Friends of Mali

Board Meeting Minutes

Sunday, November 23, 2003

10:00 a.m.

Minutes

I. Old Business

A. National Happy Hour

Six sites have volunteered. Andrew will send a follow-up e-mail to make sure things are on track. As an incentive to get people to come, each site will have a raffle for a packet of post cards with Shawn Davis’s photos.

The DC happy hour will be at a club called Enico (sp?) The objective will be to propose events for 2004 and solicit other ideas from the membership. Activities to present so far is the Mali education tool kit, funding activities in Mali and outreach to other organizations interested in assisting Mali (Louise Meyer and solar ovens). We’ll also solicit interest in 2004 elections and distribute job descriptions.

B. Elections

Elections are scheduled to take place in February 2004. In accordance with our bylaws, the positions up for election are Vice-president and Secretary. Other positions could be opened up for election however since Jumana is considering opening up her position and all agree that Treasurer should be in Washington, DC.

D. Update on Membership Activities - Andrew

Andrew sent out a survey to find out member interest in having a FOM membership database. There wasn’t a huge response but enough to go forward with creating a pilot database.

E. Articles on Incorporation

Jumana and Jenna submitted our articles of incorporation last year but haven’t heard anything back yet. Jumana will check with Jenna to see if she has heard anything.

II. New Business

A. Discounts for Members

Clarified that members with gold status will get a 15% discount on stuff from our FOM store.

B. Nalgene bottles –

Heather McCurdy is coordinating getting plastic water bottles with the Friends of Mali logo on it. We’ll advertise them on our website and see if our members are interested. If there is enough interest, FOM will order some in bulk to sell through the website.

III. Website

A. Calabash music – link on our website leads to theirs. Membership service is now a $.99 per download, we get 50% from revenue.

Next meeting: Sunday Jan 11, 2003 2 pm