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Board - Committee - Commission - Council: 2021 JUN -8 AM 10: 31
Cultural Council
Date: 2021-02-01 Time: 7:00 PM
Building: Location:
Address: Session: Open Session
Purpose: Version:
Attendees: Members - Present:
Mary Ann Kozlowski, Nora Bucko, Brian Kimerer, Katherine Lopez Natale,
Kerr! Perry, Jane Soloway, Megan Fidler-Carey, Michael Duncan Smith
Members - Not Present:
Megan Fidler-Carey, Bhart! Joy Paris
Others Present:
Minutes Respectfully Submitted By: Katherine Lopez Natale
Topics of Discussion:
This meeting was conducted via ZOOM due to the coronavirus pandemic restrictions.
Meeting was called to order at 7:04 p.m.
Minutes from the January 4, January 5, and January 11, 2021 meetings were approved.
The treasurer reported that there was only one item to report. The Klllam author visit
planned under the 2020 grant was cancelled due to grantee's inability to schedule It before
the end of the year. Discussion ensued regarding how to report or use these funds. The
Council could Increase the dollar amount of some grants given this year. However, most
applicants received the full amount they had requested so this option was dismissed. These
funds could also be applied to this year's administrative costs and used next year to
increase available funds for next year's grants. This last course of action was approved by
the Council subject to the treasurer's reaffirming the legitimacy of this course of action with
our contact at the Massachusetts Cultural Council. The treasurer will also encourage those
whose 2020 commitments have been already met to submit their request for
reimbursement as soon as possible.
Michael Duncan Smith was welcomed to the Council after having completed all steps of the
process.
The Council addressed lessons learned after going through the most recent award process.
Members agreed that applicants often provided scant information about how they would
market their services to Reading residents. In some cases they had not given specific
information about organizations that would sponsor them or Reading contacts who had
accepted the proposed services. The Council decided that our funding priority regarding
explicit outreach to Reading residents needs to be updated next year on the town website,
in our publicity for next year's awards, and on the Reading page of the MCC website. In
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addition, we plan to convey this concern to MCC in the event that they request more explicit
information on the application form.
Denial letters have been sent out. Brian will look through the RCC email to ensure that no
challenges have been received. Mary Ann has prepared some award notices and Nora will
assist her in completing this task. The email will also include a reimbursement form and a
request for a completed W9 form from those who have not previously received a grant from
Reading Cultural Council. Megan will send this information out via email once the entire
packet has been put together.
The acceptance letter will also ask awardees to submit details such as date, location, and
other pertinent Information about their project since COVID-19 has made it difficult for
applicants to ascertain all of the details by the application deadline. This information will
also usually be available to the public through RCC press releases which announce the grant
program as well as urging local citizens to consider becoming a member of the RCC.
Concerning publicity, the Council also discussed the possibility of posting information about
upcoming town cultural events on social media. Our newest member, Michael, will study
and present a social media plan for the Council, including sites such as Facebook,
Instagram, and Twitter. He will look at what other local cultural councils have done in this
regard.
A number of other items were discussed:
• The Council would like to extend our outreach to the high school to attract school-
age representation. Michael offered to reach out in this area.
• Brian is pulling together the annual survey. It was suggested that he do this using
Google forms. Michael will help with Google forms if needed. A former Council
member had a distribution list which may be available on our Google Drive.
• A mini press release will be sent to the Select Board.
• We will continue to reach out to our liaison, Vanessa Alvarado, to establish a date for
a visit to our meeting. We will also extend an invitation to our MCC liaison Timothea
Pham.
• The new Executive Director of MCC is Michael J. Bobbit. He will hold a "Meet Michael
Listening Series" with outreach to various areas of Massachusetts. On February 250
and 261°, the meetings target the Northeast and Boston areas respectively but
people from any area of Massachusetts may register for any of the meetings.
• We continue to look for new members and must choose current members to replace
our chair and treasurer whose terms will end in June.
The next meeting will be March 1, 2021 at 7 p.m.
The meeting adjourned at 8:21.
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