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PARTNERSHIP OF SOUTHEAST TEXAS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES NOVEMBER 20, 2003
POST By-Laws: Section 5. ATTENDANCE: Absence of a Director from three (3) consecutive regular meetings of the Board or absences from fifty (50%) of the meetings over a 12-month period, without an excuse deemed valid and so recorded by the Board, shall be construed as a resignation. As approved by the POST Board of Directors (9/18/2000) Unexcused Absences will be deemed as those board members that give no prior notice of not being able to attend the board meeting (RSVP by fax or phone call). Those who say they will attend the meeting, but find they cannot should notify POST as soon as possible prior to the meeting to receive an excused absence. CALL TO ORDER Barbara Knight, Chair of the Partnership of Southeast Texas, called the Board of Directors meeting to order on Thursday, November 20, 2003. The meeting was held at the Southeast Texas Art Museum in Beaumont and a quorum of board members was present. MINUTES The minutes of the previous meeting were reviewed by Pat Avery. There being no changes to be recorded, Roland Burris made a motion, second by Lee Fry to approve the minutes as transcribed by the secretary. The motion passed. FINANCIALS Steve Buser presented the financials in the absence of the POST Treasurer, Shelton McClure. POST checking account balance is $73,507 less $25,146 restricted funds for LSET, which leave POST with a cash balance of $48,361. Revenue for the month was $41,563 with expenses in the amount of $24,656.90 for a total income of $16,906.10. MEMBERSHIP REVIEW Angie Colligan, Membership Director, reviewed for the board the current membership for the Partnership of Southeast Texas. With the aid of the POST directors, 7 of the non-renewals have renewed their membership this year. Membership renewal totals for this month is approximately $2,700, but we still have approximately $21,000 left in non-renewals that we need to pursue. Ms. Colligan advised the board that we will be updating the website, and that she has been visiting with our current members, asking them for logos, internet ads, photographs, quotes, testimonials, etc. so that we can get them on the web. She also plans a membership newsletter to go out in January 2004. NOMINATING COMMITTEE REPORT Gary Biehslich, Co-Chair of the POST advised that the nominating committee had met and present the following recommendations to the board: Recommendations for 2004 POST Board Officers
Reappointments to Board of Directors
Chair Reappointments
Anne Willis made a motion, second by Rickey Simmons, that the board accept the recommendations from the nominating committee. The motion passed. Barbara Knight advised that Bob Bowers has agreed to serve as a POST Board member representing Port Arthur. He was recommended by the Port Arthur City Council and the Port Arthur Chamber of Commerce. PROPOSED BUDGET REVIEW Steve Buser reviewed the proposed budget for 2004. In 2002 POST spent approximately $23,000 more than was brought in which left a fund balance of $111,921 on December 31, 2002. As of October 31, 2003 POST had received revenue in the amount of $156,603 with expenses totaling $221,816 leaving a fund balance of $48,707, however, this is the time of year when POST receives the majority of revenue from the cities & counties. Projected revenue for November & December is expected to be approximately $263,000 with projected expenses to be $40,450, which brings POST within $900 of breaking even for the year. After reviewing the proposed Budget and Program of Work, Buser requested that the board members look at the Program of Work, see if it meets their needs and the needs of their constituencies, and then at the next board meeting, both the program of work and proposed budget will be discussed. After hearing that POST was in need of a projector, Pat Avery advised that her company will be replacing their projectors soon and she would be able to give POST one of the projectors being replaced. Barbara Knight thanked Pat for her generosity and ask that if the other board members replace or update their software, computers, etc. to please keep POST in mind. LEADERSHIP SOUTHEAST TEXAS Dennis Isaacs, LSET Chair, reported that Leadership Southeast Texas Orientation was held on September 25, 2003 sponsored by Entergy Texas at Edison Plaza. This will be the 11th year for LSET. He advised that one of the focuses for LSET this year is to look at a 500 strong alumni and to begin to go out and look for opportunities to rejuvenate and create new opportunities for that organization, including fundraisers. We have a large alumni that shows an interest based on a successful innovative program that says they want to continue in some capacity. We have a strong committee for the first time in three years that we have reinstated at-large membership in each of the nine counties in addition to a chair and co-chair position. The theme this year is Transforming Southeast Texas, focusing on economic vitality. The first session for the class of 2004 was held in Jasper on October 23 and the January session is already being planned. LSET got the opportunity to be posted by Lamar University through an invitation from Russ Schultz, LSET Admissions Co-Chair. Leadership Southeast Texas was showcased on their deans corner and Dennis, Mary McKenna, & Julie Dabney appeared on Channel 7, TCI Cable to talk about the successes of LSET. POST EDUCATION FOUNDATION Barbara Knight advised the board that POST has received notification from the IRS that POST has received that status of a 501(c)(3). One of the items of business needed is to establish a board of directors for the foundation. Discussed at the nominating committee meeting, those present felt that it would be best if POST and the Foundation had the same board of