January 17, 2006

A duly called regular meeting of the
Board of the Davis Community Network was held
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
at the City of Davis Training Room
600 A Street.

8 Board members present: Tsui Chang, Jim Frame, Rick Guidara,
Anne Hance, John Jones, Steve McMahon, Jan Meizel, Kimball Sergeant,
also Exec. Dir. Richard Lowenberg.
Absent: Tony Bernhard, Robert Nickerson, Tom Stanionis, Richard Yamagata,

1. Called to order at 5:28:00 pm by President Kimball Sergeant
2. Agenda approved as distributed with correction of date of Minutes to be approved.
3. No public comment
4. Minutes of October 18, 2005 Board Meeting approved by consensus
5. Board member nominations:
Richard Lowenberg presented the slate on behalf of the Nominations Committee:
For new 2-year terms: Rick Guidara, John Jones, Jan Meizel,
Robert Nickerson, Tom Stanionis.
New candidate for a 2-year term: Vicki Suter.
Richard distributed the statement provided by Vicki giving her interest in
joining the Board.
Motion to approve the slate was made by Anne Hance and
seconded by Jim Frame. Motion passed unanimously.

6. Officer nominations were presented by Jim Frame:
For 1-year terms: Pres. Kimball Sergeant, V.P. Steve McMahon,
Sec. Anne Hance, Treas. Jim Frame.
Motion to approve the slate was made by Jan Meizel and
seconded by John Jones. Motion passed unanimously.

7. Update - DCN Financial Status.
Richard L. reported that at the end of 2005 DCN finances were suffering seriously due to the fact that 3 major sources of anticipated funding did not fully materialize. However, several occurrences in January have helped toward restoring stability:
a. The Yolo Elections Office MOU is signed and Richard has submitted the first invoice. The MOU is effective as of July 1, 2005 to cover work done during the past six months and runs through June 30, 2006. The annual amount is $20,000 for specific deliverables.
b. A Yolo Clerk and Recorders Office MOU should be negotiated in the next couple of months again for specific deliverables (some already performed) to a value of about $18,000.
c. A new agreement with Omsoft started on Jan 1, 2006 with a few changes from the previous agreement. The $2.00 per DCN dialup account continues as before but bandwidth payments are to be reduced.
Board members noted that DCN DSL accounts also use DCN human and material resources. Richard L. will talk this over with Omsoft.
d. Two personal, anonymous donations of $5,000 each (one already paid in to the bank) in addition to a donation from VME and one from a subscriber will help stabilize DCN's financial situation for now. All outstanding bills have now been paid and it should be possible to repay Richard Lowenberg's personal loan of $5,000 made at the end of 2005.

8. Cable Franchise funds status and DCTV/KDRT changes
a. There have recently been leadership changes at DCTV and there is currently an Interim Executive Director. No prospects for working with DCTV or KDRT are likely until the organization has settled on the direction it will to take into the future. The KDRT Plone website recently finalized is now in limbo since DCTV staff have been told not to spend time on it. This is most disappointing since volunteer time and resources worth several thousands of dollars were involved in its creation.
b. Cable franchise funds are currently being used according to previous formulas because the various parties have not yet met to decide on any new ones.

9. Fundraising and donations discussion.
Richard is working on a fundraising letter/article for DCNews and other outlets. Anne has created a donation form as a .PDF which is already on line.

10. Richard distributed a draft flyer for a proposed seminar/discussion tentatively called "New Internet Media Applications" leading to practical projects and classes/tutorials. The proposal was greeted with interest and enthusiasm.

11. Committee Reports:
RAC: Anne reported resources provided to Suicide Prevention, and Winters Participation Gallery. She explained that the stckphoto site was to be closed and recommended that people take a look at an interesting RAC project product at www.slatterscourt.org.

WebTeam: Steve reported the Plone Website created for KDRT.

Director's Report: Richard noted that he had two potential interns and asked for suggestions for projects. Updating the DCN Plone Website is a possibility.

12. Meeting adjourned at 6:37 pm.

Respectfully submitted by Anne Hance, Secretary