Minutes from the meeting on Monday

[mirab <mirab MIT EDU>]

5/16/2005
meeting of the MIT Guild of Bellringers

Present: Don Morrison, Britt Hartenberger, John Danaher, Elaine Hansen, 
Susan
Assman, Jeff Del Papa. Cally Perry, Laura Dickerson, Amy Moore, Oliver 
Kosut,
Mira Blumberg, Karl (tune ringer, didn't catch his last name)


FINANCES:
- How should expenses be approved?  How should money be spent given income 
of
change ringers (ie, weddings) and expenses of change ringers (mainly every 
ten
years or so for new ropes) Vs. tune ringing income (finboard) and expenses
(music every semester)
--> Perhaps the tune ringers should attempt to get money from finboard 
before
using the main money for both groups

Sidetracked to a wedding discussion:
- Weddings
--> What DO we actually charge?  ($250, but check with the church)
--> Problems getting people to ring for weddings; possibly pay a little 
bit of
the fee to make it more worth someone's while?  Advent gives $25/ringer.
--> Better publicize ringing for weddings so more people know (and will 
then pay
the fee) but this makes the shortage of people will to ring for weddings 
even
worse.

Back on track:
- If one group loses all its members, the president will take over offices?
(cally)
--> Amendmend to part J of the constitution saying that the president will 
act
in the place of the officer which position is vacant until it can be 
filled.

- Can we actually vote on this consititution? How many members are there 
vs how
many are at the meeting. Do we count students who are just too hosed to 
come to
practices/meetings?  Encouraging students helps with being recognized by 
the
ASA.  If students are always too hosed, how will we get a quorum? Should 
people
designate proxies?
- Should there be a membership list?  This was easier when there were dues.
- Don said something about all constitution coming from some sort of
revolution.
- Should we require 3 meetings for membership and not two?
- Quorum of each group: 1/3 of change ringers, 1/3 of tune ringers, with 
people
who are both counting for both but still only getting one vote, only half 
the
members needed to vote on amendments.
- Membership is not exclusive to the MIT community.  (or does one become 
part of
the MIT community when one becomes a member of the guild?)

- Ringing Master can only be elected to 2 consecutive terms of office 
(instead
of just two terms ever, change made to deal with the fact that there might
someday be nobody left who hasn't already been ringing master)

- Wording of steeplekeeper and handbell keeper positions weird 
(towers/handbells
 have already been found)

- Change to name and purpose to make mention of ringing at Old North for 
as long
as the church welcomes us

- Do tune ringers need their own keeper of handbells? Karl said NO.

- Historian position: ZTo acquire, maintain, and organize the archives of 
the
guild (Don joked: "and to fabricate them..?")

- Should there be an official Clapper correspondant? They  can just always 
be
the same person that the Advent guild elects (not hard since it's a lot of 
the
same people voting) VOTE: Yes: 13, No: 0, Abstain: 0

---------
OFFICERS:
Amy for president:  Yes vote by acclamation
Natalya for treasurer: people thought maybe it would be nice to have a tune
ringer, so Kendall was called and voted for by acclamation
Mira for ringing master: no objections
John Wahl keeper of the handbells: yes by acclamation
James steeple keeper: yes by acclamation
Britt for Clapper Correspondant: yes by acclamation
Director of the Tune ringers, Karl: yes by acclamation
Chet for Historian: maybe Laura since she has the stuff?  Chet elected by
acclamation

** argumemt over whether the gummy penguin or shark should be the official 
candy
of the guild ensues***

---------
FINANCES:
- Ringing world and Clapper subscriptions
- Donation to Old North window campaign?  --> 1 wedding's worth
- Elaine was nagged about reciepts from 1995 AGM.  
- Muffles? Laura has a plan!!

ORGANIZE:
How much overlap is there in RW collections between Advent and Old North? 
Inventories are needed.  
- Rope storage: can Chet make chests?  ($ for wood)
- Motivated people needed to help with this effort!!  

Dianne reminded everyone to put in their orders for logo shirts etc

Rope Splicing course July 4th weekend

No progress on steam bent ash slider for the 2 at ON

Big thanks to Nancy for being a wonderful Clapper correspondant

Any progress on the Random Bob Peal board?  Aluminum?  Natalya and Jeff 
will
look into this.

Amy will update the website

Rooms:  Reserve all 4 surrounding rooms?  Loud neighbors have been a 
problem on
Monday evenings during handbell practice