IMA Lincoln Trail Regional Council - Meeting Minutes

April 20, 2002

President Bill Holland called the meeting to order at 10:05 a.m.

Secretary’s Report: Teresa Hattabaugh
Minutes from the March 2, 2002 LTRC meeting were submitted.  Motion made & passed to accept minutes as submitted.  Minutes will be placed on the website.

Treasurer’s Report: Brenda Engel
March 31, 2002 Treasurer’s Report and Budget/Actual statements presented.  Motion made and passed to accept statements as submitted.

Bills submitted for payment: $137.38 reimbursement for March 2 meeting, $59.85 ValueWeb invoice.  In addition, estimated expenses for the April 22^nd seminar were reviewed.  Approximately $2700 for speakers expenses (hotel, air fare), $160.59  for printing the seminar flyers, $479.50 for postage & addressing the flyers, and $352 for handout printing. Motion made and approved to pay bills and estimates as submitted.  Chuck Hartle to mail all bills to Brenda on Monday.

Invoices were e-mailed to Chapters on March 1 for the hospitality suite.

National VP’s Reports 
No updates to report. February reports just mailed from National.  March to be mailed shortly. Pedro Lopez mailed chapter standings this week. 

Regional Directors’ Reports

Indiana East: Last report 9^th place.  They are still experiencing problems with membership retention.  Final meeting (picnic) will be on May 15^th.  Several people to attend National conference, including 9 students.

Indianapolis: No report.

Fort Wayne: National wanted to know if Fort Wayne was still a Chapter.

Michiana: 20^th Place.  Chapter seems to be doing fine.  Will have to repeat presidents.

Northern Kentucky: February was student night and they gave away 2 scholarships.  Meeting at Argosy was well attended (about 40 people).  CMA review course is finishing up.  2^nd Place currently.

South Central Indiana: 3 students applied for our scholarship. Interviews today to finalize the winner of the scholarship.  57 in attendance at the March meeting.  The CFM course is underway.  Had about 15 register/12 attending.  A golf outing is scheduled for May 8^th, and a walk for Charity is scheduled for April 30^th.  South Central continues to have points reporting problems with National.  There are at least 2 months missing.  We would move up in standings, but the real issue is the President’s Award.  Next year’s president has a lot of energy and enthusiasm about IMA.

Blue Grass: 23^rd Place.  Talking about starting a student chapter.  President for next year is Nancy Folks again – her second full term.

Evansville: All day CPE session planned for April 27^th.  65 people attended last meeting, including 15 students.  They have 21 student members.  Scholarship fund raiser netted $1600.  CFM review course is going well.  Helping to get 2 student chapters going.  Board for next year is in place.  Things are going well for the Chapter.

Louisville:  2 hour CPE before meeting is really good – has good turnouts.  Usually have about 35 in attendance for the pre-meeting, dinner and after dinner technical session. Morning seminar on Enron scheduled for May 18^th.  Relay for Life in May.  All Board members seem to be very helpful in all aspects, help each other out.  In 27^th place currently.

Bloomington: 18^th place.  Haven’t claimed any of their CMA points.  Website is really good.  Newsletters emailed and meeting announcements emailed.  Good use of communication. 

North Central Indiana: They will be hosting a CMS in May.  Looking forward to being reinstated next year.

Wabash Valley: No report.

CHAPTERS NEED TO AUDIT REPORTS/POINTS FROM NATIONAL.  SEVERAL ISSUES WERE NOTED.

National Committee Reports
Poor communication from National was raised as an issue.  Brian will address things we need if we send to him.  Montvale had been communicating just with National VP’s, and assumed National VP’s were communicating to all Chapters.  Asked to expand e-mail list of people to include Chapters as well to improve communication.

Member Services. Rudy McCue gave an update on the new reimbursement program “Chapter Performance Program.”  He will have copies/information on this for the CMS sessions.  The model is the same as his fall presentation in Michiana except based on the National average for CPE’s.  Rudy got many of our comments from Michiana included in the final package.  Information on CPE’s – what qualifies and what doesn’t is included.  Information will be placed on the website soon.

Ethics.  Chuck Hartle reported that there are currently no big cases in front of the Ethics committee.  The meeting in Dallas was a general discussion.  The Enron case continues to be discussed.  National did not want to make a statement until all facts were in, but the committee wanted to make a statement.  Brian reported that Margaret Butler and Frank Minter were interviewed for an upcoming issue of “Biz Ed” – a publication for colleges and universities - on the impact Enron is having on accounting.  It will be a positive and pro-active statement and how to improve the situation for the future.

Governance.  The issue of the change in structure of the National VP’s continued to be debated.  Decided on the 2-year term, but many Councils cannot get 2-year commitments.  It would be easy if Paul agreed to another 2-year term.  If not, we will just be part of the Lottery to balance things out.  A final e-mail went out the past week to the Councils, asking them to respond within a week, then the Lottery will be conducted.  We need to tell Brian if the Council wants Paul to serve 2 years automatically or if we want the Lottery.

Committees will be left alone at this time.  The only change will be that Strategic Planning becomes a Standing Committee, and the MAC and FAR committees will be merged with Carl Smith as Chair.  Let dust settle on other changes before they would consider other committee changes.

Three options for our Council (for this year only): 

• Paul resign & we elect new person for 2-year term

•  Elect Paul for new 2-year term

•  Allow Paul to finish 2^nd year only, we’d  select someone next year for 2-year term

Results from Councils already – 6 want 1-year terms for their current VP, and 4 want 2-year terms for their current VP.

Students.  Ron Luther gave an update.  The 3^rd Annual Student Conference will be held on Friday/Saturday October 25^th/26 in St. Louis.  This is not a big outlay of cash for the students, since many of the costs are sponsored, and there is no conference fee.  Close by for our students. 

