Garrett County Commission for Women
August 2, 2016
Minutes
CALL TO ORDER: Judy Carbone called to order the August 2, 2016 meeting of the Garrett County Commission for Women (GCCW) at Garrett College, McHenry, MD.
ATTENDANCE:
Robin McGill
BJ Gallagher
Judy Carbone
Linda Carr
Cheri Krug
Sherri Fredlock
Jeanette Fitzwater
Guest Maureen Myers
The meeting started with a welcome to newest member Jeanette Fitzwater followed by an introduction of Maureen Myers, a potential new member of the Commission. Introductions were made by each of the women in attendance.
The women discussed a thank you gift or gesture to outgoing president Ruth Umbel and former president Joanne Harsh. Sherri Fredlock offered to do research for a potential gift and get back to the members via email.
PRAYER: Judy Carbone led the opening blessing.
PLEDGE: Robin McGill led the Pledge to the Flag.
MINUTES: Minutes from the June meeting were approved as submitted.
TREASURER’S REPORT: The current balance in the account is $1,167.60. Sherri reported that she will complete the MLAW (MD Legislative Association for Women) membership application, which costs $75 a year, as was approved at the last meeting. It is hoped that some of our commission members can attend the Legislative Review session this fall. A motion was made, seconded and was carried to accept the Treasurer’s Report
OLD BUSINESS:
Offices and committee chairs have been selected. These are:
Chair: Judy Carbone
Vice Chair: BJ Gallagher
Treasurer: Sherri Fredlock
Secretary: Nobody currently fills this position.
Education committee. Robin McGill and Terry Riley
Scholarship Committee: Robin McGill with Jeanette Fitzwater
Hall of Fame: Judy Carbone and BJ Gallagher
Publicity: Linda Carr
Because of the turnover, many of us are unfamiliar with the process of how the Commission should work. It has been asked that each member write a detailed process of their job to share so we can revise and refine at our October meeting. We also need a process on how to nominate new members and who writes the letter to the Commissioners asking for their appointment. It was discussed to email other Commissions to get an idea of their process.
The Listening Session for Garrett County being conducted by the Maryland Women’s Commission is scheduled for September 20, 2016. Judy has secured a space at Ace’s Run to hold the meeting. Water and soft drinks will be provided. Flyers are available for distribution, and Judy was working to compile a list of people to invite including those suggested by Commissioner Edwards so we can reach the largest group of people in the county.
The Commission had discussed holding a forum on health effects of Fracking, especially as to how it would affect women, in an upcoming session. It was discussed to hold off any scheduled speakers, etc. until after the Listening Session so we could have a better understanding as to what
the women of Garrett County focused on as issues. This will be discussed at October meeting with ideas as to how to move forward or any new initiatives.
COMMITTEE REPORTS:
EDUCATION: No report.
HALL OF FAME: The breakfast was a success. New applications for 2017 will be available on website with more publicity in hopes of receiving more nominations. Judy announced her intentions to nominate Ruth Umbel, in light of her many years of service to the Commission and to the community, an idea which seemed to resonate with other Commission members.
SCHOLARSHIPS: Robin will continue to work on Scholarship programs and applications.
She reported that she had received three Thank You notes from this year’s recipients and passed them around to be read by membership.
LEGISLATION: No report.
WEB: BJ continues to keep website updated as needed.
PUBLICITY: Linda will take over this duty from Dorothy Walters and will be reaching out to her for press releases sent in the past to compile a schedule for publicity.
MEMBERSHIP: Judy noted that we currently have nine members when our by-laws state that we should have between 12 and 15. We need new members. The nominating process was discussed again with the idea that we have a vetting process in which current members bring a list of potential nominees to the group and it is discussed amongst themselves. This way we could ensure a variety of representation both geographically and through industry. It was decided to discuss this further at October meeting.
MENTORING: Linda reported that the GEMS (7th grade mentoring) program will continue at the start of the start of the 2016 school year. Cheri Krug reported that the College was always looking for mentors for their college freshmen to help them with issues they may face during the year.
HISTORIAN: Sherri stated that the Library window is complete and will be up for month of August. It features current recipients of Women’s Hall of Fame. The idea was discussed that the Commission should do this on a yearly basis, either in March for Women’s History or April, around our Hall of Fame nominees.
NEW BUSINESS:
The Listening Session was discussed again. It is an open invite and will discuss issues affecting women in Garrett County and specifically what are considered to be important issues and ideas on how to move forward or to fix them. It was asked who was Garrett County’s representative on the Maryland Commission for Women. Judy said she would find out. When compiling a guest list, suggestions were made to include the Chamber of Commerce board (taken care of by Linda), Civic Club, various elected officials, those working in the medical field and as service providers. It was suggested a Master List be compiled from these invitees for future communication.
Ideas were discussed to generate new publicity for the work the Women’s Commission does.
They included a Facebook page and events created for various events we hold.
It was also discussed that once we had the processes worked out for each of our functions and committees, we would use our December 2016 meeting to discuss the 2017 program of work and do some strategic planning.
A letter will be going out to the commissioners for the next fiscal year. It was decided we would ask the Commissioners for $3,000 (up from $2,500 last year) to fund the scholarship program (up to four scholarships for four women) but also other projects the Commission may want to take on.
The meeting was adjourned at approximately 6:30 p.m.
NEXT MEETING: The next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, October 4, 2016 at 5:00 – 6:30 p.m. at Garrett College.
Respectfully submitted,
Linda Carr taking notes for Terry Riley
Secretary