Home OSCA Document Archive Reports Board Meeting Reports 2009-01-20

Board Meeting Reports 2009-01-20

Monday, 19 January 2009 23:00 By Deirdre McQuillan
E-mail Print

Membership Committee Report

Submitted by David Law

Hello Board members

I am happy to report that Deirdre and I have agreed upon a strategy. Mr. Jenkin is in agreement with this approach.

The Board's approval is required. A draft Motion is attached.

however....due to the OSCAR filing deadline, I need approval in principle from a majority of the Board now.

I would prefer to hear "aye" from as many people as possible, right away. But if I don't, I am going to take your silence as consent.

So if you object, my friends, please let us know asap. Many thanks

DKL

1 OSCA Membership Lists
The most current OSCA Membership list dates from 2006. It lists approximately 800 households. We propose to "grandfather" these.
In addition, since 2006 a small number of persons have signed-up as members; they too would be grandfathered;
In 2008, a handful of people registered in response to the OSCA ad;
In 2009 so far, 4 people have registered as members through the OSCA website.
Deirdre is creating a list of post-2006 members, which will be merged with the 2006 list.
That produces and "old and new" member list likely exceeding 1000 people.
2 Contacting members
I will put an article and ad in the OSCAR, advising that persons registered in 2006 or later will be recognized as members, unless they choose otherwise.
A part-time staff person (student) will be engaged this month to call every member, to advise them (a) that they are being treated as members, unless they choose otherwise (b) that they will be welcome at the May 2009 AGM and (c) that we need an email address for them, and to confirm their consent to receive OSCA-related communications.
The staffer will provide updates for the excel spreadsheet list, where he/she gets that info
The staffer can create an email list for us, and then send out an email to everyone confirming their status and willingness to receive OSCA
I will provide a script to the phone caller.
This effort can actually go on for some time, so we should be able to work through the whole list well before May. Deirdre will vet the results, removing people who have moved away that she's aware of, etc.
3 Recruiting new members
The website should feature a single green button, called "Become a Member of OSCA" that will send the person directly to our e-register site. There they complete a short form.
That e-register spot produces a current list of new members, which is then manually entered-into the excel spreadsheet membership list on Deirdre's computer. this goes on forever
Our OSCAR ad and article in February remind people they can join, etc
We will frequently repeat the membership reminder in the OSCAR
We should post signs / equip people at events to register new members also (not discussed with Deirdre, but I assume she has no objections)
We should "joint venture" with Mayfair, etc, to promote membership
4. Budget
We will need a budget ($500 + for the phone calls, and an unknown amount for the green button - Deirdre is looking into that piece).
Mary Anne has not asked me to pay for the ad, etc in the OSCAR, and I presume she won't. If she does, we will have to discuss that.

Deirdre and I think this is enough effort to prompt people to join; putting something into the course registration form, online, will probably not work because people will bypass it while signing-up for nude pottery, or whatever they want to take.

This strategy will mean that we have an active member list, likely of about 1,000 people, eligible to participate in the May AGM. God knows what we'll do if they all show up, of course.

 

Web/IT Committee Report, part I

Submitted by John Calvert

The web/it cmt report this month is in two parts, first in this email is a proposal for managing the website content, to keep it fresh. The report second part will follow in a separate email.

I've gone through all the main sections of our website and identified which board or other position seems most suited to be responsible for that content. In one case I've invented a communications cmt, and in another case I'm potentially implicating an external group, the Old Ottawa South Business Association in relation to the "Local Businesses" section. This is a draft, so please provide input to improve it before consideration at Tuesday's meeting. Any time-varying content that no one wants to be responsible for, I recommend be removed. Static content can remain even if no one takes ownership.

This proposal does not address reorganizing the content, strictly who is responsible for the content. Site reorg will be addressed later this winter as part of a proposal to adopt a new content management system. Details in the second part report.

Note: page name means just that page and not its children; vertical bar | represents a child page; star * represents all child pages within a section

Website content ownership

Secretary
- OSCA Board & Subcommittees
- OSCA Board & Subcommittees | OSCA Board | *
- OSCA Board & Subcommittees | OSCA Board Committees

All cmt chairs, as applicable
- What's Hot
- OSCA Board & Subcommittees | OSCA Board Committees | *
- Discussion Forums | *

Communications cmt
- Related Links
- Community Services | *
- History & People | Community Projects
- History & People | Your Government Representatives
- History & People | General & Tourist Information
- overall site look and feel, graphics

OSWATCH cmt
- History & People | Land Use & Zoning

Program cmt
- Program Information & Registration | *

Web/IT cmt
- Site Map
- Help
- Search
- Discussion Forums
- content management system
- event submission | list events, add/edit event
- members administration | become a member, member profile

BTW, discussion forums has 39 users registered of which 5 board, 1 ED, 8 cmt members

Executive Director
- Contact Us

OSCAR Managing Editor
- The OSCAR | *

OSHP or board rep
- History & People | Out Heritage
- History & People | Our Urban Environment
- History & People | History Project

Residents / Board / Staff
- Upcoming Events

TBD: Communication cmt or OSCA Board Business rep or Old Ottawa South Business Association
- Local Businesses | *

 

Web/IT Committee Report, part II

Submitted by John Calvert

 

  1. website revamp

  2. program guide / ereg

  3. budget

  4. website & other IT services as part of communications plan

  5. maintenance

1) Website revamp

a) Refresh content

- determine ownership for content, see prior email, board motion

- set a timeframe for review of content - 2 or 3 weeks?

