Minutes of February 6, 2017 Board Meeting

Arctic Orienteering Club
Meeting of the Board of Directors
February 6th, 2017
Minutes

Members present: Mike Robinson, Dela Gray, Lexi Hill, Ian Moore, Regan Sarwas, Shelly Laws,
Joyce Goodell, Dan Billman, Jill Follet, Eric Follet, Cory Smith and Lia Keller.

The Meeting was called to order at 7:11, at Regan Sarwas home.

Old Business:

  1. Mapping work for 2017.

    Much discussion follows. The compiled Survey results were provided by Mike. Mike presented a social aspect to the meets such as meeting somewhere after the meet for beers/food away from the event, as this could present a hazard. (beer). The main focus seems to be mapping.

    Some ideas: Eliminating some deadfall from specific areas. Hazards would be limbs, injuries. Beach Lake consensus is that it is pretty boggy. Mirror Lake area (North) is not so great due to steepness and devils club. Government Hill is on the steep side; many ski and bike trails. Ruth Arcand has 1⁄2 again usable area for meets-there is a swampy band through it, then usable area on the other side. One idea is to have a start at Henshew Jr. High.

    Remote areas: Regan states his concern for more remote areas is lack of turnout. IE: CM area has attracted very few participants. Girdwood: someone needs to do some re-con through the woods. This land is owned by the Muni, so mapping wouldn’t be hindered. Ian has explored this area and didn’t think it was a very good area to develop. Also, Bird Creek is not very interesting and there is the issue of bears.

    Skilak Lake VS ERNC. Board agrees SL is a bit too remote. We were more interested in ERNC. Meets here would be better earlier in the season. We would need to hype it up to encourage participation. Some logistics were: Talk to the Nature Center; Can we get permits here, Parking for a meet. The park has already GPS’d it. A trip out to check it out is worthwhile.

New Business:

  1. The vote was what to do with FNBP. Consensus was this is high priority. Hiring someone from the outside has produced inconsistent results. Areas that need the most improvement: Beginner area at Mile 1.1. Dan says Mile 2.2 on the North side of the road need major cleaning up. Ian suggests Ballfield area; Eric notes the “Burn” at Service is bad.0 Dan suggests breaking up FNBP into areas: E,W, creek, etc.
  2. Eric thinks we should start over with Lidar. Our maps and GPS don’t jive. Ian says Lidar is a good starting point. There are some concerns: the tops of alders show up, and it’s not great at veg mapping, or picking up trails.
  3. Ians idea: Start with Lidar for Topo. Then find the trails and features (boulders, etc) with gps. Then hire someone to finish it off. (Like the Sweds.)
  4. It was suggested we form groups to “survey” the ares, and make corrections on the current maps. Cory agrees there is value to remapping bad areas and combining with correct areas. In conclusion: Ask Toby if the Sweds are interested in coming back for mapping. We (the Club) do a bunch of prep work first to get the most area mapped as possible.
  5. Plan: Ruth Arcand and ERNC could be one project, estimating the cost to be about $10,000. Expand Ruth Arcand; and look at ERNC. Do a phased approach to updating FNBP.
  6. Regan: Equipment purchases: will discuss at the next meeting.
  7. Develop a Juniors program: What would this be and what would it look like. What do other clubs do? Set up a Training camp? USOF could help with funding. We could hire someone to put on the camp, possibly with a USOF training guide.
  8. What are our options for deadfall in FNBP. Dela will contact someone to ask if we can do something, and what would be the liabilities.
  9. Shelly discussed the patterning program with companies and interested parties to aid the clubs expenses for “Kids run Free”. She has a rough draft of a solicitations letter that we will clean up, to distribute to possible donors for contributions.

Next Meeting: Tentatively March 29, possibly early April Host TBD-maybe Shelly.

Meeting adjourned at 8:57

Minutes Respectfully submitted by Joyce Goodell, Secretary

Meeting Minutes as PDF

Additional Notes on Mapping Meeting at the same time/location (these are not meeting minutes, but individual notes)