directors instead of having outside people who have nothing to do with POST to administrate this foundation. The reason the foundation was founded was for the purpose of POST. The Foundation bylaws state that there are to be 3 to 20 board members as well as standing committees, much like POST. Gary Biehslich advised that the nominating committee members felt that the POST Executive Board could be the starting point for the initial directors until the foundation is established. After discussion, Lee Fry made a motion that we appoint the POST Executive Board to serve as the Directors for the POST Education Foundation. Second by J. Rice. The motion passed. PRESIDENT'S REPORT Don Travis from Region 5 gave a report on the recent 6th Annual Career Fair. In the two days of the fair, they talked with approximately 2500 students about job opportunities in our community. Received good comments from both the employers and the students. Steve Buser reviewed the POST projects/prospects highlighting the following:
ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 1:00 p.m. _________________________________ Pat Avery, Secretary PARTNERSHIP OF SOUTHEAST TEXAS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES OCTOBER 2, 2003
POST By-Laws: Section 5. ATTENDANCE: Absence of a Director from three (3) consecutive regular meetings of the Board or absences from fifty (50%) of the meetings over a 12-month period, without an excuse deemed valid and so recorded by the Board, shall be construed as a resignation. As approved by the POST Board of Directors (9/18/2000) Unexcused Absences will be deemed as those board members that give no prior notice of not being able to attend the board meeting (RSVP by fax or phone call). Those who say they will attend the meeting, but find they cannot should notify POST as soon as possible prior to the meeting to receive an excused absence. CALL TO ORDER Barbara Knight, Chair of the Partnership of Southeast Texas, called the Board of Directors meeting to order on Thursday, October 2, 2003. The meeting was held at the Southeast Texas Art Museum in Beaumont and a quorum of board members was present. MINUTES Pat Avery, Secretary, reviewed the minutes of the July meeting. There being no changes to be recorded, Lee Fry made a motion, second by Tom McClurg, to approve the minutes as transcribed by the secretary. The motion passed. FINANCIALS Shelton McClure, Treasurer, reviewed the financial statements for the months on July, August, and September. POST currently has a cash balance of $29,741.84. Revenue for the three months was $49,941.47 and expenses totaled $62,353.94. Profit & Loss Previous Year Comparison Jan-Sept. shows total income of $117,008.69 with total expenses at $198,691.17 – greatest expense being payroll. Annual meeting revenue should be approximately $8,000 after expenses. Shelton asked for board approval of the financials. Barbara Knight requested that Shelton set up a time to work on the POST budget for this next year. MEMBERSHIP REVIEW Angie Colligan advised the board that since the annual meeting, she has been trying to get the membership files organized and has also done a lot of data entry to get the system to where she can mail merge invoices. In order for her to be out in the field soliciting memberships, she has requested assistance from the board members for non-renewals. She passed out packets she prepared with information about POST to help the board of directors solicit the companies, and she will be contacting each director within the next two weeks to see if the company agreed to renew their membership. BOARD MEMBER RECOMMENDATIONS Steve Buser advised that since Bill Nylin has submitted his resignation since he has been unable to attend the Board meetings. Mr. Nylin suggested that the board appoint Larry Coker, also with Conn's, to replace him. Tom McClurg made a motion, second by Lee Fry, to appoint Larry Coker as the Beaumont representative replacing Bill Nylin, to the POST Board of Directors. The motion passed. NOMINATING COMMITTEE Barbara Knight advised that the following will serve on the 2004 Nominating Committee: Eddie Arnold, Pat Avery, Gary Biehslich, Roland Burris, Barbara Knight, Shelton McClure, Tom McClurg, Tom Purves, and J. Andrew Rice. Eddie Arnold has agreed to serve as chairman for the committee. They plan to meet prior to the November board meeting and will report to the board at that meeting. PRESIDENT'S REPORT Steve Buser reported that we are establishing a 501c3 tax status with the Internal Revenue Service in order for organizations to contribute to POST as an educational organization. The program, which will be under POST, will be called the POST Education Foundation. He advised that we are waiting on the letter of approval from the IRS. The new vision is moving forward. It will probably take a year before we are able to accomplish everything that we want to do. Don Travis, Region 5 Service Center, reported on their annual career fair "SETexas Sixth Annual Career Fair for High School Students". It will be held November 18th & 19th at the Beaumont Civic Center and the purpose of the career fair this year is to bring together employers from this area to talk to high school juniors and seniors about job opportunities and careers in their individual companies and industries. Business people have told Region 5 over the years that with so many career fairs at various high schools they were having to send people out 15 – 20 days a year. Therefore, Region 5 put together one big generic career fair, that allows business people to come together at one time of the year and talk to the students about job opportunities. This goes along with the community audit done recently where Region 5 tried to find out what the needs of the business community are as far as potential workforce. It also gives the students a chance to hear straight from the