[Temporary KAPA Chairperson and Commissioner Bob Smith at "Make-a-Difference Day"; Photo by N.S.]As committed to, here is the second round of meeting notes. Please scroll down for the intro, basics, lead in, part I...
KAPA Commissioner, Shelly Zimbler, gave a verbal secretary report (accepted) - starting with the fact that three KAPA Commissioners had resigned in the last few months, including Colin Evans, Tim Morrison and Lisa Alt [All three FOPA members / the entire FOPA Board...].
Shelly Zimbler also spoke about a meeting that had been attended by five KAPA Commissioners - with Kingston City Mayor James Sottille. It was reported that the Mayor had a voucher made out ($400) for KAPA - for the specific purpose of youth programming - and that Mayor Sottille indicated that he (through the formal process / City of Kingston) might contribute $5,000 to KAPA - if Nicky Worner (sp? / Town of Ulster) did the same. [The issue of matching funds or reasonable contributions (in regard to the smaller townships) from the other municipalities involved in KAPA has come up numerous times; I'm not going into the history of all of that...]
Shelly Zimbler indicated that Mayor Sottile had also offered to help access a truck and volunteers in order to help out during KAPA's projected move into a new facility [a contract (there are unanswered question regarding this...) has reputedly been signed - via FOPA - with what has been termed the 7-21 building or Ellenbogen (sp?) building (The former home of RNN?) - for use as a KAPA studio] ---
But in terms of all of the above --- Mayor James Sottile (here you have it :) had also asked for more financial [presumably regarding KAPA and FOPA] transparency.
[Friends of Public Access (FOPA) has subsequently - via Susan Holt (U.C. Executive Heins office) - been identified as a registered Non-Profit organization in the State of N.Y. However, no other information on FOPA was accessible (via a quick check by Ms. Holt) regarding FOPA; and, as has been noted previously, the members of FOPA (I have witnessed this and so have others) appear to evade answering direct questions (sometimes this is done by talking around the issue, sometimes by leaving a meeting early, etc.) regarding FOPA specifics; and at least one FOPA board member (see the next set of notes...) has made the claim that FOPA does not have to comply (?) with open meeting laws, etc.]
Commissioner and Temporary KAPA Chair, Bob Smith - gave the budget report for KAPA - which amounted to zip... as KAPA has no bank account or funds at its own disposal [Everything (in terms of money) is being handled [?????] by FOPA...]
[The last proposed (and admittedly idealistic) budget that the KAPA Commission has on file was made out by Bob Smith (acting as group treasurer / working in collusion with KAPA Commissioner Joe Marchetti) - with a copy submitted to (to the best of my knowlege) the members of the KAPA Commission, FOPA (if it was then in existance as such) members, the Safety and Cable Commission, the Kingston City Common Council members and Mayor Sottile.]
KAPA Commissioner Joe Marchetti asked if FOPA could help out with the budget report - as KAPA needs to know where they stand - what funds they are working with - etc. There was (at this point) no answer given [Perhaps (?????) because this was to be addressed later?]
Shelly Zimbler noted that Henry Ellenbogen (sp?) - the newly appointed KAPA Commissioner (not present) was (he is associated with the contracted usage of the Ellenbogen building, etc.) willing to help train and certify people (on the equipment) - and that this was a "bonus."
KAPA Commissioner Bob Smith's KAPA Treasurer report (KAPA balance on file: $0 / all funds are in a FOPA account, and KAPA reputedly needs "permission" and "approval" - to access these...) was accepted as given.
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With that, I guess there is going to be a KAPA Meeting Notes Part III, so please stay tuned...
These meeting tend to go on (sometimes) for hours; there is rarely (hardly ever) a quorum present; very little ever seems to be agreed upon or accomplished during the meetings...; and it might appear to some other people (as it does to me...) that "all is not right" (in regard to the relationship between KAPA and FOPA...) "with the world")]
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Once again, I refer you to a video clip [see producer specifics in the related post below and/or on the source blog] that covered a portion of this meeting...
This video clip, titled, "Friends of Public Access (FOPA), Kingston Area Public Access (KAPA) at Odds Over Funding on this event" is up on the "Kingston News Blog" at (please copy and paste this in the address bar):
http://ucpnews.blogspot.com/2009/06/friends-of-public-access-fopa-kingston.html
Respectfully submitted by,
NS
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