Finance.  Cathy Maness gave an update.  The committee has concerns on the upcoming fiscal year budget that the magazine revenues and membership levels are too optimistic.  Committee is asking that the Board revise the 2002-03 budget.  The committee has a big concern that there are no apparent contingency plans if actuals do not meet budget.  The committee also took a long look at the calculation/budget for investment income, and had a recommendation for a change to the calculation.  Finally, the Memorial Education Fund will remain co-mingled with the operations funds.  Cathy is pleased with the Committee work.    

IT.  No report.

SCMS. October SCMS Board meeting will be tacked onto the end of the SCMS conference.  Scholarship winner has been determined, not announced yet.

Accountants on Call: The Financial Executive of the Year from LTRC has been announced.  Thomas H. Outlaw, Controller and Secretary of Florin USA in Guthrie KY.  The award will be presented at the Evansville meeting on May 16^th.

Hospitality: There will be 3 councils present in our suite – North Central, the Carolinas and LTRC.  John is still looking for Corporate Sponsors and Treasure Chest donations.  The student rate for the suite is $10, member rate is $20.

CMS – Bob Smith reported that there will be 2 CMS sessions this year.  Taylor University will host on May 4^th and IUS in New Albany will host on May 11th.  Leadership training (1 hour CPE) and the competition changes will be reviewed at both sessions.  Bob & Teresa will be at both meetings, Cathy & Bob Benjamin will be at Taylor, and Rudy and Bill are planning to attend at IUS.

Communications: Alan Weber was approached by Robert Half about the potential for advertising on our website.  Alan gave them information and is waiting to hear back from them on if a banner on the website and the cost would be acceptable.

Students: LTRC had 2 nominations for our Student representative.  The committee selected Scott Gillum from USI as our Junior Student Representative.  Next year, there will be an application form for candidates to fill out.  They will also need 2 reference names for the committee to call.  The committee will also be promoting the St. Louis Student meeting in October – they will contact all of the Chapters.

Nominating Committee Report: Rudy has asked Bill Holland to be our SCMS representative next year.  Bill has agreed.  Tentative dates for the LTRC meetings next year are:

In regards to the National VP positions, the nominating committee made the motion that Paul Berrier serve his second year from 2002 to 2003, and Bob Smith serve a 2-year term from 2003 to 2005.  Motion seconded and passed.

LTRC must therefore request that LTRC be one of the 50% of the Councils who will have a National VP have a 1-year term from 2002 to 2003.  Bill Holland will submit that request on Monday.

Much discussion took place in regards to the By-Laws and the motion presented at the March 2, 2002 meeting.  Two motions were made and passed.  The first motion was to amend the motion presented on March 2^nd.  The amendments would be to delete Article VII, Section 3(c) and to amend Article VII, Section 5 to replace the word “an” with the words “the primary” before the word “alternate”.  The second motion was then to approve the amended March 2, 2002 motion.  Therefore, the By-laws were amended.

See Attachment B.  

The Nominating Committee then made a motion, which was seconded and approved, for the 2002-2003 LTRC Board of Directors.  The slate of officers was previously reported in the March 2 minutes, and there were no changes.

Education:  LTRC First Annual Professional Development Seminar has approximately 50 registrants.  Committee is projecting a breakeven or slight loss.   

Meeting adjourned at 2:10 p.m.

Attachment A

Members in Attendance

Attachment B

     ARTICLE VI - Permanent Committees
     Section 5:      In the event the National Vice President-Elect is unable to ascend to the role of
                           National Vice President the council nominating committee will select a  nominee
                           for National Vice President.

     Article VII     - Elective Officers
     Section 1:      (a) The elected officers of his Council shall be a President, President Elect, National
                                 Vice President, National Vice President-Elect, a Secretary and a Treasurer, all of
                                  whom shall be duly certified voting delegates.

                            (b) The President, President Elect, National Vice President, and National Vice
                                  President-Elect shall comprise the Council Office of CEO.         

     Section 3:  (a) The officers, excluding the National Vice President and National Vice President
                             elect, set forth in this article shall be elected by a majority of votes of the
                             delegates present at any regular or special meeting of this Council provided notice
                             of such election is included in the notice of such meeting.  Officers shall take office
                             on July 1 following their election and shall serve for one (1) year until their
                             successors have been duly elected and qualified.  An officer may serve for no more
                             than two (2) consecutive terms in the same office. The slate of officers shall be
                             presented at the Third council meeting and elected at the fourth Council meeting.

(b)     The officers of National Vice President and National Vice President – Elect shall be elected by a majority of votes of the delegates present at any regular or special meeting of the council provided notice is included in the notice of such meeting.  Officers shall take office on July 1 following the election and shall serve for two (2) years until their successors have been duly elected and qualified.  These officers may serve for no more than one (1) term in either office.             

      Section 4:       In the case of a vacancy for any cause in the Officer of the President, the President-
                             Elect will serve in that capacity until the Nominating Committee has selected a
                             replacement for the unexpired term of the President and that person has been duly
                             elected by the Council.  Likewise, should a vacancy for any cause occur in the office
                             of  President Elect, National VP , National VP-Elect, the Secretary or Treasurer, the
                             Nominating Committee shall select a replacement for the unexpired term of that
                             position and that person shall be elected by the Council.

Article VIII - Duties of Elected Officers

 Section 4:       The National Vice President shall serve on the National Board of Directors and
                       shall oversee the Regional Directors and coordinate the Chapter development and
                       Corporate and Academic Development activities and assist with National banner
                        presentations.

       Section 5:        The National Vice President-Elect shall serve as an alternate on the National Board
                              of Directors and shall Chair the Nominating Committee and coordinate the Council
                              involvement with special Chapter activities and assist with Chapter banner
                              presentations.