businesses, which will help them decide what they need to study or where they need to go to college to secure a particular position. Reporting on the DOL Grant, Steve Buser advised that the final report is now being completed. Among the findings larger employers report less problems with employability skills such as being on time, honesty, fairness, team spirited, etc., but they have to go through a lot of interviews to find people with those skills. Smaller employers have more problems with employability skills because they do not have as many applicants. The unemployment rate in Southeast Texas may be traced to the large construction workforce here. In Texas about 6% of the workforce is in construction. In the U.S. it is about the same, however, in Southeast Texas that number is almost double at 11.3%. A study by the SET Workforce Board showed that among those unemployed 15 weeks or more, more than 40% were construction workers. The short-term nature of construction jobs means that industry has a larger unemployment rate, and since southeast Texas is heavily concentrated in construction, it pushes our overall unemployment rate up on a regular basis. Steve also reported on some of the activities of POST is currently involved with:
Barbara Knight reported that the POST annual meeting was a success. The food was good, the entertainment and exhibits were excellent, and the Polynesian dancers stole the show. She felt the most important thing was that we had a lot of believers in POST who did attend. An anticipated $8,000 in profit is expected as a result of the Annual Meeting/Fundraiser. Ms. Knight also advised that a couple of fun things to help raise funds for POST are being discussed. A committee will be meeting with LSET to see if they would like to participate also. LEADERSHIP SOUTHEAST TEXAS ANNUAL REPORT Due to an illness, Roland Burris was unable to attend the POST Board meeting. In his absence Bessie Chisum gave the LSET annual report for the Class of 2003. She advised that Dennis Isaacs would be the LSET Chair for 2004. The first session for the Class of 2004 will be held in Jasper on October 23rd and the topic will be Public School Funding in Texas. With this being the conclusion of the 10th Anniversary for Leadership Southeast Texas, Bessie gave a brief history of LSET. Established in September 1992 Mayor Evelyn Lord was a charter member of the Class of 1993. Ms. Chisum also acknowledged Michael Bradford as the founder of Leadership Southeast Texas. He convened through the chairmanship of Leadership Beaumont the idea of a regional leaders network to learn to trust each other and be ready as decision-makers to go forward. She asks that everyone remember Michael for his leadership. She also applauded Steve Anthony who was a graduate of the class of 2003. These men were kind spirited and generous in their commitment to the region. Highlights for LSET during 2003 include the following:
ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 1:00 p.m.
_________________________________ Pat Avery, Secretary
PARTNERSHIP OF SOUTHEAST TEXAS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES
POST By-Laws: Section 5. ATTENDANCE: Absence of a Director from three (3) consecutive regular meetings of the Board or absences from fifty (50%) of the meetings over a 12-month period, without an excuse deemed valid and so recorded by the Board, shall be construed as a resignation. As approved by the POST Board of Directors (9/18/2000) Unexcused Absences will be deemed as those board members that give no prior notice of not being able to attend the board meeting (RSVP by fax or phone call). Those who say they will attend the meeting, but find they cannot should notify POST as soon as possible prior to the meeting to receive an excused absence. CALL TO ORDER Barbara Knight, Chair of the Partnership of Southeast Texas, called the Board of Directors meeting to order on Thursday, July 17, 2003. The meeting was held at the Southeast Texas Art Museum in Beaumont and a quorum of board members was present. MINUTES Pat Avery, Secretary of the Board, reviewed the minutes of May 29, 2003. There being no changes after the review, Eddie Arnold made a motion, second by Lee Fry, to approve the minutes as transcribed by the secretary. The motion passed. FINANCIALS Shelton McClure, Treasurer, gave the financial report to the board. He advised that the current balance sheet shows approximately $40,000 in cash for POST and $20,000 for LSET. He reviewed the profit and loss previous year comparison as well as the profit and loss budget vs. actual expenses and reported that we are spending approximately $25,000 per month, which will go down due to the income from Laura's salary not coming out of the expenses. Anticipated income is also expected from the EDA Grant. Shelton made a motion that the board approve the financials. Second by Pat Avery. The motion passed. POST BYLAW CHANGES Barbara Knight advised the board that at the May 29, 2003 Board meeting a proposal was made to include the nine County Judges or a designated commissioner as an alternate to the POST board of directors. According to the bylaws, this proposal must be made a month prior to board approval. A vote was called to approve the bylaw change. The motion passed. After approval of the bylaw change, Shelton McClure made a motion that the nine county judges or their designated alternate be appointed to the POST board of directors. Second by Lee Fry. The motion passed. The second POST Bylaw change presented at the May 29, 2003 board meeting was that the board directorship recommendations come from the "community" vs "chamber of commerce". Rick Williams made a motion to approve this bylaw change, second by Eddie Arnold. The motion passed. POST CHAIR APPOINTMENTS Gene Bouillion made a motion to appoint the following POST Chair appointments to the Board of Directors:
