Monthly Meeting Minutes September 15, 2014

George brought the subdued riot to order at exactly 8PM, with 28 members in attendance.

New Members:
Dennis Straple, with an Orange Red non-running 70-something MGB.
Chris Wood, 73’ BRG MGB

Tech Coordinator Steven Skegg gave an inspiring talk about winter car storage.

Next meeting will kick off the officer nomination season, where officers will be nominated for office. The club is still looking for candidates for Secretary. Nominations will be in October, and a second round in November. After that, the nominations are locked, and ballots are created and mailed out with the December Driveline. Dave “Cowboy” Bralich will collect the ballots and announce the results at our January meeting.

October’s meeting will be the 38th birthday of the club, which as usual, there will be cake and Champagne! On an unrelated note, Ralph Arata will be giving a discussion on lubricants.

The Christmas party is scheduled for December 6th, at our new location in Lisle, at the Wheatstack Restaurant and Golf Club. There will be Prime Rib, Lemon Chicken, possibly Tilapia. If you have any preferences or suggestions about the menu, Ralph Arata is very happy to listen to comments. The important thing to note here, is that cocktails begin at 6pm. Cost will be $37.50 per person. It was a great time last year, and this year looks even better!

We’re trying to increase the amount of advertisers in the Driveline. Both George and Ralph have taken on the challenge of each getting 3 new advertisers. The new rates for advertising in the Driveline, is $100/year for business card size, and $200/year for 1/3 page, current advertisers are grandfathered into the old rate. If anybody knows anybody who’d be interested, please have them contact Ralph or George! The current club membership dues basically pay for only the Driveline newsletter. This doesn’t leave a lot of room in the budget. If it wasn’t for things like the Swap Meet, the club would likely run in the red. So if we can get some more advertisers to help foot the bill for the newsletter, the better off the club will be.

Then it was break-time and the 50/50 raffle was held. Won by Paul Wrightson, who collected $27! And Dino Perez won a photo of an MGB GT, and Dave Newman won a framed picture of a ’74 MGB!

Past Events:
Reinout read out a letter of thanks from the group who organized the Ped in the Weeds Family Picnic, who were very thankful for the rides in our “cool cars”!


Tally Ho Rally: was attended by about 22 cars, 18 MG’s, in the Barrington/Hoffman Estates area. It was organized by Carl

Vogl of the Vintage club, and hardly anybody got lost, except for Bill Kalafut. It was enjoyed by all! Except the CMGC got its collective butt kicked by the Vintage club! So next year, we’ll have to wrestle the title from them!
Westmont Cruise Night: 18 total cars came out, 11 MG-B’s, an A, a Midget, and an RV8! Bill organized a 15-minute “walking” rally around Westmont. The top three winners were all named Jim! So non-Jim’s needed not apply! Bill offered to put on the Cruise night again next year, if the club wants to do it, which seems quite likely!
British Car Union Festival was last weekend. Turnout was very good! Numbers were comparable to last year, with around 550 cars, and over 1500 attendees. There was a full page in the Daily Herald about the BCU. Next BCU meeting is in October and John will have numbers from us then. Reinout gave a talk about the history of the MG Company. John Kearns is looking for feedback on how to keep folks around the show until 3, so if you have ideas, get in touch with John.

Staff Reports:
Finance: Ralph handed out the P&L and took questions, which mostly revolved around the cost of the Christmas Party.
Membership: 3 new members from the BCU, bringing our total to ~264 members.
Library: Still have 5 nice wall plaques’ left. If you want something, please contact Bill prior to the meeting so he can bring it.
Regalia: We’re out of hats, and have ordered new ones. They should be in next week.
Webmaster: Website is up and running. He will be back in Chicago 9/17 to 9/21.
Driveline: Victor is looking for articles from the Tally Ho Rally, the Westmont Cruise Night, as well as BCU. Please send Victor pictures, and/or a paragraph or two about the event, and picture captions, etc. Anything is better than nothing! Victor prefers JPEG pictures, as opposed to web links, etc.
Facebook: Up and running.
Tech Coordinator: Gave a nice talk tonight.
Tool Crib: The club has a nice collection of tools available for members to use. The club keeps things that are infrequently used, and that you wouldn’t want to buy yourself if your only using it a couple times. Things in the tool crib include: A MIG welder, a plasma cutter, an engine hoist, a King-Pin Ream (I’ve used that!), etc. Check out the club website, or contact Jim Evans for more info.

Upcoming Events:

Next week is the Wine, Cheese and Beer tour. October 4th, is the car care clinic for seniors, in Lisle. It starts at 8am, and take volunteers to help inspect the cars of senior citizens. Reinout is looking for volunteers to help out. October 11th, the Lucas Memorial Night Rally is being brought back by Rich Messervey! It should be a great time! It starts at 4pm on the Saturday, at The Lodge, which is west of St. Charles. October 26th, Halloween Rally! It will be scored on the special stages at the Forest Preserves. You’ll need to bring a clock and/or a pen. It starts at 11am and Reinout’s home. Check out the Driveline, website, or club email, for more info.

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