August 16, 2025 Minutes

8:00 AM
Crossroads

Call To Order:

President Nathan S

Roll Call:

Nathan S, Nathan T (left at 9:15), Kelsey, Heather, Mike, Katie, Wes, Derek

Approval of previous minutes:

Motion to approve: Kelsey, seconded by Katie, unanimous approval

Executive Director Report:

Grants

I got word that we have received a $1,000 grant from Black Hills Energy and the money has already been added to our account. I am waiting to finish up grants for Walmart and Midco until the 2026 Season is finalized since this season is drawing to a close. I am also not going to be looking for new grants until then. Probably around October I will hit grants again hard and along with that other large businesses in the area that have given to other theaters that Bella looked up for me and try to get them on board for 2026.

Website

I have been working to get the website updated. The minutes and agendas have been updated to current. Along with that, and thanks to Bella’s help I have been working on the Production History portion of the website. I worked with Bella to get all of the older shows on the website. Not all of these shows are live yet, but basic information has been added to the website. I still need to go in and add artwork to them to get them live on the site and I have been working my way through them. I will continue to do so until all of our shows are on the website. I still need to finish up the 15 Year Timeline page, which is almost completed as well. I have also been working on getting photos that we have from all past shows on our BOD Drive so we have a repository. This started this so Anna had them for the documentary, but I realized when working on getting the old shows on the website, we don’t have a central place for any of this and I think it would be good to have all of these in one place. They are in Drive/BOD/Photos. I haven’t completed this project yet, but I’ve made a lot of progress.

Mailchimp

So we ended up with an issue with our Mailchimp, all of the sudden we had over 800 emails in our Mailchimp which I didn’t trust to be real. This also pushed us past our limit which cost more money from our base account. It took some time to figure out how to correct the issue. We have implemented some ways to help stop spam from getting through on sign-up through website moving forward and I removed about 400 emails from our list. This pushed us back below our limit so we are no longer being charged extra. I will keep going through the list some more, unfortunately at this point, it takes some extra time to root out the spam.

Merch

I was contacted by Stephanie Bussiere, she had tried purchasing a tank top through out online store back in April. Teespring took her money but never sent her order. Anytime she checked it kept saying it was being processed. She was never able to get help from anyone there. She let me know several weeks ago about the issue. At this point I tried to see what I could do, which unfortunately was very little. I tried to reach out myself and could only get their AI online help, and it was not helpful. At this point I decided to end our store at TeeSpring. They have been sold a lot as a company over the last couple of years and has been steadily getting worse. I requested a payout for whatever money they owed us. Removed the merch link from our website. Removed all products from TeeSpring, I can’t seem to just delete the store itself on TeeSpring, another problem with them. I am having Bella research a new online alternative. We will get this new store running with all old products and hopefully get some new ones created soon.

To resolve the issue with Steph, we are going to refund her money ourselves, about $30, and then give her a tank top whenever we get the new store running for her troubles. On a side note, we are finally about sold out of the shirts we had on hand and I would like to purchase a few more to have on hand for shows to sell in person. I’m not in love with the quality of the shirts we got locally though, they have faded pretty quickly. I would like to try another printing shop, possibly whatever new online store we use. I will let the board know once the new store is running.

Sound

The city council approved part of the new audio system for the auditorium. They went with Haggerty’s. They decided to not go for stage monitors, microphones, microphones, hearing assistance, and video. There is work to do before the installation can happen, some new electrical conduit that will require scaffolding in the auditorium, they will even have to take out some seats to do this. They are hoping to do this in either September, October or November. I have reminded them of the show dates for Is He Dead? and the Playwrighting Festival but didn’t hear back. Just waiting on some dates and we will go from there. There is also talk of cabinets needing to be removed, Jody said that store equipment that belongs to BFACT, but I’m not sure what she is talking about. Trying to get clarification on that as well.

Officer Reports:

President
- Nothing to report
Vice President
- Nothing to report
Secretary
- Nothing to report
Treasurer
- Current balance $19,085.25. Ordered checks
Creative Committee
- Is He Dead?
  - Auditions went great and practices have begun on the show. We are very excited about the show and I think it will be amazing. Posters will be done soon and marketing will get into full swing starting late next week. Set building starts in earnest next Saturday as well and we are hoping it should go fairly smoothly. I am asking for $4,200 for this show’s budget, I can supply a breakdown if the Board needs. Just so the Board is away, $1,500 is for Rec Center Rental and $870 is scripts and licensing.
  - Motion to approve budget: Kelsey, seconded by Mike, unanimously approved
- Center of the Nation Playwrighting Festival
  - I have worked with Bella to get all of the details figured out for the Playwrighting Festival which will be on October 17 & 18. We have started soliciting playwrights, directors and actors. We will have some workshops during the week of writing, those workshops will be open to the public and we will promote as such. There will be some other activities that will be open only to the playwrights. The showcase on the 17 & 18 will be free. We did receive $1,000 from the one grant earlier this year to help pay costs for this event. Bella will be mostly running this event with me helping.
- It’s a Wonderful Life
  - Allie will be directing this show and we have begun discussions on dates and what needs to be done. We have spoken to Micah Penel to do sound for this, he will let us know for sure very soon, but he seems interested.
- Improv
  - Geno and I have had preliminary discussions on this and he is willing to lead and help create this programming. I am working on getting another meeting soon to keep this moving and start trying to get some concrete dates in place.
- GOAT
  - In speaking with Anna, we had come up with an idea to improve what we are doing with our Northern Hills Theater Group, what GOAT is part of. We talked about getting a workshop together of all the participating theaters to see how we can take some next steps. I messaged the other theaters and they all seemed interested with Anna leading said workshop. As of now, Anna is looking into a grant to pay for this event, if we are unable to get this, the participating theaters may be asked to kick in a little money to make it happen, but that would all be figured out later if it needs to happen.
Public Relations
- Engagement is currently down but will improve once Is He Dead campaign begins. Now that mail chimp has been fixed, back to getting a newsletter together. Have updated poster hanging locations to include 40+ places.
Volunteer Committee
- Social hour planned next week, approx 2 hours planned. Discussing with Derek on perhaps disbanding the creative committee and transitioning members to volunteer committee as they have overlap in duties.
Fundraising Committee
- Setting up a meeting with Derek to go over silent auction planning to coincide with Christmas show
Strategic Committee
- Still working on summary report for final meeting

Old Business:

Bylaws – Proposed amendments
1. Strike article 3 section 1, no membership committee
2. Change wording article 3 section 2, board shall maintain list of members
3. Change presidential address article 4
4. Change date of membership meeting article 5 section 1, to first quarter
5. Strike article 5 section 2, list of voting members
6. Change title article 6 section 1, director of membership to member at large
7. Strike article 5 section 2, procedures on first terms
8. Change title article 5 section 2, director of membership to member at large
9. Strike article 7 section 5 and section 6, no director of membership
  1. Combine and replace with there shall be a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd member at large whose duties will be determined by the board of directors
10. Add article 7 section 6, all board members will be required to chair or serve on a regular or special committee
11. Add article 7 section 7, all board members are expected to regularly attend monthly and annual meetings.
12. Add article 9 section 9, the board may conduct a special meeting to vote to expel a board member if the board member has broken the code of conduct, been convicted of a misdemeanor or felony crime, or has failed to complete board duties as determined by the board.

New Business:

Bella’s contract- add line to writer’s workshop budget to continue paying her through October so she can finish her duties. $280
Documentary funds – filmmaker would prefer to be paid now rather than at the end of the year, recommended to submit an invoice for payment.