Second was made by Shelton McClure. The motion passed. MEMBERSHIP REVIEW Barbara Knight advised the board that Angie Colligan has agreed to accept the position as the new POST membership director. Since there is a lot of money still uncollected from previous members, Ms. Knight ask that each of the board members review the POST non-renewal list and if there was a company that they would be willing to contact to please advise the board. Following is the list of companies with the board member that will contact the company :
PRESIDENT'S REPORT Steve Buser reported that we are trying to create a 501c3 organization to allow us to take charitable contributions for the part of our missions that is educational. We are moving forward with that and hopefully in a couple of months it will be completed. It will have to be a separate organization with a separate board of directors. It will be called the POST Education Foundation and will contract out to POST for services such as website, etc. New vision process is progressing. The Vision Committee, Regional Economic Development / Resources Committee, and the Southeast Texas Economic Development Assets Committee have all met. The purpose of the Vision committee is to evaluate a program of work for the new Southeast Texas vision project and to serve as an oversite committee, motivating sub-committees to carry out the program of work as defined by the Vision Committee and establish timelines for all sub-committees. This committee will also develop a final vision statement. The purpose of the Regional Economic Development / Resources Committee is to create and promote regional partnerships and a regional approach to economic development while improving communications and funding resources. The purpose of the Southeast Texas Economic Development Assets committee (benchmarking SETx communities and identifying regional economic development assets and target markets) is to determine who we are by evaluating regional economic development assets and benchmarking the Southeast Texas region. The committee will also identify target markets and improve the image of Southeast Texas. For information on the Vision process, go to our website setx.org, click on new vision, and it will give you the latest revisions. Steve reviewed the ED activity report for the board. 2003 YTD prospects/projects total 180 (this includes 46 carryovers). 37 are still active; 9 are on hold; and 134 have been completed. Some of the top prospects include Project Wilderness (Eco-tourism), Project Agrow (moving along, POST was told to keep quiet on project), Project Concrete EU (not going to happen here), Project 100 in Orange County, Project Zip in Jasper, Project Co-Gen (Beaumont Chamber). POST Annual Meeting – Laura Wilson advised that the annual meeting will be held on September 11, 2003 with Commissioner Susan Combs, Texas Department of Agriculture as our keynote speaker. What we hope to do is promote all the hidden successes in the 9 county area, for instance all the small mom & pop businesses, the different ones that manufacture or the services that they offer to display them. This will tie in with Commissioner Comb's Texas "YES" Program that talks about the hidden successes of rural communities that we may not be aware of. This will also be a fundraiser for POST. VISION FOR TOURISM Dean Conwell, the new Beaumont CVB Director, advised the board that tourism is one of the 2nd or 3rd largest industries in the state. Tourism is something that we need to all work together with. He advised that since each board member present is a member of some type of organization or association, to please be in contact with their CVB or Chamber of Commerce and let them know when people are coming into town. POST COMMITTEE REPORTS Marketing / Public Relations Committee – Gary Biehslich reported that they have had several discussions with the basic direction right now being a trifold brochure to help sell POST to the counties, cities, businesses. Highlights of the brochure would be the accomplishments of POST, highlight membership, what POST does, how we work with the EDC's, who supports us, etc. Personnel / Board Development Committee – Pat Avery hopes to develop job descriptions and modify local personnel positions. Barbara Knight met with Angie at the library to do some research for foundation grants – the next step will be actual examples of putting proposals and researching for grants. Ms. Knight has also talked with Chester Jourdan with the South East Texas Regional Planning Committee to see what kind of partnership we could develop with them. ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 1:10 p.m.
_______________________________________ Pat Avery, Secretary
PARTNERSHIP OF SOUTHEAST TEXAS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES MAY 29, 2003
POST By-Laws: Section 5. ATTENDANCE: Absence of a Director from three (3) consecutive regular meetings of the Board or absences from fifty (50%) of the meetings over a 12-month period, without an excuse deemed valid and so recorded by the Board, shall be construed as a resignation. As approved by the POST Board of Directors (9/18/2000) Unexcused Absences will be deemed as those board members that give no prior notice of not being able to attend the board meeting (RSVP by fax or phone call). Those who say they will attend the meeting, but find they cannot should notify POST as soon as possible prior to the meeting to receive an excused absence. CALL TO ORDER Barbara Knight, Chair of the Partnership of Southeast Texas, called the Board of Directors meeting to order on Thursday, May 29, 2003. The meeting was held at the Southeast Texas Art Museum in Beaumont and a quorum of board members was present. MINUTES After review of the March 2003 POST Board minutes, Eddie Arnold made a motion, second by Lee Fry, to approve the minutes as transcribed by the secretary.
