HARDWICK COMMUNITY TELEVISION – ANNUAL MEETING April 29, 2021 AT 7:00 P.M Via ZOOM video conference Present: Leif Goldberg, Elizabeth Dow, Rachel Kane, Michael Gray, Robin Grant, Kurt Bos, Rip Keller, Jim Kelty
President Rachel Kane called the meeting to order at 7:03. Kurt moved acceptance of the minutes of the 2020 meeting; Rip seconded; unanimous vote to accept. Leif gave the station report: He signed the contract with Comcast, good to 2028. VAN did the initial negotiating, and he signed the same contract as other stations, except he further negotiated that HCTV keep Hazen and the Hardwick Town House as ROS sites.
Comcast ended our courtesy phone/internet services, so Leif came up with a faster phone/internet plan from Comcast at effectively $50 per month more than our previous payment. Hazel is willing to continue as our bookkeeper, but Leif is still looking at local bookkeeping options. The basketball season had the crew covering Hazen Union’s JV and Varsity Hazen games, as well as the Middle School home games. The station covered 17 games (2/3 of what we usually cover) in a season beginning February 1, making it only ½ as long as usual. The Athletic Director at Hazen found us new sponsors. We had 3 people working at each game (camera, announcer, and scorekeeper), but because we had three sponsors per game, we made more money than usual; the sponsoring basically covered our expenses. We will be doing baseball games when the season starts. We have a coin drop coming up from 9:30 to noon-ish on June 26 with June 5 as backup. Lots of stations around the state want state funding. They have concern about the future of broadband in the state. PEG has begun to lobby for legislative awareness of what the station does. Leif expressed some concern our relationships with the surrounding communities – towns we work with but have no technological connection with. He’s not sure how the push to expand broadband will impact the station’s activities. He encouraged the Board to consider how we might hire ourselves out to serve them. Rachel endorsed PEG’s efforts to promote the role and importance of the local stations. Rachel also requested that Leif continue to cultivate a relationship with neighboring towns. Leif asked about whether the station support Rip’s “At home with the Maestro” idea for a series of 26 programs about music. After much discussion, the Board agreed conceptually that it would like to support it, but settled on no specifics. ELECTION OF BOARD MEMBERS Two-year terms – Members of the Board Rachel Kane Michael Gray Kurt Bos One-year term Jim Kelty Robin moved we accept the slate; Michael seconded. Unanimous approval. ELECTION OF OFFICERS Pres. – Michael Gray Vice Pres. – Rip Keller Secretary – Elizabeth Dow Treasurer – Kurt Bos Robin moved; Kurt second; unanimous approval Kurt moved adjournment. Rip seconded. The meeting adjourned at 8:33
HARDWICK COMMUNITY TELEVISION – QUARTERLY MEETING April 29, 2021 AT 8:30 P.M Via ZOOM video conference Present: Leif Goldberg, Elizabeth Dow, Rachel Kane, Michael Gray, Robin Grant, Kurt Bos, Rip Keller, Jim Kelty
Newly elected President Michael Gray convened the meeting at 8:34
Kurt moved that we approve the minutes from the previous meeting. Rip second; Rachel asked about what we did with the extra $11,196 COVID money from VAN. Leif reported that we have not used it. He reported that Rip has ideas for a project, as does Elizabeth Rossano, and he’s aware of others working on ideas. Leif suggested that we can give stipends for these people who make videos. We resumed the discussion about Rip’s “Meet the Maestro” project, and we left it that he come back to us with a specific request. Unanimous approval of the minutes. We decided to call a special meeting to discuss how to distribute/spend the COVID money – May 27. Starting at 6:00. Robin moved we accept the financial statements. Rachel second. Discussion on some details in the checking account. Unanimous approval. Rachel asked about meeting in person. We decided to try the Pavilion at Atkins field for May 27. Robin moved; Kurt seconded. Unanimous agreement to adjourn at 8:47. Elizabeth H Dow, Secretary
HCTV Board Meeting January 14, 2021 7:00 – Zoom Present: Leif Goldberg, Wiz Dow, Rip Keller, Mike Gray, Kurt Bos, Jim Kelty, Rachel Kane (arrives 10 minutes into the meeting) Absent: Robin Grant
In Rachel’s absence, Rip opened the meeting at 7:15 Kurt moved; Michael seconded, and unanimous vote approved the minutes from October 2020 with no additions or corrections. In a discussion of the Profit & Loss statement, Mike and Jim raised some informational questions. Leif explained the COVID money. Kurt moved; Mike seconded, and a unanimous vote approved the statement. The Balance statement revealed nothing new or startling. Our depreciation has not been updated recently, so they will need adjusting, but the rest has no surprises. Wiz moved; Kurt seconded, and a unanimous vote approved the statement. Rachel joined the meeting. Leif gave the Station Report. He submitted two reports to the state on his use of the COVID money, and, as per usual, he funneled the report through VAN. He received more money than expected and discovered that someone at VAN had changed some of the numbers. Leif reported the change to VAN which suggested that we hold onto the money and spend it later. Several ideas arose that would use the money to benefit the community. Wiz moved; Kurt seconded that we set the money aside to use for COVID-related projects. The motion received unanimous approval. Leif met with a consultant from VAN to do a study of all the stations in the system. They reviewed operations and looked for areas of improvement. Hardwick and Woodbury participate in our activities and receive our programming on cable and from them we receive our funding. Craftsbury, Greensboro, Wolcott, and Walden all participate in our activities, but they cannot receive our programming through cable – only internet streaming. We need the cable connection for funding. That delivery discrepancy raises the question of how we can expand our business model to benefit financially from the people who use the service for free? Currently, we’re broadcasting no basketball games. Teams are practicing with a schedule in place, but the Governor has given no permission for teams to congregate to play games. When he does, we will be very busy all of a sudden. Since