In attendance were: Joe Sellers, Roger Boak, Tom McBrayer, Bill Smith, Debbie Kempler-Smith, Donna Sellers, Joachim Lohan, Bob Hoekman, Randy Carlson, John McCleery, Chiquita Taylor, Diana Floyd, Camille Yarbrough, Mercedes Tarley, Barbara Shepard, Tom Woltz, Jeremy Mills, John Phillips, and Annie Hadow.

Chiquita opened the meeting by welcoming Diana Floyd, who was nominated for the At Large Board Member position that became available when Chris Rampacek resigned his position in September. Each person introduced him/ herself to Diana.

The Board voted on and approved Diana's addition to the HARRA Board.

Bob Hoekman reported to the group that after evaluating the efficacy of the iSTAT device, he is not inclined to recommend that HARRA purchase the cartridges for it. The device requires precise calibration and, in addition, the cartridges expire and become worthless if not used within a certain period of time. Also, no one had given any thought to sharing the device with other area Marathons, which would make a lot of sense. The Board agreed; HARRA does not elect to contribute to the purchase of the iSTAT cartridges at this time. Bob also reported that it looks like HARRA will have 22 members fully trained to operate the AED device as of November 13, 1999.

Roger Boak reported on the laptop purchase. HARRA is planning to buy Jeremy Mills' laptop for $800. Once a replacement battery has been purchased and the computer is confirmed to be in good operating condition, HARRA will purchase it from Jeremy.

Chiquita mentioned that the information on the bulletin boards in Memorial Park is out of date. The Park put the boards up for HARRA to maintain and keep up. John McCleery has the key to the bulletin board doors. Chiquita asked Mercedes Tarley to find a volunteer to take on the project.

Debbie Kempler-Smith presented the expense report for the Kids' Run. The bottom line is that we have approximately $3770 to carry forward for next year's race. In addition, Memorial Hermann has pledged $5000 to sponsor the race again next year. Debbie thanked Mercedes for her excellent work with the volunteers. She moved to vote that we hold the race again next year and that we accept Memorial Hermann's 2000 pledge. The Board approved those items. Debbie said that she would write the necessary letter to Memorial Hermann to thank them for their pledge and to let them know that they will be next year's race Sponsor.

Chiquita discussed the state of the Treasurer's office. Debbie Reeves resigned her position as HARRA Treasurer last week. Chuck Cofer has agreed to help with the Treasurer's duties in the short term. Camille Yarbrough and Roger have been working with the banks to determine the status of HARRA's accounts. Currently we have four accounts, which include two money market accounts, one savings account (for the Memorial Park Trail Fund), and one checking account. Recommendations are that we reevaluate our holdings to better accommodate our financial needs. Because of signature authority requirements, Chiquita or Roger will move the monies around as recommended. Camille and Roger will review the material recently recovered from Debbie Reeves and will give more details at the next meeting.

Camille gave her report on the HARRA Bayou City 10k. She presented a detail of the proposed budget, which she anticipates will be approximately $87,100, with most of the expenditure due to occur in February and March. The projected budget is for 7500 runners. Since Printing Express has agreed to donate printing and because the race can use HARRA's equipment free of charge, some of the costs associated with the race management have already been taken care of.

Randy Carlson told everyone that he had met with Glenda Barnett from the Houston Parks Dept. today. Glenda is going to let the necessary people at the Parks Dept. know that HARRA will be coming to solicit sponsors. HARRA has targeted Continental Airlines, The Houston Chronicle, The Coastal Corporation, and R.R. Donnelley & Sons for sponsorship. Former President George Bush has agreed to be the Honorary Chair for the race. Debbie Kempler-Smith told Randy that her contacts at Memorial Hermann Sports Care are interested in helping as well.

Chiquita let the group know that Diana Floyd is formulating an idea for a project. She is a former attorney who has worked with the Harris County Juvenile Probation Dept. Diana informed the group that Harris County's is recognized as a model program for the U.S. She is investigating the feasability of creating a program to send juvenile delinquents through training camp, perhaps in conjunction with the Students Run program. She told the group that Boulder, Colorado currently has a similar program in place, and has had a high success rate with it. She will investigate her idea further, and will report the results to the group at a later meeting.

Tom McBrayer discussed the Race Director's Seminar he was planning to conduct. Only 3 people signed up for the seminar; usually there are about 15. He is interested in hearing input from everyone as to why the interest was low. Was the agenda not interesting? Was the seminar scheduled at a bad time? Please let Tom know. Also, Tom told the group that the 20k had 2711 finishers, making it the 2nd largest 20k in the country. He expressed that Houston Striders did a good job with the race.

Chiquita agreed that Houston Striders did a good job with the race. She mentioned that she would like to have distinguishing clothing for the volunteer bikers to wear. Bob Hoekman agreed and offered to buy fanny packs for volunteers to wear. HARRA will continue to pursue this.

Debbie Kempler-Smith advised the group that the current HARRA wearables inventory is owned by Kempco. Debbie wants to liquidate the inventory because it is not moving. She proposed offering to sell it to local running shops at cost plus, and to let them sell it for whatever they would like to charge for it. Diana will check to see if she can help sell some of it through Houston Fit. Debbie asked if there were any objections to selling it at cost plus 10%. Chiquita said no, but thinks we should try selling it through Houston Fit first. Debbie will give the information about the merchandise to Tom Woltz to advertise in Footprints so HARRA members will know where to purchase the merchandise.