YATES MILL ASSOCIATES Board of Directors: Feb. 4 meeting minutes
Minutes from January meeting approved by the group.
Park Business: Tim Lisk
The park held a successful Partnership Reception where VIPs from NC State and County Commissioners
attended. Park also held a volunteer appreciation reception in January that celebrated the hard work of
all the volunteers. Gary Coates was named Volunteer of the Year
YM pond is being looked at as a potential site of a mussel propagation project by U.S. Fish and Wild Life
Service. YM is currently putting together a proposal.
Duke Energy is funding trail work on Creekside trail
The trail camera is picking up lots of pictures of wildlife in the park and can be viewed on Facebook.
Mill as Muse contest is currently going on at the Park. The reception is being held on February 15th.
The Mill Heritage Tour video is currently being updated and should be ready to go by March.
Mill Update: William Robbins
The flume is causing issues. Something keeps placing items in the flume and clogging up the gate.
After heaving rains and winter weather, debris removal was completed on top of the dam.
The mill had some roof issues. A leak at the top of the roof was reshingled and a board replaced in the
ceiling. There is also an issue with a leak where the shed and mill join.
The Holiday and Craft sale, Santa Photo Session were all successful and customers were able to pay with
credit cards.
The park and mill tours are still dealing with obnoxious and disruptive photographers during tours.
Tim - To deal with this issue the park is rolling out annual permits for professional photographers.
William - professional photographers should be encouraged to make a donation to the YMA.
The mill experienced flooding in January which deposited a tree on the dam, washed stones away from
the waterwheel support, and arm in front of waterwheel broken off again.
William and Brooks Burleson began repairs under the mill to replace posts and construct more solid
footings for posts.
Corrine Dunn asks how many posts are complete and William responded that two are complete and two
more to do.
Financial Reports: Shelia Hunter
January Income - $2906.34
Includes Santa Photo Session - $172.00
Holiday Sale - $245.10
January Expenses - $6377.21
Net Income is a loss of $3470.97
$14,639.00 drawn from NCCF is still available to be used for future repairs on the mill. This was money
left over from the flume repairs.
After researching new tax policy information it looks like YMA is exempt from paying sales tax.
Margaret asked the question: Does the committee have an online discussion on increasing prices for
mill tours? The decision was made to have the discussion through email and make a decision before Mill
Tours start.
Committee Reports:
Development: Art is continuing to work on corporate sponsorships and working with Margaret with
updating the corn-grinding sponsorship document. Art plans to meet with Charlie Leffler re YMA
partnership opportunities.
Events: Margaret – Santa at the Mill was very well attended. The event had at least one person in each
time slot. Margaret noted that attendance tapered off towards the afternoon and wondered if that
should be considered when planning next year's event. A limitation to the event in fundraising potential
is that people tended to buy only one photograph. Stan has already committed to do the event again
next year. With the success of the modified craft and holiday sale, think ahead to having the Holiday Sale
with Santa at the Mill instead of with the last corn-grinding.
Advisory Council
Voted to add Advisory Council to serve January and July. This group will have 5-7 people and will serve
as goodwill ambassadors and help with fundraising. The group will be people who are successful
business people in their field that are interested in community involvement and have helped YMA is the
past. These people could be a good tie in to corporate sponsorships.
Nominations: John Vandenberg
Group is nominating 5 people to ask to be on the Advisory Council. Will have the people selected by the
Annual Meeting so they can attend.
Group decided to go pick the core group of people to invite:
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Kristie Nystedt
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Jenny Haas
Lionel Vatinet
Mary Lu Wooten
Alton Howard
Bobby Brown
Mark Fountain
Board Members
John contacted everyone whose term is ending and there are 2 open slots that will need nominations
New Business
Events: Jill
Chicken Pickin’
Arlene Lord is the point person for this event. William will do parking. The board decided to shorten the
time of the event to 2 hours and determined that 3-5pm is the best window. The max amount of tickets
that YMA can sell is 250. The goal is to start selling tickets by the beginning of March. Margaret is
working on getting music for the event.
Caroline asked if board members are required to sell 10 tickets and Margaret said she would think about
it and get back to everyone.
Big Boss Fundraising Event
The date is TBD but expecting late February or early March. A portion of the proceeds of beer sales will
towards YMA. Margaret is working with LaFarm Bakery to see if they can provide samples for the event.
It was also discussed asking Robbie to make cornbread to have as samples. YMA will be able to sell
merchandise during this event.
Annual Meeting
The board discussed the preparations for the annual meeting on May 6th.
ADJOURNED