PFC Board of Directors Meeting
Minutes for September 23, 2004

Attendance
Board Members: John Austin; Larry Horvath; Arun Mathur; Pete Schermerhorn; Howard Shapiro; Duane Thomas; Laurie White; Carol Collins, PFC General Manager.

Julie Sverid, PFC Human Resources Director – facilitating meeting
Kathryn Sanderson, Member/Owner volunteer - recording minutes
Guest: Martin Piszczalski, PFC Member/Owner and former Board Member

Call to order
7:30pm by Julie

Agenda Review
Board self-monitoring report G.9 Board-Membership Communication was removed from the consent agenda and postponed until the October meeting.

Consent Agenda
minutes and web minutes of the 8/16/04 meeting. All Directors having reviewed and understood these materials, Laurie moved approval, Duane supported, approved 7-0.

Volunteer Program/Discount
Extended discussion of the role of volunteering. In general, the Board feels that volunteering is important in the cooperative and the community setting, that it creates a sense of ownership, involvement, and identification with the Co-op. The range of volunteering possibilities should be expanded, with actual in-store work playing a reduced role. Ideally, a Volunteer Coordinator would be a volunteer position, but it would also be appropriate for the Outreach Coordinator to manage the program. It should be well organized. The Board must remember the possible legal and tax liabilities associated with compensating volunteers and decide what level of risk it is comfortable with.

Summary of discussion points

• What volunteers do must be useful to PFC
  
• Should encourage volunteering, make people eager to volunteer
  
• Must be cost effective, taking into consideration the “2nd bottom line”: a co-op’s social/community responsibility
  
• There should be incentive to volunteer
  
• Should support the Co-op or the community
  
• Should not be a burden on Operations
  
• Volunteers should have an identity in the co-op and with the co-op; be their own sub-culture - a cadre – their own organization

Duane and Larry will draft policy wording for Board consideration at the October meeting.

Task Force Reports & Recommendations
The Member Linkage, Fundraising, and Board Member Support & Training reports were delivered and discussed. The Audit Task Force report will be presented at the October meeting.

During the meeting break, the Board celebrated Carol’s ten years of dedicated service as PFC General Manager and thanked her for her outstanding contributions to the organization’s success.

Desirable major PFC program, product, and service expansions
The Board continued discussion of possibilities for the future. Larry provided information about Northern Lakes Co-op in Minnesota - founded in 1932, it employs 160 people in twelve departments and provides a wide range of goods and services including groceries, hardware, and a pharmacy. Martin Piszczalski described a central city mall in Rotterdam, Holland that includes a bookstore, classrooms, massage, fair-trade store, organic café, and a grocery that is considered the natural-foods center of the city. The Board agreed that these are preliminary discussions, and that progress will involve reaching out to the Membership, considering their unaddressed needs as well as those of the community.

Next Meeting
Thursday, October 21, 2004, 7:30pm at Menlo Innovations (212 N. 4th Ave).

Adjournment
by acclamation at 9:45.

Respectfully submitted by John Austin, Board Secretary