Minutes of the 1999
Annual Meeting of the International Costumers' Guild and Concurrent Meeting of
the Board of Directors, 15 February 1999
NOTE: These minutes are subject to correction and approval by the members.
ICG Board meeting called to order at 9:35 a.m. by Byron Connell.
Chapters represented:
· Australian Costumers' Guild -- Christopher Ballis
· Chicagoland Costumers' Guild -- Michele Jaye Solomon
·
Costume Guild
· Costumers' Guild West -- Darla Kruger
·
Greater
·
Greater
·
· Northern Lights Costumers' Guild -- Dina Flockhart
· Rocky Mountain Costumers' Guild -- David Kinnamon
·
· Western Canadian Costumers' Guild -- Eileen Cates
Ken Warren was assigned the task of checking the membership list and validating proxies. There was brief discussion of the procedure for waiving the reading of the minutes at the ICG meeting. There was brief discussion of reports for the ICG
meeting.
OLD BUSINESS
· Motion to extend the life of the future directions committee:
Motion: Darla Kruger, Costumers' Guild West.
Seconded:
Approved unanimously.
· Motion to extend the life of the video sale discussion committee:
Motion: Darla Kruger, Costumers' Guild West.
Seconded: Eileen Cates, Western Canadian Costumers' Guild.
Approved unanimously.
NEW BUSINESS
The balance sheet for 1998 was discussed. Some of the balance shown existed only on paper, because of as-yet unrealized Costumer's Quarterly expenses – the reality is around $1,300. The proposed budget for 1999 was discussed. The proposed budget did not rely on any of the surplus from 1998. New items included: Archives, Publicity, Calendar & Yearbook. Ten percent of the budget was to be held back as reserve.
Motion to approve the budget:
Motion: Steve Swope, Corresponding Secretary.
Seconded: Dina Flockhart,
Northern Lights Costumers' Guild/Costumers' Guild
The budget was adopted unanimously.
Lisa Ashton presented a proposal regarding the production of a costuming-related calendar. She needs a photo selection committee. The submission invitation is ready, and she volunteered to do the mailing. The goal is to keep cost under
$20, and have four pictures per page.
Motion to form project committee:
Bruce Mai,
Seconded: Darla Kruger, Costumers' Guild West.
Approved with one nay.
Bruce and Nora Mai presented a proposal to produce an ongoing yearbook, to feature guild and chapter information, dependent upon submissions from the various chapters. CC16 would provide the seed money, if desired. The publication is intended to be annual, cannot be in color for reasons of cost (500 B/W copies would be approx. $2000 -- in color, it would be $16,000), and is not intended to compete with the CQ. Each chapter would be responsible for submitting material, and the editors' discretion would rule. The initial plan calls for four photos per chapter, plus contact information, a possible group photo, and a mission statement. Lisa Ashton suggested including lists of winning costumes from WorldCon and Costume-Con.
Motion to proceed with planning:
Darla Kruger, Costumers' Guild West.
Seconded: Sharon Trembley,
Approved with one abstention.
In accordance with the By-laws, the Board meeting was recessed at 9:55 a.m. pending the start of the ICG meeting.
The ICG meeting was called to order at 10:00 a.m. by Byron Connell, simultaneously recalling the Board of Directors from recess.
Chapters represented:
· Australian Costumers' Guild -- Christopher Ballis
· Chicagoland Costumers' Guild -- Michele Jaye Solomon
·
Costume Guild
· Costumers' Guild West -- Darla Kruger
·
Greater
·
Greater
·
· Northern Lights Costumers' Guild -- Dina Flockhart
· Rocky Mountain Costumers' Guild -- David Kinnamon
·
· Western Canadian Costumers' Guild -- Eileen Cates
Members in good standing were identified and segregated from non-members for ease in voting. Thirty-four members in good standing were present; 32 members in good standing were represented by proxy. In all, 66 voting members were represented. A quorum was recognized. The agenda, reports, and other information were distributed.
Motion to waive the reading of the minutes and approve
them as distributed: Motion: Sharon Trembley,
Seconded: John Sims, Lunatic Phrynge.
Approved unanimously.
