Photo of Wonderwall during game with people holding up Dark Clouds and Wonderwall scarves and flags

The Board of Directors’ next meeting will be held over Zoom on Tuesday, May 4 at 7:00pm.

The meeting is open to the public. Please email president@dark-clouds.com to request access to the online meeting.

Dark Clouds Board of Directors Meeting Minutes

Monday, April 5th, 2021

7:00pm

Zoom

Board Members Present:  Sam Solberg, Nick Rodriguez, Meagan Weber, David Zeller, Andrew Bruski, Maggi Heyer, Jack McFarland, Ty Hoagland, Shaun Sapala, Andy Kahl

Absent: Andy Wattenhofer

I. Call to Order

Meeting called to order at 7:05pm

II. Approval of Minutes  

Jack motioned to approve, Nick seconded.

III. Reports of Officers and Committees                                    

a. Treasurer’s Report 

None, Andy absent. 

b. Committee Updates 

Merch

  • Membership scarves are on the way; cards have been ordered after lots of revisions, definitely going to be delayed.
  • New shirt will be announced at the Annual Meeting on the 9th and sales start Monday. 

Matchday

  • No capos for the first matches and few, if any, flags.
    • Too difficult to set aside seats and get them in a good position.
  • Thunderwall should have a small contingent.
  • WW will be seated per state guidelines.
    • Hoping the team can relax some of those restrictions after the first 4 matches.
  • Need to coordinate putting up banners.

Mar/Com/Social 

  • Andy’s co-chair had to step down, but they are getting squared away again.
    • Looking for volunteers.
  • Use form on MCS channel.
  • Newsletter will be going out soon.
  • Nick volunteered to help pick up some slack.
  • Pivot to YouTube is something we’re looking at for streaming, so we need to update the Annual Meeting.

Silver Lining

  • Free Bikes 4 Kids event had 13 volunteers, 64 bikes cleaned; they have a good set up going there.
  • We’re going to do the stadium cleanup instead of our river cleanup; signup went out on the team’s site, so we’ll get that out to folks.
  • Working with Green Garden Bakery to do some work for them; still coordinating times. Planning document is in the works.
  • SAYEC field lining event will be coming up as well. 

Membership

  • Meagan and Alicia worked on the membership survey to get our questions fleshed out; draft was posted and we welcome any edits/suggestions.
  • Scarf handout event could move to the home opener Saturday, but do we want to have people come early in the afternoon or do we do the Friday night before the opener?
    • Scarf handout at Black Hart on the 24th.
    • Split into two shifts, messaging will be that earlier is best for those nervous about interacting with a lot of people and later best for those going to the match or watching at Black Hart.
    • Set up table outdoors at BH. 

Partnership

  •   Meeting will happen soon.
  • Reach out to partners and see what they are doing and willing to do for watching matches (not necessarily watch parties, but just places to watch).
  • Summit seems interested in doing our beer still! Zeller will follow up. 

Tifo

  • Discussions are happening. In-person and budget challenges.
  • Hoping to take the United Together banner and have that hoisted before matches; paint original tifo on that banner. Working with WW tifo folks.
    • Need to see what the logistics of that are and go from there.
    • If we don’t get it painted, the possibility is that we could just use the same tifo (but we don’t love this idea).
  • BLM banner location is being looked at as well.
  • David Martin has been brought back in to provide some advice and assistance.
  • Also need to figure out the vertical hoists because we won’t have enough people for hand over hand. 

IV. Old Business

  • Update on Action Items from 04/05/21
    • Meeting with Front Office – Sam and Nick:
      • Alex Kidd, new WW season ticket rep was on the call.
      • Seats sold in WW as actual seats, pods of 1-6 tickets.
      • Discussion of how to support during the first 4 matches, which won’t be much. We will reevaluate as the 4 packs go on sale.
      • Corey F. (MNUFC Community Outreach) discussed their work in the offseason and what we will see from them during this season.
        1. Worked with players to decide where Man of the Match funds will go to.
        2. Will be starting a scholarship program with MIAC schools and hosting another stadium cleanup event, as well as remodeling a Boys & Girls Club in Saint Paul.
      • March to the Match? Team would have to get a permit with the city to make that happen.
        1. Nick will follow up.
      • For tifo follow-up, Justin should be main contact; copy Sean. 
  • Other Old Business
    • Membership survey update
      • See Membership update section
    • Annual Meeting update (scheduled for 04/09)
      • We are having one!
      • Nick will help host/produce.
      • Meagan will put out the draft program, let us know if you want to handle your committee’s thing or if you want one of us to do it.
      • Q&A with the BOD. Moving this to YouTube to test it out for matchday streams. 

V. New Business

  • Recap of meeting with AccessiLoons
    • Chatted about how we can help them, what they would like to see.
    • We can help promote them on social media.
    • They also provided questions for the survey, as well as some tools for Partnerships.
    • We want to support them, but we also don’t want to make it seem like other SG members couldn’t support/join them. 
  • Watch parties (see message from Wes in Slack)
    • What are our feelings about these gatherings?
      • Need to have the conversation so we know what our messaging is and what our expectations are, re: protocol.
      • It’s important to us that we are following state guidelines, so we can make sure we let our partners know that we expect that if we are sending people to them.
      • Is there a point where we will want to promote “this is where the Dark Clouds will be”?
      • For now, promote what our partners are doing, reevaluate as state guidelines evolve. 

VI. Open to Board

  • Virtual watch parties will continue, move to YouTube.
    • Nick will set up a Zoom call to coordinate with anyone who wants to be on the stream, but also train those of us that want to produce.
    • This way we’re not relying on just two people all season. 
  • Away travel-how will that work?
    • Sam has a spreadsheet via ISC on how that will work for each team.
    • We currently do not have a Travel Chair. 
  • Who is running for WW board??
    • We do not know, but their annual meeting is 04/10/21. 
  • Sam will follow up with Abe re: TC Sol Futsal program

VI. Open to Public 

None

VII. Set Date for Next Meeting

Meagan will set on Slack

VIII. Adjournment

Adjourned at 8:27pm

Leave a Reply