Pre-meeting Happy Hour location: Spoon House, Green & Wright

Combat Mondays at 6pm at Stock Pavilion; Saturday happens if people say they will. Not this weekend, probably next Monday.
Combatants still combating
We need to talk about youth rules at the next official practice. Kendrick will be there to help explain.
Jeremy, Riley, and Tyler are making gorgets (and possibly Priya).
Kendrick: Is now a Rapier MIT with clearance to run practices as long as it's ok with our people. Aleator is ok with it.

Marshall: (from google chat) we'll need a new group marshal in the future. My work schedule makes it nearly impossible to make it. I'll keep the title for now but it needs to go to somebody who can make it.
Old Business

How did it seem to everybody?
Some posts around back that messed up parking for merchants. Had to drive on sidewalks. Where they KNEW where to go from last year, the uni put up poles now. Some people with vans had difficulty.
Troll: maybe 234 adult members in the door? Total: about 280, 285
1 person who pre-regged, check is at Roana's.
A couple families might have been overcharged because Troll didn't know about the family cap. KINGDOM LAW: Family cap is 3 adults. Kids are 50% of adult price, 12 and under usually.
We took in: $2,589 deposited.
We actually made money on Maidens this year!!!
Participants: folks had fun. Huzzah!
Feast: sold 33 tickets, (47 at Crown Tourney)
Feast guy was there 8 hours
Roana: feast is worth supporting and doing again in the future. We might lose money on it for a few more feasts until people get used to a new tradition.

numbers in Wurm Wald have been dropping; more pressure on a smaller number of people to hold officer positions
Similar problem in St. Carol on the Moor
Wurm Wald used to be a barony that shrunk and became a shire. St. Carol has also been a shrinking, small group.
Also, where would we hold meetings? The groups are roughly about an hour's drive apart.
Concern whether WW will swallow St. Carol. We don't want to do that.
Both groups have nice bank accounts. If one merges into the other, who controls the $$??
Tomaris: "What about pre-nups?"
Concern from people outside both groups who think we should both just keep recruiting and doing more hard work and we could both make it happen in good 'ol Pollyanna style.
To balance all these concerns, Aleator has suggested that we have a trial period of joint effort

Unofficial merger
Each group has its own officers, with one person holding the office for both groups. IE, seneschal of STC is also seneschal of WW, etc. Do the same report twice, change the name of group
Exchequer: 1 account in stasis and never changes, nothing comes out or goes into it during the trial merger

Does this sound even reasonable, workable?
St. Carol's perspective (via Kendrick and Katerina, in attendance): ditto on the concerns; also: what happens when the active account changes dynamically, and by the end what do we do with the difference?

More resistance to the idea of the shell trial merger than to the idea of an actual merge/blending
also some concern that maintaining offices over a larger area will be a lot more time-consuming and burnout-inducing
What do we gain by officer-sharing? -- Minimize burnout fatigue? (StC is already suffering from fatigue)
Wurm Wald's going down to about 50% of the membership we had 3 years ago
Meanwhile, 1 family is moving into StC...
Will merging create enough potential officers among the combo to fill a reasonable number of offices?
Questions, comments, concerns? Think about it and stew...
Kenneth (from google chat): As our numbers seem to be down and new members seem to be in short supply it only makes sense that we combine forces to stay viable.

This topic kinda got lost in the shuffle. We've had a LOT to discuss...but for those playing the Meeting Minutes Home Game, we need to find a bunch of new officers. Basically, just about everybody is leaving/stepping down. Volunteers?
Seneschal -- planning to step down at the end of March; planning to move to Seattle by summer
Exchequer (if Sofya has to be seneschal again)
Pursuivant -- Durio graduating in May, may be here as late as July. maybe Bran, as indicated from a previous unofficial discussion, and tonight he said he could be ready to hold an office again....Bran? Comments on the wiki?
Marshal -- Kenneth needs to step down
Webminister -- see Seneschal
Chronicler -- as if we've had one of those for a while
Reeve -- see Webminister
MoY -- see Chronicler
Chirurgeon -- see a doctor
Underwater basket weaver -- see Jaques Cousteau
Maidens deputy parking guru -- see all of the above
Deputy EVERYTHIGN

18% of our total financial assets
the story is available on sca.org; it's too long for Sofya to type it all here. Don't make me!!!

We don't have to count the RSO, but Roana argues that we should
Bran: maybe we should do 20%?
Roana: this Maidens is the first event we've made money on in several years
Vote: in favor of giving 18% of combined checking and RSO accounts, roughly $3600
$650 written to SCA, Inc. Kingdom of the Middle, signed and handed to Kendrick to take to Val Day this weekend

because of The Situation, we need to make sure we know the rules about youth activities
Most of the youth in our shire belong to the seneschal, due to childbirth-related activities
The Situation happened in the first place because rules lapsed and it became OK to bend them...
Aleator: says it would be a good idea if more officers in our shire became youth-approved so we can have more official youth activities
but they're charging us now for our own background checks? Not passed yet, but it's been discussed among the brass
you need a background check to run an official youth activity
once the last adult wants to leave, it's time for the kids to leave too
Aleator: it's just a fluke of the numbers that we're still here. If the settlement had been 6 times higher, the SCA would be finished. --Amanda: That would make the paperwork so much easier. (Spoken like our exchequer :-D)

will let us know what to do and when
maybe check with Event calendar to ensure the demo doesn't land on the same day as an event people are planning to go to?
Yeah, it's already been discussed, Sof is a step behind :-)

Event Steward? Feast Steward?
Dates: Last weekend of January
please have a written bid with a written budget asap, probably have a vote sometime in April

Project Day soon? Let's make stuff!
How about this Sunday afternoon at Sofya's? I want to make Bran's dagger sheath and learn how to boil leather. 2:00 (Cindy maybe)

February 2012 Meeting Minutes