[Recording Secretary's note: The actual text of all submitted reports appears at the end of these minutes. Those submitted verbally are transcribed, where appropriate.]
REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT: Byron Connell presented the President's report verbally (transcription follows).
John Sims commended Byron for his work. Applause followed. The utility of e-mail for communication and discussion was discussed, along with how to subscribe to the list. (Report appended.)
Janice Dallas observed that her name had been misspelled in the 1998 minutes. Kathryn Draves (Sick Pups) observed that the Pups had not been listed as in attendance at the 1998 meeting. A note was made to correct the 1998 minutes
to reflect this.
REPORT OF THE TREASURER: Byron Connell presented the Treasurer's report, including the balance sheet for 1998, explaining the paper vs. reality state of the balance: Approximately $1,300 of the surplus is "real," the rest is related to as-yet-undelivered CQ's. The ICG has approximately 1000 members in good standing. (Report appended.)
REPORT OF THE CORRESPONDING SECRETARY: Zelda Gilbert presented the Corresponding Secretary's report, which incorporated the Publicity Committee's report. Two promotional flyers were produced and distributed during the previous year. The goals of the Publicity Committee are not well defined. Do we want more members? Do we want a better image for costumers? Do we want more people to know about us? And what about the few who give costumers a bad name? (These are issues for the coming year's P.R. Committee to deal with.) Mention was made that it would be good to coordinate P.R. efforts with upcoming Costume-Cons.
REPORT OF THE EDITOR, THE COSTUMER'S QUARTERLY: Pat Ritter presented The Costumer's Quarterly report. This included: an explanation for the lateness of the Quarterly -- the soliciting of advertisements -- the availability of subscriptions to non-members (ten non-members currently subscribe) -- the hope and plan to re-establish CQ subscriptions for all chapters -- the ongoing need for submissions -- the appointment of an editorial board (a Canadian representative is needed) -- changes in printer and printing (color covers soon?) -- the need for a better means of managing subscriptions. Discussion followed.
Issue 98.3 was to be mailed beginning the following day. Issue 99.1 had been started. Issue 98.4 was "in limbo". CQ should be back on schedule within six months. Extra copies of the CQ may be purchased at $4.95 each. An effort was under way to have Tower Books carry the CQ among its fanzines.
REPORT OF THE ARCHIVIST: Carl Mami presented the Archivist's report. In 1998 the Archives received $30 in cash from the Sick Pups. The APA collection is up to date with the recent donation of some early issues. The Mai, Pettinger, and
Connell photo collections were received. The Archive is operating on about $40,000 worth of loaned equipment. More archive material is still desired. Maintaining the archive takes about three hours per day. All CCs but 11 are in the archive on videotape. About half the CCs are on stills. More storage will be needed soon -- to preserve image detail, about 1.4 megabytes are used per picture. Physical space for the archive is running short; a 12 x 15 room is full. APA space will be gone after issue 100.
The anticipated expansion rate is ten
gigabytes/year. Alternate sites for CD's
are needed. Identification of existing and incoming pictures is needed. Byron Connell observed that Carl had put in a
Darla Kruger offered a contribution of $100 from Costumers' Guild West in support of the archives, which was accepted with thanks.
REPORT OF THE PARLIAMENTARIAN: The Parliamentarian had nothing to report.
REPORT OF THE
WEBMASTER: Byron Connell presented
the Webmaster's report. The site is busy
(1,600 hits per month, including visitors from
REPORT OF THE RECORDING SECRETARY: The Recording Secretary had nothing to report.
OTHER MATTERS: No chapters were dissolved in 1998. The Board reported its actions to extend the lives of the two committees established the previous year. Member input was solicited on behalf of the members of the future directions committee (Pierre Pettinger, Joan Bradt, Robbi Dyer, Chair, Marty Gear, Zelda Gilbert, and Carl Mami). Darla Kruger again volunteered to look into legal ramifications of masquerade video sales.
