WCFA Board Meeting – Online Zoom 1200 – 1430
December 12, 2020
Meeting was called to order at 1209 hours
Present were: Will Judkins, Todd Graves, Tim Logozzo, Saul Labanauskas, Greg Bailey, Reed Gracie, Dave Rains and guest Jake Burkhart.
Minutes from last meeting were review. Board members had been sent a copy via email prior to the meeting. Motion to approve minutes by Greg, seconded by Tim, motion approved.
Treasurers Report was presented by Danielle. Financial summary had been sent to the board members via email prior to the meeting.
Account Balances as of December 12th are as follows: Checking – $9,692.36, Savings – $60,072.51 for a total of $69,764.87. Compared to same date last year we had a total of $89,616.57 in the bank.
Profit and Loss for this year to date is: Income – $44,990.99, Expenses – $57,825.60 leaving a negative net income of <$12,834.61>. Compared to same date last year we had a positive net income of $14,414.03. Discussion followed. Motion to accept financial report by Greg, seconded by Will; motion passed.
The board discussed stipend payments to the board members who attended at least 2 meetings a year and salary for the president. With our current financial situation this will be tabled until the spring meeting. It was brought up that with our zoom meetings the expense to board members to travel to meetings is gone, may be a mute point. We do want to get a policy firmly set on how the president and board members will be paid.
(Danielle cannot find anything going back to 2018 that says we will pay a stipend to board members who attend 2 regular board meetings a year.
This information is from the 12/1/18 meeting regarding paying board members to attend meetings: “Todd Graves wanted a clarification on how much some who was asked to attend a meeting by the WCFA would be paid hourly and if expenses would be included. All agreed to pay at the Lead Instructor rate, currently $22 for hours attending a meeting. Travel would be paid at the current rate and lodging in meals would be included. These expenses will be paid by WCFA for attendance at the requests of the EB, President, VP or quorum”.)
Training Committee Topics were discussed. Greg let us know that he heard from NWSA that they are not waiving training or fitness tests in 2021. All agreed that we could continue to use the online Zoom platform classes when possible. It saves a lot of cost for both members and WCFA. R6 is still working on the in person class guidelines. Our biggest challenge is finding locations that will allow us to meet. We will address this as training times approach. We decided to table raising class prices until January when we hope to have a TC meeting to further discuss training options. We discussed how to provide shelter training for the online classes. We need to ask the FS if they would allow company owners to video students deploying as long as the administrator of the deployment met the training requirements of being 200 level SRB. Greg said he would like an in person RT-130 in February. He also said he would teach for free to keep our class prices down.
We had a lengthy discussion about contractors using fire departments for FFT2 training. There is a suspicion of dishonesty with a member that is turning in 30 or more fire department FFT2 training certificates from Dist #3 in Omak. After much discussion on whether or not is was our responsibility to police such matters, we decided the best way was to offer this member to use their preferred instructor as an Outside Instructor, like we have in the past for other members. This should solve the problem and bring everyone into compliance. A meeting will be set up with this instructor to be sure he is qualified to teach under our MOU. This was a concern for Danielle with records inspecting. Todd said he knows most of the FC in departments and would happily call to verify records if needed.
Since Kevin Curfman was a member of the TC we decided to fill his position by appointment. Will accepted the appointment and is now part of that committee.
Jake Burkhart joined our meeting at 1340 hours. The group discussed vacation and holiday pay and US Labor Laws. Employees are due vacation if they fall under continuous service. Discussion on how to break service without breaking the law. There has to be a document in the employee’s file that provides proof that the employee broke the continued service and not that you just didn’t have any more work for them. Jake said it needs to be looked at like unemployment laws. There are specific formulas on how to calculate pay including fringe. Jake suggested that the WCFA consider using Legal Zoom ($1000 annual membership fee) to provide legal forms to our members, like a generic employee’s handbook. Todd would like the WCFA to work on compliance information that can be added to our website. Much discussion followed. Jake left the meeting.
Old Business:
Review of Covid-19 Standards was discussed. Most agreed that the guidelines set out were not followed consistently and changed with location. Stories were told by several board members.
IRS 990-N filings and getting non-profit status is turning out to be a difficult task for Danielle to handle alone. She would like to get some professional guidance. Discussed using Bart Bradshaw but are concerned with his fee. Danielle has a relative that is a CPA and she is going to start there to see what to do next.
We don’t have time to Review/Update of By-Laws so it will be tabled to our spring meeting.
In our discussion about Professionalism/Ethics provision and adaptation; The board needs to review and approve the Ethics policy so we can get it finalized. This is tabled to the spring meeting.
The follow topics were briefly touched on because we were running out of time. They will be discussed at the General meeting in a few minutes.
Committee Reports
o PAC – No news
o Medical Services Advisory Committee – Todd will follow up.
o Legal Advisory Committee – No news
Todd shared Kevin’s concerns at the last meeting that is it critical to keep in contact with the Fire Defense committee every couple of months. Keep up on our DNR relationships and the State Fire Marshall’s office. We also need to be in contact with Slosson to find out if they are using closet resources or DPL for State Mob. Todd plans to write a letter to DNR concerning State mob.
No other Old Business
New Business:
Todd shared his take away from the PNWCG meeting in November that he and Saul attended via Zoom. The committee was very quiet and only the questions that were prepared in advance were discussed. Todd reviewed the questions and there was some discussion. One concern was contractors not being used on State mob. Todd will follow up on this.
Todd feels that it is critical that we adopt compliance with Farm Labor and DOL laws with a condition of membership. Much discussion follow, most notably was asked, “Is it our responsibility to police such matters?” Todd felt that monitoring this would set our association out as a professional group. Much discussion followed and the consensus of the board was to not consider this necessary for membership but rather work to be sure our members are educated and doing business in a professional way.
What went wrong and what went right / concerns this summer. Stories were shared. Several did not get paid.
New member – Bailey Logging (June 2020) will be introduced at the General meeting.
Record Review Prices – tabled until spring.
No other New Business
Spring meeting date May TDB
Meeting Adjourned 1256 hours