Minutes: January 19, 2005

Minutes of the Board of Directors, The Special Hope Foundation

After receiving proper notice via email on December 30, 2005, a quorum of the Directors named either by the Incorporator or listed in the Articles of Incorporation, constituting the Board of Directors of this Corporation, held their meeting at this time, on the day, and at the place set forth as follows:

The following Directors, constituting a quorum of the full Board, were present at the meeting:

• Lynne O’Hara, President
• John O’Hara, Vice-President
• Ed Hoskins, Secretary
• Carrie Jones
• Tracie Sloat (via speaker phone)

Excused:

• Mary Wilson, Treasurer

Minutes Approved

The first order of business involved the review of the minutes from the previous Board Meeting on November 4, 2005. All reviewed and accepted the minutes.  

Review of Existing Business

Updates from Prior Grantees

We received an update from Parents Helping Parents.  645 were impacted from the iTech center for the first half of the year that we funded.

We received an update from Jim Fructerman at Benetech.  They have named their software product, “Root 66 Literacy” and they are ready to launch their beta test in 1 month.  They are a little behind schedule because their original program had used pictures from an expensive source.  They found flicker.com and creativecommons licenses where they will pay much lower royalty fees for images.

Timeline for Completely Funding Special Hope / Necessity of an Audit

It the last meeting, we we tabled the idea of fully funding the foundation which would require an independent audit (for foundations with revenues greater than 2,000,000 dollars in one year).

The accountant made two arguments for fully funding now: our accounting is very straightforward, and due to the fact that the foundation young, there isn’t a long history to review.  The auditor who is assigned to Special Hope at the accounting firm, Molly Marshall, gave us the 7 different documents that would be used to perform the audit.  It was determined that all of the information that would be required for these documents is readily available.  It would take a week of data gathering.  She would come in every day for 5 days.  The cost would be between 8 and 10 thousand dollars approximately.

In order to perform the audit, we would have to form an audit committee composed of members of the board other than the CEO or CFO.  This group would have to officially call Molly and request the audit.  They would verify authenticity of the records and receive the audit report.  Then they would have to present the results to the full board of directors.  

Mary still has concerns about the expensive and how much time the audit will take.

• If we fund all at once, the grant budget increases significantly.  It would be difficult to give out a larger amount of money.
• Theoretically, we shouldn’t ever have to dig into the principal (giving 5-6%)
• It takes a lot of work keeping our funding low enough to stay below the $1-2 million revenue cap.

The motion was made to completely fund the foundation even though it would require an audit.  The motion was unanimously passed.

The motion was made to have Tracy head the audit committee with the support of John and Carrie.  The motion was unanimously passed.

Hope Technology School

Carrie excused herself both from the discussion and vote on this item due to a potential conflict of interest with the Hope Technology School.

We discussed in the last meeting the school’s request for an addition $40,000 to help them during an unexpected transitional period before their move.  The financials that they had previously given to us were incomplete, and did not include the $100,000 that we had granted.  Upon our request, they have now provided more accurate accounting reports, and the figures look good.  Nothing stands out as an unreasonable expense or line item.  (These are the best financials that we have ever had.)

Mary is considering taking on a role helping the school with their financials.  She was concerned about the conflict of interest, but after discussing it with Lynne, not only won’t it be an issue, but it will help us (and other sources of funding) support the school in the future because it will help them provide better financials.

Unofficially the move is scheduled for September.

The motion was made to grant $40,000 to the Hope Technology School this grant cycle.  The motion was unanimously passed by all present.  

Committee Reports

Finance & Investments Committee – Mary Wilson

No reports today, since our schedule is changing to 3 meetings per year and Mary is home with her new baby.  However, we did review the tax return.  

Grant Review

The board was asked if anyone has any personal connection to any of the following organizations: Family YMCA of Blackhawk County, Quest, Inc., Special Care & Career Services, and Dreamcatchers Empowerment Network.  No members had any affiliations or contact with them.