FINANCIALS Steve Buser gave the financial report for the months of March and April. Total assets are $103,273.94. Restricted LSET funds total $24,607.99 which leaves POST with a balance of $78,665.95. He advised that these are the dry months when we don't have the revenue coming in from memberships. Most of our revenue comes at the end of the year, so things will be tight during the summer. After discussion Ms. Knight advised that the report would be filed for audit. SETWIN REPORT Don Travis, SETWIN Chair, reported on the current status of the DOL Grant that began 2-year's ago and is funded by the Texas Department of Labor. The purpose of the grant was to get a snapshot of what our community looks like as far as economic development goes, workforce development, where the jobs are, where are the potential employers. Information is being gathered in stages, with the latest project being interviews with major employers in the growth industries in southeast Texas. Nine interview questions were asked. In conclusion, Mr. Travis reported that most companies had no trouble finding qualified applicants for new jobs. Most of them have an over abundance of people applying for new jobs and they are not interested in discussing how to improve training for their applicant pools. They are already getting enough people who are trained. The major concerns of the companies seem to be work ethics, basic skills, and a desire to work longer hours. BYLAW AMENDMENT Barbara Knight reviewed the following Bylaw amendment proposals by the POST Board Development Committee:
In order to change the bylaws, this amendment should be put before the board and then voted on 30 days later. After discussion Roland Burris moved, second by Pat Avery to accept the amendment proposed by the Board Development Committee. The official vote will be at the next board of directors meeting on July 17, 2003. POST Board Recommendations The Nominating Committee recommends the following be appointed to the POST Board of Directors:
Gary Biehslich made a motion, second by Michael Barnhill, to approve these members for board service. The motion passed. STRATEGIC PLANNING REPORT Strategic Planning meeting was discussed where community leaders met to see where POST and the region needs to go. Forty community and business leaders discussed the question "What does Southeast Texas need to do as a region to attract jobs and businesses?" Reporting for the groups were Pat Avery, Rick Barrilleaux, Mark Viator: Mark Viator reported that they discussed the issues that were needed for a regional approach to the economic development. Three of the problems that they saw: cities and areas have separate visions, there is no unified vision; there is a problem of leadership identification; there is a lack of an overall plan for the region. They see a need to develop an overall vision for the region that gets the synergy of each area (when you talk about a 9 county region, you talk about regionalism, it's important to have everyone see what benefits one area benefits the other). They feel POST needs to help each county develop a vision, to pull people together by starting with the county judge and identify different leaders to bring together perhaps through the chamber of commerce or their economic development corporations. Help them develop a vision or an overall plan for their county and then somehow over a period of time bring all 9 counties together to see how they can get synergy. Pat Avery discussed the regional approach in economic development in developing the funds that pay for new regional development. This group worked primarily on the regional approach to economic development POST funding resources. They see a need for an administrative structure in funding to apply to businesses and industry to locate in southeast Texas. A need to determine a base level of funding as defined by the POST board members. Also POST needs to be recognized as an administrative entity that coordinates responses to prospects as defined by the membership. If this were in place by the end of the year, POST direction would be set for the future. Rick Barrilleaux discussed Branding the Region and Regional Assets. They discussed problems such as what's in it for me, how do we in Beaumont, Port Arthur, Orange, bring in Jasper and let them see what's common – why are our economies compatible and why should we undertake something of this size. The first session was about Regional Branding. Regional Branding is a major undertaking, both in terms of resources, dollars & time, customer perception. At the second meeting, they brought in a professor from Lamar who gave them an idea – immediately the group split. Half wanted to go with retail & tourism and the other half wanted to go with primary jobs & industry. Once they had time to absorb what the professor had to say, by the third meeting no one wanted to do anything. They decided it was too big a project. At this point, they feel like branding is going to be something out there, we need to find the combination, we need to understand what we are about, why we want to be involved. Branding concept is what you have left to develop loyalty around you. We need to work on the bigger issue of what are we, what do we want to be, and how do we get there. Laura Wilson presented a presentation summarizing the one-day session. The