«
»
The NCPR Executive Council Home

NCPR Executive Council Meeting Minutes: Thursday, July 14, 2016

by on July 25th, 2016

Council Attendance:  Rod Giltz, Linda Cohen, John Ernst, Steve Hopkins, Nancy Keet, Dale Kramer, Alan McLeod, Susanna Piller, Melissa Farmer Richards, John Rosenthal, Marion Roach Smith

Staff Attendance: Ellen Rocco, Monique Cornett, Sandy Demarest, Martha Foley, Bill Haenel, Joel Hurd, June Peoples, Lauren Rosenthal, Jon Sklaroff, David Sommerstein

Excused: Cali Brooks, Sarah Johnson, Dick Munro, Cathy Pircsuk, Mark Scarlett

Call To Order: 1:00 pm
Recorded By: Jon Sklaroff
Adjournment: 2:10 pm
Chair: Rod Giltz

Agenda Item/Topic Details/Discussion Action/Follow-up
Introductions/
Appreciation		 Rod Giltz called the meeting to order.  Council and staff introductions were made. Information only
Item 1:
Meeting Minutes approval
  1. Rod brought forward the motion to approve the previous meetings minutes.
    a. Approved.
 Action Item: Approval of Minutes
Item 2:
Executive Council
  1. The Executive Council (EC) is made up of 13 members, 16 including SLU ex-officio.
  2. The committee members are volunteer advisors to NCPR are community members from throughout the NCPR listening region.
  3. The Council is currently broken down into three classes – A-B-C – with 3 year terms with 3 total terms allowed per member.
  4. Class C was unanimously re-elected by the council for a 3-year term.
    a. Dick Munro – 3rd term
    b. Cali Brooks – 2nd term
    c. Alan McLeod – 2nd term
    d. Susanna Piller – 1st term
  5. Current members had been asked by Station Manager Ellen Rocco or other members to join to help the station.
  6. Proposal to amend the bylaws to increase the total council membership from 16 to 20 approved by unanimous council approval.
    a. Originally limited to 16 for a “lean and mean” organization, however, at this point expansion is welcomed for a more robust group.
    b. After meeting with community members Rich Paolillo and Robert Sheperd, Ellen agreed that opening the Council up to public applications for membership induction would be good for the station.
  7. Rod has one more year as chair.
    a. By next year’s meeting, a new chair should be elected.
 Information only
Item 3: New EC Member approval
  1. NCPR accepted applications from the public for those interested in serving on the EC.
  2. A nominating committee comprised of EC members Linda Cohen, John Ernst and John Rosenthal reviewed the 12 applications that were submitted.
    a. 4 finalists were chosen by the nominating committee.
    b. The other 8 applications are being held for future consideration.
  3. The entire EC voted to approve the 4 finalists:
    a. Mark Dzwonczyk – Nicholville, NY
    b. Hannah Hanford – Saranac Lake, NY
    c. Stephen Meier – Queensbury, NY
    d. Christopher Robinson – Potsdam, NY
 Action Item: Vote
Item 4:
SLU Report
  1. Marion Roach Smith – SLU Trustee, NCPR EC Council Member – provided an update from the SLU Board.
    a. Per Marion, the Board of Trustees are NCPR “biggest cheerleaders” who are proud of all the work and recognition NCPR receives.
    b. From SLU President Bill Fox “…warmest congratulations on four Murrow Awards and the Gabriels Award …”
  2. Melissa Farmer Richards – SLU VP for Communications – brought up a “very informal” discussion that she has had with Ellen about a possible new location for the NCPR station.
    a. If possible, find a vacant store front on Main Street in Canton.
    b. Very early in concept, nothing not much explored in cost or availability.
    c. In addition to helping NCPR, this would offer help in revitalizing downtown Canton.
 Information only
Item 5: Personnel Update, Ellen Rocco
  1. Two major changes occurring at the station, Sandy Demarest – Underwriting Director – is retiring after 20 years with NCPR and June Peoples – Giving and Finance Director – is moving on after 13 years.
  2. When Sandy first came on, NCPR was bringing in about $20 thousand annually in underwriting, in her last fiscal year Sandy brought in over $580 thousand in revenue.
    a. Jon Sklaroff, current Office Manager and Development Coordinator is being promoted to replace Sandy.
    b.Sandy officially retires on September 30th.
  3. June will be moving into a position with Advancement at SLU to take on a new challenges.
    a. June’s position will be split between a Giving Manager and a Membership Manager. Monique Cornett has just been appointed to the MM position; this is temporary until a search can be done in late fall. An immediate search will be done for the Giving Manager. The station will also search for a new traffic/development assistant.
 Information only
Item 6: Fiscal Year 2016 Financial Report, June Peoples
  1. The latest Financial Report presented with the caveat from Ellen that our revenues fluctuate in cycles and could be greatly impacted by a number of things including years in which we have had grants.
    a. In years with surplus, funds go into the reserve fund
  2. It is NCPR’s goal to be balanced at the end of FY ‘17 despite having to use about $140K from the reserve fund for FY ‘16.
    a. Major gifts expected to be paid in FY ‘16 will now be given in FY ’17 (about $100K total)
    b. Ellen expressed her need to improve on bringing in major gifts for the Next Generation fund – Fund pays for young talent across the board – Brit Hanson, Lauren Rosenthal, etc …
    c. Learning a new fundraising software caused a pushback in some of our FY ‘16 earnings, money will catch up in FY ‘17.
    d. Many donors are moving from lump-sum gifts to installment giving which pushes money into FY ‘17.
    e. With constant credit card hacks happening, updating donor records can be challenging, and have a correlation on income.
  3. Bob Sauter – Station Engineer – completed two sales of equipment, translators, no longer needed due to upgrades done over the years, bringing in $130k for the station.
  4. NCPR has two endowments, one held with the Adirondack Foundation and a “quasi-endowment” held with SLU.
