Men's Club April 29th, 2004 Meeting Minutes

Saint Ambrose Men’s Club

Meeting Minutes

8:00 p.m. April 29, 2004

1) Call to Order and Opening Prayer - Mike Baumann

2) Roll Call - 23 members present - Officers present: Baumann, Rebholz, Schiferl and Tennessen. New Member: Mark Padellford.

3) "Shameless Self-Promotion": Dave Blatnik talked about Marathon Oil and his position as corporate lobbyist.

4) March 18th Minutes: Approved

5) Treasurer's Report: Current Financial Position = $28,356. Outstanding commitments = $15,032. Financial position less commitments = $13,324.

6) Old Business

a) Lenten Fish Dinner – Ticket sales = $1,720; expenses = $487; net proceeds = $1,233.

b) Pancake Breakfast – Ticket sales = $1,662; expenses = $969; net proceeds = $693.

c) Thank You – Life Care Center East – Norb read a letter from Joanne Whalen, executive director of LCCE thanking the Men's Club for the $300 grant for storage shelves.

d) Job Networking - To date, seven members have provided information as input to our data base: education, employer, position, skills/experience, Motion made and accepted authorizing Norb (up to $500) to develop and publish a Men's Club Directory. To support this, he will develop a "personal inventory" worksheet in time for the May meeting to help validate/update information currently on file for each member.

e) Upcoming Events

i) Adopt-a-Highway Spring Cleanup – scheduled 8:00 Saturday May 1st.

ii) Golf Outing & Steak Fry May 27th

f) Funding Approvals – Motion made and accepted to approve the following funding requests as recommended by the officers of the club:

i) $315 to Corpus Christi Catechism Fund covering costs of catechisms provided to each of 100 Saint Ambrose of Woodbury confirmands.

ii) $1,000 to SAW Youth Ministry to help cover costs of their missionary trip to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation this summer.

g) Men’s Club Mission & Charter Planning Discussion – Those present affirmed the existing mission/charter statement is appropriate without modification: "The Men's Club works to build a sense of community for the adult men of the parish and their families. Our members support the parish through fundraising, social and spiritual events and providing manpower to support numerous parish activities." The predominant views (offered as "the concensus position") as expressed at the meeting were:

• When charged with a specific goal (e.g. athletic fields), we are able to raise the necessary funds in ways that do not compromise or conflict with parish capital campaign initiatives.

• We need to have a sustained focus on some specific "big ticket item"…something of permanence…subject to concurrence by Father Tom…around which we would establish fund raising goals. What might such an item be? The following suggestions were made:

(a) Extensions to the athletic fields (e.g. a maintenance/equipment storage facility),

(b) A specific inner city parish support activity,

(c) A capital improvement project.

• Focus on fewer is better both in terms of project goals as well as fund raising projects…e.g. that we should have one major fund raising project per year.

• To the extent that we achieve annual goals, we will be in position to support donations to causes such as the following per established funding approval guidelines.

(a) Faith formation including adult education (such as Ministry of Mom's Sharing (M.O.M.S)).

(b) Youth Ministry (e.g. annual mission trip)

(c) Woodbury Christian Cupboard

(d) Outreach (e.g. LifeCare Center East (LCCE))

(e) Corpus Christi Catechism Fund

In this context, getting "bogged down" in funding requests and approvals should not be viewed as a bad thing.

7) New Business

a) Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast Wed. May 12th – the Men's Club is sponsoring a table for eight at this year's breakfast. Larry Best, Dave Betz, Ed Black, Mark Fritz, Ed Mottaz, Mark Padellford, Paul Rebholz, Patrick Tinucci, signed up to attend.

b) Men’s Club Wind Shirts – Matt Leighton is donating wind shirts from his business for purchase by Men's Club members for the nominal fee of $30. All proceeds will go to a charity of Matt's choice.

c) Oktoberfest – Saturday, September 25th is our planned date and on hold with the parish office - subject to O.K. by Father Tom. (Norb has confirmed Guardian Angel's Fall Festival is September 17-18 so we are not in conflict with their event). Pat O'Neill has volunteered to coordinate.

8) Next Meeting 6:30 pm, May 27th steak fry at the home of Bruce and Gloria Soma

9) Adjournment at 9:45 PM.