May 4th River Meeting Notes

Attendance: Vinny, Bart, Margery, Junior, Stan, Natasha, Ryan, Mel, Anthony

Trip reports:

• Ryan: Tune up trip – flow 4k(ish), rained.  some swims (Natasha had a great swim).  Kelly, Carol, Kurt damn fine dinner.  Shared costs.

• Ryan: Flat water:  Fantastic.  Wind calm, weather nice.

• Ryan: BT1 – adventure.  Changing flows. Raining.  No river and went to Quarry regional park and did on land river skills. 

• Bart & Junior: BT2 – day 1 was below troublemaker to current divider.  Day 2 Gorge.  Flip on Fowlers (channel river right upstream of fowlers).  A lot of energy spent on ferrying before getting to Fowlers.  Satan’s had another flip & swimmers were stuck in eddy fence.  A lot of paddles were lost.  Another flip below Satan’s at Haystacks.

• Bart & Junior: Beyond Basics: 1 day trip due to low turnout.  Ran Gorge no incidents.  Everyone wore drysuits. 

• Anthony: High water 1: Chicken TL.  Low turnout and used oar boats as “crew” to allow “guides” to practice guiding high water. Turned out good, no incidents. Good idea for future high water years to expose new class to river in early weekends

• Margery: High Water rowing training.  Gorge first day and Chili Bar second.  Oar boats only.  Reviewed high water skills.  Stern frame tower blew out and had to be rigged with straps. 

Project Life Raft

• Trip Leaders have $200 to use if they provide env education on trip.  Trip report will need to be explicit in explaining what was discussed in the education.  This will be reported back to PLR. 

•  All attendees received a flip chart that included games for env awareness.  Can be done in the boat, at camp, during lunch, during take out/shuttle time.  A lot of the trainings take 10 mins or less. 

• Learned about river systems, damns, reservoirs.

• Two attendees were fisherman and gave a lot of information about river fishing. 

• We are receiving 6 fishing rods for use on our trips to use at camp.  Need to be aware of participant age for fishing – 16 year age and under.  If 16 or older you need a California Fish and Game

• Funding was a one time deal for 2011. 

SOP Revision Proposal Discussion

• SOP Section 3 has two separate conflicting revisions proposed. 

o   Ryan’s Proposal:  1) waiting period for steering committee members so that we know what a quorum is.  This encourages commitment.  2) Changes mandatory members to chairs only and all others are subject to attendance requirements.  3) Attendance by telephone is acceptable.  4) Clarifies that trip leaders need to be active.

o   Juan’s Proposal: 1) includes two week waiting period.  2) Trip leaders are mandatory members and do not impact quorum.  There is a matrix to explain how this works.   3) Attendance by Skype is acceptable. 

• Straw pole – 6 votes support Ryan’s proposal, 1 vote for Juan’s proposal

ATA Application Jonathan Schmidt

• No quorum of steering committee to vote

Finance Update

• We still have money

• No substantial flow of money – low expenses so far

Fundraising

• Summer or Fall rafting trip

• Need to set the date after scheduling the next

Wilderness First Aid / Swiftwater schlolorship funds now available.

• Trip Leaders have first preference and all others are first come first serve to renew

• SWR - $100

• WFR - $100

• WFA - $50

Prepare for Upcoming Season

• What to do with class of 2011? Where do they fit? They are welcome to come as happy paddlers and should have training and guide experience as convenience allows (with discretion).  We have guaranteed them a spot on the 2012 training.  Chairs & Mentors should reach out to the trainees to follow up and gauge their interest. 

Open Floor

• Trip Leader meeting next Wednesday at the Yosemite room at the Sierra Club

Eddy Topics:

• Issue about non Trip Leaders, Non-Committee leaders being part of the Steering Committee.  Anyone can write a proposal to revise the SOPs. 

• Can initiate new position for “newbie” coordinator to become opt-in members on the steering committee

• Can we have an opportunity for entire membership of ICO to vote?

• We have low attendance that affects the quorum

Action items:

• Ryan to email Sully about California Fish and Game

• Figure out if Jared needs to be at the ICO fundraising? Anthony to have a date set by the third week of May

• Trip Leader meeting to discuss what do with class of 2011 trainees