VENTURA COUNTY PROFESSIONAL WOMENʼS NETWORK
Post Office Box 6329  Oxnard, CA 93031  (866) 275-4134  www.VCPWN.org
Minutes
VENTURA COUNTY PROFESSIONAL WOMEN’S NETWORK
LEADERSHIP TEAM MEETING,
APRIL 22, 2013
IN ATTENDANCE: Alison Balter, Mary
Gabriels, Jann Huling, Shirley Jones, Sheila
Lowe, Michelle McConica, Jim Nicoll, Sue
Osborn, Micki Rickard, and Darian Taylor.
ABSENT: Shirley Lorraine
President Mary Gabriels called the meeting to
order at 6:10 p.m. at Sheila Lowe’s home.
Shirley Jones moved that the minutes from the
March 2013 meeting be approved, and Darian
Taylor seconded. The motion passed
unanimously.
Networking – Alison Balter
Spirit of Networking Award: Alison received
nominations from leadership team members,
nominating other leadership team members. But,
it’s too late to try to get other members to
nominate anyone - the plaque has been ordered.
The Member-Working-with-Member and Blow
Your Own Horn portions of the meeting are
going very well now. Alison has it running at a
smooth flow.
Webmaster/Membership – Sheila Lowe
The membership committee met last Tuesday.
The committee would like to re-initiate “member
connections” - one-to-one buddy assignments to
help our new members feel at home sooner. This
has not always been successful in the past, but we
decided to try it for three months to see how it
goes.
Sheila is going to add a question on our
membership application, asking where the new
member heard about VCPWN.
Last month we had 5 new members, including
one re-joining member - Anna Kittleson.
Jann H. said she would call all new members
about one week before the meeting to give them
a reminder.
President-Elect – Darian Taylor
May’s speaker is Karyl Lynn Burns, Founder and
Artistic Director of the Rubicon Theatre. Laurie
Kreis will be our sponsor.
In June we will have Roberta Fronteras, a docent
from Heritage Square in Oxnard who will
provide a history of hats. All attendees will be
encouraged to wear a hat. Rick White will be our
sponsor.
In July, new member Dr. Kerry O’Reilly will be
our speaker, on the topic of women’s well being.
We need a sponsor.
Darian announced that the retreat for the
incoming leadership team will be on Saturday,
June 1st from 9:00 am to 1:00 pm at the Pierpont
Inn, in the Crow’s Nest.
Finance – Shirley Jones-Snyder
Our Silent Auction netted $1,020 for the group a great success.
We need to find a better way to collect credit card
payment - it becomes a cumbersome job for a
Promoting the professional and personal growth of Ventura County women
through education, mutual support, and sharing of resources
relatively small amount of payment. Shirley JS
has a square reader - a tool to access PayPal for
processing credit cards using cell phones, but it
can only be used with an iPhone 4 or better.
Darian and Sheila both have these phones.
Hospitality – Jann Huling
Getting table hostesses still remains a bit of a
challenge. We discussed some ways to remedy
this. And all present agreed, Jann is doing a
wonderful job!
Special Events – Micki Rickard
The silent auction was a big success - everything
looked so enticing, and all agreed Micki did a
super job!
Micki is thinking she will ask for baskets and
donations at every meeting, so she’s always
building the inventory.
Regarding the Table Top Expo: Micki needs to
form a committee as soon as possible. Alison,
Darian, and Jann all agreed to be on it for
starters. The date of the expo is 10/10/13.
Micki has two outside vendors interested already.
Regarding a fundraising event in June - Micki
had the idea of a day trip to Solvang, however the
bus company she found would cost $1,800, and
the bus fits 18 people, making it an expensive
outing. She is soliciting ideas.
Member at Large – Jim Nicoll
Jim has no formal report to make, just reiterated
that he is willing to fill in wherever needed to
help the leadership team.
Communications – Michelle McConica
Michelle is ready to post the flyer for the Expo.
She asked that anyone who may have
unsubscribed from our mailing list and who
wants to be added back, to please let her know.
Vertical Response is not the easiest tool to use graphically it’s very challenging. Sheila L
mentioned that she just tried MailChimp and it
was much better. Michelle wondered though, if
we’d be able to port our email list over. Need to
look into this.
Michelle noted that our notice had not appeared
in the Sunday VCStar.
Immediate Past President – Shirley Lorraine
Shirley was absent, but Mary G. reported that
Shirley has a complete slate for the new
leadership team. Voting will take place at the
May meeting.
President – Mary Gabriels
Mary read a nice thank you note from Martha
Jaffe who won the business card drawing for the
flowers.
In May Mary will resume the table centerpieces,
although it’s gotten very difficult to get gift
certificates from restaurants.
Darian T. proposed allowing everyone present at
the meetings to stand and introduce themselves.
Since we sit at different tables, we don’t always
get a chance to meet everyone. But it was agreed
this would be too time consuming and might be
abused. However, Mary G. thought it might
work if she simply introduced everyone from the
hotsheet - this would be extra incentive to
register early, too.
Women’s Business Expo by the Expo Galz on
Saturday, May 18th. We’ll need the 30-year
anniversary banner. Table sign ups were covered
for most of the day. Sheila L and Jim N. are the
committee for this event.
New Business
Promoting the professional and personal growth of Ventura County women
through education, mutual support, and sharing of resources
Sue O. asked about having another new member
breakfast in July - six months since our first one.
All agreed. We will try a Tuesday morning, to
see if we can get some of the members who
couldn’t attend on a Friday. This time we’ll try
Marie Callenders in Ventura, and Micki R.
thought this would be a good way to thank them
for always donating to our silent auctions. The
manager there is Trinity Straw. Tentative date is
July 16th, 8:00 am, pending availability of the
restaurant.
D & O Insurance education from our agent Phil
Bullard. We guessed it would only require about
15 minutes, either at the June retreat or prior to
the May meeting. Alison B. will check with Phil.
May is our anniversary, so should we
acknowledge in some way? It was decided we
would simply mention this in the meeting.
For the Spirit of Networking Award presentation,
should we invite previous winners? Yes. Email
is okay for those who have it. Alison B. said she
would need help addressing invitations to be
mailed. Shirley Lorraine should have the list of
previous winners.
The meeting adjourned at 7:28 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Sue Osborn, Recording Secretary
Promoting the professional and personal growth of Ventura County women
through education, mutual support, and sharing of resources