Minutes Of NCR-SCCA
Monthly Board Of Directors Meeting

October 19th, 2022

Attendees: James Shanks, Bruce Dover, Sam Fouse, Shane Irving, Kit WIlliams, Anna Crissman, Lee Hill, Al Heatwole, Stephen Miller, John Bodnar, Blair Deffenbaugh late

Guests: Chris Schimmel, Rob Wilmoth late, Ben Tyler late

1. The meeting was called to order at 7:31 pm by Anna Crissman, NCR RE
2. Motion to approve the minutes from the August meeting as there was no Board meeting in September (Shanks/Heatwole). Passed.

Order and content of the items listed below reflects the order of discussion, as nearly as possible; not necessarily as they appeared on the published agenda.

Financial Report

Treasurer Sam Fouse had sent a copy of the financial report to Secretary Kit Williams.

As the details of our finances are confidential, NCR members who wish more information should contact either the Office Manager or any member of the Board of Directors. They are also invited to attend a Chapter Meeting, where such matters are discussed in detail.

Chapter Reports

James Shanks reported that the Triangle Chapter did not meet in October as it was immediately after the Runoffs, but they had met in September and he had posted his meeting minutes to the Google Drive. James said they had a great meeting and ran another car trivia competition, something the Triangle Chapter had done previously this year. Lee Hill said the West Chapter had met with about 15 people or so, and they had discussed the Runoffs at length as they had just wrapped up. He said they also had a conversation about the NCR Time Trial at NCCAR. Kit Williams said he had hosted the Cape Fear Chapter meeting, and they had roughly 10 people attend. During the meeting a new Chapter Coordinator was elected in Shane Irving. The Chapter also elected a new Solo Chair, Rex Loden. Kit said they spent the remainder of the meeting discussing the upcoming NCR autocross events at Cherry Point.

Old Business

1. October Time Trial Recap: Anna discussed the recent time trial event we hosted at NCCAR on October 15th-16th. She said we had a great event and the number of drivers was higher than our June time trial. Stephen Miller said he had to confirm all of the numbers but he felt we were close to breaking even or possibly a small profit on the event. He said we had roughly 32 two day time trial drivers and 16 track event drivers over the weekend. Anna said we had several people upgrade their event from the track event to the time trial. Sam Fouse said we had not quite gotten all of the bills for the event yet, as we will need to pay the track the balance of the rental contract and for the oil dry that was used on Sunday after an oil spill on track. Stephen commended Anna and John Bodnar for the work they did in timing during the event, as we had multiple new challenges and issues that they were able to overcome. We had multiple drivers attend who had not run with our time trial program before, and we had positive responses from those drivers saying they would definitely be coming back. Stephen noted that the upcoming time trial at Carolina Motorsports Park that we are co-hosting with South Carolina Region would be a good opportunity to see if changes to our event schedule could help maximize our event. He said we had done parade laps at the end of the day on Saturday which allowed spectators and driver crew members to go out on track and he felt this is something we should work to include in future events. We have been working with the track to finalize our dates for next year’s schedule and we are still working to see exactly when we will be back at NCCAR. Stephen noted that during the event we had two notable incidents; a light barrier hit and an oil leak on track. Stephen also noted we had another incident of losing control of the track during a session. We had drivers ignore a black flag condition, which led to us calling for a red flag condition, which the drivers also ignored. This also happened at our June time trial earlier this year. Stephen said it is a priority to ensure this absolutely does not happen again, and we will need to spend time before our next time trial coming up with ways to guarantee we do not lose control of the track ever again. Rob Wilmoth spoke up about a potential sponsor who may be interested in supporting our TT program and our events. Anna said we would be open to a sponsorship and would be happy to work with that group if they are interested.

The Board unintentionally skipped the next item on the agenda and discussed it later in the meeting.

