Gulf Winds Track Club Minutes of April 12, 2017

Present: Zack Scharlepp, Paul Guyas, Maria Matheu, Tom Perkins, Kory Skrob, Charlie Johnson, Mike Savage, Mark Priddy, Emma Spencer, Mary Jean Yon, Katie Sherron, Kristin Halley, Tracy Godin, Judy Alexander, Others; Felton Wright, Bill Lott, Sheryl Rosen, Rachael Scharlepp, Robert Skrob, Mike Peymann, Robert Nowak , Eric Godin.

The President called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m. and a quorum was established.

The Board reviewed the March 2017 minutes. A motion to approve was made, seconded and passed.

New Business

Trail Sign Project at Phipps – Eagle Scout Robert Nowak presented to the Board his trail signs project at Eleanor Phipps Park. Working in conjunction with the City Parks and Recreation, he created and put out directional signs marking out two different trail loops around Phipps. The City paid for the signs up front but as part of his project Robert had to fundraise the expenses incurred which totaled $1014.53 and he had already raised approximately $800. Robert asked the Board if they would consider donating $50 to the project as GWTC are heavy users of the trails in Tallahassee. The board discussed and a motion was made to approve a donation of $250, seconded and passed unanimously.

Marathon Committee and Proposed Budget – Sheryl Rosen asked the Board to approve the marathon committee who will direct the race for 2018, the committee will include Sheryl Rosen, David Yon, Mike Peymann, Felton Wright and Eric Godin. A motion was made to approve the committee, seconded and passed unanimously. Sheryl also presented a draft budget which includes an estimated total revenue of $100,100 and total expenses of $92,450, with estimated net revenue of $7,650. The draft budget is conservative and considers an approximate 20% reduction in registration fees and also a 30% reduction in sponsorships. A motion was made to approve this budget, seconded and passed unanimously.

SMIRFS – Felton Wright presented the flyer for the SMIRFS summer cross country program, which will start June 5th and continue July 21st at Meadows Soccer Complex, headed up by coach Carly Thomas who used to run for Chiles and FSU. The program has enough coaches and if anyone knows of any children who want to participate please give them a flyer and direct them to sign up on Eventbrite.

Flash 6K/12K Financial Wrap-up – Mark Priddy presented the final financial wrap-up for the Flash 6/12K, extra expenses incurred included the doubling of food costs due to packet pick up being at Island Grill and Wings, and 6K course certification. Mark asked if GWTC pays for course certification but it was determined that these costs are to be included in race budget. Net proceeds totaled $686.43, to be split equally between the Chenoweth Fund

($343.22) and GWTC ($343.21), and an additional $151 was contributed to the Chenoweth Fund for a total of $494.21, a motion was made to approve the split, seconded and passed unanimously.

Sealy Elementary Wellness Fair –Zack Scharlepp informed the Board that he had been approached by an art teacher, Natalie Hader at Sealy Elementary about the possibility of GWTC having a table at their forthcoming wellness fair on May 22nd. Tracy Godin said she would talk to Angie Milford to see if she would be interested. Anyone else interested should contact Zack.

GWTC Logo Tablecloth – Mary Jean Yon asked the Board if they would approve the purchase of a GWTC logo tablecloth to be used at events such as the one mentioned above in order to enhance the club’s visibility at these events. The cost for a 6ft table cloth would be approximately $229. Mary Jean also asked for assistance in choosing colors. Rachael Scharlepp said that she had previously bought an 8ft tablecloth for $259 and that size may be better to fit a multitude of table sizes. A motion was made to approve the purchase of a GWTC logo tablecloth up to $300, seconded and passed unanimously.

Trail Power Runs –In collaboration with Keep Florida Beautiful and Keep Tallahassee Beautiful and the Boys & Girls Club of the Big Bend, GWTC was part of the trail power cleanup/run at Lake Elberta on March 25, 2017. The trail power run was a short run followed by a trail clean up. Mary Jean asked the Board if GWTC could be part of the next trail power cleanup/run on May 13th at Lake Henrietta which would include a 1 mile fun run around the lake and trail clean up. Mary Jean made no financial ask of the Board but would like to be able to use the GWTC name for this event and she made a motion to approve this ask. Paul Guyas amended the motion by authorizing all trail power runs to use GWTC name in the series. This motion was seconded and passed unanimously. Board members asked if Mary Jean could send out reminders of when these events would take place. Tom Perkins inquired about insurance coverage for these events, Mary Jean said that Keep Tallahassee Beautiful and Keep Florida Beautiful had their own insurance that would cover the cleanup and GWTC’s insurance would cover the fun run.

St. Marks Duathlon Financial Wrap-up – Gulf Winds Triathlon Club President Charlie Johnson presented the final financial wrap-up for the St. Marks Duathlon. This was Charlie’s first race as a race director and he thanked GWTC for their support, with a special thank you going to Peg Griffin and Bill Lott for equipment and timing support, and thanks also going to Kathy McDaris. The event was a great success and the final proceeds totaled $4,684.52. He hopes to keep the race going for many years and to grow over time, but he may shift the dates to another weekend as this year fell on a time change. Zack Scharlepp asked what the Tri Club was going to do with the proceeds, Charlie stated that they still need to have some discussions regarding the donation but likely it would go to ECHO Tallahassee, an organization that helps get people back to work and also has a small food bank.

