Minutes – April 9, 2010

Online News Association Board of Directors Meeting

1 p.m. ET

In attendance:

  • Christine Montgomery
  • Jim Brady
  • Neil Budde
  • Cory Tolbert Haik
  • Meredith Artley
  • Katharine Fong
  • Katie King
  • Liz Lufkin
  • Dick Meyer
  • Anthony Moor
  • Ken Sands
  • Amy Webb
  • Jonathan Dube
  • Jane McDonnell (Executive Director)
  • Sherry Skalko (Editor, Journalists.org)

Not in attendance:

  • Jody Brannon
  • Jonathan Hart

Minutes

Membership

  • Jim Brady told board members on the call that tweaks on membership rules went out on email yesterday but that no substantial changes were made from the previous. Dick Meyer added that the entire subcommittee signed off on the changed language. Jane McDonnell read the four categories. The board then unanimously approved the categories as a change to the bylaws with these four categories.
  • Jane mentioned now that these new categories were settled, ONA will be able to move on membership campaigns such as, “sprucing up your profile,” and more.
  • Jim then talked about about the 5 non-professional member spots on the board and how the subcommittee worked on coming up with a recommendation to either guarantee and set this number or rather that it be up to five non-professional member spots. He said the subcommittee recommended that the slots should not be guaranteed. The board then discussed the two options.
  • Anthony Moor: I move that we permit 5 non-professional memberships to be on the Board of Directors of the Online News Association. Dick Meyer seconded this. All were in favor and it was approved unanimoulsy.
  • Dick: I move that we accept the recommendation from the membership subcommittee that the 5 non- professional seats on the board be open but not guaranteed for non-professional members. Anthony seconded this.
  • All in favor by way of roll-call vote:
    • Christine Montgomery
    • Jim Brady
    • Neil Budde
    • Cory Tolbert Haik
    • Meredith Artley
    • Katharine Fong
    • Katie King
    • Liz Lufkin
    • Dick Meyer
    • Anthony Moor
    • Ken Sands
    • Jonathan Dube
  • Opposed:
    • Amy Webb
  • Jody Brannon was the only voting board member not in attendance
  • Jim made a comment after the vote that if we, “look up and see that we only have 2 non-prof members on the board in two years then we will need to bring this up again then.”

Events

  • Ken Sands talked briefly about the training going on in Nashville that day involving 64 people and that there was some revenue attached. He also brought up the Parachute Training efforts and how Birmingham was slated in June and Denver was a possible after that.

Awards

  • Anthony reported that his committee is building out the new award tool and that the call for submissions will go out in the next couple of weeks.

Advisory Board

  • Amy reported that a final list of people for the Advisory board were ready and viewable on the Writeboad. She said the group needed to figure out who has relationships with the suggested list and then move forward on how we will reach out to this list. She talked about a systematic way to approach this. She asked that Board members attach their names to people they know. She said there will be a conference call soon to talk about this further.
  • Jane then talked about the need to use the Powerpoints and collateral that is being worked up for various conferences and panels when board members have the opportunity.

Executive Director

  • Jane said the current Gannett-funded Parachute Training grant was renewed and that Gannett has also agreed to sponoring other ONA events. She mentioned she also had similar proposals in place and gave other smaller updates on grants.
  • Jane also talked about newsFOR, a conference to be held Oct. 28 2010 at Arizona State University. Jenny Leigh from the New York Times and others are offering our resources of the journalists they we know to attend. Meredith Artley said she would head up a subcommittee to get a list together of possible ONA members to attend and work through this with the rest of the board.

Board member additions

  • Christine Montgomery told the board that the “15th board member seat” would be on the agenda for dicussion at the May in-person board meeting. Liz Lufkin said the group should get a short list together but have more in-depth conversations with potential candidates.
  • The board then discussed the idea of appointments vs. an election process.

Student Clubs

  • Jane said two student clubs are being started before the end of the year and a new page reflecting this has been launched on journalists.org.

The call was adjourned at 2:02 p.m. ET