Tuesday February 13th, 2024, 7:30pm

Mid America Freedom Band

Board Meeting Minutes

Tuesday February 13th, 7:30pm

Virtual

Attendees: BOARD MEMBERS:J.J. Pearse, Debbie Farrell, Nicholas McWilliams, Rose Rodriguez, Rameka Jennings, Nathan Brown, Joy Hope, Steven Irving, Christian Montes, Staff: Ian Bradt, Jessie Davis, Erin Trampel, Lee Hartman; Members: April Booth

Acting Proxy: N/A

Called to order at 7:33 pm.

Committee Reports

Fundraising, Rameka

The first committee meetings happened last week. Here are the notes from the meeting. Our main priority is to update and advertise our donor/corporate sponsorship program. Lee shared some great assets with me, that I am reviewing to update the working document. Next steps include edits/feedback from the Fundraising Committee, presenting to the board for approval and then implementing through the website and marketing.

Additionally, there is opportunity to be more involved and strategic with the season announcements and our fundraising calendar. I think approaching next season to kick this off with a fundraising calendar, etc. could be successful.

If we are looking for timing for a live event, when is the ideal time? Agreed, not June. Summer before we go back to rehearsals?

Marketing, Joy

Press release was sent for the band challenge. Haven’t heard back yet from media outlets. Trying to get a video a week uploaded to tiktok. Shoot any other ideas my way for socials! Thought about adjusting templates for mighty mo, but just decided to follow the same format as MAFB.

Membership, Rose

Committee list has been submitted for whomever ends up taking over.

Adrienne Hixon
Christina Carroll
Nick McWilliams
Chuck Jackson
Charlie Grace

Performance Opportunities, Rose and Steven

We need to find a time to meet.Mostly looking for pep band opportunities. Maybe local league championships, sporting kc, kc current, etc.We could take the beatles show around to John Knox and other places like that.

Reports

Secretary, Steven

No report.

Artistic Director, Lee

Season 21 is plugging along and folks are doing great. I’m adding Bernstein’s Turkey Trot to the program and it’s been ordered.

Season 22 is all planned.

Do we have a calendar@freedomband.com account? Would be great to have that and create a usable calendar. I say this as I kept throwing dates out to people and I want them all in one place.

Additional dates since the annual meeting

April 27 -KC AIDS Walk We Will be at the finish line again. Working on a tent for coverage
June 1 - Pride Night at the Royals
Sept 29 - Mid Mo Pride in Columbia $85-125/ hour for school bus rental if we wanted to go that route. I’ve reached out to BandTogether to see if they want to perform with us like last year but I’m thinking it’ll be their Tower Grove Pride day.

Commission contracts for Nick Omiccioli and Abdo Timejardine-Zomeno are almost ready and need to be sent and formatted to our template.

Would like to purchase GrantStation $699 for $99 today only.

Mo Humanities grant applied for $15K. NTDF panel on Friday. NEA due Friday. MAC due 2/26. Flarsheim due March 29.

Assistant Artistic Director, Jessie

Next season is booked for MMJO! All performances will be at 7:30 p.m. at The Lavender Flamingo (St. Andrew's Undercroft).

Friday, October 11th, 7:30 p.m. Echoes of the Greats
Friday, February 21st, 7:30 p.m. Modern Threads
Friday, June 20th, 7:30 p.m. Monsters and Mountains, the music of Maria Schneider

Pride Bands

Board retreat was this past weekend in Orlando. Some great things coming down the pike, including a TON of massed performing opportunities in 2025 - including Inauguration and WorldPride, both in DC.
I am working on setting up a volunteer database for Pride Bands Alliance, and will share that with our members once completed. Our standing committees are: Communications, Conferences, Development, DEI, Membership, and Special Events. We are going to try pulling in volunteers on a by-project basis, so there is less of a time commitment to the overall committee happenings.
A lot of our sister bands are having the same growing pains as MAFB post-Covid. Don’t forget that part of our membership to Pride Bands is the networking we can make between bands! There are three FB groups that are very active: Pride Bands Forum, Pride Bands ADs, and Pride Bands Presidents. Let me know if you would like added to your respective group!
New items are added to our resource library often: https://www.pridebands.org/resources/

Board Chair, Alex

No report

Vice Chair, J.J.

No report

Treasurer, Nathan

Report available upon request.

Executive Director, Ian

Paperwork has been submitted to the GEM for next season. We might need a driver for the Zoo Event, something to keep in mind. Truck is scheduled out of Olathe the Saturday before at Noon. We still need to inventory the storage unit, the church is done. Still troubleshooting the sound equipment, hoping to have it resolved before the April concert for MMJO. If not, we can rent one.

We will need electronics for the library (vocal mic and playback) and Gem (will need the gem’s amp and playback) performances next season.

Librarian, Jeanine

ASCAP Report was submitted and approved at end of calendar year.

Webmaster, Erin

A few minor text changes were made to the website.

If anyone would like to update their photo on the website, please send it to trampele@gmail.com. I will be updating the leadership page this week with the new board and executives.

Old Business

No old business.

New Business

Officer elections

Secretary-Steven
Treasurer-Nick, Lisa
Chair-J.J.
Vice Chair-Christian

Season 22 branding

Purchase flags and poles
I requested an RFP from Chris Green, former Central Florida band director who runs Virtual Guard Closet. They couldn’t get the flags for cheaper (33.50). But the poles were 13.95. I think we go with bandshoppe. I asked if VGC would price match and they gave a wishywashy answer so i don’t wanna work with them.

Purchase GrantStation