the games will have no audience, this service will bring the games to the families, so the Hazen Union Athletic Director wants us to cover all the games – Middle, Jr. Varsity, and Varsity – in Hardwick, not just the 25 Varsity games. If that happens, we will broadcast one or two games every other day. Hazen offered to find sponsors for the productions. Leif has figured out the personnel, so we’re ready to go when the Governor gives the word. We need a bookkeeper who can manage QuickBooks, can do the year end taxes, and keep track of some of the payroll issues. Kurt asked about the Workers’ Comp. issues from the previous meeting, and Leif recognized that we need to get straightened out. We need to get the policies together, especially since we’re hiring a new person. We agreed to put it on the agenda for the next meeting. Mike suggested we create an ad hoc committee to sort it out: Kurt, Rachel, and Leif. Rip left the meeting. On the Comcast Agreement, Leif gave the background on how VAN developed the contract. He then pointed out that it obliges Comcast to give us our subscriber numbers, which we’ve never had. It also requires Comcast to support the stations with promotion – like a statement on the Comcast bill. It continues the annual reimbursement. The contract allows stations to request to have the channel upgraded to High Definition. Leif expressed concern about the ‘remote origin’ site clauses. We have one at Hazen and one at the Town House. We have our ‘origin site’ in the Memorial Building which feed right into the cable feed. This contract does not list these remote origin sites. Instead, we have a broadcast server at the station which picks up the signal and feeds it into the cable feed. Leif is concerned about the maintenance of those sites. After a lot of discussion, Mike suggested we try to get ourselves written back in. Leif will raise the issue with the Comcast representative. Wiz moved; Kurt seconded that Leif sign the contract. Unanimous agreement. Other Business: None. Adjourn at 9:02.
HCTV Board Meeting October 29, 2020 Minutes Present: Mike Gray, Rip Keller, Leif Goldberg, Wiz Dow, Rachel Kane, Kurt Bos Absent: Robin Grant Guest: Jim Kelty, formerly of GMATV.
Rachel called the meeting to order at 7:04
Minutes: No additions or corrections. Mike moved and Kurt seconded acceptance. Unanimous approval. Profit &Loss statement: Leif explained the COVID money we got from the state, saying that while the station has not made any major changes, shifting ways of working caused some new expenses and shifted in old expenses. Making the shifts and working in the new ways also took more of his time. All of that the state money paid for. Mike asked for clarification of some of the terms on the report. Kurt moved and Mike seconded acceptance. Unanimous approval. Balance statement: Mike asked for some clarification about the CDs. Leif pointed out that the depreciation numbers haven’t been updated, because the bookkeeper’s eyes have begun to fail. She hasn’t been able to keep up with inputting data. Kurt moved and Kip seconded acceptance. Unanimous approval. Budget: Rachel asked for clarification on the website design proposal. Ours is mounted on WordPress, and Leif discussed some of the limitations of the platform. We discussed how to go about developing a new one, probably not using WordPress, which makes the development a lot more complicated and expensive. Several board members suggested people who could do it, but we made no decision. We discussed the potential need of new cameras or computers and why Leif had budgeted for them, but we made no decisions. Leif also put a line for play-by-play announcers in the budget. He’s convinced that there will be crowd-less sports season at the school this year, and we’ll need announcers. Mike asked about the capital spike payment. Leif explained that it’s a historical line, going back to 2011, and it’s not clear that we’ll ever use it again. Kurt moved and Mike seconded acceptance. Unanimous approval. Station Report: We generally agreed that we should start looking for another bookkeeper/accountant; the current one encourages it. Leif explained that we still do not have a contract with Comcast. VAN and Comcast had fruitful negotiations underway when COVID shut them down. Negotiations will begin again in November. Rachel asked about our line of communication with Comcast. Leif explained that Comcast requires an annual report and a 3-year plan from him with full documentation. After they get all the stuff they request, they review it and get back to us. Otherwise, Leif contacts them if he has questions or problems. Leif reported on our participation in a statewide movie project to remake Castaway. He and a group of community members did two scenes which he said went well. Soccer season has not yet ended, so he’s still shooting sports. Lance is back as an announcer, and James, now at Lyndon, would like to do what he can during basketball season – as will Lance, delighted at being paid. Jim (our guest) offered to run the camera for basketball games. Kurt suggested running two cameras – one on the floor and one in the stands. Leif is feeling the weirdness of the Covid world, but he likes what he’s doing. The trail people asked them to do the witch reading stories in lieu of the pumpkin walk. We discussed the limitations to what we can film because of copyright issues. We use Vimeo as a way of distributing our material, and the company is really touchy about posting copyrighted material. Other business: Rip offered some videos he’s making in his role as music director at the Episcopal Church. Jim offered to join the board. Since he needs to be elected to the board, he agreed to attend meetings until he’s elected in April. Leif raised the issue of the renewal of our workers’ comp insurance. We had a long discussion about the fairly complicated issue. The fact that our “contractors” use station equipment makes it difficult for us to legally call them independent contractors, so we may need to get certificates of insurance for them as employees. The insurance company wants to know who works here and how we insure them. Mike talked about how the Town of Woodbury issues waivers to local tradespeople rather than requiring them to carry workers comp. Leif will talk to other TV stations and ask how they handle insurance. Meeting adjourn at 8:56 Elizabeth H. Dow