1. VIR Speed Suite: Sam Fouse gave an overview of the Speed Suite, our permanent facility we purchased in 2017 at VIR’s Technology Park. He felt it was long past due to start upfitting our space. Sam had been looking into plans for adding our own bathroom, a kitchen and sink, a secure closet, and a storage loft. Sam felt most of this work would be relatively easy, except for the electrical and plumbing, which would need to be done by a professional. He said we would need to start off by doing a thorough clean out of the space, and then getting permits from the local government for the work. Sam said he would work on a definitive plan and budget, but felt we had enough money to make this happen easily.

New Business

1. Scholarship Program Update: Anna read an update that John Lindquist had sent to the Board, as he was not able to attend the meeting. The Scholarship program team has been working hard all year, setting up at the VIR IMSA race as well as the SCCA Runoffs. They have been hosting an auction for a slab of the old Oak Tree which concluded recently. The winner of the auction wishes to remain anonymous, but the auction raised approximately $9,000 for the scholarship fund. The scholarship program team had met earlier this week to draw winners for their raffle. One of the raffle winners, who had won a Max Papis steering wheel, donated the wheel back to the program to be raffled off again. The scholarship team has several school presentations planned for October and November, all planned to happen in Davidson County.
2. Board Meeting Time Change: Anna brought up a proposal to change the Board meeting time from 7:30 pm to 7pm or earlier. She noted that the meetings have become entirely virtual, meaning none of the Board members have to travel to attend, meaning the meetings can be started earlier. She asked if meeting at 7 or 6:30 would be preferable. Many Board members said 6:30 would be too early, and decided on 7pm. Motion to change the Board meeting time to 7pm beginning in November 2022 (Crissman/Fouse). Passed.
3. Elections for 2023: Anna brought up that the elections for 2023 are coming up soon, as the bylaws require the elections to take place in December. The positions open for election are Assistant R.E., Treasurer, and two Member-at-Large seats. The two MaL seats are Al Heatwole and Paul Spencer’s. Nominations for these positions are due before the end of the November Board meeting and must be submitted either by email or in writing to the Secretary or to the NCR Office. Each candidate must be endorsed by three other members in good standing, also by email or in writing. The elections will start the first Wednesday of December and will run through the end of that month. We have been running our elections through MotorsportReg.com for several years, and it should be a fairly simple process, as we no longer have to count mailed-in votes.

Additional Item Not on Agenda

1. Year End Awards and Banquet: James Shanks asked if we had started to plan the Year End Awards as well as the Region Banquet. Anna said she has started the process and is working with Elizabeth Severt to plan an event in Wilmington sometime in January. As for the awards, Anna noted we did need to form an awards committee and start planning for and making those awards. For the banquet, Anna discussed wanting to have an option for members to see the banquet virtually if they cannot attend in person, and wanted to look into recording an award acceptance speech for anyone who receives an award but cannot attend in person. Blair Deffenbaugh said he could make this happen, as he had done for the previous year’s entirely virtual awards. James noted the awards committee is composed of the three Chapter Coordinators, and the four Members-at-Large, as well as a Committee Chairman. Anna asked if James would want to volunteer to be the awards committee chairman as he has done so many times in the past, and James agreed to do so again.

Item from Old Business that Was Skipped Unintentionally

1.  November TT at CMP: Anna had accidentally skipped this agenda item and brought it back up as we had covered everything else planned for this meeting. We are co-hosting this event with the South Carolina Region and with help from Racing for ALS. This is the rescheduled event for Jim’s Race, which was our planned time trial at Rockingham earlier this year. Anna said it should be a fantastic event and working with the people at Racing for ALS has been wonderful. She noted the schedule and some other specifics for this event could be a good gauge for us to look into modifying our current time trial event schedule.

Additional Additional Item Not on Agenda

1. The Board discussed a 2023 event scheduling topic that will not be published at this time until plans are finalized and announced.

Motion to adjourn the meeting (Crissman/Deffenbaugh) at 8:44 pm. Passed.

 

Please note that all NCR members are welcome to attend NCR Board of Directors meetings.

If any member should have a question about the Region or its activities, please contact the Office Manager or any member of the Board.

 

Submitted by Secretary, Kit Williams