SkipMorrow's blog

The VBPC Annual Banquet is scheduled for Saturday, the 23rd of January at 7:00 PM (doors open at 6:30 PM).  The banquet will be held at Rockafeller's in Virginia Beach.  We will be giving out awards for the annual competitions, which means that if you won first place in any of the monthly print competitions this year, then you need to bring your print with you to the Jan 5th membership meeting so that it can be entered into the annual competition.  There will be other awards as well, and a fantastic menu.  The cost is only $7.50 per person, and you know at that rate, tickets will sell fast!  We will be limited to 80 people, so don't delay!

A few other details:

• There will be a cash bar
• There is mandatory valet parking in the parking lot, but there is not an established price.  The attendants work for tips, with the average tip being one or two dollars.
• We are still working on getting a guest speaker.

Menu:

• Baked Ziti
• Baked Ziti with Shrimp
• Chef's Choice of Vegetables
• Fresh Baked Breads (Cornbread and French Bread)
• Dessert Buffet
• Rum Cake
• Chocolate Éclair pie
• Coconut Cake

We have set up a registration page here on the website where you can RSVP and tell us how many guests you are bringing.  After that, you will have an option to pay with PayPal (as always, you do not need a PayPal account--just a credit card), or if you prefer, you can pay with cash or check at the Jan 5th membership meeting. 

Here is the link, and you must be logged in to register:

http://vabeachphotoclub.org/BanquetRegistration 

Please remember that the November meeting will be on Tuesday, Nov 10th.  This is the SECOND Tuesday of the month instead of the normal first Tuesday.  The meeting date was moved this month due to the conflict with the November state elections.  Furthermore, the Wedding and Portrait group will be meeting on the 2nd of Nov at ECPI.

Speaking of elections, don't forget that we will also be holding the VBPC general elections in November.  If you are interested in running for any of the positions, please contact Skip so that he can get you on the ballot.  skip@pelorus.org

3/24/09 VBPC Board Meeting

Meeting called to order at 6:40pm by President

Hallie ran down the list of upcoming speakers and special events
She has a full committee staff now, consisting of Roy Widgeon, Mike Ornoff, Dave Grochmal. Steven Kestler will be in charge of education.
Mark Huber is in charge of the "Introduction to Photography" group (for lack of a better name)
July 4th picnic is in the planning stages - we hope to have a speaker for the meeting

Focus Groups -
Due to the HUGE increase in the meeting room fees (from $20 to $50 EACH) we are planning to ask participants to invest $1 each for the facilities.

Competition Committee (Mindy)
Competition in absentia - this was discussed, a vote was taken to set it aside for further study. Mike O suggested that we allow "X" entries per year, with "X" TBD.
The Club will revisit this in the summer

Church Meeting Rooms:
Skip and Tom will meet with the church to try and negotiate a lower rate for the meeting rooms, as they went from $20 to $50.
We will be checking out the Central Library for possible meeting sites

BYLAWS:
This was a HUGE topic. Concern was expressed by attending members about the current by-laws and constitution, as they give the board pretty broad powers. Adrian provided copies of documents from another club he is a member of, and we also had a copy of the Shutterbug Club bylaws; we will be exploring this over the next few months, and attempt to come up with a more "acceptable" set of by-laws for the Club. This MUST be completed by August, so as to give the members a chance to review it, comment on it in September and October, in time for the November elections.

MEMBER DIRECTORY:
Another HUGE topic. Some members want to have access to each others emails, because not everyone responds to private emails in the forum. It was pointed out that most of the members online have their emails published on the website under their profile info. This is another issue we want to bring to the membership at large, for further input.

TREASURER'S REPORT:
Some members had expressed concern that this was not in the newsletter, and we had not been announcing it at the meetings. Regarding the publishing of the info in the newsletter, we decided a year or so ago to NOT do so, since the newsletter was publically accessible; that we would announce the info at the meetings, and/or make it available to anyone who asks. I explained that, regarding it NOT being announced in recent months, I had forgotten it due to time constraints at the meetings. The books are open and available to ANY paid member.

ATTENDING MEMBERS:
Skip Morrow
Tom McElvy
Halie Hovenga
Slip Shepard
Mark Huber
Alan Rabe
Mike Ornoff
Scott MacKay
Eric Fadden
Mindy Bockrath
Belinda Traber
Joan Grippo
Adrian Felton
Bobby Thompson

The meeting ended at approximately 8:45pm

I wanted to pass along an exciting announcment about an upcoming exhibition by a couple of our members.  It would be great if you could go and show your support!

”The World Thru Our Eyes”
 
aLatte Café
321 Granby Street
625-2326
April 4 – May 1
 
Mark your calendars now.  Please come out and join us on the 4th of April.  We hope to see you there.

Flo and Pam

I want to remind you about an important upcoming event that could affect the direction and organization of our club.  The monthly board members meeting will be held this Tuesday night, 24 March at 6:30 PM at 4609 Rothwell Court, Virginia Beach, VA (it's the community clubhouse for Belinda Traber's community).  Why am I reminding you about this particular meeting?  If you aren't a regular in the VBPC web forums, you probably aren't aware of a discussion brought up by one of our members concerning the club's bylaws.  The discussion has generated a lot of interest, and most likely decisions will be made at this coming board meeting to either change (or not change) the way we do business.  There have been several proposals in that discussion thread already, and we will discuss them all at that meeting.  To illustrate the impact that these decisions may have, we may be deciding to hold an election at an upcoming meeting to elect more voting officers for the club.  We may be deciding on adding voting officers from the regular members.  The point is, serious decisions will be made.  If you want to be a part of this, you are welcome to join us at this meeting.

We filled it up! Thank you everyone, and I look forward to seeing you all!

The banquet starts at 6:00 PM, this coming Saturday, the 24th (not 6:30 as I incorrectly stated in a recent email)