Arts Commission

Committee Meeting Minutes Tuesday, September 15, 2020 11:00 a.m. Middletown, CT Via WebEx MCA Grants Review Committee: Minutes Present: Lee Godburn Joyce Kirkpatrick Julia Faraci Charlotte McCoid Also Present: Kisha Michael, Staff 1. Call to Order - Lee volunteers to chair meeting and opens it at 11:11 AM 2. Public Session - With no public present, there was no session. 3. Old Business a. MCA Grant Policy Review & Recommendations Bylaws – “Commission Policies/ Procedures Grants” was briefly discussed but tabled for further discussion with the members. It needs to be brought up to date. The following recommended changes were agreed on: -Paragraph 1 – Changes underlined and in italics -Change to “Three Commissioners plus Staff are required on the Review Panel” -Change next sentence to “Commissioners on the Review Panel must be those who do not have a conflict of interest with any of the applicants being interviewed as outlined in the current Conflict of Interest Policies” with remainder of paragraph unchanged -Commission Voting - A duly constituted quorum of the Commission will vote on the Review Panel’s recommendations. The Committee agreed on the need to add that the “Commission next will vote on whether to vote on each application or on the whole group of applications.” This and related points to be considered at the next Grants Review Committee meeting. Recommendations on a new Commission voting statement will be drafted for all to review before the next meeting. It will include recommendations for attendance at MCA-supported events by Commissioners and discussion of Grant Reports by the full MCA Commission. Yearly Grant Schedule was briefly discussed. More investigation is required to solve the problem of lag time between the MCA Grant Award decisions and the deadline for getting them onto on the Common Council agenda. 4. Any other business – The rest of the agenda to include youth applicant incentives, yearly grant schedule, grantee timeline, funding and conflict of interest was tabled for the next meeting of the committee 5. Announcements – none 6. Adjournment – The meeting adjourned at 11:47 a.m. Respectfully submitted, Joyce Kirkpatrick, Secretary pro tem