×
Posted mars 7, 2022 | Minutes

2021-08-24-Minutes

NCF Board of Directors
Minutes of Meeting
August 24, 2021 

SOME HIGHLIGHTS

Minutes of a meeting of the Board of Directors

The meeting was called to order at 7:12 p.m. with Chris Cope as Chair and Graeme Beckett as Secretary for the meeting.

INTRODUCTIONS

Board members present:
Anis Hanna (gb499) Chair
Andrea Holland (es170) 1st vice Chair
Emmanuel Adenlolu (gc476) Treasurer
Graeme Beckett (aw958) Secretary
Christopher Cope (bz787)
Martin Dubois (al432)
Michael Chan (ga869)
Majd Karam (gc029)
Lindsay Carreau (gc034)

Regrets:
Peter MacKinnon (fr198) 2nd Vice-Chair
Lauren Gardner (fy923)

NCF Management/Staff present:
Executive Director: Shelley Robinson

Guests:
None

Once around the table.
Informal pre-meeting conversation, with Directors taking turn offering personal views and commentary on interesting things that might not make it to the Agenda.

  1. Confirmation of Quorum

    Quorum was confirmed.
  2. Review of the Agenda

    Motion: To adopt the agenda as circulated.
    Proposer: Majd Karam (gc029)
    Seconder:  Chris Cope (bz787)
    The motion was carried.
  3. Review of the Minutes of the Previous Meetings

    Minutes accepted as circulated.
    1. July 27, 2021

      Motion: To adopt the minutes of the July 27th meeting as circulated.
      Proposer: Michael Chan (ga869)
      Seconder: Andrea Holland (es170)
      The motion was carried.
  4. Reports  
    1. Executive Director's Report (Shelley Robinson)

      Shelley distributed her ED report in advance of the meeting for both the open and in-camera sessions of the meeting.

      Select Highlights from the public portion of the Executive Director's Report

      DSL MEMBERS:
      Jun 1/21: 2991/2697
      Jul 1/21: 2948/2653
      Aug 1/21: 2909/2612

      Jan-Jul 2021 sign-ups: 171
      Jan-Jul. 2021 cancels: 344
      Net DSL growth Jan-Jul: -173

      Aug 1/20: 3186/2889 without CAF
      Aug 1/19: 3309/3031 without CAF
      Aug 1/18: 3333/3096 without CAF
      Aug 1/17: 3212/3067 without CAF
      Aug 1/16: 3057/no CAF
      Aug 1/15: 2959/no CAF

      Operations:
      ●  We have 20 open-box Smart-RG 516s that are available for $85 ($40 off new) with a 90-day warranty.
      ●  We have upgraded the capacity on our back-up server and our upgrading our email servers as part of our ongoing commitment to high quality services and network resilience/redundancy.
      ●  Summer HelpDesk Analysts Lily (Jianrong) An and Tom Lumsden are picking up their work quickly and doing well.
      ● Andres Carranco is working on updating our volunteer training program, to be launched in the Fall with a focus on remote learning and volunteering opportunities (with in-office volunteering planned for post-pandemic).

      Communications and Advocacy:
      ● Working on planning our 29th birthday on September 29th.
      ● NCF ad-hoc marketing committee had our first meeting.
      ●  Final edits on Digital Equity Ottawa reports on digital equity (affordability, connectivity, connected devices and capacity of the voluntary sector) in rural and urban Ottawa, as well as a study of community mesh networks are being completed, to be released at the end of September.
      ●  Summer student Nelson Odutola is working on creating new content for the website related to affordability, community mesh networks, and digital equity, in line with the reports as well as including resources for additional information.

      Covid 19
      Communications:
      ●  Because the Delta Variant is significantly more contagious than other current strains of COVID-19 and given that the province has paused the re-opening plan, we are maintaining our high-level of caution.
      ●  NCF COVID-19 Safety Plan, regularly updated: www.ncf.ca/coronavirus
      ●  HelpDesk hours: Monday-Friday 10am-7pm, Saturday 10am-5pm.
      ●  Office visits by appointment only: Monday-Friday 10am-5pm
      ●  Masks must be worn in the office at all times.
      ●  Following national and local health guidelines we’re encouraging office staff to use the three-layer medical masks we provide.
      ●  We have two extra-large air purifiers for the office: one for the office and one for the HelpDesk area.
      ●  Only one member/member group in the office at a time, chairs are in the hallway spaced more than 2m apart.
      ●  many staff are still working remotely to ensure staff can maintain appropriate social distance in the office.
      ● We have a daily office cleaning checklist.
      ●  We have a plexiglass shield for the front desk and a washable plastic cover for the debit machine.
      ●  We now have hand sanitizer, gloves, lots of cleaning fluid, hand soap and face masks.
      ●  We encourage members to use the lockbox (during and outside of office hours) for modem and payment drop-off.
      ● We encourage members with no payment method on file to use forms of payment that don’t require them to come to the office in person. We continue to accept cash.

      Motion: To move in-camera.
      Proposer: Emmanuel Adenlolu (gc476)
      Seconder: Majd Karam (gc029)
      The motion was carried.

      Motion: To receive the Executive Director's report..
      Proposer: Andrea Holland (es170)
      Seconder: Martin Dubois (al432)
      The motion was carried.
  5. Ongoing Business
    1. None.
  6. New Business 
    1. Deep Dive Topic Discussion (Shelley Robinson - in-camera)

      Preliminary discussion on deep dives was discussed in-camera.
    2. Vaccination Policy - Re: More Transmissive Covid Variants (Shelley Robinson - in-camera)

      Discussion on the upcoming vaccination policy was conducted in-camera.
    3. Signing Authorities/ED's Authority to Bind the Corporation and Past Chair Role (Anis Hanna)

      Motion: To move out of camera.
      Proposer: Chris Cope (bz787)
      Seconder:  Martin Dubois (al432)
      The motion was carried.

      Following a round of discussion, the following motions were made.

      Motion: That any two of the following six individuals have signing authority for the National Capital FreeNet; Anis Hanna, Andrea Holland, Emmanuel Adenlolu, Graeme Beckett, Chris Cope and Executive Director Shelley Robinson.
      Proposer:    Majd Karam (gc029)
      Seconder:   Chris Cope (bz787)
      The motion was carried.

      Motion: To renew Executive Director, Shelley Robinson's authority to bind the corporation.
      Proposer:    Andrea Holland (es170)
      Seconder:   Majd Karam (gc029)
      The motion was carried.
    4. HR Discussion Re: New Contracts/Updates (Shelley Robinson - in-camera)

      This item was conducted in-camera.
  7. Announcements
    1. There were no NCF announcements.
  8. Date of Next Meeting

The next meeting is scheduled to be September 21st, 2021 and was subsequently revised to September 28th 2021 at 7pm.
Location: Electronic meeting.

  1. Adjournment

    The meeting adjourned at 8:40 p.m.

(Links that return 'not found' indicate documents that have not yet been provided by the author)