GALLATIN COUNTY FAIR BOARD
JANUARY 20, 2009 MINUTES
Approved as Amended at the February 17, 2009 Meeting
ATTENDANCE:
Fair Board Members Present: Bob Brekke - Chairman, Dennis Farnham, Linda Warner and Chuck Busta
Absent Fair Board Members: Chris Budeski, Misty Radue
County Commissioner: Joe Skinner
4H Agent: Faith Poet
Fairgrounds Foundation: Chairman Tim Kuhlman
Staff: Sue Shockley, Manager and Linda Blomback, Secretary
Public: Al Lien and Sonja Berg
CALL TO ORDER: Bob Brekke called the meeting to order at 5:34 p.m.
PUBLIC COMMENT: None
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Chuck Busta moved to approve the December 16, 2008 Fair Board minutes as presented. Linda Warner seconded. Unanimous for. None against. Motion carried.
COUNTY COMMISSION UPDATE: Joe Skinner deferred to the Use of the Road Dept item that will be covered under Decision Items on the Agenda.
FAIRGROUNDS FOUNDATION UPDATE:
-Tim Kuhlman reported that the Foundation has been updating the Foundation Bylaws.
-He also invited the Fair Board to the Foundation Annual Meeting on January 29 at the Holiday Inn.
-They are trying to get new board members and hopefully the updated bylaws will make the Foundation more efficient because there will be 7 board members instead of 11.
-They are also working on a new Foundation brochure.
-The Bozeman Lions Club has donated the money raised from the Summer Fair to the Foundation.
-The Foundation will be selling food and beer at the Dog Keg Pull during the WinterFest. The beer is being donated by Lehrkinds.
4H UPDATE: Faith Poet reported:
-The 4-H Horse Committee bill has been taken care of.
-4-H skateboarding has been taken care of as of today.
-She is working on scheduling changes for the Fair so they don’t have 3 shows at once.
Sue commented that Anne Marie Moran brought in 40 2x4’s that were donated and a $1500 Gift Certificate to Sweetpea Nursery that was donated in exchange for the 4-H Horse Committee bill.
DECISION ITEMS
A. Election of Board Officers: Chuck Busta moved to nominate Bob Brekke for Chairman and Chris Budeski as Vice-Chairman. Linda Warner seconded. Unanimous for. None against. Motion carried. Sue reported that there were no new applicants to fill Jim Oberhofer’s position on the Board.
B. Chef List: Sue distributed the Chef List for the year. It is alphabetical and if someone can’t do it, they need to find someone to take their place and let Sue know.
C. Use of Road Dept buildings and property by other County Depts: Sue Shockley reported that the Fair Board set policy for other Departments use of the Road Department property. Nothing has happened yet. She has not received anything in writing, but informally. Larry Watson has asked to store vehicles from the Sheriff’s Dept, but is not sure how many or how long they will be stored. Sue asked him for something in writing. She asked the board if they should send our an email asking for requests in writing? She said that heating just one of the buildings at 40O is $1500/month. All the other buildings have has the water drained, but the Fairgrounds needs to figure out how to cut costs.
The buildings are poorly insulated and have single-pane windows.
Joe Skinner commented that there needs to be a good policy in place first and then an application process. He said that it would be good to store the Sheriff’s dept and that they may have more to store with the jail being built.
Sue said that there is still a lot of Road & Bridge equipment in the Roads Property, but she is not pushing them to remove it as they are in the process of building a new building.
Dennis Farnham asked what the Fairgrounds will need for space. He was concerned that it would get filled up before the Fairgrounds knows what they will need for storage.
Joe asked about charging for the storage to help pay for the heating bill. He said it would be good to have a policy with how long departments could store things and price in place before the application process starts.
Bob Brekke suggested that with the July 1 new budget that we should start then.
Sue said that the sooner the better because the Sheriff’s Dept needs it soon.
Dennis Farnham made a motion to have a Special Fair Board Meeting to work out the details of the Road Dept property on Tuesday, Jan 27th at 5:30pm. Linda Warner seconded. Unanimous for. None against. Motion carried.
Chuck Busta asked if there would need to be a security system in place for any evidence? Sue said that there is a fence around Dennis Hengel’s Weed Dept Building.
