Old Business

• So far, one person has expressed interest in the position of Advertising Manager of the Journal. Jim Pearsall will be interviewing him in the next week about the job, duties, etc.
• President Christ has spoken with Don Schmitz about setting up a marketing committee to promote the IPMS/USA. He has directed him to choose a committee and establish a budget for fiscal 2016. Schmitz will present a report on his progress and goals at the board meeting in Columbus later this summer.

New Business

• Following Webmaster Eric Aitala's recommendations, the board approved switching e-commerce vendors for our Web site. The new site will not go "live" till after the convention and he and MJ has had a chance to thoroughly test the online marketplace offline.

Officer/Staff Reports

Dick Christ, President

• No new items to report.

David Morrissette, 1st VP

• Airfix has ceased sending out review samples to anyone (including show donations, etc.) due to budget cuts and has posted this fact all over the web. This isn't surprising as it is getting harder and harder to get review kits but we are leveraging the fact we are one of the few sites to actually build the kits we get.
• The IPMS/USA manufacturers dinner is set for Buca de Beppo on Friday night of the National convention.
• Late reviews are at 41. Based on what is coming in soon, that number should drop into the low 30s. This is a record low number.

Ron Bell, 2nd Vice President

• We have had three clubs expressing an interest in hosting our 2017 national convention.
• Columbus has the shirt design set and will have it posted on their we site soon. Registration has slowed a bit, but always does at this point. It'll pick up in the next month or so as the show gets closer.
• Lee Forbes has found a vendor that says he can do our trophies at a "good price". I've asked Lee to put together some numbers for us and do a presentation to the board meeting at Columbus.

John Shimek, Treasurer

• Nothing to report.

Dennis Tennant, Secretary

• Conflict of interest forms are flowing in nicely. I will be putting together a list of folks who still haven't complied for second round of requests.
• Election bios/photos have been sent to web and Journal staff for Bell, Drummond, Morrissette, Van Schoonhaven, Noack, Tennant and Pearsall.

Larry Randel, DLC

• Annual Awards process moving forward with RCs having provided nominees from Regional winners and to nominate candidates for National winners for Chapter of the Year, Newsletter of the Year and Website/Webmaster of the Year. I will be sending out the packages for each award to the board in the next few weeks.
  Revell Make and Take choices for models are down to either a red or yellow 2015 Mustang. At the moment there are no aircraft choices available to order and the Mustang is partially pre-painted and very basic?only 12 parts.
• Going to start the process to split Region 5.

Jim Pearsal, Historian/Publication Dir.

• No new items to report. We do have a candidate for Ad Director. I will be interviewing him in the next few days.

Bruce Briggs, Membership Secretary

• No new items to report. Updated roster sent to Columbus folks.

MJ Kinney, National Office Manager

• The slate for the elections will be as follows:

  • President ? Ron Bell and Bruce Drummond
  • 1st Vice President ? Dave Morrissette
  • 2nd Vice President - Mike Von Schoonhaven
  • Secretary ? Dennis Tennant
  • Director Local Chapters ? John Noack
  • Historian/Pubs Director ? Jim Pearsall
• This list has been forwarded to John Heck and Eric. Dennis has taken care of the bios for each. The ballots will be in the May-June issue of the journal and there will be a ballot box at the convention. Voting ends August 31st.
• I will be mailing 7 Regional Chapter of the Year plaques shortly. We need to get the plaques for the convention ordered as well as the trophy for the chapter of the year.
• I am/have mailed new brochures to all events to date ? am working on the end of April and May.
• We mailed Journal V27J2 to 4026. There were 232 non-renewed members. We have 114 new members since the first of the year.

Eric Aitala, Webmaster

• The search for a replacement online store for our website continues. I tested two companies and will send a link for the e-board to test drive. Choosing either will take some time to set up before we can stop using our current online store.
• An announcement was placed in the Forums for a new administrator. For the moment, the administration load is pretty light, so I'd like to keep doing it until I can find a better solution for handling Forum members whose IPMS/USA membership has expired.

Submitted by Dennis Tennant, Secretary