September 20, 2005

Davis Community Network (DCN)
DRAFT UNTIL APPROVED

A duly called regular meeting of the
Board of the Davis Community Network was held
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
at the City of Davis Training Room
600 A Street.

8 members present: Tony Bernhard, Tsui Chang, Jim Frame,
Rick Guidara, Anne Hance, Steve McMahon, Jan Meizel,
Kimball Sargeant, also Exec. Dir. Richard Lowenberg.
Absent: John Jones, Robert Nickerson, Tom Stanionis,
Richard Yamagata;
and Richard Reid on-leave.

1. Called to order at 5:17:00 pm by President Kimball
Sargeant
2. Agenda approved as distributed
3. No public comment
4. Minutes of June 21 Board Meeting approved by consensus
with deletion of the last sentence in item 5 of the draft
circulated by e-mail.

5. CMC, cable franchise updates, Steve McMahon:
A 5 year process overseen by the Telecommunications
Task Force ended in August when the City Council signed the
resulting 13 year franchise contract with Comcast. As the Task
Force completed its assignment it recommended that it should
be replaced with an official Telecommunications City
Commission.

6. Annual Report, Richard Lowenberg.
We reviewed the Draft 2004-05 Annual report sent out
to the Board as a pdf. Board members were asked to email
Richard Lowenberg with any corrections or additions. The
report will be addressed as necessary by the Executive
Committee and then will come back before the Board at the
next meeting on October 18. Some discussion centered around
the financial part of the report. Steve made a motion, seconded
by Jim but later withdrawn, concerning sources of income and
strategies to deal with times when cash flow is particularly
slow. The motion was superseded by a general consensus that
Richard Lowenberg should focus on exploring options with the
Yolo Elections Office for renewal of the 2004-05 MOU for
2005-06 and the timing of resulting MOU payments.
Simultaneously, Richard should inquire of the City if the
DCN/City MOU payment might be paid early to compensate
for the anticipated Elections office income. Also of interest is
the possibility of the resurrection of a line of credit that was
negotiated with the City several years ago but not used.
The Board agreed that new sources of income are needed and
that this needs to be the subject of some strategic planning. As
the discussion wound up Steve suggested some layout changes
involving the separation of subscriber Income and bandwidth
costs, and the inclusion of anticipated income from an
Elections Office MOU.

7. This item was covered to a certain extent in item 6 and was
not addressed separately.

8. Board member donations. Kimball asked members to make
their donations at the end of the meeting.

9. DCTV Sponsored Project, Steve McMahon and Anne
Hance:
DCTV's radio arm, KDRT, has been approved by the
RAC the use of a Plone site on the DCN server Crank along
with 3 Mailman Lists and a DCN Calendar.
DCTV (piloting with KDRT) would like to work with
DCN to develop a unified digital community based on DCN's
Plone application software. This could eventually encompass
all of DCTV's current and future internet-based applications
(web site, listservs, calendar, programmer pages and blogs, rich
media storage and delivery, and more.
The Plone site to be set up for KDRT initially will be
set up by Steve McMahon but customized by Scott
Alumbaugh with Steve's oversight.

The issue of DCN/DCTC combining some
administrative functions was discussed briefly. Several reasons
for considering this issue were expressed. a) The slight
possibility that some time and cost savings might result, b)
cooperation between the two entities takes a small step in the
direction of media convergence, c) in the event that either
organization becomes more fragile any mutual support should
be an advantage. The Executive Committee will continue this
discussion.

10. Committee Reports:
RAC: Anne reported on a mini project application from
two Davis residents who are starting a new "Military Families
Speak Out" regional organization in opposition to the Iraq war.
Board members encouraged the RAC to warn the group that if
it takes off and becomes really large it will need to become
independent of RAC awarded resources. Anne note that
groups are routinely told that their RAC resources and Web
Team help are meant to launch them on to bigger things.
However, many mini projects remain 'mini' and do continue to
use the free resources indefinitely.

Web Team: Steve reported that Crank, the new Sun
server, is now up and running with Zope applications installed
and functioning (including the Community Calendar.) A
Simple Site class last Thursday was well attended and a
Mailman Class to be held this coming Thursday is
oversubscribed.

Director's Report: Richard reported that DCN and
DCTV are inviting political candidates to a meeting at which
the various resources available to them via DCN, DCTV and
KDRT will be explained.
Richard emphasized that strategic planning for a stable
financial future is essential as an ongoing responsibility for the
Board of any nonprofit. DCN is now due for such planning
which has not happened for more than a year.

11. Announcements:
Jan reported that some DHS teachers would like Simple
Sites and could DCN arrange training for them. It was agreed
that this is great and yes, DCN can train.
Anne will not be at the October 18 Board meeting. Jan
will take minutes.

12. Meeting adjourned at 6:42 pm.

Submitted by Anne Hance, Secretary