Genl Meeting Minutes (2/27/2007)

(minutes recorded by Mike Broome and transcribed by Ken Walsh)

Sixteen TriTrogs attended the February meeting, welcoming new member Erin Amadon from Hanging Rock. She joins us from NNJG.

Mike Broome mentioned the updated web site. Many are impressed, but others lamented losing the bouncing bats. Mike will look into the possibility of a cookie that will allow users to turn on/off the bats.

In her final act as Treasurer, Lisa Lorenzin shared the Annual Treasurers Report. It took almost four hours to compile, partially spent finding the bank statements. The TriTrogs Treasury holds a balance of $2169.97 currently.

Lisa also shared details about the Fall VAR/MAR that the TriTrogs are co-sponsoring with Philly Grotto. The celebration of Philly Grotto's 60th anniversary will be held at the TRA site, and the TriTrogs are responsible for finding trip leaders. Philly Grotto requested that the TriTrogs man a security gate, but no one at the meeting felt that the TriTrogs could pull this off (and didn't know if a security gate was necessary). Lisa still needs to discuss whether the TriTrogs might receive a cut of the proceeds, but we would likely just earmark it for a charity.

Howard discussed the Wiley Elementary School's Science Night and the fact that he, Diana, and Ken will be manning a cave station there. He discussed the planned demonstration for March 15.

Some survey notes from Worley's Cave in Rich Valley, Virginia were returned to Ken last month, and this should allow continued exploration and mapping of this cave. Anyone interested in leading the novice cartography effort should contact Ken.

There was a prolonged discussion about the traditional TriTrog format of meetings and the executive board's role. We discussed the NSS requirements, low meeting turnout, the possibility of alternate social occasions, how to inform people about alternate meeting places, why it's good to have officers handle business, and our relationship with the museum. The consensus of members present at the meeting was that monthly meetings should be continued with the existing format and officers should start to define the executive committee roles differently in the electronic age. This will be handled by an interested group at a future date.

After a short break to pay dues, we discussed upcoming trips:

• Aqua Cave with Matt Jenkins on Mar. 17
• Rowland Springs Cave and Hancock Cave on Mar. 10 with Dave Duguid
• Spring VAR in Durbin, WV on April 27-29
• Girl Scout trip on July 15
• Fall VAR/MAR on Oct. 12-14
• Grand Caverns survey on Mar. 3
• Easter Restoration weekend at Grand Caverns April 7-8

Cave trip reports were then shared:

• Howard Holgate described his trip to Mystic, New Trout and Hamilton Caves with Ken, Hayden, Rick, Ericka, and Steve.
• Ken put off his discussion of Australian caves to the program.
• Pete Hertl and Mike Broome discussed trips to Organ and Grapevine Caves with Bob Handley.

Officer elections were held with the following slate winning by acclamation: Mark Little (Treasurer), John Plyler, Mike Broome (Editor), Howard Holgate, and Ken Walsh (Secretary).

Ken shared a program called Summer Caving in January, with cave slides from his trip to southeastern Australia and Tasmania.