ATTENDANCE: Zephyr Tate-Mann, chair; Lois Thompson,  Merrill Ring, Carolee Monroe, Debi Evans, Gar Byrum, Mike Davis, Ned Freed, Ted Radamaker,  Laura Ditte Lo and Carol Whitson. 

MSA  The meeting Agenda was approved.

MSA  The ExComm minutes for June 6 and the General Membership minutes for June 29 and July 27, 2009 were approved as submitted.

Debi Evans presented the Treasurer’s report.  Account Balances in the three First City FCU accounts are $5.00, $1,186.04 and $16,000.04.  Debi has opened the Wells Fargo account with $5,158.25 and will gradually transition completely out of First City.  She has set up the new accounts so that bills can be automatically paid or paid with a debit card – a service that First City was unable to provide.   Debi also reported that the all of the clubs who had shared the Dem HQ office with us have now gotten FEC numbers and therefore we can pay them for their share of the donations received at HQ.    
MSA  The Treasurer’s report was approved.

Committee Reports:

Carolee reported on her work to staff the County Democratic booth at the Fair.  Claremont Day is 9/24/09 and we will also be filling many other shifts since we are closer than other clubs.

The Mixer on Sunday June 28th  was deemed a great success as we had a very good turnout and signed up several new members.  Many thanks to Ned and Tamara Freed for the use of their home.

Programs:

Merrill reported that Gerald Kominsky from the UCLA Dept of Health Policy Research will be our speaker at an upcoming General meeting.    Our September meeting will feature a tribute to Werner Warmbrun, former Pitzer professor and dedicated member of our Club.  His interview for our TV program will be replayed at the meeting.  In addition, a farewell tribute to Werner will be included on our website as well as in our next newsletter.

Action Plan for Health Care reform:  Merrill and David Levering are working with some other local groups to go to David Dreier’s office (during the August recess) and demonstrate in favor of Health Care reform and hopefully state their concerns to Mr. Dreier himself.  Mr. Dreier’s “health care plan” is buried in his Fair and Simple Tax plan as a tax credit and is totally inadequate to correct insurance company abuses.

Also, after learning that Dreier does not plan to hold any Town Hall meetings in the district, David Levering has been putting together a panel of speakers for an informational meeting on the Health Care  Reform issue.  Time and place to be announced by email.

MSA (Debi, Lois) to pre-approve up to $1000 for an ad in the Daily Bulletin to publicize either of these events.
Merrill and Zephyr reminded us that everyone should be writing letters to newspapers and also to our Congress members in support of Health Care reform.

Mike Davis is calling everyone on the roster to solicit the 2009 dues if not paid.  Roster will then be updated and a phone tree can be created.

Food Drive:  Through August our club and the Warner for Congress campaign will be co-sponsoring a food drive to benefit the Los Angeles Regional Foodbank.   Collection bins will be outside the Russ Warner’s office at 219 N. Indian Hill Blvd.  Debi and Zephyr will create flyers for distribution at the Sunday table and elsewhere.

Web Forum:  Merrill reminded us of the feature of our club website that allows for the posting of comments.  He apparently has been the only one using it.

As a result of email correspondence from Ted Radamaker to Henry Vandermier of the California Democratic Council, which were then forwarded back to our club President, Zephyr queried Ted about statements he made regarding our Executive Committee procedures and whether our meetings were open or closed.   His email also stated that at times club business was being conducted by email or by phone and that the outside membership was being denied access to these emails.

When queried directly by Zephyr, Ted acknowledged that our ExecComm has not had closed meetings, and that we have often had other members of the club present for all or parts of ExComm meetings.

In practice, we have only convened Executive Committee meetings which also include appointed positions. However, the ByLaws state that the Executive Board (which consists of elected officers only) is allowed to convene in closed session for matters concerning personnel discussions and legal issues.  Ted agreed that this provision of the ByLaws should be preserved.

Ted requested that there be more clarification about the Announcement, Membership and Opt-In lists.  Zephyr stated that because we have not yet completed the scrub of our roster and mailing lists, we do not yet have an accurate Opt-In list – for people who wish to receive information that Ted culls from various internet sites.  It is this information about which we have received the greatest number of complaints as to the content and volume.  Therefore, our present database should be used only to disseminate information which advances the Democratic Party or the Democratic Club of Claremont.

Respectfully submitted,

Carol Whitson
Recording Secretary