Guy Proulx Sylvia Faulkner Lysanne Gauvin Lucie Houle Leslie Lawry Brian McCauley Anne Morin Jean-François Normand Ann Perry Lisa Rondeau Michael Snaauw (by phone) Robert Way Sheila Willis (by phone)
Teri Caruci Wendy Potvin
Guy Proulx welcomed the Directors to the meeting.
The minutes of the meeting of January 16, 2016 were discussed and approved. Guy Proulx agreed to send the minutes to David Bellerive Lamarre for posting.
Guy provided the financial update as Teri Caruci was unable to attend the meeting. Guy indicated that the financial statements for 2015 were nearing completion. There have been no transactions since the meeting of January 16, 2016. The balance in the account is about $4,000.00.
The winter luncheon, hosted by Anne Morin and Brian McCauley, was held at Robbie’s restaurant on St Laurent Boulevard. Approximately thirty people attended. Eight participants did not attend due to weather issues. A 50/50 draw was held which generated $70.00 for the QCC. Robert Way won the 50/50 draw. A draw was held for a free ticket for the summer cruise and Dana Vaughn won the prize. A good time was had by all.
Ann Perry reported that she had cancelled the booking for the hall for these two dates due to the low turn out at the last euchre evening in November 2015. It was agreed that this was the correct approach. A new event had been tried and it was determined that it was not sustainable on an ongoing basis. Another euchre evening may be tried next year as we do want QCC members to participate.
Ann P. indicated that the e-mail is ready to be sent to Sheila Willis for transmission to the QCC membership. Ann P. also said that she has already provided the note to the curlers who participated in the fall 2015 event. Ann P. has developed a listing of all winners of the curling events from the very beginning. This list will also be included in the note that is sent to members of the QCC advising of the upcoming curling event.
It was agreed that all future notices of events to the members of the QCC will include an attachment which details the upcoming QCC events for the year.
Lisa Rondeau and Jean-François Normand, the hosts for the spring luncheon, reported that the notice to the QCC membership is ready to go to Sheila for distribution. Lisa is waiting for the new QCC website to be announced to include the new website address in the note. Jean-François will book the Brew Street Mill Pub shortly.
The Hammond Golf course is booked for this event and the note to QCC members will be sent to Sheila for distribution by the end of April 2016.
Guy reported that the boat has been booked and will be leaving from the Gatineau dock near the Lady Aberdeen bridge. Lisa mentioned that she is already getting quite a lot of interest in this new activity.
Lucie Houle indicated that she will book a golf course in March 2016. At that time, the specific date will be established.
Leslie Lawry will explore different menu options with the Hellenic Centre keeping in mind the cost of the dinners. Leslie needs to make a deposit to the Hellenic Centre in order to hold the room. Leslie is also looking at different entertainment options other than a comedian.
Lucie raised the question of the current subsidization of non-QCC members who attend the Annual General Meeting dinner. It was agreed that subsidization of QCC members is to continue. It was also agreed to review the approach of providing the subsidy to non-QCC members.
Guy reported that he and Brian had met on January 19, 2016 with representatives of the CRA’s Young Professional Network (YPN). One purpose of the meeting was to see if there are opportunities for the YPN and the QCC to work together. Some of the discussion focused on how members of the YPN could access the knowledge and experience of members of the QCC. A second aim of the meeting was to determine if there was interest in more general knowledge sharing between members of the YPN and the QCC. This would occur on a social basis.
Both Guy and Brian reported that the meeting was very positive. Both organizations will maintain their separate mandates. Brian has agreed to prepare a matrix showing the roles, responsibilities and differences of the two organizations. This will be shared with the YPN for their input.
Potential opportunities were discussed including members of the QCC participating in some the of lunch and learn sessions sponsored by the YPN and having members of the YPN come to Ottawa River Cruise event. Guy indicated that he will include this development in his presentation to the Agency Management Committee (AMC) of the CRA.
Recent developments, mainly the interest of the CRA to have the QCC migrate its website off of the current CRA website and the QCC’s slow progress in this area, have contributed to the decision to make the migration a most urgent priority. Guy thanked Wendy Potvin for the work that she has done on this file.
Guy provided an update on the status of the migration of the QCC’s website from the CRA platform to an independent one. Guy reported that he had reviewed the draft website and provided David Bellerive Lamarre with comments for both the English and French version of the website. Guy’s comments included corrections to existing information on the draft website. Guy provided David all the information that David needs to complete loading the information on the website. This includes minutes of meetings, list of activities, new definition for 25 years of service, the welcome letter, the membership form and results of golf and curling activities. In addition, the new QCC poster will be included on the website. This means that David now has all the input that he requires to finalize the updating of the website.
The draft website should be ready for review by the Directors in about one week. The Public Affairs Branch (PAB) will ensure that the existing website will be linked to the new website on InfoZone. PAB will also provide the QCC with a copy of all archived and current information pertaining to the QCC website.
A note will be sent to the members of the QCC advising them of the new website and its address. The new website will be available by March 31, 2016 at the very latest. It was also agreed that information will be kept on the new website for two years. After two years, the information will be archived.
It was agreed that Guy will ask to make his presentation to AMC sometime in May 2016. Guy will finalize the date in consultation with Mike Snaauw. Guy will also update the draft deck for presentation to AMC.
Lisa was thanked for the work that she did in the development of the new poster for the QCC.
This item was deferred for discussion to the next meeting as Wendy needs to participate since she has the name of a person interested in becoming a Director. Brian agreed to develop criteria that might be used in the recruitment of future directors to the Board of the QCC. Brian will table this for discussion at a future meeting.
Lucie reported that she has obtained the updated list of branch recognition coordinators. She will send a note reminding them of the requirement to include the invitation to join the QCC when an employee reaches the 25 years of work milestone. Lucie will also include a reminder to provide retiring employees with information concerning the QCC so that the retiring employee can join the QCC and/or update their contact information. Lucie will do this once the new website is up and running as she needs to include the new website address in the documentation going to the branch recognition coordinators.
Sheila raised the question of the manual mail outs that are done for about sixty QCC members that are not connected to the Internet. Currently, these members receive a mail out every time an event is announced but do not receive the reminders. The aim of the discussion was to identify ways of reducing the number of mail outs that are done each year. This will include the option of including the calendar of activities for the year to assist QCC members who do not have access to the QCC website.
Brian agreed to develop some options for consideration by the Directors that would reduce the number of mail outs to one to three per year.
The next meeting will be on May 25, 2016 at 5:00 pm at the Train Yards. Should Guy not yet have had the opportunity to present his deck to AMC, the next meeting will be on June 1, 2016 at the same time and location.