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2021-01-14 Ed! Board MinutesEd! Board Meeting January 14, 2021 Meeting called to order: 8:04 AM Board Members/Administration in Attendance: Pam Stuller, Matt McCulloch, Jenny Shore, Kali Kelnero, Cheryl Farrish, Kimberly Koening, Mark VonGunten, Deandra Peterson, Jen Lawson, Carrie Hulbert. City of Edmonds Representative in Attendance: Patrick Doherty and Megan Luttrell Guests: Whitney Popa (WorkHorse HQ), Olivia Brown Latham (Sugar Spa), Cecilia Fisher (Slate Salon) Public Comment: N/A Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes: Matt moved to approve the minutes. Kali seconded All approved, none opposed. President's Report: Pam provided an update that Ed! has received a generous $1,000 grant from the Tillery Foundation on behalf of Whitney Popa (WorkHorse HQ). Pam thanked Kimberly Koening for storing a lot of Ed!'s gear (extra umbrellas, signage, etc.) at her store. Pam then went over the Year in Review and encouraged Ed! members to review the committee lists for opportunities to contribute in 2021. Treasurer's Report: No updates, aside from the City will not be assessing late fees on delinquent assessments. New Businesses Added to BID: Not reviewed at the meeting, but this month's list is included Ed!'s monthly newsletter: Designs by Sophia (Sophia Sargent); Pacific Premier Bank (Jack Albright); FIELD (Liz Morgan); Fire & the Feast (Andrew Leckie); Brandi Alsdorf, LLC (Brandi Alsdorf); Silvertech (Joe Gonzalez); MAS, Inc. -Certified Public Accountant (Kimberly Martin); and The Basement Salon (Brooke Schick) City Report: Patrick provided a City report. Due to the Governor's new Covid-19 regulations, Edmonds is treated as a region with King/Snohomish/Pierce Counties and, as a region, we are back to Phase 1 regulations. This leads to ongoing restrictions on indoor dining, group sizes, etc. The Equity and Inclusion Toolkit is now done and will be rolled out this month. The Mayor's first "State of the City" event will occur virtually on 01/21/2021. Edmondsbizbooster.com is a new online compendium of resources to help businesses, start-ups, etc. succeed in town. More substance will be added to the website soon. City Council passed a Streeteries ordinance at the end of 2020 that allows for these to exist in a more permanent basis through 2021, assuming that these are still required by Covid-related restrictions. There is a limit of 20 streeteries under the current regulations (there were 17 restaurants that participated at height of summer). Budget: No updates Committee Updates - Communication & Outreach: The Committee met to discuss how to continue member outreaches in the age of Covid. They came up with the idea of doing a "virtual coffee" with new members. The Committee is also working to clean up the list of member businesses. The annual meeting is tentatively set for 04/28/2021 at 9am. o MOTION: Matt moved to approve $300 towards advertising in My Edmonds News. Jen seconded. All approved, none opposed. Admin: The Admin Committee met to review how to ensure that there is good engagement on the Board, as well as the ideal division of labor between Carrie (Program Manager) and volunteer board members. To help foster transparency and engagement amongst committees, each committee will distribute minutes of their meetings to the entire Board. There are four Board terms ending in 2021 and Pam will be doing outreach to see whether these Board members intend to re -up their positions. There is also an open "By Appointment" position and Pam will be bringing a proposal forward next month to appoint Olivia Brown Latham, who has already been involved with the Marketing Committee, to this position. The City had requested access to Ed!'s photographs from the Member Spotlight series and, after Ed! asked for clarification on how these photos would be used, the City decided to move forward in a different direction. The Committee also discussed how to handle membership for business addresses where there are multiple businesses operating out of the same office address. Pam will ask Lacey at the City for clarification on who is paying the assessments in such scenarios. Furthermore, work is being done to compile a list of businesses with delinquent dues so that discussion can be had about how to address those dues and provide resources for businesses struggling to pay their assessments. o MOTION: Kali moved that we approve $755 for this year's operating expenses budget and $150 for this year's supplies budget. Kimberly seconded. All approved, none opposed. Marketing: Kali provided an update. For Valentines' Day, Ed! is launching a new "Love Local, Love Edmonds" campaign to run February 1-14. It is designed to enhance Valentine's Day shopping/dining in downtown Edmonds. Shops, restaurants, and services can develop their own Valentine's Day specials (gifts, Valentine's displays, food & drink specials, beauty packages, writing someone into a will, etc.; no discounts required). This will be marketed in a February promotional article. To do this, we will need a $1,000 budget to pay for design costs, cost of stencils, spray chalk and other components, and additional advertising. The Committee is looking ahead towards Summer and what we can be done to promote downtown businesses. There is a survey in this month's Ed! newsletter regarding Walkable Main Street and Patrick indicated that the City has no current plans to renew this for 2021, but the City would welcome feedback from the survey. o MOTION: Kimberly moved to approve $1,000 for the February marketing campaign. Kali seconded. All approved, none opposed. Carrie also provided a holiday update. This year's holiday budget was cut from $7,500 to $1,000 and visits to the Edmonds Holiday website were down, but this was to be expected with the drop in budget plus the lack of "events" that Ed! typically highlights this time of year, i.e. the Holiday trolley. There were still very competitive click -through rates on the holiday ads that were run. Traffic was mostly from social media. Window decals were placed in many businesses and some of these are still up. Selfie stations were well -utilized and Festive Drink Bingo generated good feedback from the restaurant community. - Appearance & Environment: N/A, although goal is to use the Bank of America signage/parking for as long as possible. Grants Program: No updates. New Business: None. Meeting Adjourned: 8:59 a.m.