Meeting Date: 23 January 2017

Start Time: 7:00pm

Location: 104 Frederick Street, Annerley

End Time:  8:00pm

Chair:  Henri de Montferrant (Seneschal)

Attendees: 

• Cara of Kirriemuir
• Alain Quartier (Marshal)
• Rufus Adycote of Mynheniot (Baron)
• Wei Min Cheng (Chirurgeon)
• Ulfar Hausakljufr 
• Gwen, 
• Wojciech Waz
• Sarah Pynke (Reeve)

Apologies:  Drake Morgan, Acacia de Navarra, Jessica of Fearne Abbey

Quotum met?  YES                      

Motion to accept previous minutes: Henri. Seconded by Sarah 

GNW 2017 Proposal

The proposal has been discussed over the last week on Facebook with no major items requiring attention being found. Several items were raised on the night and addressed as part of the approval.  A summary of these items and resolutions is below.

1. There were concerns over the details of the shower system.  The original proposal ran out of money in the event fees to pay for a full hire system so the proposal was to rely on people’s personal water heaters.  There was concern over potential breakages / damages etc. It was agreed that a domestic style system similar to what is used by the St Florian encampment at Festival should be purchased as a site improvement.  Regardless of site this can always be used to make hot water in kitchens and also for showers if the site does not have them. A proposal will be put together by the Steward team and they will apply to previous years Fighter Auction money (site improvement items is what the fund is set aside for).  Failing that an application will be made to the St Florian Barony instead and this could then double up as a water heater for Rowany Festival if borrowing Lorcans is no longer an option for whatever reason. This reduces the risk item out of the operating budget.

1. There were concerns over the quantity of water that was allowed.  30kL was factored in. This equates to approx. 65L per person per day.  Views ranged from agreement this was light to it was excessive for the expected uses.  In the end an extra allowance was agreed, refer to the note at the end.

1. There was a line item for skips for garbage removal.  This was $500. The concern was this wasn’t enough. It was agreed that it wasn’t for skips.  The budget was tight, the $500 was the estimate to hire a cage trailer for the weekend and pay for fuel and dump runs each day as required.  The skip heading should have been replaced with garbage removal. If more numbers book and there is extra money then skip hire is up towards the top of the list of upgrades.  This would remove the need for volunteers to do dump runs. It was agreed $500 was sufficient for the trailer option.

1. The power supply was raised as a concern.  The exact power amounts available are still being confirmed by site.  As discussed in the Facebook group the bare minimum we need for power is the cool rooms.  We’d ideally like lights in the kitchens / amenities area and ideally be able to provide power for medical reasons as well however we can work around the lights and power for medical means isn’t always available at camping events.  It was agreed that if the power supply for some reason came back not being able to run the bare minimum of the cool rooms then the Stewards would come back to the baronial meeting for approval for extra funds to hire a generator or cool rooms with in built generators.  This will be sorted out well in advance of the event and there would be a suitable time to make these alternative arrangements.
2. There was also a fair amount of concern over the general lack of contingency as a separate line item.  There was some in the original budget with the GST credits but it was relatively small for the type of event being run.  It was proposed and agreed that an additional $4000 be pre-approved as a contingency that can be accessed if something goes wrong and stuff needs fixing on site to keep the event running.  This contingency would have to be requested of the Reeve and Seneschal and good cause would have to be shown to access the money but no additional baronial meeting is required to approve the money as long as it’s under the $4000.  
3. To be clear, this $4k contingency is not covered by the event fees.  There were various discussions over this and the key points that came out of it were;

• If something went wrong that couldn’t have been accounted for we didn’t want the reputation of this years event and future events to be harmed.

• Given the nature of this years event having to change to a new site with a completely new set of conditions and having to put a bid together in less than two weeks there was a fair amount of pressure on the steward team.  A new green field site with little to no contingency is not fair or realistic on them. Especially doing everything to get the event to stack up under the $150 mark which was determined to be the max people saw as being viable.

• All numbers have been worked out on an assumed 150 people.  This was dropped from previous years as we are changing sites but the reality is the site is still within Brisbane, day-trippers can still visit easily, it’s closer to anyone driving from interstate and there are other things planned to help encourage more people to come.  All of this means that every booking over the 150 results in more revenue to minimise any risks of having to draw on the contingency.

• The fighter auction money from this year can be used to offset infrastructure costs like water heaters etc. as a last resort.  Ideally this is covered by previous years fund and approved before the event but worst case we will use the contingency and reimburse out of the fighter auction funds generated this year. 

All of the above was discussed and there were no objections.  Everyone approved.