purpose of this meeting was to come up with a strategic plan or program of work for POST, where do we go for now, how do we get everybody back to the table, where do we start. A couple of people came up to us and said before we get into another plan, whatever happened to the Perryman report that POST did in 1998 that we called the 10 year vision. The purpose of that plan was to create a strategic vision for POST to aid the Southeast Texas Region and local citizens in achieving objectives through a set of strategic initiatives. All of the top 9 goals in that report have been accomplished, but we still need to work on them and you will see some of these come up again in the new vision. Forty community / business leaders met and were ask, "What actions should Southeast Texas take to create jobs and bring in industry?" Groups broke out and from the meeting came 10 new goals:
PRESIDENT'S REPORT 501(c)3 proceeding forward – Discussions with Jane Lowry who is helping to form the 501(c)3. We would create a separate organization / foundation to head educational parts of the things we do. Top 5 prospects: Manitoba is not going to locate in Texas; HQ is a backoffice opportunity that we have that is going to be coming up in the near future; AGrow is a 2,000-4,000 job project, is a high tech agricultural facility that is looking for big acreage; Concrete EU is going to happen, but not in our area, but there is going to be some association and southeast Texas association; Cat is on hold. Barbara Knight advised that Steve Buser & Laura Wilson have met with four county judges and will meet with the other five very shortly to ask for recommitment on funding and also their active participation on our board. The POST executive committee members are now responsible for two subcommittees under them for bringing about changes, as the board becomes more active. PORT ARTHUR BOSS INTERNATIONAL TRADE SUMMIT Ike Mills, Executive Director for Port Arthur EDC, reported to the board about the Port Arthur BOSS International Trade Summit. The event is scheduled for June 4-6, 2003 at the Holiday Inn Park Central and the Port Arthur Civic Center. The three-day summit focuses on small businesses doing business with the state and also this year on international trade because of our strategic location in Port Arthur with our port. One of the things that make this a little different is that these small companies will be able to go online to various companies and may actually be able to walk away with a contract. EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE REPORT Barbara Knight advised that there are 3 chair appointments that need to be filled. Even though these are chair appointments, the POST bylaws call for the board to vote. Four names are brought before you in case one of these individuals is unable to accept the appointment. Recommendations for chair appointments are Penny Sullivan with Westvaco, Robert Turner with JK Chevrolet, Tom Burger with ExxonMobil, and Michael Shahan with Lamar State College Orange. Ms. Knight entertained a motion to ask these people to serve as chair appointments. Second by Don Shaw. Motion passed. ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 1:10 p.m.
__________________________________ Pat Avery, Secretary
PARTNERSHIP OF SOUTHEAST TEXAS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES MARCH 20, 2003
POST By-Laws: Section 5. ATTENDANCE: Absence of a Director from three (3) consecutive regular meetings of the Board or absences from fifty (50%) of the meetings over a 12-month period, without an excuse deemed valid and so recorded by the Board, shall be construed as a resignation. As approved by the POST Board of Directors (9/18/2000) Unexcused Absences will be deemed as those board members that give no prior notice of not being able to attend the board meeting (RSVP by fax or phone call). Those who say they will attend the meeting, but find they cannot should notify POST as soon as possible prior to the meeting to receive an excused absence. CALL TO ORDER Barbara Knight, Chair of the Partnership of Southeast Texas, called the Board of Directors meeting to order on Thursday, March 20, 2003. The meeting was held at the Southeast Texas Art Museum in Beaumont and a quorum of board members was present. MINUTES After review of the January 2003 POST Board minutes, a unanimous vote of the board approved the minutes as transcribed by the secretary. FINANCIALS Shelton McClure, Treasurer for POST, reviewed the January - February financials. The balance sheet shows a cash balance of $127,201.01 of which $29,003.94 belongs to LSET, leaving a balance of $98,197.07 in POST funds. Shelton advised the board that the process of separating the LSET funds from the POST funds is being discussed. There is also a need to set up an Audit Committee and he requested volunteers from the board members present. Board members to volunteer were Tom McClurg, Gene Arnold, and Gene Bouillion. ENTERGY PRESENTATION Steve Buser introduced each of the following Entergy associates: Michael Barnhill, Karen Bourdier, Rick Hatcher, Kim McMurray, Carolyn Motl, Karl Segura, and John Tarver. Since Steve worked for Entergy prior to coming to work at POST, he was able to tell a tidbit of information about each of them. After Steve's introductions the following comments were made about Steve and POST.