D. Deposit and Insurance Recommendations: Sue asked to table this item. Sue said that our insurance deposits for events at the Fairgrounds have gone from $300,000 to $1 million to $1.5 million. People who just want to have a meeting at the Fairgrounds should not have to come up with this size of deposit. MACO has asked insurance companies to rate the risk of events and then MACO came up with insurance rates. We need to approve our event risks. We are going to start depositing the checks for deposits instead of holding them. Sue will email the information to the Board members tomorrow and the Board will discuss it at the Special Meeting on the 27th.
COMMITTEE REPORTS
A. 2009 Fair and Bozeman Roundup: Sue said there is not much to report due to the WinterFest. She is looking for entertainment and has small contracts for sound and stage in place.
B. Contract Committee: Sue said the Board needs to get started on the new BAHA contract. Dennis asked if we could make all the contracts due at the same time. Sue said it wasn’t that easy and Chuck said that some of them are lengthy and would prefer to deal with them one at a time. The Contract Committee includes Chuck Busta, Chris Budeski, Linda Warner and Sue Shockley. Chuck will set a meeting to discuss the BAHA contract. Linda excused herself from the BAHA contract meeting due to her involvement with the figure skating groups.
C. Capital Improvement Committee: Chris Budeski was absent so Sue reported that HKM will be doing the engineering study and we will add an addendum for Scope of Work to the contract. She hadn’t gotten any suggested changes or additions back from anyone on the committee. Chris Budeski thought they should add the Scope of Work and meet with Clint Litle of HKM. Sue needs to know what the Committee wants to do with the contract. She will talk to Chris to get a meeting scheduled.
D. Policy /Bylaws Committee: Sue said that it will take multiple meetings to update the Policy Manual. Bob said there is a meeting set for Feb 4th, 6:30am at the Holiday Inn.
E. Parking Committee: Dennis asked about parking at the WinterFest. Sue said that the Sheriff’s Dept would help park and that they would need someone at the Road Dept Property. She did not think that the Parking Committee would have to meet.
F. Pricing Committee: Sue said that the Fair Board needs to review the Fairgrounds prices annually in January so a meeting needs to be set for January or February. She will contact Misty Radue to get it set up.
G. Security/First Aid/Alcohol Committee: With the committee needing a new chairman to replace Jim Oberhofer, Dennis Farnham volunteered to be the new chairman.
H. Volunteer Committee: Sue said we need people to take Superintendent positions for the Fair. Joe asked Sue to send him a list and a brief description and he would mention them on the radio programs he does (Fri. 8:30am with KMMS and Tue with Dave & Dean).
I. Marketing Committee: Sue has given the information to Jaime. Jaime is finding it hard to get cash this year. She has raised $20,000 in cash and barter.
J. WinterFest Committee: Sue reported the following:
- The Schedule is almost ready.
- The free-stage entertainment is just getting finalized.
- We have people calling to volunteer to fun events for next year – i.e. Packers Scramble & Mutton Bustin.
- Misty Radue called and said the Horse Sale has about 70 head for sale, about the same as last year and the Stallion Service Auction is also about the same.
- The Tack Swap will be run by the 4-H Horse Committee.
- Working Horse and Driver has had quite a few entries with the online entries available.
Sue asked Al Lien if he had anything to add for Working Horse & Driver. Al said he didn’t have anything to add for Working Horse & Driver, but he was concerned about the ice on the Fairgrounds. He felt that the Operations staff needs to lower the blade on the grader to the gravel when plowing deep snow. Sue said that the Operations staff are trained, but they are waiting for the mechanic to fix the grader. She has actually asked them to not grade the snow too deep because it puts the gravel in the wrong places. Al is concerned about the horses that will be pulling the wagons on the ice and rough road. Bob Brekke said hopefully the grader will be fixed soon or that we could ask the County to help grade or sand. Sue said there are very few
pieces of equipment running. Dennis Farnham asked when the new mechanic would be hired? Sue said the end of the week. She also said that Dave from the Road Dept is attending the interviews and that some of the interviewees are also equipment operators.
Sue continued:
- There is a WinterFest meeting on Thursday.
- Dennis will be helping with the gates.
- We have 54 gate shifts to fill so we’ll be asking for people to help.
K. Open Lands Committee: No report.
CORRESPONDENCE: None
MANAGER’S REPORT: The Manager’s Report was sent out.
