SCRPA
Board Retreat
North Charleston, SC
North CharlestonConvention Center
December 14– 15, 2006
December 14th:
In Attendance: Joe Ross, Lisa Crochet, Randy Woodard, Jim Headley, Kevin Walsh, Glenn Parker, Willis Lee, Jan Cox, Don Shuman, Ray Dunham, Ann Cunningham, Tom O’Rourke, Clarissa Douglas, and Paul Wieters.
Jim passed out calendars and cd’s to each member.
He then went over the calendar, citing that all Executive and Full Board meetings have been set in place. Executive meetings will be 10:00 a.m. and Full Board meetings will follow at 11:00 a.m. on the days scheduled throughout the year.
Jim also put a plea out to Branch and Committee chairs to make sure dates for meetings and workshops are approved by the SCRPA office BEFORE sending information to delegates.
Ann called the meeting to order at 1:25 p.m.
Before Ann started with the agenda, she invited Jan to conduct a group game.
Ann began to go over goals for the year which includes:
- The Vision Plan
- Encourage agencies around the state to adopt the healthy eating habits to include healthy alternatives in concessions stands and vending machines.
- Continue to promote Our Promise to Kids program.
- Focus on increasing membership.
- Help recruit a strong class for the upcoming 2008 LEAD program.
- Strengthen partnerships, especially with Municipal associations, as well as city/county managers association.
- One Thin Dime Campaign.
- Promoting land and water conservation, trails, etc.
Jim gave an overview of the Board Functions:
Budget– Jim addressed to the Board that the association was not a recreation department or a government agency. The association does not receive tax dollars.
Jim then gave a presentation of how monies are received and where the monies go.
Memberships- Jim went over the benefits of being a member.
* Access toPublications
* Access to the website
* Opportunity for Professional Development
* Legislative support at National and State Level
* Statewide Athletic Tournaments.
* Provide networking opportunities
* Provide scholarship for college students
* Provide resources for public entities
Board/Committee Makeup: Jim explained that the following make up the board: President, Vice-President, President-Elect, Secretary, District VP’s, Elected Officials, and Branch Chairs.
Jim then went over the committees and responsibilities.
Vision Task Force: Overseen by David Bennett.
Jim reported that 14 directors from around the state were invited to attend a session on the VIP program hosted by Clemson on January 10th.
Ann invited Marshall Johnson from PRT to give a report.
There was a recent loss to the PRT office, a director had passed away. The Governor asked Chad Prosser to be the director.
PRT commissioned a $300,000 study, hiring a group from Ireland to look at tourism across the state. The findings were that there are three areas to work in Tourism and it will take about $30 million to work in these areas: event marketing, product development, and PRT. The study is complete and Marshall will get the results to the Board at a later time.
We then went into Branch goals:
Aquatics: After hitting some of the highlights of the previous year, Ray listed goals for the upcoming year.
- Increase awareness and interest.
- Continue the Lifeguard competition.
- Continue the pool manager workshop and revisit the workshop to include front line staff.
- Revisit survey to include salary and programming
- Have a presenter at the conference.
Ray did mention that Ron Koch is the Vice Chair this year.
Ethnic Minority: Clarissa listed goals for the upcoming year.
1.Continue to build relationship with Benedict.
2.Put together a pamphlet or newsletter to advertise the branch.
3.Work on communication within the branch.
4.Reach out to private organizations to recruit memberships.
5.Workshop on Customer Service scheduled for Feb. 27th.
Parks: Don Shuman listed goals for the upcoming year.
1. Work with STMA at the joint conference. (Might use park and St. Andrews)
2. Nipsi offering ADA 3 hour workshop, maybe for conference pre or post.
3. Planning something Feb. 28th with Sports Turf Management in Rockhill
(Manchester Field).
Ann announced a 10 minute break.
Ann introduced Phil Macchia and Cheryl Hieslman to discuss the upcoming joint conference.
Phil passed out conference brochure and session proposal forms.
* He then went over conference at a glace.
* Discussed in length about session proposals. North Carolina has submitted about 25
session proposals, no session proposal has been received from South Carolina.
* Discussed sponsorship opportunities.
Phil attended NC state conference recently and reported to the board that the folks in NC are excited about coming to South Carolina next year. He would like to see the same enthusiasm with the folks here in South Carolina.
Meeting was adjourned at 5:00 pm.