Committee Reports:

Treasurer’s Report –Katie Sherron
Katie provided the Board with account information showing that as of March 31, 2017, the summary accounts are, $68,710.80 in the Operations account, $3,231.43 for the Events 1 accounts,
$5,074.25 for the Events 2 account, $10,140.95 for the Triathlon account, $85,000 in the Invest and Reserve account and $15,753.05 in the Chenoweth Fund. Compared to last year at the same time, GWTC is in a much better position financially with Spring Time expenses paid but charitable checks are still to go out. Jeanne O’Kon has been appointed the Vice Treasurer and has been given signing authority for events accounts and will write the checks for the Palace. Katie wanted to know what discretion she had with regards to writing checks for race expenditures if they were over the budgeted amount without always going back to check on detailed budgets. The Board agreed that as Treasurer, Katie has the authority to write checks at her discretion and if she feels that there is a large discrepancy from the authorized budget she can relay this to the board for their input.

Membership Report –Mark Priddy
There are 1237 members in the club as of April 12, 2017, an increase of 48 from last month’s meeting. We also have 630 household memberships, 23 more than last month. The Tri Club has 232 members, an increase of 2 since last month.

Race Director Coordinator Report – Mary Jean Yon
Mary Jean has had two meetings with club race directors and hopes to have another in May. Communications with EMS services have been going well

Newsletter Report –Fred Deckert
No report.

Clothing Coordinator Report –Rachael Scharlepp
Rachael has bought a few ¾ Nike zip shirts with the GWTC logo on that are expensive and cost
$75 each. She has made $600 in sales in the past month and has an estimated $1010 left over in her budget. Because she is out of singlets and women’s t-shirts she would like to put in a new order and would require additional funds to do that. She has been working with CCR to purchase items that they may be willing to sell at cost, with printing costing an additional $3-10 of which she is working on trying to lower these costs. She asked the Board for an additional $1000, Katie said that she actually had $2000 left in her budget so Rachael rescinded her previous ask.

Equipment Report – Katie Sack & Bill Lott
Bill thanked the Board for the purchase of the generator, it has already been used at Spring time. He also told the Board that he and Katie had found a second large storage unit a few over from the other one rented by GTWC, and everything has been moved into it. The Board thanked Bill and Katie for moving everything.

Website Committee Report – Mary Jean for David Yon

A subscription to the website is now available on the GWTC homepage online. Currently there are 520 new subscriptions that send information posted on the website directly to subscribers inbox’s.
Chenoweth Fund Report – Mary Jean Yon for David Yon
The committee is working on the Pot Luck Bash but at present there are no funding requests of the Board.

Triathlete Report –Charlie Johnson
The Tri Club newsletter will go out to all track club members soon. The next speaker for the April Tri Meeting will be Dr. Anders Ericcson, author of the 10,000 hour rule which Bonnie Wright help set up. The meeting will be held Monday, April 17, 2017 at 7 pm at Momos. The next Grand Prix race will be Beach Blast, Mexico Beach, on April 29, 2017. The triathlete spotlight will focus on Tanya and TJ Devlieger.

Lecture Series Report – Kory Skrob
There was a great turn out for the runner safety lecture with A.J. Smith, approximately 27 people attended at the event held at Smash Burger. Following that lecture, Kory was approached to see if GWTC could put on a self-defense class, she is looking into this as a possibility and if anyone has any contacts please get in touch with her. On April 3rd there was a trail lecture held at Island Wing and Grill, where Jim and Kristin Halley spoke about the trails series, Tallahassee trails and also future training. Over 20 people were in attendance despite bad weather that day. The next lecture will occur at Premier Health and Fitness on May 21st, and is a runner focused session that will look into core strength, speed and endurance. Kim Johnson will be the instructor for this lecture/demo. Individuals wanting to attend this event will need to sign up online as there will be limited space. Kory said that she would likely slow down these lectures during the summer months but any ideas for future lectures are greatly appreciated.

Training Report –Tracy Godin
Spring time training just wrapped up and Trail Blazers just started up. Tracy also plans to start up the Sunday long runs after Ragnar.

Social Report – Kristin Halley
With Tracy’s help, Kristin has set up a movie night on April 23rd at the Southwood Pool House, where they will play the Boston marathon film, Patriots Day. She plans to have a popcorn machine. Additionally, Kristin is working on a trivia night at the Brass Tap on May 16th, this may be running themed, or a mixture of running and general questions or just general knowledge, and this is to be determined. Kristin said that she is feeling overwhelmed and has too much on her plate to fully commit to being the social coordinator, therefore she is going to step down. As this is an elected position a new coordinator will need to be found. Kristin has a potential interested individual who may like the role. If she is interested she has been invited to the next Board meeting to be introduced. If possible, Zack as President can elect an assistant to help Kristin with the events she already has scheduled.

Trail Coordinator Report –Kristin Halley for Jim Halley
Trail Blazers started April 11th and they had 35 people of all different running abilities in attendance. They had a 2 mile and a 4 mile out and back course marked at Tom Brown Park. They

plan to start off on shared use trails and then head to single track later in the training. Next week will be Overstreet trails. Jim is going to have a GWTC table at the Greenway Day from 10-2p on April 29th, promoting the club and the trail series. They are trying to introduce new trails into the trail series including Munson, J.R. Alford and Maclay but permitting and fee usage is an issue, they hope to have these issues resolved soon to open registration end of April and a proposed budget will be presented at the next Board meeting. A suggestion was made to only try and get one new trail per year instead of turning to get three new ones passed, Kristin took this suggestion on board.

A motion to adjourn was made, seconded and passed. The meeting adjourned at 8:49 p.m.