Meeting of 27 October 2015

Present: Loreto Doyle, Angelo Spinazzola, Paul Weinberg, Jitka Zgola

Regrets: Ian Green; Anne-Claude Pépin, Rosie Smith

Meeting called to order
Agenda approved as amended
Approve minutes of the meeting of 23 September 2015
Motion: to approve the minutes of 23 September (moved: Angelo; seconded: Jitka; carried.)
Financial Report (Jitka)
No changes in position since last meeting.
Motion: to approve the financial report (moved: Jitka; seconded: Angelo; carried.)
Old Business
- Community/Tourism Web Site (Angelo)
- Mike Shepherd agreed to work on the back end of the web site; he set up a test site on his own server. Angelo let him know that we were meeting, and asked for an update. So far, there has been no communication back.
- Action: Angelo will keep on top of things and get a response in the next few days; he will tell Mike that, without a response, we will seek another provider.
- Business Training (Loreto)
- SABDA was approved to run another training workshop to be funded by the NS Department of Labour and Advanced Education, but we did not get much interest locally. Working with the Ingonish Development Society, the Ingonish Resource Centre, and the Department, we decided to try a workshop located more centrally to northern areas.
- We have set up a 5-day programme to be held in Ingonish Beach. An Events sheet announcement has gone out, posters will be hung in Baddeck/locally/down north, and notices sent directly to previous attendees. There is a registration form on line at the Shores of St Ann's web site.
- Community Transportation Study
- Ann Claude has received a draft letter from Loreto; awaiting a response from the County Council. The Study was done in 2013, implementation plan in 2014, no word yet from Council regarding that implementation plan.
- Action: Loreto will check with Anne-Claude to make sure the letter was sent, and will follow up in one week.
- Bookkeeping
- Jitka sent a sample financial statement, as required by the Registry of Joint Stocks, to Lisa Finney, giving her an idea of the info we need to track in financial reporting. In addition to those reports, we need to be able to separately track grant money so that we can accurately account to donors.
New Business
- Immigration Summit
- No information has yet come from our Council on a study done by CBU; they asked each Cape Breton Council to have members of their communities and councils come together on the question of immigration. We do not know the outcome of this request from CBU.
- Ian attended the Immigration Summit organised by the Province in Halifax; we will wait for his report of this event.
- Viewscapes Project
- A new plan has been drawn up for the entire Trail by Jamie Eldridge and Dennis Laffan, for the Cabot Trail Steering Committee. The Committee has funds available to do such a project, and plans to start in 2016.
- Facades Programme
- Paul reported that Lucille Timmons (who managed the last programme through Cheticamp after the Cabot Trail Working Association, the fundraiser, ceased operating) has circulated a call for expressions of interest in a new Facades programme; she has had initial talks with ACOA, who has indicated support in principle. We will continue to spread the word about this initiative, and support the programme going forward. Loreto has already submitted the call to the Events sheet, and it has been published in the community.
- Mentoring and Recruitment
- Angelo has created an informal group of entrepreneurs from Cape Breton who are interested in finding ways to reach out to others to support people settling here, perhaps returning here, growing their businesses. The group hopes for 9 or 10 interested people who will put together a mentoring "pot of gold". They hope to talk to interested business owners individually or as a group.
Next meeting:
Our next meeting is set for 6:30 pm, Tuesday 8 December 2015, at Cabot Shores.
Note: The meeting date has since been changed to Monday 7 December.
Meeting Adjourned (moved: Loreto; seconded: Angelo)

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