Wintonbury Land Trust Meeting Minutes for Nov 21, 2013

WINTONBURY LAND TRUST – November 21, 2013, 52 Duncaster Road, Bloomfield  

Present:  Chip Caton, Dale Bertoldi, Patrick Sullivan, Paula Jones, Vikki Reski, Kevin Gough
 

    1)      October 24, 2013 Minutes were approved as submitted.

 

      2)     There were two additional Agenda items added under New Business:  Simsbury Land Trust record-keeping workshop, Meeting with Back East Brewery.

 

 

Snow bunting (seen on Bear Ridge Drive)

 

 

3)      Committee Reports

a)      Strategic Plan

1.      2014 Goals and Objectives – We reached consensus that our 2014 goals, in priority order, are as follows:

(1)   Find a Membership Chairperson, and update our membership database.  Our objectives include increasing the number of members, collecting annual dues, and running an annual appeal. 

(2)   Sponsor two fund-raising/outreach activities.

(3)   Find a Webmaster, update the website, and publish a paper & online Bloomfield Trails Guide of Land Trust and Town Trails. 

(4)   Close on Hawk Hill, Lisa Lane; work on the Evans, Malucci, & Roditi parcels.

(5)   Add new trails on newly acquired parcels; maintain existing trails.

(6)   Review Land Trust properties for potential resale.

(7)   Continue developing our working relationship/partnership with the Town of Bloomfield.

2.      Funding Sources and event possibilities – We briefly discussed some possibilities, including the annual bike tour, and a tag sale.  We have already agreed to repeat the joint hike with the Simsbury Land Trust for Trails Day weekend in June (possibly in reverse order).

b)      Financial

1.      Capacity Building funds – We agreed to use up to $5,000 of Capacity Building funds for Website work, trail guide production, media blasts, and membership database work. 

c)      Acquisitions

1.      Evan’s parcel – The Summary Appraisal cost $1,200; we should have that appraisal within a few weeks.

d)     Events

1.      Approximately 35 hikers enjoyed our October 26^th hike with the Simsbury Land Trust.  A story about the hike is in our November e-newsletter.

2.      Celebrate 2013 – 2014 – We would like to have a celebratory event.  We need a volunteer to organize it.

3.      Snowshoeing at Speer/MDC – The date and time for this event TBD since it is weather-dependent.

e)      Membership/Community

4.      Newsletter – The lead story in the December issue will be on Membership; the second story will be Part 2 of the 3-part series “New Life for an Old Farm”.

 

4)      New Business

a)      Our next meeting will be January 12^th at 4 PM.  We will meet with Sharon Danofsky on January 16^th at 7 PM.  Both meetings are at 52 Duncaster Road.

b)      There was no Community Q&A.

c)      Paula reported that Simsbury Land Trust provided a very informative session on their recent project regarding developing a record-retention policy and record-keeping protocol.

d)     Chip, Kevin, and Paula met with the owners of Back East Brewery (in Bloomfield).  Back East is willing to consider supporting their local Land Trust (as they’ve supported other local non-profits).  We agreed to provide some suggestions to them in writing.

 

Recorded by Paula Jones