Minutes RMAVV Board of Directors Meeting
Saturday January 11, 2003

Attendees - Nancy Janes, Dave McLoughlin, Kathryn Stubler, Judy Mason, 
Karen Loveland, Mike Heck, Tim Merrick, Jeff Carr, Horst Caspari, John Bauer.
Not present -  Bret Neal and John Mathewson.

President Nancy Janes called the meeting to order at 2:08

Wine Development Board Proposal
Jeff Carr of the Wine Board presented a proposal from the Wine Quality Committee.  
The purpose of the proposal is to improve the quality of Colorado wines by 
providing information and expert feedback to winemakers.  The proposal, has 3 main goals:
1. Create an opportunity for wineries to have wine tasted by experts - a blind 
tasting with a private critique
2. Perform lab tests on the wine to be tasted.
3. Submit wines to Beverage Tasting Institute with private feedback.
The Wine Board would contribute $15,000 of their $450,000 budget, the 30 participating 
wineries would contribute $25 each and RMAVV is being requested to contribute $18,000.
Comments from the board;
A. Would this provide a good enough sample of the industry or would wineries only provide 
their best wine. 
B.  Are we losing continuity i.e. the Richard Bruno program 2 years ago, no follow up, 
then this different program?
C.  This program doesn't help with the hands on problem solving and solutions in the 
winery, can we have a Bruno type program also. 
D.  Is there any way the program could provide feedback to the vineyards, i.e. 
grower's standards, statistics for quality of wine vs. brix, ph, etc. 
E.  Like to see a breakdown of what the dollars are spent on, i.e. a budget, cost estimate.
D.  Like to understand what feedback the wineries and the RMAVV would get and when.
F.  Apparently participation in the program would mean nothing as far as advertising 
is concerned.  .
G.  Will the program be continued next year?
H.  Some of RMAVV members are out of state wineries and therefore would not be eligible 
for the program. 
I.  Some RMAVV members are amateur winemakers and would not be eligible.   
J.  How will the wineries be equitably selected? 
Nancy will provide BOD with copy of proposal and Jeff will revise proposal to include 
schedule of reports.
Board will need to firm up our budget before we are able to consider funding this 
proposal at this level.
Budget Discussion
RMAVV Balance excluding wine fest kitty		$103,000

	Expenses (present)		
		Fixed Costs 				 $3,200
		Specialty Crops Program Commitment	$15,350
		Horticultural Society Meeting Speaker	 $1,500
		4 Educational Meetings/year  (Est.)	$12,000
							$32,450
	Income 
		5 year average Wine Fest income		$28,000
		Membership 				 $2,500
							$30,500

Administrative Assistant
Nancy submitted a proposal for creation of an RMAVV office with an administrative 
assistant.  This would include rental of office space, purchase of computer and 
appropriate software, desk, files chairs etc.  Part of the advantages of an office 
would be a central collection area for all the records, data and history.   Her 
estimated costs came to about $8,500.  Proposal received from Amy Nuernberg was 
less than Nancy's estimate.  
Motion by Karen to set up an RMAVV office not to exceed $3000 and ongoing expenses 
not to exceed $7,000 in the first year.  Mike seconded, unanimous approval.

Budget Discussion - Continued
Kathryn made a motion to form a committee to create a basic 2003-04 budget for 
approval at the next meeting, Dave seconded, unanimous approval.  The committee 
consists of Nancy, Mike, and Kathryn.

Meeting Suggestions from Mike Heck
A meeting in Denver
Tax accountant
Winery Machinery
IPM
Quality Program
Site selection
Closures (Corks)
Nurseryman

Lobbying/Education of State Legislators
Dave suggested that we think about a method of educating state legislators on the 
wine industry.  It is a growing industry unlike the apple industry, and perhaps some 
law changes could help.  Dave indicated a lobbyist to address specific issues would 
cost about $25,000 a year.  Discussion indicated there is some danger in opening state 
law and perhaps getting a worse law passed.  Suggestion that perhaps we should look for 
issues that the distributors would be interested in partnering. 

Wine America   
National organization whose purpose is to help the wine industry with legislation etc. 
and help state organizations organize their political efforts.  Board agreed to join 
Wine America.  Kathryn made a motion to allocate $1500 for someone to attend the 
March meeting in DC. Dave seconded, passed unanimously.  Discussion indicated Nancy 
should go and do some networking.

Wine Fest contracts
Kathryn moved that we send a letter to Mike Heaston stating we would like to review 
his currant agreement for wine fest duties, Karen seconded.  Unanimous approval

By-Law Changes
John Bauer agreed to look at what it would take to change the by-laws to allow 
staggering of terms of officers and BOD members.

Next RMAVV meeting March 29
********************************
Phone /E-mail business 
A phone and e-mail review was conducted of a proposal from Doug Caskey re: Specialty 
Crops Program submittal for Marketing.  The Board agreed to submit the proposal.

Respectfully Submitted				

Judy Wise Mason - Secretary