- webmaster to implement revisions as provided by content owners

- remove dead content: not claimed, incorrect, or out of date

Timeline
- mid-Feb - target completion

b) New content management system
Gather functional and technical requirements
- fact finding with other groups, online
- spoke with Friends of the City of Ottawa Archives, Heritage Ottawa, both of whom have adopted Drupal as their CMS
- still need to check other community associations, Glebe, OOE
- using www.cmsmatrix.com
- discussions with one or two possible vendors
- board/staff/volunteer input required

Timeline
- end-Jan - circulate draft requirements for comment, input
- mid-Feb - ready for mini-RFP
- mid-Mar - consultant in place
- mid-Apr - go live with new site

Are there any dependencies with other OSCA operations, Firehall programming?

2) Program guide / ereg
Gather requirements and technical parameters to better integrate program guide & ereg
- held initial netmeeting with service provider (Scott Cuff, Interware Systems, Toronto)
- new session snafu in December with website link to ereg, resulted in 25 minute delay in go live
- need to better document go live parameters for web/IT volunteers (webmaster)

Timeline
- depends on requirements
- minor tweaks by service provider free of charge at any time

3) Budget
- have done preliminary fact finding, require further info to finalize
- have created preliminary list of assets (hardware, software, service fees & contracts), require further refinement

4) Website & other IT services as part of communications plan
Impact
- we don't have a clear measure of website usage, ISP provides reports but these don't filter out web/IT cmt & Board members & staff
- we don't have a clear idea of residents' communication preferences: letter, The OSCAR, email, website, discussion forums, etc
This info would inform priorities for time/$ to spend and invest in these various media

Content submission
- events are posted regularly (daily/weekly) by residents, board members, staff
- board agendas, minutes and reports are posted monthly by JMC
- special events are posted as needed by webmaster
- special projects are posted as needed by webmaster

Usage of online discussion forums is low. We are holding off on widely publicizing them as in their current form they are a temporary measure until the website revamp is complete.

5) Maintenance
On an as needs basis
- ISP Primus has requested OOS homepage logo to acknowledge free web hosting, we are investigating this
- Google indexing file - not yet implemented
- menu fixes, some made - a few outstanding
- events weekly mailout year end glitch - suspected bug, not worth fixing
- forums spam - only one incident so far, spammer account was deleted, moderator will continue to monitor situation, if necessary in future will require moderator approval for new registrations
- events weekly mailout duplicates glitch - volunteer training
- mail list service was out of service in the fall - working again but we don't know why, will monitor

Big thank you to Chris Solar and Rob Burr who continue their excellent hard work in handling the technical details of the website, events weekly and custom mailouts and discussion forums.

 

Old Ottawa South River Run Proposal

Submitted by Larry Ostler

What Is It?

  • a road race within our neighbourhood

    • choose the distance … 2.5K, 5K and 10K … something for everyone

    • offers both competitive and participatory experiences

    • this is a fundraiser in support of the Firehall Renovation Project

Back to the future

- Ottawa South Neighbourhood Run … circa 1990 to 1994

When

  • Sunday, June 14th

    • on your mark, get set … go at 9:00 am


Where - start and finish at Brewer Park (in front of the arena)

The Race Route

    • north on Brewer Way to Hopewell

    • east on Hopewell to Grosvenor

    • south on Grosvenor to Cameron

    • east on Cameron to Wendover

    • south on Wendover to Warrington

    • along Warrington to Linda Thom Park

    • under Bank Street (via the underpass)

    • along the Rideau River pathway through Windsor Park

    • loop back at Rideau River Drive and Fentiman

    • and … back to Brewer Park


  • I’ll bring a map to the meeting

Current Status – working group has been formed to organize the Run

Next Steps - currently finalizing the “Application for Special Events” with the City

Future Steps - a lot of work to be done

  • Sponsorship and door prizes

  • Interface with the NCRA/Running Room, etc

  • Advertising and Promotion

  • T-shirt and logo design

  • Online Registration (utilizing the Program Registration process)

  • …. and more

Looking for - approval from the OSCA Board to proceed … with regular progress reporting back to the Board


Last Updated ( Saturday, 01 May 2010 22:37 )  

Events Calendar

<<  Feb 12  >>
 S  M  T  W  T  F  S 
     1  2  3  4
  5  6  7  8  91011
12131415161718
19202122232425
26272829   
Add an Event

Coming Events

Latest News