    a. Adirondack Foundation endowment funds the NCPR Adirondack Bureau.
    b. SLU fund for facilities emergencies.
  5. Currently NCPR has a cash balance of $313,000.
 Information only
Item 7: Underwriting
Sandy Demarest
  1. Goal set for FY ’16 at $540,000.
    a. Increase of $30,000 on previous year based on expectations of newly created sales rep position created in the Champlain Valley.
    b. Due to an unfortunate set of circumstances, the person hired, Xian Chiang-Waren, resigned after a brief tenure with the station.
  2. Despite the setback, Sandy was able to bring in $580,000 in the year.
 Information only
Item 8: News Team, Martha Foley
  1. Another great year with multiple, prestigious awards.
  2. The addition of Brit Hanson – Digital Content Producer – has allowed the news team to expand to a multi-platform world.
  3. Reporters are now working on more in-depth stories.
  4. Lauren Rosenthal has been a great addition to the team, and “hit the ground running.”
  5. Meredith Turk finishes up her time collaborating with NCPR after receiving special project funds from the Assn for Independents in Radio (AIR) to work on the Homefront Fort Drum series.
    a. A benefit of NCPR being known system-wide for quality work helps projects like Meredith’s get selected.
  6. In addition to the News Team awards – PRNDI, Murrow – Ellen and Brit received a Gabriels Award for the work done on Ellen’s trip to Cameroon.
    a. Murrows in Overall Station Excellence and Website Excellence.
 Information only
Item 9: Content, Jackie Sauter
  1. A concerted effort has been made to focus on refining and modernizing our content.
  2. More exploration into how people are now consuming content.
    a. Podcasts
    b. On-demand streaming
  3. Some older shows are aging out, exploring new programs potentially.
    a. Garrison Keillor has now retired, as Chris Thiele takes over in the fall, will see how it sounds.
    b. Car Talk is starting to get stale despite it being one of the most popular shows on Public Radio…still.
  4. More efforts have been made to market programming, specifically from NPR.
    a. The Spark Campaign is entering its 3rd phase.
    Phase 1: Morning Edition
    Phase 2: All Things Considered
    Phase 3: News Magazines
    b. The efforts “invite” listeners to tune in.
  5. With 2016 being an election year, listenership is expected to be up.
  6. NCPR began as radio, incorporated a website, now a Public Media entity.
    a. The new fundraising model has helped direct us.
    b. Need to still develop new fundraising techniques for digital.
 Information only
Item 10: Digital, Bill Haenel
  1. Web traffic down from last year.
    a. Prison break last year greatly inflated the numbers.
  2. Overall traffic up 20% from two years ago, up 150% from 5.
  3. Facebook likes up from 6,700 to 10,000 since last year.
    a. Quality of work by everyone on staff drives engagement.
  4. 57% more digital listenership on digital from last year.
  5. Brit produced about 30 pieces last year, would have had maybe 10 digital first pieces without her.
  6. Looking for ways to better reach our audience.
 Information only
Item 11: Station Events
  1. The Howl Story Slam in collaboration with the Adirondack Center for Writing (ACW) has been wildly successful.
    a. Packed events with great excitement.
    b. Similar and stylized after the popular Moth story-telling.
    c. Throughout the Adirondacks and Clayton in the summer.
  2. Possible NCPR visits from NPR News Director Mike Oreskes and NPR CEO Jarl Mohn.
 Information only
Other Business None Information only
Public Comment
  1. Esther Katz in person: “Happy with the station.”
  2. Mark Wilson via email: “Friends, With great respect for NCPR, its staff and the community of listener/members you have helped develop in the North Country over the years, I would like to address the concern raised at the last EC meeting over NCPR’s shrinking donor base. As a once-regular member household that has found itself straying to podcasts and other online information and entertainment options in recent years, I would strongly urge you to view any drop in subscribers seriously.I realize as a steering committee you have no say over programming, and that is too bad. From the perspective of this household, NCPR’s programming is central to our defection (ncprexit?). To cite an obvious example: Car Talk. Ray Magliozzi passed away two years ago this fall, by which time the show was already two years into reruns. Doing basic math, if every show Tom and Ray ever broadcast qualified as a “best of” and the shows were rebroadcast in reverse order to keep as up-to-date as possible, NCPR would now be rehashing advice about vehicles no younger than model year 2007/2008. In a region where most vehicles (driven by NCPR demographic, at least) last less than a decade, the show has become practically irrelevant.On a local level, in the 8-9AM weekday slot, NCPR seems to be broadcasting more archived material, outdoor pieces, local folk music and story-telling these days, leaving a smaller and smaller local news hole for a growing geographical area. While I genuinely admire Martha, David, Brian and the rest of the team, I wish NCPR could offer more comprehensive local reporting.An idea: Perhaps a pre-recorded weekly news round-up taking advantage of other news organizations and reporters across NCPR’s listening area would be of value to your listeners in this respect. It might fit nicely into the Saturday schedule between “Weekend Edition” and “Wait Wait. . .”Thanks for hearing me out on these matters of concern.”

    a. Jackie Sauter response: While shows like Car Talk do have a limited shelf-life, it is still very popular. Will explore new programming.

    b. Martha Foley response: Could possibly explore the round-table show option. Creating new content is difficult with the limited staff we have, but will look into it.

 Information only
Next Meeting Quarterly Meeting in October 2016, TBD Information only
Adjournment 2:10 pm

Comments are closed.

Comments are closed.