Family YMCA of Blackhawk County

We were hoping that this program would catch on nationally after our last grant was made, but it’s moving slower than we had hoped.  It is encouraging that the program director will be attending the national YMCA meeting to discuss disability programming where she will be attempting to promote inclusive programs.  She will also participate in the development of a diversity initiative to define curriculum standards.  They have also have other individual organizations who are interested in what they are doing.  Since these things take time, they are asking for $10,000 to continue their work in the local area.  They also incude many programs in the community that are not assoicated with the YMCA.

The motion was made to grant $10,000 to the Family YMCA of Blackhawk County this grant cycle.  The motion was unanimously passed by all those present.

Quest, Inc.

Not too long ago we funded Oak Hill,  a similar organization that constructed a Sensory Integration Room.  They had someone who had a limited background in sensory integration.  This proposal seems better than the one we already funded.  Quest is requesting funding to purchase equipment for their new sensory integration room.  The purpose of this room is for therapy (not recreation).  Another positive thing is that they also track progress very carefully, and individual programs are adjusted after the results are reviewed by a professional weekly.

The motion was made to grant $20,000 to Quest, Inc. this grant cycle.  The motion was unanimously passed by all those present.

Special Care & Career Services

We are seeing more and more grant requests for Supportive Employement programs.  Instead of taking disabled people and having them spend their time at a facility, away from the general public, they go out with job coaches and get real jobs where they earn real money.  This allows them to do something good for themselves as well as the community.  These types of programs are more expensive, and government agencies don’t provide enough money.   Another reason that it is hard to get adequate funding is that helping small children is more compelling than people in their late teens, and early twentys.  What sets this agency apart from other supportive employment programs, is that it is one of a small percentage of those that are doing the types of assessment, training, and followup that will lead to success.  They also provide a better variety of jobs, since they will go find a job that makes sense for the individual.  They are also willing to continue to support as long as they are needed.

The key points of this program match our mission perfectly.  $10,000 will pay for 10 individuals for 1 year.

The motion was made to grant $10,000 to Special Care & Career Services this grant cycle.  The motion was unanimously passed by all those present.

Dreamcatchers Empowerment Network

This is also a supportive employement program, but it is geared toward emotionally disabled individuals versus the developmentally disabled.  There is a huge difference in funding for these programs.  The funding for emotionally disabled programs comes from the department of rehabilitation, and they have funding for one year of vocational training.  You get covered for 90 days on your job period (job coach).  The funding is also based on whether or not the county has a program in place.  If they don’t meet criteria, they don’t get the state money.  The parent organization (which is for profit) and saw this gap, so they saw the potential to make these programs county by county to capture the funding by helping counties meet the criteria.  They found they weren’t getting the full funding that they could get if they were non-profit.  This way they could create a model, and also get funding from non-profit funding. The first program that they put in place (in Napa county) was so successful that they became the model for two other counties.  Their ultimate goal is to have a Dreamcatchers Network in each county.

Although the primary goal is to get everything in place so that a county can receive goverment funding, government funding isn’t enough, since this is a supportive program like “Special Care” above.  In Napa and Solano counties there are 4000 who are eligible, but only 25% are getting help.  They also have an intermediate program for those who are not ready.  They do get some job skills, but in a very structured environment at their facility (janitorial and food services jobs) then when they get to the point they can work on their own, then they can go with a job coach.  A site visit was made both to the facility, as well as some of the regular jobs that had been filled by participants of the program.  The employers loved how well the employees did, and they were also so happy to be helping.

The key to getting employers to participate is that they don’t have to pay for the first 40 hours.  So if the employee doesn’t work out, they have nothing to lose.  In addition, the employer trains the job coach, then the job coach stays with the employee for the first 40 hours to train them.  They will need ongoing funding that pays for the first 40 hours as well as paying the job coach.  (Funding also goes to the people in the center.)

The standards are much lower than the last group which is a bit concerning.  This may be due to the fact that they are accepting just about anyone into their program.  They may not even be able to screen people.

The motion was made to grant $40,000 to Dreamcatchers Empowerment Network this grant cycle.  The motion was unanimously passed by all those present.  

New Business

Next meeting May 25th at the office boardroom.  5:00 for dinner.  

Adjournment

There being no further business to come before the meeting, upon motion duly made, seconded and unanimously carried, the meeting was adjourned at 8:20 p.m.

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Lynne O’Hara, President

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Ed Hoskins, Secretary