Full Board Meeting: December 15th
In attendance: Tom O’Rourke, Kevin Walsh, Lisa Crochet, Joe Ross, Jim Headley, Jeremy Jiunnies, Jan Cox, Randy Woodard, Ray Dunham, Don Shuman, Glenn Parker, Marshall Johnson, Ann Cunningham, Clarissa Douglas, Willis Lee, Paul Wieters, and Buddy Jennings.
Ann called the meeting to order at 8:05 am.
First on the agenda was the VIP plan which was presented by Jimin powerpoint format.
Jim started with a time line of how the VIP plan came to be:
In 2004 the Board directed the marketing committee to come up with a slogan to
promote to the South Carolina Profession.
Invited Jane Adams to the 2005 Southern Leisure Management Trends Institute to give presentation on how California came up with a VIP plan.
Contracted with Clemson and Benedict to go around the state to identify our professions core values. Wanted something “non” California.
Visited district meetings and held sessions at the 2005 SC/NC Joint Conference to find out what we believe in as a profession and what do we want to convey as a profession.
After Clemson gathered feedback from around the state, finally came up with the core values and “Creating Communities through People, Parks, and Programs”.
Vision Task Force that was created began working on mission statements to support the vision and core values.
The whole idea of having a VIP plan is to have a marketing tool or communicate what we do as a professional.
The 2006 Board approved the mission statements.
Clemson went out and surveyed the association and county and city management association and came up with a list that was very comparable to the core values previously introduced by Clemson.
The Vision Task Force after receiving support from the membership and city/county management association is now ready to implement this program.
Met at Clemson with the Vision Task Force, 6 people representing different agencies, and Brian Wofford, Marketing Chair for SCRPA. These people met to decide what the next step would be in the VIP plan.
The thought was to train 8 to 10 folks, then those folks would go to agencies throughout the state and train staff. After discussing this idea it was rejected.
What we want to do is identify a good number of departments to fully integrate the entire process. Clemson would take these agencies through the whole vision process.
It is not the Vision Task Force idea that everyone would have the same vision statement.
Need to have mission statements talk about supporting economic development.
We have invited 16 agencies to come a January 10th meeting. It was decided that we want the Directors from those 16 agencies to come to this meeting, only the directors. The director could bring a staff member or city/county manager. This meeting will layout exactly what Clemson will do when they come to train the staff.
This in a nutshell is a timeline of the VIP Plan.
A member of the board wanted to know how the 16 agencies were selected. Jim explained that agencies selected were based on size, location, city vs. county vs. special purpose districts.
The agencies selected were: GreenvilleCounty, SpartanburgCounty, City of Greer, City of Newberry, CharlestonCounty, AikenCounty, City of Rock Hill, City of Aiken, FlorenceCounty, City of Myrtle Beach, Town of Cheraw, City of Anderson, SumterCounty, City of Chester, City of N. Augusta and City of Orangeburg.
It will probably take an agency a good year to really get this program rolling.
Clemson will be doing a website providing evaluation tools to be able to measure the program and its effectiveness. This website will also provide articles relating to Parks and Recreation as well as a place for agencies to post results.
Jim asked the Board if they had any question about the presentation. None where asked.
Ann addressed the Board wanting to know if the Board supported the program.
Jan responded by saying the implementation process seems confusing.
Ann explained that the training process should help determine how to implement the program.
Jeremy stressed that as a board member he supports this program, but without the directors input or support the plan would be pointless. Having the Jan. 10th meeting is important.
Tom added that the association has done a great job of providing the leadership to have us all understand that we better have a plan for the future because if you don’t your in trouble. Having said that, a good thing the association created is a do it yourself kit to hold all our hands through it. The association isn’t asking everyone to do it exactly the way they say. Every agency is different. The association has done a great job of listening to the members.
Glenn hopes that on the January 10th meeting, people aren’t asked if they want to do the VIP plan or not. He added that he hopes the directors are given the information, take it back to staff, and that there is buy in from everyone before agreeing to participate in the program.
Jim did agree with Glenn and mentioned that there will be a 1 to 2 hour meeting with the directors, then a 2 to 3 hour meetings back to the communities with Clemson, the director, and key staff. If at this point if there is buy in, a series of day long workshops will be implemented to all staff.
Kevin wanted to clarify his position as many people know that he has been a critic of the plan, mostly because he didn’t want to see California plans implemented.
He explained that St. Andrew’s has been doing visioning for about 5 years and will not be adopting the VIP Plan. St. Andrew’s already has a vision and it is different. With that being said, he understands as an association what they are trying to do and as a Board member supports the vision.