ADMISSION OF A NEW
CHAPTER: The petition for admission
of the Greater Portland Area Costumers' Guild was brought before the
membership. Motion to accept the
chapter: Ken Warren (Sick Pups). Seconded: Steve Swope,
1999 BUDGET OF THE CORPORATION: The new budget, as approved by the Board of Directors, was presented for discussion, though no action needed to be taken. Considerable discussion followed. Ken Warren delivered a message on behalf
of some members that, since the CQ was already behind schedule, it was inappropriate to be expanding into other publications (i.e., calendar and yearbook). Byron responded by pointed out that entirely different groups of people were taking responsibility for them, and that no division of resources would result.
AMENDMENT ONE TO
THE STANDING RULES OF THE CORPORATION:
Motion to amend the standing rules to create a Budget and Finance
Committee: Darla Kruger, Costumers' Guild West.
Seconded: Michele Solomon, Chicagoland
Costumers' Guild, and Steve Swope,
The Standing Rules are amended by the addition of a new Standing Rule ## [number to be inserted], to read as follows:
## The ICG Budget.
A. There shall be a standing Budget and Finance Committee to review periodically the finances of the Corporation and to prepare and present to the Board of Directors annually a budget for the Corporation. In preparing the proposed budget, the Committee shall consider the requested expenditures of each officer, committee chair, and staff member, together with estimated revenues for the year. It shall consider separately from the general revenues and expenditures of the Corporation all revenues and expenditures for The Costumer's
Quarterly, and may identify as it wishes any other categories of revenue and expenditure to be considered separately. After consulting with the members of the Committee, the Committee chair shall inform all officers, committee chairs, and staff members of the dates by which such requests must be submitted and the information they must include.
B. The Budget and Finance Committee shall consist of the Corporation Treasurer and four members of the Corporation, who are not Officers or other members of the Board of Directors, appointed by the President, one of whom the President shall designate as chair.
C. Annually, in advance of the Annual Meeting, the Committee shall present to the Board of Directors its proposed budget for the ensuing year. The Board shall consider the Committee's proposed budget and may either adopt it, with such changes as the Board finds desirable, or refer it, with or without amendments, to the Annual Meeting for approval.
D. The Treasurer shall report the Corporation's revenues and expenditures to the Committee and the Board at least quarterly. To meet arising needs, the Board may increase or decrease budgeted expenditures as needed during the course of each year. To meet arising needs, the President may, without the Board's approval, increase or decrease budgeted expenditures each year by an amount not to exceed fifteen (15) percent of the budgeted amount and shall promptly report such changes to the Board and the committee.
Rationale: This new Standing Rule creates a permanent Budget and Finance Committee and spells out the Committee's duties and composition. It will give the Guild, for the first time, a mechanism for budgeting its resources. The Guild now lacks such a formal mechanism.
Discussion followed.
Motion to amend section C to specify 30 days of lead-time in submitting the budget to the board:
Motion: Dina Flockhart, Northern Lights Costumers' Guild.
Seconded: Michele Solomon, Chicagoland Costumers' Guild.
Discussion followed. A stipulation that the proposed budget be in writing was accepted as a friendly amendment. Amendment approved with one abstention. Discussion of Standing Rule continued.
Motion to amend standing rule to provide overlapping two-year terms to provide continuity:
Motion: Pierre Pettinger, St.Louis Costumers' Guild.
Seconded: John Sims, Lunatic Phrynge.
Wording corrected by Kathryn Draves, Sick Pups.
Amendment approved with one abstention.
Standing Rule approved with one nay.
The final text read as follows:
The Standing Rules are amended by the addition of a new Standing Rule ## [number to be inserted], to read as follows:
## The ICG Budget. A. There shall be a standing Budget and Finance Committee to review periodically the finances of the Corporation and to prepare and present to the Board of Directors annually a budget for the Corporation. In preparing the proposed budget, the Committee shall consider the requested expenditures of each officer, committee chair, and staff member, together with estimated revenues for the year. It shall consider separately from the general revenues and expenditures of the Corporation all revenues and expenditures for The Costumer's Quarterly, and may identify as it wishes any other categories of revenue and expenditure to be considered separately. After consulting with the members of the Committee, the Committee chair shall inform all officers, committee chairs, and staff members of the dates by which such requests must be submitted and the information they must include.
