Houston Area Traditional Dance Society
This page has two major sections:
1. Officers required by the bylaws
2. Other officers and positions
A third section lists positions that we used to have, but don't currently.
Current officers, committee chairs, and selected other volunteers are listed on the About HATDS page on hatds.org.
The Who What Where document (in Dropbox / Board Policies and Procedures) lists jobs that don't have officer status and who does those jobs. Who What Where probably needs to be updated each June.
The President shall be the principal executive officer of the Corporation, and in general supervise and control all of the business and affairs of the Corporation. He/she shall preside at all Meetings of the Board of Directors. (5.03)
The President creates the agenda for the board and membership meetings with input from the other directors and (optionally) using the template in the Dropbox Board Documents by Year subfolder. See the document named Procedure for Recording Meetings for guidelines.
The President presides over board meetings, leads the discussion of the agenda items, and keeps discussions on point and/or mediates discussion between board members.
The President also presides over membership meetings, following essentially the same procedures as for board meetings. The President usually does announcements at the contra dances but any director can do that, using the KISS form available at the door.
All directors receive the emails sent to board@hatds.org. Unless someone else is appointed to do so, the President responds to legitimate emails and informs the other directors of his/her response.
In the absence of the President or in the event of his/her inability or refusal to act, the Vice President (or in the event there be more than one Vice President, the Vice Presidents in order of their election) shall perform the duties of the President, and when so acting shall have all the powers of and be subject to all the restrictions upon the President. (5.04)
Board members who don't have other specific titles are often given the title of Vice-President, but one person should be designated as First VP.
The Treasurer shall keep current and accurate financial records with complete entries of each financial transaction of the Corporation, and shall submit a statement of financial condition to the Board of Directors at their Regular Board Meetings and to the Membership yearly. (5.05)
A detailed list of duties:
| Memberships and Donations | $1,856 |
| Net Contra Dance Profit/Loss | $51 |
| Net ECD Profit/Loss | $32 |
| Bayou Bedlam Profit/Loss | $1,028 |
| Other Revenue Received | $110 |
| Administrative Costs not otherwise included | ($774) |
| Total Profit/Loss 6/1/16 – 5/31/17 | $2,303 |
Requires secure internet access and a printer (black and white is fine).
The Treasurer's job is possibly the most labor intensive of all the required positions, as it requires constant and accurate updating of the corporation's financial records and regular reports to the board.
The Secretary shall keep minutes of all Meetings of the Board of Directors and Meetings of the Members. The Secretary shall include in the minutes of the next Regular Meeting of the Board of Directors a summary of all discussions and decisions made by the Board via email or other electronic means since the last Meeting. (5.06)
A very important position that also requires responsibility and good spelling, grammar, and note-taking skills. See the Minutes page in this handbook for details and procedures.
The President and Secretary can not be the same person (5.01 and State Law).
The communications coordinator is the board's liaison with the webmaster and the listmaster. This person also sends text messages on behalf of the Board using our SMS interface (pass phrase required).
listmaster) on the content and scheduling of HATDS email blasts.
This is a very important position and should be filled by a board member. A report/update from the Compliance Officer is needed at every board meeting.
The Compliance Officer
Almost all of the IRS emails are not relevant to us, but complacency is what got us into trouble before (see History, next) and without due diligence it could happen again.
The treasurer also receives the IRS emails. It's a good idea for the compliance officer to check with the treasurer if there's any question about the relevance of an IRS email. Please don't assume that the treasurer actually read the same email!
HATDS files a version of Form 990 each year. Changes affecting that form deserve attention and consultation with the treasurer. Remember that HATDS has no employees so information regarding health insurance and salary reporting can be ignored.
This position was formed by the 2014-15 board in response to HATDS losing its non-profit status due to not filing a required form after the IRS changed its rules. It cost us $850 and hours of volunteer work to regain that status.
The position was also formed because no procedure was in place for checking—much less maintaining—the HATDS timeline of critical events, or making sure that the board complied with the timeline or bylaws. Anybody
could have done those things, but too often Nobody
did.
Kendall Rogers wrote an excellent, detailed guide for the Membership Coordinator. There is an updated version online at hatds.org/board/membcoor.
The Membership Coordinator does not need to be a board member, but should be someone who attends dances frequently. They also need to own and be an intermediate-level user of spreadsheet and word processing programs.
Requires secure internet access and access to a printer (black and white is fine).
This person keeps tracks of all HATDS consumables such as cups, plates, napkins, etc. When something is running low, the supplies manager purchases the items and is reimbursed (board approval may be required for larger purchases), or coordinates with the Treasurer for online bulk purchases using a debit card.
A list of supplies the Supplies Manager manages:
*Found in Dropbox; copies of these need to be printed and brought to the dance when supplies are low.
The Volunteer Coordinator is responsible for keeping SignUp Genius updated, making sure that the most important jobs are covered (such as door manager), and soliciting and training new volunteers for the door manager, hall manager, and kitchen manager jobs. The volunteer coordinator does not need to manage the sound techs.
Sign Up Genius is being used to
See the Volunteer Coordinator page for detailed procedures.
Some boards have produced the occasional theme dance (ice cream social, St. Patrick's, Halloween, hats for HATDS' birthday, etc). An Events Committee or an individual could be recruited to develop and promote those special dances.
An events committee could also help coordinate larger infrequent events such as double dances with potluck dinner, workshops, and special dances or concerts with visiting artists.
We have a fair amount of old flyers and newsletters. It would be great to get those organized and digitized.
We used to have real newsletters , but unless someone is passionate about producing a newsletter, including soliciting and writing articles, newsletters are likely to remain a thing of the past.
No, this isn't an office, but it's something that hopefully is on the agenda of every HATDS Board of Directors. Having a newsletter (not just an dance reminder), a volunteer coordinator (and many volunteers), dance themes and special events, and distributing a timely report of board meetings (now required by our bylaws) all promote a sense of community, something HATDS had at one time and has since lost. Many people see our dances only as a commodity rather than a community they can be involved with.