Ann stressed the importance of standing behind the vision. She asked for any other comments or questions.
Jim invited the Board to attend the January 10th meeting if interested.
There were no other comments.
Ann then invited Buddy Jennings to the floor to discuss legislative issues.
Buddy explained that he tries to be the eyes and ears in the general assembly, raise the bar, and let folks know what we are all about.
Buddy discussed how a lot of legislative business is done in the summer and fall. He has spent a lot of time doing what ever it takes to spend time with members of the general assembly, building relationships.
From the November elections, we acquired 18 new house members. On December 5th and 6th the House had a re-organizational session. He will get us the information at a later date.
Buddy attended a Speakers’ retreat in Charleston on December 8th and 9th, he was the only Lobbyist attending with full access to the Speaker and all of the Chairs.
Buddy then listed the issues that he sees in the session this year:
They have more money – will be starting the year with 400 million dollars more then last year. They will have money to spend.
Immigration – Farmer Bureaus and Contract Association depend on that labor force, but the assembly will pass some kind of Immigration Bill because it is getting hundreds of calls on the burden on schools, hospitals, etc.
Restructuring – there will probably be sometime of restructuring. There has not been a restructure since Carroll Campbell.
Insurance – for people living close to the coast. They are having a challenge insuring their property because the federal regulators told the insurance companies that they have to be able to cover multiple events. As a result, a lot of insurance companies are canceling policies. May have impact on the economy.
Gangs – there will probably be a lot of discussions on gangs and gang related activities.
Cigarette Tax – The governor is calling for a 30 cent tax increase. Previously he called for the nationally 93 cent tax and no one paid attention. Buddy still believes there will be a tax increase with 80% of the population saying they don’t have problem with the increase.
Ann thanked Buddy for his presentation.
Ann asked the Board to look over the Legislative Platform and asked for any questions.
Glenn had a question about the last sentence in the Capital Development regarding the support of the 93 cent increase. He proposed to word it as such: “That only one we would support.” After much discussion Jim suggested it say “If there is an increase in the cigarette tax that a portion of that be dedicated to the PARD Program”.
Glenn made a motion to pass the 2007-2008 Legislative Platform
There was a second by Paul
A vote was made by the Board, and the Platform passed with no opposition.
The next item that needed voting on was the Cigarette Tax Strategy Group. The Board was asked to review the resolution. Jim listed all the other organizations that a participating in this strategy group: March of Dimes, American Cancer Society, American Heart Association, South Carolina Tobacco Collaborative, and American Lung Association.
After a brief discussion a motion was made by Paul to join the Cigarette Tax Strategy Groupand a second by Tom
A vote was made by the Board to join the Cigarette Tax Strategy Group, and passed with no opposition.
Ann announced a 10 minute break.
Ann presented the next item on the agenda: The certification process.
Jim reported the NRPA would like for SCRPA to take a look at our current certification process and make some changes. We have been asked to stop doing the following: the interview process, asking for a statement of professional goals, and requesting 2 letters of reference. This is not part of the National certification program.
This item was tabled and will be discussed and voted on at the December 10, 2007 Board Meeting.
There was a brief discussion about our orientation program that is presented at the annual conference. The program is in need of attention. A motion was made that a new member orientation process be implemented. It was seconded. The Board voted and passed the motion with no opposition. Paul with the help of Glenn will present the Board at the December 10th meeting with a plan on how the new orientation process will be conducted.
Last on the agenda was a SCRPA Board Action Form regarding the 2008 SCRPA 63rd Annual Conference site proposal.
Jim went over the four sites on the proposal and gave his recommendation for the Hyatt Greenville.
Kevin was concerned that the last time we were in Greenville the Association financially did not do well. Jim commented that it was more likely an economic impact of Sept. 11th.
Paul brought up that statewide public schools will be opening the week of Aug. 22nd – 26th(date of proposed conference). He also brought up that it is during this time that staff may go on leave having worked a long summer. Because of this, he feels that this week may not be good for the association in regards to the conference.
Jim stated that the dates were chosen based on affordable rates. There was a brief discussion about how the timing may not be right for many people.
Jan suggested recommending The Embassy instead of the Hyatt based on the free breakfast and Exhibit booth being comped.
The Board decided to stay with the Aug. 22nd – 26th date. A motion was made to have the 2008 Annual conference at the Embassy Suites Greenville. There was a second. The Board voted and passed with no opposition or discussion.
Meeting adjourned at 11:13 a.m.