May 11, 2014 Zimfest Association Board Meeting Minutes Synopsis
Members in attendance: Jacqueline Fallon, Tsitsi Hantuba, Jennifer Kyker (as of 7:48), Paul Mataruse, Dana Moffett, Amy Robinson, David Simon, Alex Weeks
Non-voting member in attendance: Claire Jones
1) Review of April Minutes and Synopsis: approved. David will contact Larry to post the synopsis.
2) Zimfest 2014 OC Planning Committee update: Alex is working on programming. The Zimfest Pass is still in progress. Everything else can be put on the test website soon. Registration under one price for all meals, workshops, concerts, housing and meals will fall under a program called Zimfest Pass. This will simplify the process so that participants don’t have to keep track of tickets for everything. The price is $475 for a single room, $450 for a double and $420 for youth. Includes housing and meals Thursday night through Sunday and 3 workshops. People can sign up for more than 3 workshops without having to pay more. They will be asked to pay for the workshop if they fail to attend.
Letters and contracts have been sent to performers and teachers. Only a few have come back so far. Some of the B1 Visa holders will be put on the lunch concert schedule to remain in compliance with the rules.
Mokoomba: Stage requirements and ticket sales options are being worked out.
A few Zimbabweans who missed the application date have expressed interest. Unfortunately, we cannot accommodate all the interested Zimbabwean teacher applicants this year. We nevertheless want them to feel welcome and to attend the festival.
Online registration should open soon. Betty Weiss will be editing the festival guide.
3) Budget update Tsitsi/Claire—they will talk before the next meeting and present this information at the next meeting.
4) Update on tax issues—Claire found the law that exempts artistic cultural organizations qualify. We are required, however, to pay labor and industry taxes on our teachers and employees at a rate of 0.2607 x the number of hours. We will pay this for the festival teachers this year plus Claire’s hours as an employee.
After the festival, we may reassess whether it is in our best interest to remain registered as a nonprofit in Washington state due to the high tax burden.
We will also be paying taxes on T-shirt sales in accordance with Washington state law and have paid for the sales tax on 2013 T-shirt sales.
Federal taxes—Tsitsi is still reaching out to a CPA firm. We will likely need to file for an extension due to a pending May 15 deadline.
We voted to modify the bylaws to require a minimum of 8 board members in order to remain in compliance with Washington State law.
5) Marketplace vendor fees—Current fees include a per table charge and 5% over $500 sales. This is consistent with other festivals and will help the festival remain financially viable. Our financial situation is currently precarious, so we are not in a position to reverse this policy right now.
6) Village Meeting Agenda—David. Are there topics that we should include? David will bring a more concrete agenda to the next meeting.
7) Zimbabwean engagement—David will reach out to Lucky to see if he wants to be the contact person for the Zimbabweans. He also wants to get topic ideas. Ideally we would like to have this list by the June 8 meeting so that we can discuss this.
8) Family lifetime membership wording—MyLinda sent out some wording. Claire will talk to Larry about changing that wording.
9) Board membership—checking in—is anyone planning to step down from the board after the next meeting?
Next meeting June 8, 6-8 pm PST
