City of San Diego Retired Employees Association
September 8, 2020
Board Meeting Minutes
The meeting was called to order by President Dick Wilken at 9:30am.
Board members present: Jim Baross, Mike Bresnahan, Chris Brewster, Karen Butler (left at 9:45), Shirley Hall, Joan Hernandez, Charlie Hogquist, Brad Jacobsen, Joan McNamara, Ty Rogers (at 10:30), Mary Ann Stepnowsky, Dave Twomey, Dick Wilken, and Janet Wood.
The minutes of the August meeting were approved.
TREASURER’S REPORT: Karen reported nothing unusual.
M/S/C to accept the Treasurer’s Report
INVESTMENT COMMITTEE REPORT: The Russell 3000 has appreciated 37.54% to date; the Money Market has appreciated 4.20% to date.
COMMUNICATIONS: Dick received a call via our call center from a member who is on line but does not use email. He complained that he has missed the General Member meetings as he does not get the Zoom meeting info in the paper Newsletter. This info was provided to the member. I addition, Dick announced that Jim Baross had created the General Membership meeting as recurring meetings with the same Meeting ID. Dick will ask Janet to include this info in future editions of the Newsletter.
Dick received a call from RESDC Executive Director Mark Nanzer offering to introduce the President of the local health insurance brokerage firm, My Senior Health Plan, in case we might be interested in a partnership with that firm similar to what they have. Dick explained that this would be a conflict since REA did a partnership with MEA/SDPEBA several years ago. Dick asked the Board members if anyone thought we should explore this and no one commented.
RETIREMENT BOARD REPRESENTTIVE’S REPORT: Charlie reported that there was no August SDCERS meeting. SDCERS has now implemented a remote call center to be used when employees are not in the office. SDCERS should be able to provide all essential services online now.
DISCUSSION/ACTION ITEMS:
1) The Nominating Committee will be Mike Bresnahan, Jim Baross, and a General member to be determined.
2) The status of the December meetings was discussed. It was decided bot to have a General Membership meeting in lieu of the Holiday Party; it would be too much effort to get a speaker. It was decided to combine the December Board meeting with the annual Board Retreat. The date will be Friday, December 11 at 9:30, via Zoom.
ADVOCACY COMMITTEE REPORT:
1) Dave reported that the Board previously allocated $600 to sponsor Carl Luna’s Restoring Respect conference when it was going to be held live. However, for an additional expenditure of $400 ($1000 total), our name and logo will be on all promotional materials for the online conference, and we will be shown as a principal sponsor of Cindy McCain’s talk. The Advocacy Committee recommends the expenditure of the additional $400.
M/S/C (10-2-0) to approve the expenditure of an additional $400 in sponsoring Restoring Respect.
2) Dick briefed the Board that there arose a policy difference in the implementation of the top banner on the VOSD Morning Report. Dave Twomey thought that the banner should link only to the “landing page” on our website which describes the recent Image Enhancement initiatives. It would not further link to the REA website. The Board members that commented on this stated that we should want interested readers to link to the web site if they wished to learn more about REA and its mission. Dick suggested that he, Dave, and Mary Ann meet to finalize this direction.
3) One person has volunteered to serve as newsletter editor, but they will need to be interviewed in depth about the nature of the job and their willingness to take it on. Also, the person who produces the County Retirees’ Association newsletter is willing to take on the job on a temporary, paid basis if need be until we find or hire an editor.
4) The next Advocacy Committee meeting will be September 24 at 9:30 am. Another meeting will be scheduled for some time between Thanksgiving and the December holidays.
ADJOURNMENT: The meeting was adjourned at 11:00 am.
Respectfully submitted,
Brad Jacobsen
Secretary