Kerry Goldmeyer called the meeting to order at 10:08 AM on December 11, 1999 in the Meeting room of the Loudoun County Offices of Virginia Cooperative Extension. All those present introduced themselves.

Andrew Gerachis welcomed us to Loudoun County

Committee Chairs: Membership (Pat Reilly). Education (Bud and Fran Gregory), State Fair Committee (Evelyn Parker), VMGA Report (Mike Feris).

Unit Representatives: Mike Feris (Chesapeake), Gary Bill (Newport News), Sybil Przypek (York), Karen Sacasky (Lynchburg, Amherst and Campbell), Lenore Plissner (Fauquier), Sydney Self (Bedford), Ailene Bartlett (James City County, and city of Williamsburg), Tom Geer (Prince George County), Pat Reilly (Prince William), Tom Park (Rockingham and Augusta), Phyllis Bayer (Norfolk), Ann Gorrell (King George, Caroline, Stafford, Spotsylvania, and city of Fredericksburg), Valerie J. Dagley, Barbara McKee (Loudoun County), Kathy Heslip (Arlington and city of Alexandria), Jack Slapcinsky (Fairfax), Fran Gregory (Page, Warren, Shenandoah and Clarke), Ed Tyner (Culpeper, Orange, Madison and Rappahannock), Evelyn Parker (Hanover).

VCE Representative: Diane Relf, Ph.D.

Tom Geer pointed out that I had misinterpreted his wording. Let the sentence read – " Tom Geer commented that even in the military, which is probably the most demanding force for uniformity that you might expect, there is still a recognition that individuality is important and they allow for different units to have distinctive insignia."

Also the date of our next meeting with Dave Barrett is scheduled for February 11, 20-00 not the 13^th as previously stated in the minutes. Susie McCrea reported that her name was misspelled throughout.

The minutes were approved as corrected.

Gary Bill distributed a treasurer’s report. It indicated that our assets totaled $13,499.50 as pf November 30, 1999. We have no large outstanding debts. Our contribution from the Richmond VNLA ($500) was received, and is not reflected in the totals on the report since it came in after the report was finalized. Our income is at 60% of expected revenue, while our expenditures are slightly less. The report was accepted as delivered.

Education: The next Continuing Education event is the Professional Horticulture Conference of Virginia January 24-27, 2000. The Program is available by telephoning (757) 523-4734 or on the Internet at www.phcv.org. The conference registration is $65 until January 8 th, after that the registration is $80.00.

Pat Reilly has arranged a conference hotel rate with a hospitality area. The rooms are available for $ 47.00 per room with no additional charge for extra folks in the room. If we get 25 rooms the hospitality room will be free. All the rooms are ocean view, and there is onsite parking. Rooms must be booked by Jan 15^th to get that rate. Call The Howard Johnson South 1801 Atlantic Ave 1(800) 258-1878.

Coming up in March is at Sandy’s Plants in Mechanicsville March. The program will introduce the newest cultivars, and discuss the perennials that are available at Sandy’s Plants. There will be a 10% discount for plants purchased at the event. May’s program is the 6^th of May. There are several speakers lined up dealing with hydroponics among other topics.

Diane Relf offered that she would be a repository for any announcements, and distribute them to all the Units using the MG List Server. She also announced that there would be a Southeastern MG Conference In Atlanta this year, and that she would post details on the MG List Server.

Pat Reilly reported that the membership as of this morning is 384. She has given many of the Unit representatives a list of the VMGA members in their units, as well as those who failed to re-register for this year. She has applications to distribute to each of the units so that they can recruit during their training this winter and spring. The number of those who failed to re-register is actually quite small in most units, but she asked that the Unit Representatives survey those non-renewals as well as recruit new members.

The question of whether VMGA applications could be sent out using the "franking" privilege was discussed. Diane Relf clarified that it is not proper to sell things using the franking privilege. Therefore the best approach might be to include the application (without expressing the amount of the dues) and ask that those who are interested fill out the application and someone will contact them with the details.

A discussion ensued about how we could get people to join– "what’s in it for them?" Tom Geer mentioned that his Unit has an incentive where whoever has the most volunteer hours will be awarded a $20.00 scholarship for education opportunities. Diane Relf pointed out that in a recent communication from the Association of Association Presidents that there is a trend away from recruiting by using "in-the-pocket" benefits. Instead the trend is towards recruiting so that members can feel like they belong and can help to make a change. She pointed out, as an example, that we could be proud of the fact that the Pest Management Guides (PMGs) are now being renovated largely because of the constant input into Tech about how difficult to use the PMGs were.

Kerry asked if there was someone at Tech who could help with recruiting and/or writing a brochure. Diane Relf said that there was no one there with the time to do this, and it might not be the best to have that type of information come from her office anyway. Pat Reilly went on to say that she feels a brochure is in order, and it is her committee’s charge to do one. She feels that the meetings with VCE Leadership, and changes facilitated by VMGA Inc. are good selling points, but she needs a graphic arts person to help to make a slick publication from the ideas and words that we already have.

Mike Feris reported that his computer has recently died, and that he hopes that he will have the VMGA Report out by Wednesday.

He and Mary get most of the local association newsletters, but many of them arrive in poor condition. Many are shredded since they are stapled at the bottom, and hang up in the letter sorters employed at the US Post Office. Some of the units, Franklin County is one, have still not updated their mailing lists since Alice Nicolson was the VMGA Report Editor. She still gets the newsletter from the Franklin County MGs and Mike doesn’t.

Mike will look into getting groups discount from Barnes and Noble.

He offered to process any local association’s mailing list to certify it for bulk mailing as a service of VMGA, Inc. This would help a local association utilize the lower postage rates available to non-profit organizations through bulk mailing, and they would not need to buy the program. If your unit has a 150-piece mailing, it is eligible for a non-profit, bar-coded label bulk rate of $0.19 per piece.

