The SSCC board met on March 23, 2017.  Ten board members and three guests were in attendance.

Committee Chair Reports:

Treasurer – Bruce Schaefer reported that we are projected to have $252 more income than expenses this year and there is $3,450 in the bank account.
Cable Release – Dennis Freeman gave a call for entries/articles. He will take submissions until next week.
Main Topics for Discussion:

Website – The sale of objects by establishing a SSCC Market Listings to offer used equipment, etc. for sale was discussed. Mark Paster wrote up a page of ideas for consideration.
Michael brought up that our bylaws state we can sell items in this way, and Bob Catlett noted that we have held auctions in the past. It was suggested that the seller should be encouraged to leave a donation to the club after a sale.  The market should be available only to paid membership to list, but available to anyone for purchase. Mark will write a disclaimer for the section stating the club is not responsible for the listing and all sales are between the seller and buyer.  He will send the disclaimer to the board for review.
Year-End Event – There was a straw vote and the event will take place at the Silver Spring United Methodist Church in our meeting space, and it will be potluck. There will not need to be an admission fee because we are not renting another space.   Renee will be collecting door prizes and composing notices for the Cable Release and email blasts.  David will print the awards and bring them to the event.  Bruce volunteered to pick up any prints left from non-attendees and lock them up in our storage space.  Catherine will collect the raffle money. We have a judge, and the awards are in process.   Stephanie will pick up the images for the year-end competition.  David Blass and Stephanie are working together to organize all year-end tasks.
Carl Brandt Retrospective – Michael was approached by a representative of Carl’s family on helping to sell some of his vast collection of prints to help with his care. After discussion, it was determined that our role should be to advertise any event to sell his prints, but not to take on the effort to coordinate and conduct the sale.
Maryland Photographic Alliance – Michael attended a meeting of this new group that was developed to help pool resources of multiple photo clubs in Maryland. Michael will continue to attend and explore the opportunities such as sources for judges, speakers and inter-club competitions.
Nominations and Selections Committee – It was discussed that a slate of candidates for the officers must be offered in an April meeting and voted on in a May meeting. Bruce has volunteered to head the committee to look for candidates. He would like two other people to help with this and will compose an email blast to call for nominations.
Ideas for the Future

• It was suggested we ask a lawyer whether we need liability insurance. It was decided that, for a start, we would update our sign-up sheets for field trips and our Meetup site to use the same disclaimer as in the membership form.
• Speaker and Judge compensation was reviewed.  It was discussed not to bring up compensation unless they asked, and we that call it an ‘honorarium’.  It was decided to continue offering an honorarium as we do now.  Nothing was changed.
• It was brought up that we could have a monthly survey of the membership to review the judges and speakers so as to have empirical data to help decide to whether use a particular judge or speaker in the future.  We could share this information with other clubs to help make future selections.
• The Return on Investment for our PSA membership was discussed, and it was felt it led to credibility in the annual fees.