WCFA Board Meeting – Online Zoom 1600 – 1830 – May 24, 2022
Board meeting was call to order at 1606 by President Todd Graves, Secretary Danielle Sims, and board members: Dave Rains, Reed Gracie, Saul Labanauskas, Greg Bailey, Will Judkins. Tim Logozzo joined later. Saul had to leave near the end.
Minutes from last meeting were reviewed as all had received a copy via email to review before the meeting. Motion to accept minutes by Saul, seconded by Will. Minutes approved.
Treasurers Report was shared by Treasurer, Danielle Sims. Account Balances are as follows: Checking $64,596, Savings $60, 081, PayPal $10,928. Discussion to pay $6000 salary for the President’s work from May 2021 to May 2022. Motion to pay president by Dave, seconded by Saul. Danielle will send check to President Graves after the meeting.
Danielle gave an update on what has been happening with the IRS Update & 990 Filing. We have continued to receive letters from the IRS saying that we owe penalties for not filing 990 for years 2007-2019. Danielle sent a fax as instructed to be exempt from owing the penalties. Every few months since we received less letters than originally sent. Danielle suggested we continue to wait to see what will come we also discussed getting an accountant to help. Motion to wait by Greg, seconded by Dave. All approved.
Danielle reported that the 2021 filing of her 1099 had an error. Her December pay was categorized wrong and therefore left out of the annual total put on her 1099. She changed the December pay date to January 2022 and will make it up in 2022 1099 rather than amending the 2021 1099. All ok with that.
Training Committee Topics to discuss:
Danielle proposed a future S-230 class policy relating to S-290 timeline. She shared the current process allowed students and their employers to submit S-290 certificates up-to the start of class. This is causing stress and difficulty for her and the instructor. Danielle proposed that we require students to have the S-290 done 2 weeks prior to class start date. If it is not done, the student will not be allowed to attend. Class refunds will be done the same as other classes according to the current Training Policy. A motion to accept this change was made by Greg and seconded by Will. All approved.
Danielle shared a problem with instructor database privileges. Currently instructors are allowed to changed student status and add anyone in the database to a class. Danielle discovered a problem in both of these privileges and sent an email to Dan Curfman, our admin to fix this. One instructor deleted students from a class roster to clean it up for them, but this deleted the payment tracking that she was using that the instructors don’t see. Another instructor was able to add a student to a class that wasn’t one of their employee’s. Both issues caused trouble in the database and adding a student caused a member to call, angry thinking his employee was being taken from him. This problem has been corrected.
Training Coordinator wants to approve two unit instructors to be lead instructors. Pete Day to teach Field Day only, Jason Sare to teach all 100 level classes. Greg Baily said he would monitor Jason at two of his upcoming classes and turn those in so Jason could be moved up to lead. All approved.
Danielle shared that Fire Shelter Pamphlets are not required for RT-130 classes in the course outline. We will no longer provide them at these classes but will for the classes they are required.
Danielle shared that she would prepare the RT-130 for next season again but would like to call on instructors, board members for input with ideas. All agreed.
Old Business:
Review of Covid-19 policies Fed & State. No news from the Feds, as far as we know contractors are not required to be vaccinated. Todd shared that from the NWSA conference they clearly said they will not be needed. President Graves attended the Fire Defense Committee meeting earlier today and confirmed that Inslee had dropped the mandate for contractors. Todd called DNR to see if he could get clarity from them to see if they would adhere to Inslee’s ruling. He got transferred around and was not able to get any answers.
No committees have met since our last meeting. Todd will follow up with the ones that he is involved in.
President Graves shared the work that he and Danielle did to finalize a draft of the Code of Ethics provision. He will send it out to the board members and then members for a final review by June 15th. Some recent concerns have come up that this provision would help resolve and it imperative that we get it adopted soon.
Any other Old Business? Discussion on cross carding. Limit days, add back admin override. Will bring to the members at the General Meeting.
New Business:
President Graves shared his thoughts on Contractor Liability at Incidents. He was asked to be a STL on a fire in 2021. He was asked to do several jobs. He asked where is my liability? Would the team cover him? They said NO! Would my insurance cover me? NO! Todd recommends just saying NO, do not go beyond the scope of the order.
President Graves proposed group purchasing (shelters, radios, tires, insurance). Much discussion followed. Will share with the members at the General Meeting.
Discussion of Water Contract Process Pros/Cons. Linda Neely left. President Graves plans to contact CO’s to introduce the WCFA. Discussion about little problems with in-person inspections. Most felt the honor system wasn’t a good idea, corners will be cut. Reed said he like the email communications. It was brought up about having to put water in trucks during freezing temperatures. SAM issues have been difficult for many.
Danielle shared that the Records Provision in the last contract where you had to give employees who asked copies of their records. This provision is not in New WH Contract, and the employers need to let their employees know. Will pass on at the General meeting.
Dave Rains shared his concern for not being able to sub-out fallers. Reed said fallers have “O” #’s and cannot be subbed out. Why do fallers have “O” #’s? Dave said he would get with President Graves to see if we can get some answers by the fall meeting.
Danielle shared that we have 6 New Members to discuss and election of officers for the following positions:
o President 2-year term – Currently Todd Graves
o Executive Board #2 – 3-year term – Currently Will Judkins
o Executive Board #5 – 3-year term – Currently Dave Rains
No other New Business.
Fall Meeting TBD
Motion to adjourn meeting by Will, seconded by Reed Meeting Adjourned 1834