Gotham Board Meeting

August 15th, 2018

 

Location: WebEx

Start Time: 19:10

 

Attendees:

 

*Rich Babineau

*Rob Burzstyn

*Phil Constineau

*Nick Finger

*Alex Ghinger

*Adam Kopchian

*Jon Morgan

*Greg Woodburn

Ted Perkins

Eric Hammond

 

Apologies:

 

*Mark Power

Sebastian Cray

Shockey

 

* Denotes Board member

 

Agenda:

 

  • Gotham Huddles (Shockey)
  • Coaching
    • Agreements
    • Bi-weekly coaching meetings
  • B Games
    • Task Force
    • Posted to Empire GU Site
  • A/B Buddy System
    • Task Force
  • Empire GU Conference Call
    • Contact updates
    • Score Reporting
    • Sidelines - ROPE LINES CRACK DOWN (Again)
    • CIPP (Must Be Mentioned)
  • Bachelor Auction
    • Wilco
  • Metric Tracking
    • Please fill in the contact info you know
  • Game day set up
    • Drink ups
    • Vans
    • New call for fields and equipment “scholarship” positions
  • Fundraising
    • Plan for Fundraising
    • Minimum Goals
    • Goal for money at the end of the year
  • Other Board Comments
  • Q&A

 

Notes:

 

Gotham huddles:

  • Shockey was asking whether or not we should do Huddles this year, similarly to the ones done in the run up to Bingham
  • A concern was raised regarding the amount of time already dedicated to training and games (at least three days a week from now until the end of year)
  • They are very good when building towards something (eg Columbus, OH, or Bingham 2020), or for connecting to former players
  • We will reach out to Shockey in the Spring to revisit the huddles leading up to Columbus to defend our #1 spot.

 

Coaching:

  • All coaches except for Seb have executed their agreements and meetings have been extremely positively both individually and collectively 
  • Updates from weekly meetings will be provided to the Board on a regular basis

 

B games:

  • Rich and Seb have reached out to schedule B side games from a number of teams, as well as have posted requests on the Empire GU website
  • A small group will be tasked to reach out to get games scheduled throughout the season, with the goal to schedule at least five (5) games
    • Group to provisionally include Rich, Seb, Jacquie, Jon and Nick

 

A/B buddy system:

  • Trying to get an A/B buddy system in place to partner experienced players with non-experienced players (phrasing and criteria to be determined)
  • A similar model to "drag mother" could be leveraged to encourage people to come to practice (eg the one used last year)
  • Distribution of buddies need to be done fairly and a small group will be put together to come up with an approach (Alex to work with Rich)

 

Empire GU:

  • Updated the GU with the new contacts for Gotham, as well as nominated Seb to be the person to report scores
  • Sidelines need to be clearly laid out for all home games (rope / string 5m from the line, and technical zones need to be identified); Rich will get the appropriate equipment to lay these out
  • All players need to CIPP and we need to continue to push to remind everyone to register or renew their membership
  • Rob's sheet has an automated way to identify who has a current CIPP or not, plus this will be linked into the surveys for each game

 

Metrics and Tracking:

  • Rob created a sheet to track metrics on who showed up and when, how they were recruited, match survey (availability, able to drive, etc)
  • Board members should review and update this as necessary, especially with regards to recruiting
  • This can be used in future for focusing attention on funding or outreach

 

Game day setup:

  • Greg to reach out to Juan to coordinate Gym Bar availability - provide him game times as soon as possible
  • Except for the pre-season games, we will probably only need a van for Rockaway (hopefully we won't be need one for Brooklyn)
  • "Scholarship" for those people who can help out with getting equipment to games and practices, in exchange for discounted dues:
    • For tracking purposes, we should come up with a standard way of tracking and measuring this to ensure that people are appropriately compensated
    • As in the past, this should be opened up for other activities that people can volunteer for (eg coat check, working the door, driving vans, etc)
    • The criticality for the fields and equipment position is that it can cause severe issues for the team if the right things do not get to the field - people have to firmly commit to doing the role
    • One suggestions was to have each (drag house, etc) be responsible once a week / month to take equipment

 

Fundraising:

  • Rob has put together a overall goal for fundraising:
    • Gotham Fund: $20k
    • Gotham general account: $15k
  • These numbers are doable if we carry on with our fundraising plans (see below) plus continue to collect dues from players
  • Main fundraisers planned are as follows:
    • Bachelor Auction
    • Long form raffle
    • One more event for November
  • Adam to provide updated financial statements

 

AOB:

  • Jon:
    • RRSNY pre-season on Sunday; will provide any feedback to the Board
    • Alumni events are being planned and will be announced shortly
  • Alex:
    • There is a plan where we can look at partnering with a restaurant to get people to show up and the team can get a percentage; this was warmly received and Alex will get more information
  • Greg:
    • Working on logo for Gotham Fund; should be ready soon
    • Practice jersey artwork in progress
  • Nick:
    • Talking with Rob Raimo and Adrian Wagner's husband to see about updating our corporate marketing
    • The Board should think about who we can reach out to for sponsorship opportunities for the upcoming year, as well as any other ideas for bringing in more sponsorship
  • Phil:
    • Would like to send all the coaches (Seb, Joe and Jacquie) to the coaching clinic at Yale scheduled for a couple of weeks
    • Vote: Passed unanimously (with no response from Nick - connection issues)
  • Rob:
    • It was very positive that only  five people didn't come to practices after the Intro to Rugby, three of which have indicated that they will be returning

 

Bachelor Auction:

  • Auction will be held on 9/5 at Industry and there are already12 bachelors and seven prizes confirmed - if anyone has any further prizes, they should get in contact with Wilco
  • Social media outreach is in progress, and bachelor profiles will be released in phases in the run up to the Auction
  • Last time we didn't raise a large amount of money in comparison with previous years, so we need to get as many people as possible to show up, and get some great prizes
  • Side prizes should be incorporated as well to bring in further money during the event

 

Q&A:

  • Eric:
    • Willing to provide feedback on the house concept; Rich to reach out and add him to the task group
  • Ted:
    • Would like to see the consolidated accounts to show our current state and projected budget
  • Adam:
    • Wanted to see the costs of supporting the B side in previous years and Ted will provide balance sheets showing what was covered

 

Next Board meeting to be scheduled

 

Call ended 20:00