our insurance, I need the "employment > affiliations" of all the directors > > and officers. The application doesn't bind us to > buy the coverage, but > > we will get an exact quote. > > > > If you don't want this info on the board's > remailer, feel free to send > > it to me by private e-mail: wb6yru@aenet.net. > > > > Note: The spam-trap on my e-mail account may > bounce back a challenge if > > it doesn't recognize your address. Just hit > reply, that's all you have > > to do. (Sometimes the challenge takes a couple of > minutes.) > > > > Gary > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > SJAABoard mailing list > SJAABoard@sjaa.net > http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From wb6yru at aenet.net Fri Aug 25 23:00:34 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Re: director's insurance option In-Reply-To: <20060825234922.22390.qmail@web42404.mail.scd.yahoo.com> References: <20060825234922.22390.qmail@web42404.mail.scd.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <44EFE382.9080700@aenet.net> David Smith wrote: > I work for Affymetrix, although it escapes me why they > need to know that. > --- David Me too. Maybe it has something to do with conflicts of interest, but that's just a wild guess. At least they aren't asking for more personal info, like how much we make or what property we own. I'll inquire. Still remaining are Lee and Gordon. Gary > --- Gary Mitchell wrote: > > >>I still need to hear from Lee Hoglan, David Smith, >>Bill O'Shaughnessy, Rich >>Neuschaefer and Gordon Reade. >> >>If you guys could please take care of this now while >>you're thinking about >>it, I'd really appreciate it. It will only take a >>minute. >> >>Gary >> >> >>Gary Mitchell wrote: >> >>>In order to complete the form for the director's >> >>liability option on >> >>>our insurance, I need the "employment >> >>affiliations" of all the directors >> >>>and officers. The application doesn't bind us to >> >>buy the coverage, but >> >>>we will get an exact quote. >>> >>>If you don't want this info on the board's >> >>remailer, feel free to send >> >>>it to me by private e-mail: wb6yru@aenet.net. >>> >>>Note: The spam-trap on my e-mail account may >> >>bounce back a challenge if >> >>>it doesn't recognize your address. Just hit >> >>reply, that's all you have >> >>>to do. (Sometimes the challenge takes a couple of >> >>minutes.) >> >>>Gary >>> >>> >> >> >>_______________________________________________ >>SJAABoard mailing list >>SJAABoard@sjaa.net >>http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard >> > > > > __________________________________________________ > Do You Yahoo!? > Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around > http://mail.yahoo.com > > _______________________________________________ > SJAABoard mailing list > SJAABoard@sjaa.net > http://www.sjaa.net/mailman/listinfo/sjaaboard > From robhawley at earthlink.net Mon Aug 28 12:14:05 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Results for this Ephemeris mailing Message-ID: <001901c6cad6$2167ca20$0500a8c0@robathome> The incremental changes we made this week seems to have incrementally improved performance. 950, 951 delivered Tuesday - Thursday (most on Tuesday) Sunnyvale-north delivered Tuesday - Friday with most Thursday/Friday Curiously Jim's and Gary's were delivered two days apart even though they are in the same zip code. At this point I am willing to declare victory and not do further tests. If we want to do one more experiment we could seal the next batch and see how long that took. I could do a more limited survey from people that I know are friendly. Since we will be mailing in the same manner I would not expect a change in the result. I am not inclined to do the full automation test at this time. I will deliver 25 September copies to Orion in Cupertino. I am going to hold onto the rest of the copies in case we change our mind in the future. If we want to do a full automation test then we will need to run a few extra copies from a future edition. An interesting experiment we could run next month would be to send several copies first class and see how long that took. That would set our "best case" scenario. Ultimately the better approach is the electronic version. I have been working with Paul to insure that at least the PDF version is available during the same time period where the paper Ephemeris's should be arriving. Rob Hawley From craigus at rocketmail.com Mon Aug 28 22:59:37 2006 From: craigus at rocketmail.com (Craig Scull) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] August 12 , 2006 - Final SJAA Board Meeting Minutes Message-ID: <20060829055937.35791.qmail@web54501.mail.yahoo.com> ======================================================= August 12, 2006 - SJAA Board Meeting Minutes - Rob Hawley ======================================================= July minutes were approved. ------------------------------------- Members present ------------------------------------- Mike Koop Rob Hawley Rich Neuschaefer Gary Mitchell Lee Hoglan Gordon Reade Dave Smith ------------------------------------- Treasurer's report ------------------------------------- CD 1 5,076.34 CD 2 5,167.51 Checking 8,175.76 Obs. Fund CD 3,100.51 PayPal 348.65 Savings 403.18 Petty Cash 86.50 ------------ TOTAL accounts 22,358.45 Our liability insurance is coming due later this month. Assuming we don't change anything and assuming they don't raise our rate, it'll be $1140. We have not received a renewal bill from them, but we have a copy of the 2007 policy on CD. Jim gave Gary the IRS notice about filing form 990 and he will be sending it in, (this happens every three years.) Normally we don't file form 990 because our annual gross receipts never exceed $25,000. That may change soon; it was $23,322 last year. Rob expressed concern that the legal addresses of the club were not a board member's homes. Motion to change legal address the club to Mike' home. Contact for the PO will be changed to Rob's home. Pass Unanimously. ------------------------------------- Membership report ------------------------------------- Membership numbers have been relatively stable. Refer to the full report in the log Expiring 21 Paid(current) 285 Email delivery 17 Labels Generated 307 S&T Members 187 New Members since last meeting 10 Current + complementary 315 ---------------------------------------------- Insurance ---------------------------------------------- Insurance is coming due. Rob recommends we add Director's Liability. We don't have a current quote. Action - Gary to get us a quote {see follow-up emails on the board list}. ------------------------------------ Loaner scope program ------------------------------------ New donation received from Dix McQuire (the Earl Watts dob). This 18" needs some work. A proposal was made that Michelle update the scope. Some members expressed concern on the estimated $3000 cost. As a minimum Rob volunteered to replace the secondary next year. An parallel suggestion was made to raise money by selling unused scopes. ------------------------------------- Observational astronomy class ------------------------------------- Sept class will be on sketching. Mike is doing August class on Telescope types. ------------------------------------- ATM Class ------------------------------------- Usual 3 people attended. Gary sometimes shows up. Current game plan is to continue, but Mike does not feel that everyone will continue. ------------------------------------- General Meeting Programs ------------------------------------- Sept slide and equipment Oct Dr. Stahler's talk for the October meeting will be entitled, "Why Are There Stars?" Nov offer pending radio astronomy Nothing for December. Tried to get someone to speak on Lick IR, but having difficulty getting someone to commit. All agreed that July meeting ran too long and should have had breaks. ------------------------------------- Microphone ------------------------------------- Rich had problems with sound quality. Mike and I believe that mic setup should have been better ------------------------------------- Houge Star parties ------------------------------------- Last couple had good weather and well attended. We covered a lot of multiply booked nights. ------------------------------------- School star parties ------------------------------------- There's one school star party scheduled for August 19 (at Presentation Center). Unfortunately this is in conflict with the Coyote star party. ------------------------------------- Observatory committee ------------------------------------- {Craig's report} Friday night was well attended and skies were great. Saturday night was lightly attended and almost 100% clouded out. We collected around $120 for the porta'potty (includes PayPal donation). A 3 day party is planned for Aug 25/26/27 (fri/sat/sun). Before I left I had already received a dozen emails and my vacation message is currently handling the replies to people to let them know their registration is confirmed and also to ask them a few follow up questions - as well as to offer them one of the email addresses I am checking while on vacation, should they have any questions that need my attention. I will tally all this data into the reservations spreadsheet when I return later next week. There is buzz on TAC by some saying: "Is Willow Springs really as great as people say it is?" "Willow Springs is not as dark as Lassen/ Shingletown, but likely the next best thing" I'll email Bob and ask him what his survey revealed so you can report that, which also helps give us more insights into "the mind of Bob." The stickiest question for SJAA and our donor continues to be around the sustainability of demand and therefore financing. I think you already talked about the easement precedent issues that Bob was trying to test/understand better, so I don't think we have any updates there. The toilet - no updates. You could possibly elaborate more on the point raised at the last meeting - private observatories, while adding complexity to the picture, could be the easiest way to finance the site - and could be as simple as 10x10 storage containers for some. {Rob's comments} Rob's main question at this point is whether SJAA as an organization will be able to continue to manage the property. He believed the money issue was not a concern. Sufficient interest has been demonstrated. Donors would subsidize the costs of the property, if necessary. He raised the concern that only Craig and himself had worked on the property so far. The rest of the