Evelyn Parker submitted a report through Mike Feris, congratulating the VMGA members for making the State Fair a success. There were 124 volunteers who volunteered 974 hours. At a rate equivalent to $6.25 per hour we saved the taxpayers over $6,000 while educating the public and helping to beautify the state. The cost to the VMGA was $31.00 but netted a donation of $500.00 from the Richmond-based VNLA. The next State Fair will be at the State Fair Grounds. After that, the site for the fair is not known.

Unit Support: No report was submitted

The committee has decided that they need some input from the general membership, and will submit a questionnaire to the membership through the VMGA Report for distribution. The top questions being asked are: "what do you want from the VMGA," and "what do you want VMGA to be."

Diane Relf reported:

1.) The State Extension MG Coordinator position has had a job description defined, and the position will be advertised the first of January. They are not looking for a horticulturist but a manager, communicator, and leader with some interest and familiarity with horticulture. The person will not be required to be a MG since that unnecessarily limits the field of potential candidates.

2.) "The Virginia MG Handbook" is being revised by Mary Predney and others, and will go to press on Monday. It is 650 pages long not including the index, glossary, and the several pages of color plates dealing with disease. These sections will be printed separately. New items include the addition of study questions at the end of several chapters to cause the reader to reflect on what they have just read. Another difference is that the printing costs are slightly higher, so the books will be "print on demand" - that is, the book is now in electronic form, and copies will be printed when they are ordered. One of the advantages of this system is that any changes or errors that are identified can be fixed with little difficulty. She is looking into what type of lower price can be offered for MGs to upgrade to the new book. She hopes to make it lower, but that depends on several things over which she has no control. Mary Ann Hansen is working on diseases of ornamentals as a diagnostic chapter for addition to the MG Handbook. She will add 2 pages per year (this year ornamentals next year, vegetables) and add these new pages every year as the color plates for the MG Handbook mentioned above. These color plates must be printed in bulk, and therefore are not part of the print on demand process mentioned above.

She anticipates that she will be able to find a way to provide each unit having a MG program with a copy of the new handbook, gratis.

3.) New "MG Coordinator’s Handbook". Sheri Dorn has been kept on in a consulting basis, and will finish the new Coordinator’s Handbook, which will be available in the end of January.

4.) The reporting system They are working on making the system less of a burden, while still indicating the educational need for activities that will be reported as volunteers hours. There are some items that may not be needed in all localities, so they are working on these things now. Phase three of the reporting system development is beginning now, so the system may take another year to become fully functional. It is working now, and those that use it are going to be able to use it to generate reports from the DB.

5.)The MG List server It may be good to promote the MG list server with the unit members and the local associations. Some folks have reported problems getting signed up for the list server. VMGA, Inc. will put directions about how to subscribe to the list server on the VMGA Web Page. Currently, there are only about 200-250 MGs subscribed (of the over 3500 MGs eligible), so talk it up so we can get a user base for the list server.

7.) Meeting with VCE Leadership: Dr. Wright will be stepping down as Horticulture Dept. chair and returning to research. Dave Barrett and Steve Umberger are still there and our meetings with them will help keep the VMGA and MGs in their list of priorities. Issues that were brought up in VMGA leadership's recent meetings with Dave Barrett, Steve Umberger and Robert Wright, will be brought up in a meeting in February between Umberger and the agents. These issues include seeing what types of materials the agents need regarding MGs, as well as programming information. In other words not just technical information, but systematic and programming information – how you can implement the information, predict need for the program, and evaluate the impact of the program’s implementation.

8.) MG College: will be held 21-25 June. It will be held at VA Tech. And Diane is open to suggestions regarding course content.

By-Laws Changes: A motion was made and passed to submit the By-laws changes that were approved at the October Bimonthly Meeting to the general membership for their approval at the General Meeting in June.

Web Site: We have a new web address staring soon. The Webmaster at this time is the Secretary, Frank Reilly. He is looking for volunteers to help write some of the pages.

Nominations And Audit Committee: Kerry asked for volunteers to serve on the nominations and audit committee. The audit committee must visit with the books for a few hours immediately prior to the annual meeting in Blacksburg at MG College in June. The nominations committee must prepare a slate of candidates to submit to the board for approval. That requires that they be done before the April meeting of the board. Representatives should look to their unit for suggestions as to membership on these committees or as candidates for office.

Long Range Planning Committee: By-laws require that we have no less than 4 board meetings per year. Is there any interest in deleting the December board meeting? It was moved to delete the December meeting. Discussion ensued, a vote was taken, and the motion failed. It was pointed out that the President could always cancel the meeting at her/his discretion.

Next Meeting: The Next VMGA Meeting is February the 12^th in Chesterfield County Central Library. Directions will be posted on the web page.

VMGA Banner: The VMGA Banner that has been used at the State Fair needs to be replaced. We do have a VMGA flag that will be available from the Gregorys. Diane Relf pointed out that we needed a VCE MG banner as well. The consensus was that if we need a banner of Virginia Master Gardeners in addition to our own VMGA Banner, then Tech should provide it.

Additional Training Opportunities: Andrew Gerachis gave out a list of other training opportunities including the Turf Ecology Course at Tech, The VNLA Turf meeting in Richmond and offerings from The State Arboretum and The Smithsonian Institution.

There are several advanced MG training programs ready or near ready. The Urban Tree Steward, the Water Quality Steward, and planned (pending grant money) community gardening, and school gardening.

MG College suggestions: A number of suggestions were made to Dr. Relf about proposed topics for MG College:

The Meeting was adjourned at 1:55 PM.

Respectfully Submitted

Frank Reilly,

Secretary, VMGA, Inc.