B. The Budget and Finance Committee shall consist of the Corporation Treasurer and four members of the Corporation, who are not Officers or other members of the Board of Directors, appointed by the President, one of whom the President shall designate as chair. In order to create a staggered membership for this committee, the President shall, on the first year of the committee's existence, appoint two members to a two-year term and two members for a one-year term. Subsequently, in following years, all members shall be appointed to two-year terms.
C. Annually, not less than thirty (30) days in advance of the Annual Meeting, the Committee shall present in written form to the Board of Directors its proposed budget for the ensuing year. The Board shall consider the Committee's proposed budget and may either adopt it, with such changes as the Board finds desirable, or refer it, with or without amendments, to the Annual Meeting for approval.
D. The Treasurer shall report the Corporation's revenues and expenditures to the Committee and the Board at least quarterly. To meet arising needs, the Board may increase or decrease budgeted expenditures as needed during the course of
each year. To meet arising needs, the President may, without the Board's approval, increase or decrease budgeted expenditures each year by an amount not to exceed fifteen (15) percent of the budgeted amount and shall promptly report such changes to the Board and the committee.
AMENDMENT TWO TO THE STANDING RULES OF THE CORPORATION:
Motion to amend Standing Rules 12, 13 and 14, Concerning
Costume-Con Site Selection, to Conform to the
Costume-Con Constitution: Steve Swope, St. Louis Costumers' Guild. Seconded,
Standing Rules 12, 13, and 14 are amended to read as follows {material to be deleted is enclosed in [brackets]; material to be added is CAPITALIZED.}
12. COSTUME-CON. A. The International Costumers' Guild shall act as overall sponsoring organization for the annual [convention] CONFERENCE known as [Costume Con] COSTUME-CON, effective with Costume Con 8. As a non-profit sponsoring organization, the ICG shall promote the educational, cultural, artistic, and theatrical advancement of the costuming art through this [convention] CONFERENCE.
B. Each [convention] CONFERENCE shall, however, be run as a separate financial entity, with no commingling of [Costume Con] COSTUME-CON and ICG funds. Further, this sponsorship shall be in no way construed as acceptance of any fiduciary responsibility, which remains solely with each [convention's] CONFERENCE'S committee. Each [Costume Con] COSTUME-CON committee [remains] IS solely responsible for the administration, policies, and programming of the [convention] CONFERENCE itself, with the exception of the ICG annual meeting, IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PROVISIONS OF THE COSTUME-CON CONSTITUTION.
C. This sponsorship [can] MAY be revoked by a 2/3's vote of the ICG Board of Directors should the policies of an individual [convention] CONFERENCE committee significantly violate the aims, objectives, and/or By-Laws of the ICG.
13. COSTUME-CON SELECTION. [Costume Con] COSTUME-CON site selection [will occur three years previous to the year in which the convention shall take place. It is the responsibility of the Costume Con for that election year to operate the site selection. Site selection ballots will appear in the progress reports of the current Costume Con. The election will run through Saturday of the Costume Con and results announced at the Historical Masquerade] SHALL BE CONDUCTED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PROVISIONS OF THE COSTUME CON CONSTITUTION.
14. COSTUME-CON BALLOTING. [The Election Commissioners for each election shall be the chair/co-chairs or their designees of the Costume Con immediately prior to the contested bid] BALLOTING FOR COSTUME-CON SHALL BE DETERMINED BY THE COSTUME-CON CONSTITUTION.
Rationale: These amendments recognize Costume-Con's status as a separate conference from the ICG under its own Costume-Con ConStitution, including the use of the term, "conference," rather than "convention," and the name of the conference.
Discussion followed. Motion to add Service Mark notation to the name Costume-Con where it appeared within the amendment:
Motion by Darla Kruger, Costumers' Guild West.
Seconded: Ken Warren,
Motion approved unanimously.
Citing legal difficulties with the use of the Service Mark (authorization to use the Service Mark has not yet been obtained [n.b., Standing Rules 12, 13, and 14 in their present form predate the Service mark]), Dina Flockhart (Northern
Lights Costumers' Guild) recommended rejection of the motion to amend Standing Rules 12, 13, and 14. Carl Mami agreed with the recommendation.
The motion was defeated.
Motion to refer the matter to the Board of Directors: John Sims, Lunatic Phrynge.
Seconded by Jess Miller, Guild West, and Carl Mami, Sick Pups.
