International Society of Precision Agriculture (ISPA) Board Meeting Minutes
 
March 21, 2019
 
Conference Call
 
Participants: Ian Yule, President; Victor Alchanatis, Secretary; Terry Griffin, Treasurer; Nicolas Tremblay, Immediate Past President; Ken Sudduth, Past-President; John Stafford, Past-President; Quentin Rund, Executive Secretary

 

Could Not Participate: Jess Lowenberg DeBoer, President Elect; Raj Khosla, Founding President

 

The meeting started at 13:30 UTC-6
 
Welcome: We had a double-start to the meeting as North America jumped the gun on daylight savings and Quentin did not update the start time accordingly. So had a double-start to the meeting, but all were able to participate as planned. Missing was Jess who sent his regrets.

 

Review minutes of last meeting: Just a few minor edits. Approved as submitted. Quentin showed the website and where to access the past meeting minutes. (https://www.ispag.org/ISPA_Board_Docs)

 

Treasurer report: Fee for downloading transaction data. Should we do CD with excess funds? Terry suggested that much of what is in account may be paid out for admin fees and conference fees prior to getting income from conference in 2020, so maybe not much at this time. Current balance is $59,741.82

 

15th ICPA: Minneapolis/St. Louis. Quentin presented three options for Minneapolis

Mystic Lake Resort, 6/21, $135room/$35k food and beverage
Marriott Downtown, 6/14, $174/$50k
Renaissance Downtown, 6/21, $209/$69k

After reviewing these options, the board thought it would be better to hold the conference later in the month – wanted to check on availability of June 28 as well. Quentin will check and report.

 

ISPA Audit: Terry and Ian discussed ISPA audit. Terry is concerned that if just an ISPA audit, the cost is not worth it due to not many transactions take place with just ISPA business. If ICPA is included, would be more worthwhile, but the audit would check what happened against “agreed procedures” (which we did not have formalized for previous conferences). Discussion favored Quentin and Terry determining some initial formal procedures for the 15th conference and this would be used as basis for an audit after it’s over. It was agreed that formal procedures would be useful for Society business as appropriate.

 

Country Reps policy recommendation: Ken presented the current status of the country reps program at ISPA. Ken walked through the document prepared to codify the country reps program and asked board members to comment on the proposed document. He noted there are several sections where options exist and could board members please indicate which option they preferred. Board members were asked to send comments to Ken in next 2 weeks and be prepared to discuss and adopt the program at the next board meeting.

 

Examination of stipend renewal to PRAG Editors: A discussion about the stipend given to PRAG Editors started with a citation of the 2016 minutes where a stipend of 2500 Pounds was established as an ISPA contribution to PRAG Editors. John commented that the work load has grown for the editors as the number of articles has increased.

2017 – about 220 articles
2018 – about 300
2019 – already through March there are 96 (on pace for near 400)

The board did adjust the stipend in 2018 2.7% due to cost of living increase. Currently, the stipend is 2567.5 pounds per editor. 
Nicolas discussed need to restructure deal with Springer. 
Ian will explore options for basing stipend on inflation and work load.
Tabled vote till next meeting based on Ian’s work, but in principle board is inclined to support the cost of living and workload adjustment to the stipends. 

 
Considerations for new deal with Springer: This discussion was tabled for next meeting

 

Status of PA definition process: Not pressing, tabled for next meeting

 

Developments with communities: Nicolas reported PAQ has developed and released some new website tools for community leaders including wiki, listserv, and documents library features.

 

ECPA updates including travel costs may be prohibitive: Terry mentioned cost of travel to Europe may prevent him from being able to attend.

 

Other items? – none

 

Meeting adjourned.