board felt that there would not be a problem. Rob also re-emphasized how much acquiring the property would change SJAA. As two examples he cited the need for director's liability insurance and the need to file annually IRS statements. ------------------------------------- Calstar ------------------------------------- Reservations opened on Aug 9. The rate has been slower than last year. As of the meeting 42 people signed up. 37 meals sold for a total of $511. About half paid with PayPal. The rest are pending. ------------------------------------- Ephemeris distribution ------------------------------------- The next Ephemeris mail preparation will be Aug 17 at 7:30 PM Paul sent a copy of the new Ephemeris first page for testing. Paul is also running 50 extra copies of the Ephemeris this month so we can conduct full automation tests with USPS. Membership database was CASS certified on 4 Aug. Several errors were reported via some more detailed error checking we purchased. These have been corrected. The database will now be maintained with all addresses Standardized. Rob presented test plan for using full automation. He also demonstrated a tool for insuring the labels are put on correctly. The decision was made that we will not apply seals in this mailing. We will test the results of the changes on the Ephemeris address page and using standardized addresses before we add more complexity to the mailing process. ------------------------------------- Coyote star party ------------------------------------- Last party was well attended. Rob is doing BBQ again in August. ------------------------------------- Calendar ------------------------------------- {Mike please supply} 2007 calendar {Mike please supply} ------------------------------------- Evergreen Observatory ------------------------------------- Evergreen Observatory has working with SJAA as one of his goals. Steve Nelson proposed a plan where SJAA will train star party Docent on the facility's 8" dobs. The kids would then help out in school star parties. Steve Nelson was authorized to plan a docent-training program at ECC this fall if they are interested. These plans will be brought back to the board at Sept board meeting. This proposal Passed unanimously. The meeting was adjourned at 7:58pm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.sjaa.net/pipermail/sjaaboard/attachments/20060828/979753e8/attachment.html From wb6yru at aenet.net Tue Aug 29 23:39:57 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] August 12 , 2006 - Final SJAA Board Meeting Minutes In-Reply-To: <20060829055937.35791.qmail@web54501.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060829055937.35791.qmail@web54501.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <44F532BD.1080005@aenet.net> No corrections, just two comments: Craig Scull wrote: > ======================================================= > August 12, 2006 - SJAA Board Meeting Minutes - Rob Hawley > ======================================================= > July minutes were approved. > ------------------------------------- > Members present > ------------------------------------- > Mike Koop > Rob Hawley > Rich Neuschaefer > Gary Mitchell > Lee Hoglan > Gordon Reade > Dave Smith Just in case the question ever comes up, this list of attendees should continue to be in the minutes. (Apparently it matters to governments and insurance companies.) > ---------------------------------------------- > Insurance > ---------------------------------------------- > Insurance is coming due. Rob recommends we add Director's Liability. We don't > have a current quote. Action - Gary to get us a quote {see follow-up emails > on the board list}. I'm still waiting for directors employment info before I can send in the application. It turns out Gordon Reade is having e-mail issues, apparently he never saw any of the e-mail requests. I talked to him a star party and got his info. Now, only one remains: Lee Hoglan. Does anyone know of an alternate e-mail address for Lee, or knows anything about who he works for? That's all I need. Gary From robhawley at earthlink.net Wed Aug 30 16:15:25 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Mail Black Holes Emerge Message-ID: <004101c6cc8a$2d438270$0500a8c0@robathome> It looks like I may have spoken too soon regarding the success of our test. I got word that the Ephemeris was delivered to a Los Gatos location on Monday or almost a week after mine arrived. Someone else reported that they had still not received theirs in a portion of Sunnyvale. It is possible that bulk mail gets from Lundy to Los Gatos by having a carrier walk to Los Gatos. Short of that there is little to explain the delay. We could try using full automation. That is supposed to be the fastest way short of slapping a first class stamp on the newsletter. That introduces a bunch of formality to the process (most of which involves what I do). It will also require that we seal the newsletters. So... I am willing to get us approved for mailing with full automation, but only if the people who label the Ephemeris are willing to spend an extra 45 minutes applying seals. If we are not willing apply seals we can't use full automation. My default action is to not proceed with the approval process. We can try sending