Adopted unanimously.
Ken Warren (
Motion to separate ICG membership and Chapter membership, ICG membership to be overseen by the Board of Directors:
Motion by John Sims, Lunatic Phrynge.
Seconded by Ken Warren,
Motion to refer the matter to a committee, to report at next annual meeting: Moved by Eileen Cates, Western Canadian Costumers' Guild.
Seconded by Carl Mami,
Motion approved with one abstention.
Byron Connell raised the issue of Guild representation in
SELECTION OF OFFICERS
Byron Connell read the slate of officer candidates for 1999:
President: Byron Connell
Vice-President: Ken Warren
Treasurer:
Corresponding Secretary: Jess Miller
Recording Secretary: Steve Swope
He asked whether there were any nominations from the floor. There being none, he asked for a motion to accept the entire slate of officers. Motion to accept the entire slate of officers:
Motion: Sandy Pettinger,
Seconded by Karen Heim,
Adopted unanimously.
ADJOURNMENT OF THE
ANNUAL MEETING
The Annual Meeting adjourned at 12:54 p.m.
The Board of Directors meeting continued.
Motion to elect the officers selected by the Annual Meeting: Motion: Zelda Gilbert, Corresponding Secretary. Seconded by Eileen Cates, Western Canadian Costumers' Guild and Ken Warren, Vice President. Adopted (one abstention had been intended but wan not called for in the actual vote).
ADJOURNMENT OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING
The Board of Directors meeting adjourned at 12:55 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Steve Swope
Recording Secretary
This is what I'd like to say about my activities as President during 1998. I've tried to do things that improve communication among the chapters and tend to knit the Guild together as an organization. Some of these have been pretty small steps, but you have to start small and build the infrastructure so that subsequent steps can be more effective.
I began by actually implementing all the mechanisms that we've adopted and spelled out in the By-Laws and Standing Rules over the years, but have never put into effect. So I appointed an Editorial Board for The Costumer's Quarterly, like we were supposed to do. I appointed a Public Relations committee, like we were supposed to do. Those boards have had some substantive meetings and I expect that they will continue to function over the course of the next year.
I've tried to correspond regularly with all the chapters. A Presidential Message went out every month, sometimes with not very much substance in it, sometimes with some things that I thought might be controversial, like the one I wrote about the ICG budget, and the most recent ones preparing for this meeting so that, I hope, people had a chance to look at the agenda and at least some of the agenda items in advance of the meeting, making it run more smoothly here.
A couple of things haven't worked as well as I had hoped they would. We still have a problem with the Quarterly; we are in arrears at this point on three issues. We're going to keep working on that; we will get the Quarterly back on schedule. I know Pat is going to make a report as the Editor of the Quarterly in a few minutes, so I won't say any more than that. The other thing that hasn't worked out quite as well as I hoped it would was the Special Advisory Committee on the Future Direction of the Guild. Robbi Dyer and the other committee members have had some conversations, but they have not reached the point where they're able to give us a report with recommendations, and this morning the Board of Directors extended the life of the committee for another year. We hope that the Committee's recommendations on the way the Guild should grow and evolve over the course of the next several years will be ready for us well in advance of next year's Annual Meeting.
I know it's not customary to ask for comments or questions with respect to a report, but I'm going to do so. Does anybody have any questions with regard to my report or any comment you want to make?
The Corporation's Balance Sheet for 1998, attached, is an integral part of this report.
It's been a challenge these last couple of years to balance the duties of ICC Treasurer with the rest of my life. Some of it rewarding, some of it pretty frustrating. The enclosed binder contains a printout of the ICG database, by Chapter, along with a full alphabetical list of all members in good standing. Also enclosed is a printout of the ICG bank account transactions and transactions by category.
Recommendations:
Updates/Changes: My successor would greatly benefit by standardizing the way chapter updates/changes are submitted to the Treasurer. Not only will it let those in each chapter responsible for updates know what is expected of them (including set dates for submission), it will make it much easier for the Treasurer to update the database. Timely quarterly updates are essential to make the ICG grow and remain fiscally stable -- and will allow the Treasurer to plan the time on their calendars to receive the information, process it and disseminate it back to each Chapter.