AN ODE TO POST His name sounds like he drinks too much And at times he seems out of touch You know – with reality and such But when you see all that gets done Even when he's constantly on the run And a great staff always under the gun It's clear this outfit called POST Gives us all a great deal to toast And for our money we get the most! After these comments Steve told the group he didn't realize this was going to be a roast. Michael Barnhill then announced that on behalf of the Entergy team, he wanted to present Steve with a check in the amount of $20,000 to assist with the goals of POST for regional economic development. PRESIDENT'S REPORT Steve and Laura reviewed the following for the board:
LEADERSHIP SOUTHEAST TEXAS Roland Burris, LSET Chair, advised the board that Session II, "Workforce Development", was held at Lamar University. In the afternoon they also participated with the Jason Project. Session Ill, "Homeland Security" will be next Thursday and is being held at the Premcor Refinery in Port Arthur. LSET Day in Austin was February 24, 2003 and LSET participants had the opportunity to have breakfast with legislators and agency people. LSET was able to go on the floor of the senate and have a resolution presented to them recognizing the 10th anniversary of Leadership Southeast Texas. STRATEGIC PLANNING MEETING Barbara Knight advised the board that Michael West with the Texas Department of Economic Development has agreed to come and be the facilitator for the Strategic Planning Meeting. An invitation list is being completed now of entities from the 9 counties. Board members are asked to submit names of anyone they feel should attend this meeting. The half day meeting will be held on April 11' 2003 and we are hoping to have 50-75 people attend. COMMITTEE DISCUSSION POST Annual Meeting Committee -Laura Wilson deferred the discussion to next month, however, she advised the board that it is being planned for the fall of this year with the theme being on fun and anyone wanting to volunteer, please call the POST office Proposed POST Executive Committee -Don Shaw made a motion, second by Tom McClurg, to appoint the following to the 2003 POST Executive Committee. The motion passed.
Ms. Knight ask the board members to read over the list of committees and let the officer over that committee know which one they would be interested in serving on. ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 1:00 p.m. ____________________________________ Pat Avery, Secretary
PARTNERSHIP OF SOUTHEAST TEXAS BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES JANUARY 16, 2003
POST By-Laws: Section 5. ATTENDANCE: Absence of a Director from three (3) consecutive regular meetings of the Board or absences from fifty (50%) of the meetings over a 12-month period, without an excuse deemed valid and so recorded by the Board, shall be construed as a resignation. As approved by the POST Board of Directors (9/18/2000) Unexcused Absences will be deemed as those board members that give no prior notice of not being able to attend the board meeting (RSVP by fax or phone call). Those who say they will attend the meeting, but find they cannot should notify POST as soon as possible prior to the meeting to receive an excused absence. CALL TO ORDER Steve Buser, President of the Partnership of Southeast Texas, called the Board of Directors meeting to order on Thursday, January 16, 2003. The meeting was held at the Southeast Texas Art Museum in Beaumont and a quorum of board members was present. NOMINATING COMMITTEE REPORT Eddie Arnold, Chair of the Nominating Committee, reported that the committee would like to recommend the following nominations as POST Officers for 2003:
George Hudspeth seconded the motion. The motion passed. After accepting the nomination, Ms. Knight advised the board that she felt this year is a pivotal year for POST with lots of challenges. One of these challenges is to get board members to attend meetings. Ms. Knight stated "Times in our nation & region are tough, and times are tough for POST, but we are going to survive this economic recession". She feels as a regional organization, POST needs to make a difference by bringing more jobs and more opportunities to this area. By working together on committees and on this board, POST will make a difference. One way to achieve this is to put together a strategic planning team. Ms. Knight advised that she would like to have the meeting at the Westvaco facility with local leaders and plant managers at the session as well as the POST board members. Suggestions for the session should be sent to Steve or Barbara. Board members present discussed the following comments:
Barbara Knight recommended the need to have someone outside of POST as facilitator for the meeting. Two names were mentioned, Michael Clayton with the Better Business Bureau and Dr. Lynn Godkin, Professor at Lamar University. Luis Silva advised that as a board member of both the Beaumont Chamber and the Port Arthur Chamber, he feels POST should work more closely with the Chambers; have constant dialogue with them in order to connect. He also feels Steve should attend Chamber Board Meetings. There is a lot of activity in this area, and POST needs to be more aggressive with the EDC activities. John Johnson stated that Steve already does all the things that Luis was recommending. Steve advised the board that the Beaumont Chamber at one time invited him to the Board meetings, but for whatever reason they no longer do that. Roland Burris suggested that each board member arrange to be at their local Chamber of Commerce meetings each month or every other month and give a report for POST to see if they can develop some sort of a relationship rather than have Laura or Steve attend all the chamber meetings. Possibly make this part of POST's mission - to rearrange priorities to get more trust among EDC's and chambers. Eddie Arnold stated that we have 3 or 4 new EDC's that are vying for economic development just like everybody else is. They have a mission, they have a job to do, and if they have a prospect, they want the glory, they want the praise. Unfortunately, even if POST is involved with the prospect, they wind up in the back seat. When you don't have your name in the headlines, the general public tends to say you haven't done anything for me lately. We know that POST is doing a great job, we know that they are involved, that they are a wonderful resource for this entire area, but when you get down to the local newspapers or local people in the community, POST does not get the credit that they deserve. We need to develop a plan to overcome this without