SOLO II Committee Meeting Minutes 10/9/07

Members in Attendance – Gretchen Everett, Dick Willy, Mike and Carol Leuty, Russell O’Connell, Jackie McInnis, TJ McGreary, Mary Lee, Randy Ayer, Bud Bohrer, Tim Irwin, Val Korry, Karl and Amy Coleman, Glenn Austin, Keith Brown, Ron Bauer. Visitors: Eric Hagen, Rory Paine-Donovan, Victor Moore, Andrew Blakeman, Matt Gehr, Bobby Rice, Taa Semo, Brandon Kelley, Nam Huynh, Tim Monk, Edwin Abiva, Roland Abiva.

Minutes Review – Minutes were approved as written.

Board Report – Race is going to be asking for money since they do not currently have enough for their year end awards. They are short $1500 - $2000 in total. Someone suggested we might have some “extra” glasses to donate. Anything you want published in NW Sportscar News should be sent to Dick Willy who will forward to the editor. The current membership level is 1,035. This is about the same as this time last year. We are currently looking for a Treasurer, Secretary, and Board Members. Anyone interested should speak with Lou Ann. The region is trying to create an awards committee with one person from each venue. This is regarding annual awards, not individual venue awards. The region banquet is February 17^th at the LaQuinta Inn in Tacoma.

Treasurer’s Report – Lots of activity since August and September were both presented. All caught up with Packwood and with the Evolution Schools. The group made a request that Lou Ann create a report to show expenses/income for each individual event of the season so that we can evaluate which events we may be losing money on.

WWSCC Report – Keith was not present for the meeting, but notes were taken. Sportscar Spectacular was on Sunday with the Coneheads practice on Saturday. 40 entrants had 14 runs per half. Lots and lots of runs had by all. They raised just under $1100 additional funding for the Coneheads banquet. Several WW clubs have donated extra dollars to help support this banquet as well. SCCA has not done this yet. A motion was made and approved to donate $100 to this cause. Rules meeting will be held the beginning of December. Once a date is decided an announcement will be made. Start thinking about those rules! They are still looking for a new President, so anyone interested should contact Karl Coleman. They will start working on a date for Coneheads, taking Daytona, the Boat Show, and the region banquet under consideration.

Event #8 (BMP) 10/21 (Jackie & Kevin) – Everything is coming together nicely.

OLD BUSINESS

Donation to “Merry Mountaineers” – Bud felt that not all of the information was presented at the last meeting. Originally Bud suggested that we pay the Senior Citizen Center $1200 last year. The region treasurer felt that since this was a donation we could afford to increase the donation to $1500. In following this example, Bud felt that we should also give a small increase this year. Karl felt that we should address the situation because it seemed like the amount has just been increasing every year and if we are not going to break even at the end of the year, then we should really evaluate how much are we are donating to them each year. Karl felt this was setting a very challenging precedent, since we are not increasing the amount that we pay to “Friends of Packwood” for our site fee donation. A motion was made that we wait until the end of the year after evaluating our current financial situation and then make a decision regarding any additional donations.

NT Issues – Those in attendance last month read a “draft” letter regarding the issues we felt should be addressed from our National Tour and Pro Solo events with National office. As decided, Dick spoke with Howard at Nationals. Howard said the course review is supposed to be done in a cooperative fashion, not just changed by one individual person. Dick also suggested that the NT contract was a disaster, and the schedule was very difficult to try to comprehend and that any changes made to the Test N’ Tune should be added to the contract so that we ALL understand what is expected of our region. It seems that Howard is in understanding of our current situation, but no detailed action plan has been created. Dick asked that Howard wait to speak to Cindy until after he has the chance to speak to her personally before hand. Bud has also requested permission to contact Howard regarding the situation with Sandy Brown and the Packwood site access issue that came up right before the Pro Solo.

NEW BUSINESS

Draft Letter to Board (2008 Weekend Membership Program) – Dick distributed a draft letter that he wrote to the SCCA Board of Directors. He has been made aware of a new program that SCCA is instituting on each of the regional venues. This would be a new program that does not allow anyone who is not a member of SCCA to participate in our events. They are offering a “weekend membership” that would be an additional $15 to participate. Dick is very concerned about this concept because as a Solo group we are NOT having problems with our membership numbers and IF this is something that is enforced upon us we will see a DECREASE in membership because once new people see the additional dollars they are being forced to pay they will go straight to WW or BSCC events instead. Ron reminded us that although he doesn’t agree with the program, it does say that the National Office “encourages” us to charge an additional $15 but they will only take $5 of that money. So we can take a $5 hit in our own income and just give National Office an extra $5 per non-member. National Office also argues that non-members are more of liability because we pay more money per incident IF there is some type of accident. There were a lot of good points presented and Dick will continue discussions with other Solo Chairs around the region, and also the region board before he makes a final decision about sending his letter.

Rules Meeting – Dick would like to dedicate the November meeting for presenting rules, but hold off on making the final votes until the December meeting.

Drifting – Karl would like to add a “Drifting” report to the agenda so that Russell can make a monthly update to progress of this possible venue. Russell invited several people interested in the program to experience how SCCA autocrosses are organized. He made a point of making it clear that there are very few key people who do almost 100% of the work to make these events happen for the masses. The group reminded our new guests that although we are in support of a pilot program for drifting it will be required that an infrastructure is established to help support the program. Russell also reminded the group that things will be much more organized with these events. There will be required rules that everyone must follow, and a structure for working and competing will be put in place.

In the last year, several people have volunteered to help run the drifting program at Evergreen Speedway which has been a huge learning experience. They are seeing an average of 30 – 50 people per event. They feel there are several limitations being placed on these events (Friday night events from 4-8 pm, etc.) that are holding those numbers down. This is the main reason the group is so excited to look at additional locations to hold events.

Meeting adjourned at 8:40 p.m.

GOO