FINANCIALS: Sue reported that Ginger emailed out part of the Financial Report and that the Profit/Loss statement is an estimate until exact amounts come from the County. Linda Warner moved to approve the financials. Chuck Busta seconded. Unanimous for. None against. Motion carried.
DISCUSSION ITEMS:
A. RMAF Spring Board Meeting: This meeting is March 23 in Boise. Sue will be gone March 20-24.
B. RMAF Spring District Meeting: This meeting is April 24 in Helena. Sue said that this is open to managers and staff and that they sometimes bring in speakers for the meeting. Last year they brought in a financial planner.
C. 2009 Legislative Issues: Sue said that the Montana Assoc of Fairs have had two issues come up:
1. Light shields on ball fields. We don’t have to worry about this because government agencies have been excluded.
2. Horseman’s Act – which is concerning liability issues for horse-related activities. Al Lien said that it defines the risk. Sue said that this will include all activities like baseball, hockey, etc. but also excluded government agencies. They are rewriting the Horseman’s act to include government agencies. She said that it would help us by making the person participating more responsible, but if you’re negligent, you’re negligent.
D. County Audit Review of Fairgrounds Procedures: Sue said we are being reviewed but not because we are doing anything wrong, it’s just our time to be reviewed.
E. Insurance Issues: Sue reported that Tyler Delaney, an insurance agent, is looking into the Workmen’s’ Comp issue to help provide insurance. Sue has also talked to Cindy in HR regarding Workers Comp. For a small amount of money we can cover volunteers through Workers Comp instead of liability insurance. Social Security numbers are an issue as we can’t have them sign up on a sheet and include social security numbers that others can see.
F. Update on Charging for Parking at large Fairgrounds Events: Dennis reported that at the meeting in December only one group showed up, the Optimist Club, but the door accidentally got locked. He would like to set up another meeting. He asked that the Fairgrounds call the groups.
G. Personnel: Sue briefly talked about Jaime’s progress and said that Ginger, the new bookkeeper is awesome and that the two new operations guys are doing well. She also said that Linda has been working very hard on WWW.
H. RFP for Alcohol Vendor: Bob Brekke said that we need to get the RFP for Alcohol out and see what we get back to see if we want more than one. Sue said their proposal may be different and that we need to decide first. She talked to a couple of vendors that would charge $800 for an event. As an example the Testyfest had 16-18 bartenders. The Contract Committee needs to set a meeting.
I. Fairgrounds Business Plan: Nothing new to report.
J. Haynes & BAHA Update: Mark D’Agastino said that Julie Keck can’t move her trailer until her office is done and Mark can’t move his trailer until Julie’s is moved. Chuck said they weren’t supposed to bring the trailer back in the first place. Dennis asked if Julie’s office is done? Linda said that it wasn’t even close. Sue said she gave the information to the BAHA President and she will follow up with him. Linda asked what Mark said about contract with Ice Dogs and the Fairgrounds? Sue said it would not be with the Fairgrounds because it is within 65 ft of the Haynes, but that BAHA is not supposed to sublet. Sue asked what we should do if it’s not moved
by the 30th? Linda said that she will make sure that Julie knows what’s expected. That way the information will have been given to three people. Bob stated that BAHA has broken their lease agreement at that point. Joe said that something needed to be done. Sue said that there is nothing in the contract about fining them so the only course of action would be to lock the door. Chuck suggested that the Fair Board send them a letter explaining that by Feb 1 it will be a breach of contract. Joe suggested sending the letter through the County Attorney first. Sue said she will let BAHA know.
K. Changes to Fairgrounds General Lease Agreement: Tabled.
L. Other Items for Discussion: Nothing.
ANNOUNCEMENTS: Sue said that the Fair Board needs to plan Jim’s retirement party. Chuck suggested Johnny Carinos. Bob suggested Holiday Inn since they support us. Tim said to just let him know. Sue said she would contact Jim for a February or March party and that she would order a belt buckle.
AGENDA ITEMS FOR NEXT MONTH’S MEETING: None
NEXT MEETING DATE: February 17, 2009, 5:30pm with dinner at 5pm and a special meeting on January 27.
ADJOURNMENT: There being no further business, Bob Brekke adjourned the meeting at 7:17 p.m.
Respectfully Submitted
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