crossing the line and infringing upon the local EDC's and communities and they get upset. POST can sit back and play a support role and supply resources, but you don't get a lot of recognition as being an active participant, therefore, the general public does not see POST as a viable entity that they want to share anything with. We need to find some way to prove the benefit of POST. Possibly get the chambers, local EDC's and communities that are not participating to give POST the credit that they deserve or get them to buy into this organization so POST can evolve back into the regional economic development organization it once was. Pat Avery agreed with Eddie and Gary Biehslich ask Steve what the Board members could do to assist. Luis Silva ask if POST had been involved with any of the new businesses coming into the City of Port Arthur. Steve advised that POST was somewhat involved, but POST generally takes the role of "we are here to help. If you need help in your community, we are here to help in any way that we can, and if you don't need our help, we will stay away. On the other hand, if your community is doing a good job of attracting business, we would like to know how you are doing that, so that if we are in Mexico or Chicago, and we can say that XYZ is using this kind of method to attract companies to their community. POST has been actively involved in every community in Southeast Texas the past year on a major project of some kind." Steve also stated, "A lot of changes have occurred since this organization was founded. POST was the only economic development organization at the time. Since then Beaumont, Port Arthur, Jasper, Nederland, as well as several other EDC's have been formed which gives a lot more resources for the area. POST original goal was to land the jobs here, now we are more of a support role." Steve feels one of the problems we face is that according to the bylaws we cannot have elected officials on our board. That might have been something that was needed back in the 80's, because of the confidentiality of prospects and clients, but that is not true today. By not putting judges on our board we are missing a lot of creative input today. We need to review the issue and possibly change the bylaws. MINUTES After review of the December 2002 POST Board minutes, Gary Biehslich made a motion, second by Pat Avery to approve the minutes as transcribed by the secretary. The motion passed. FINANCIALS Shelton McClure, POST Treasurer, reviewed the December 2002 financials stating that revenue for the month totaled $7,325.13 with expenses totaling $22,945.53 for a net loss of $15,620.40 for the month. Total assets for POST are currently $139,877.58 that also includes LSET funds in the amount of $27,788.91. After discussion, Shelton McClure recommended the board accept the financials, second by Roland Burris. The motion passed. PRESIDENT'S REPORT Laura gave a year end prospect report. This is actually an activity report that POST has modified throughout the year to let board members and communities know how many times POST has been in their region and where we get our leads from, so hopefully this report will educate the group here a little bit. For example, look at #1, the first 3 initials signifies whether the project/prospect is Active, on Hold, or Removed from our schedule. The second column is an S for prospect or J for project. The final column will be either an E for existing or N for new business. Next is the project name, source that it comes from (we have tried to be very specific as to whether it came from Jefferson County or from another county) and from within that county it came from this city or that chamber or whatever organization. We tried to really define where our source came from. When you get to the POST column - this actually means the year that POST received that lead, the order of leads for that particular year. You can see in the beginning POST had about 20 carryovers from 2001 that were worked on. Listed are the type of business or service they are, how many dollars per capital, how many jobs. Next it is broken down into the 9 counties that POST actually promoted or worked on with that prospect/project and then the status of where we are today with that client. On the very last page, you can see a total of 179 prospects/projects were worked on in 2002. At the beginning of this year 133 of these leads have been removed from our list. Laura was recently asked "out of the 133, how many announcements did we have?" POST is not always involved in the end of the project. Maybe the clients and the community are still working on it themselves and no longer need our help and we don't know if there is going to be an announcement or not. We remove it when our services are no longer needed. POST began with 179, we removed 133, and we will carry over 36 of these projects into the new year. Today is the 16th of January and we have had five phone calls of new projects in the year 2003 for a total of 41 projects/prospects that we are currently working on. This summary is for the entire year, and is something that we will continue to update. Ms. Wilson explained how leads are received from TxED or from the individual companies and then how POST puts the communities and EDC's that best fit the requirements of the lead. Steve advised that fun365days.com got a $5,000 grant thanks to Jefferson County to upgrade the site. Most of the money will be going toward a geobase designed to enable you to click on a community and see what is happening in that community. The grant will also be used for a billboard to advertise for the website. Steve reported that the Big 9 Directory is now on the internet and is called "Big 9 On Line". There are several ways to select from the site: Company name, City, Contact name, POST Classification, as well as basic industries, manufacturing, or services/supplies. LEADERSHIP SOUTHEAST TEXAS Roland Burris, Chair for Leadership Southeast Texas, advised they are in the process of naming the nominating committee for the 2004 class. Session II is scheduled for January 30th at Lamar Institute of Technology. Also on that day, the class will be able to participate with the Jason Project at the John Gray Institute. OTHER Barbara Knight advised that item seven on the agenda (committee appointments) would be deferred to a later date when we will be asking which committee you, as a board member, would be willing to serve on. ADJOURN There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 12:55 p.m.
_____________________________________ Pat Avery, Secretary
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