Communication:
Dates for submissions and a page showing the best format to use for could
be posted on the ICG Web Page. The
President could also include this information in their communication to each
guild (via email and
It's been a pleasure working with all of you over the years. I hope my time commitments begin to loosen their grip so that I can get back into the swing of actually making costumes again and attending local events and Costume-Con (someday)!
Best regards,
<signature>
Jana Keeler,
Treasurer
INTERNATIONAL COSTUMERS' GUILD
Webmaster's Report for the Annual Meeting
Traffic and content of the ICG Web Site continued to grow in the past year. We have over 1600 visitors per month, over 100 HTML pages and over 225 graphic files. JulieZ's Costume Page still continues to lead as a major source of visitors. However there are several contenders for top referrer site.
International visitors have come from such countries as:
Due to my house move late last year, the site has not been added to or enhanced as much as would I have liked over the last few months.
Since I can't make it to Costume-Con and corner folks, I'm asking for feedback. You can contact me with feedback at:
eMail: webmaster@costume.org
Postal:
Voice: 510-713-9519
****General open ended questions.
What does everyone think of the web site?
What would you like to see added?
What would you like to see removed?
Any design hints/tips/tricks?
****Points to ponder about my design/policies/etc.
The site is a fairly static ICG-centric information depository.
It is meant to be a jumping off point to other sites with broader information (i.e.: local chapter sites, meta-sites such as JulieZ's, etc)
There are no frames, no java, no javascript, no fancy tables, and a minimal about of graphics. I am assuming most visitors are novice computer users, not computer savvy, not-state of the art and/or not-power users. Despite all the "not"s, I hope this doesn't come across as negative, what I mean is that I'm making no assumptions/requirements as to a user's knowledge or computer system's ability.
****Future of the site.
With my purchase of a home, don't expect "paid for" upgrades, i.e.: no extra bandwidth, fancy stock graphics, mailboxes at costume.org for members, chat rooms, additional domain names, etc. That said, I can afford to maintain the site (ISP fees and domain name) and have the time to keep it reasonably up to date. However, many of upgrades mentioned are available for "free".
Well they inflict advertising on you as you use them. I can get chat room software and <username>@costume.freemail.com for the "cost" of having advertising banners during the chat or mail session or <username>@costumemail.com for the cost of the new domain name and advertising banners. Are these services valuable enough to use, even if it means you get an advertising banner every time you use it?
****Internet domain names.
Since I can't afford to grab it, I'll inform ICG community. The domain name icg.org will soon be available. Its registration expired Dec 3, 1998, so it's in the grace period (the owners have 60 days to renew) and the web address www.icg.org takes you to an ISP home page.
Both icg.net and icg.com have been renewed recently.
Other domains of interest that are or will be available:
costumer.com - expired in Jan 98 (internic record last updated in Jan 96), host not found for www.costumer.com
costumer.org - no record at internic
costumer.net - no record at internic
Checking just the org domain for local chapters finds the following are also available:
brcg.org
cguk.org
gbacg.org
gpcg.org
phrynge.org
nynjcg.org
sickpups.org
nlcg.org
rmcg.org
slcg.org (surprise, surprise, slut.org and sluts.org are taken)
sbcg.org
swcg.org
I did not try all forms of a local chapter's name, nickname or letters.
JohnO
(11/10/97-2/8/99)
REVENUE:$5833.75
General: $1923.00
Dues: $1162.00
Other Income: $ 761.00
Costumer's Quarterly: $3910.75
Subscriptions: $3910.75
EXPENDITURES:
$3605.86
General: $ 980.83
Bank Charges: $ 121.51
Costume-Con:$ 750.00
Lifetime Achievement Award: $ 109.32
Costumer's Quarterly: $2625.03
Printing: $ 669.25
Processing and Handling: $1222.98
Bulk Mail Permit: $ 85.00
Postage: $ 559.80
Miscellaneous Supplies: $ 88.00
Revenues over Expenditures, 2/8/99
General: $ 942.17
Costumer's Quarterly: $1285.72
TOTAL: $2227.89
OPENING BALANCE, 11/10/97:$1335.09
CLOSING BALANCE, 02/08/99:$3562.98