some copies first class as I suggested in my previous email. Rob Hawley From wb6yru at aenet.net Wed Aug 30 23:50:45 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Mail Black Holes Emerge In-Reply-To: <004101c6cc8a$2d438270$0500a8c0@robathome> References: <004101c6cc8a$2d438270$0500a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <44F686C5.5010505@aenet.net> Rob Hawley wrote: > It is possible that bulk mail gets from Lundy to Los Gatos by having a > carrier walk to Los Gatos. Short of that there is little to explain the > delay. Has anyone asked the bulk mail dept. for an explanation? > > We could try using full automation... I strongly suspect such efforts will only result in a marginal improvement. If we go to full automation, what exactly does that do? The newsletters go through the machines more smoothly, maybe save a step or two in the sorting process. Anything else? How would that gain more than a day or two? We're looking at delays of several days, even weeks. > I am willing to get us approved for mailing with full automation, > but only if the people who label the Ephemeris are willing to spend an extra > 45 minutes applying seals. If we are not willing apply seals we can't use > full automation. However, having said all that, I'm willing to help out. It wouldn't hurt to at least try it for a while. Gary From robhawley at earthlink.net Thu Aug 31 08:06:03 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Mail Black Holes Emerge In-Reply-To: <44F686C5.5010505@aenet.net> Message-ID: <004801c6cd0e$fac664e0$0500a8c0@robathome> > Has anyone asked the bulk mail dept. for an explanation? > I spent 45 minutes with them. Their recommendation was to use full automation; however the purpose of the office was to help people use full automation. The changes we have made to date were intended to get us as close to that standard as possible without adopting the full formality. If we were shipping 3000 instead of 300 pieces full automation might save us money. I say might because as a non-profit we already receive a huge discount for just using Machinable bulk mail. With the size of our mailing it will likely cost us money. > I strongly suspect such efforts will only result in a > marginal improvement. I agree. I suspect we have hit the wall with respect to bulk mail. We are getting what we paid for. > However, having said all that, I'm willing to help out. It > wouldn't hurt to at least try it for a while. It would be interesting to try it once and see what happens. We do not have to commit to a permanent change. I will reCASS the database (to give us a clean certificate) and take the sample up to Lundy either next week or the following week. Rob Hawley From wb6yru at aenet.net Thu Aug 31 17:01:32 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Mail Black Holes Emerge In-Reply-To: <004801c6cd0e$fac664e0$0500a8c0@robathome> References: <004801c6cd0e$fac664e0$0500a8c0@robathome> Message-ID: <44F7785C.6070007@aenet.net> Rob Hawley wrote: >>Has anyone asked the bulk mail dept. for an explanation? > > I spent 45 minutes with them. Their recommendation was to use full > automation; however the purpose of the office was to help people use full > automation. The changes we have made to date were intended to get us as > close to that standard as possible without adopting the full formality. But that's not an explanation. I'm really having a hard time understanding this. Here we are in arguably the high-tech center of the world, with arguably the best postal service in the world, and we can't get mail across the valley in a *week*. I can see third class taking an extra day or so, but fer cry'n out loud--a fit person can *walk* the distance. Now, maybe there's not much we *can* do, short of going to first class or just mailing them sooner. And I certainly don't want to discourage doing experiments. However, before we get too carried away, it'd be nice to know that this added effort and expense really will make a difference. Did they at least say what difference we can realistically expect? Gary From robhawley at earthlink.net Thu Aug 31 19:48:43 2006 From: robhawley at earthlink.net (Rob Hawley) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] Mail Black Holes Emerge In-Reply-To: <44F7785C.6070007@aenet.net> Message-ID: <009c01c6cd71$238d9e40$0500a8c0@robathome> The phone number of the bulk mail office at Lundy is 437 6812 Go for it Rob Hawley From wb6yru at aenet.net Thu Aug 31 21:56:25 2006 From: wb6yru at aenet.net (Gary Mitchell) Date: Sat Sep 30 03:57:35 2006 Subject: [SJAABoard] directors' employment info for liability insurance Message-ID: <44F7BD79.4000302@aenet.net> Regarding our application for the supplemental directors insurance and the question why they want our employment info., here's their reply: "We ask for their outside employment affiliations for underwriting purposes only. We review to determine that the board is experienced and diversified; we also want to make sure there is no self-dealing going on and to make sure that at least 51% of the board are disinterested directors...i.e. not paid for serving the corporation in any other capacity and not related by blood or marriage to any other person paid by the corporation as required by the Nonprofit Corps Code." Gary