Minutes from the 1st board meeting of the SBSP, June 14th 2003 - Bergen, Norway
Agenda
1. Reflections on the General Assembly (GA) including confirmation of the constitution of the new board
2. Local treasurers and their tasks
3. Homepage Webmaster and Bulletin Editor
4. Gyrodactylus workshop 2004
5. 1st SBSP meeting in Vilnius 2005
6. Other issues
Present:
Karl Skirnisson (President), Gediminas Valkiunas (Vice-president), Cecilia Thors, Einar Strømsnes, Romualda Petkeviciute, Jorun Tharaldsen (observer) Charlotte Maddox-Hyttel (Secretary; ref.)
Absent:
Katja Pulkkinen (Treasurer)
1. Karl thanked everybody for a well-run GA, and the constitution of the Board was confirmed as indicated above. It is a great pleasure thus to be a united Society of Parasitologists from the Scandinavian and Baltic (and other) countries.
2. Local treasurers are: Iceland - Karl; Norway - Einar; Sweden - Cecilia; Finland - Katja; Baltics - Romualda; Denmark - Charlotte.
Tasks for the local treasurer are:
1) To establish and maintain the local membership list
2) To open an account in the name of the Society
3) To keep all transaction receipts, including receipts for purchases, bank statements, etc. This should be kept for at least 5 years.
4) To provide the Treasurer of the Society (Katja) with necessary information and transaction originals for the biannual accounting period.
It was reminded that the present accounts should be changed with regard to name (now The Scandinavian Baltic Society for Parasitology) and the new statues together with a copy of the minutes from the GA must accompany the application for such an account.
It was suggested that members might best pay for at least 2 years at a time in order to minimise their bank-fees, etc.
It was also suggested that the Baltic members should be encouraged to become SBSP members already from 2003 (fees. 25 ? / 10 ?). This will be a major task for Romualda.
3. Árni Kristmundsson is willing to continue as our Webmaster at least for the next 2 years. For the establishment of the SSP homepage Árni has been paid ?1800. We should decide at the end of the year (depending on workload) how much to pay him for his services.
Jorun Tharaldsen is willing to continue as the Editor of the Bulletin. Previously the payment for this job has been NOK 7000 per year (2-3 issues per year). This amount was established in the 1990s. However, in the future only special issues in the form of proceedings from symposia etc. will be published. Thus, payment in the future will be NOK 6000 per issue.
The board extends great appreciation for their great work to both the Webmaster and the Editor.
4. At the General Assembly was announced the intention of Tor Bakke and Kurt Buchmann to arrange a special meeting concerning Gyrodactylus under the auspices of the SBSP. According to Tor Bakke the meeting will likely be held in Oslo, Norway, where much of the research has been funded. This meeting initiative is greatly welcomed by the board. According to our Statutes, at least one member of the Board should be in the organising committee, mainly serving with an advisory function and as a liaison between the board and the organisers. It was agreed that both Einar and Charlotte participate in the committee - depending on the location of the planning meetings. Einar may have to withdraw due to demands of his PhD thesis work.
It was agreed that Karl should write a letter to the 2 organisers (Tor and Kurt) stating that the SBSP is in favour of the meeting and informing of the Board participation.
It was agreed that in such special meetings the SBSP will have no financial commitments. The Bulletin may be used for proceedings, and the costs for editing and printing (approx. NOK 20,000) must be covered by the meeting budget.
5. Gediminas will be the chairman of the Local Organising Committee for the 1st meeting of the SBSP in Vilnius in 2005. The timing for the meeting was discussed and it was agreed to ask the members via e-mail for feed back and suggestions/preferences. We suggest either the end of May or the end of September.
For the meeting there should be a scientific committee and a local organising committee including at least 2 board members. Their task will be to find funding, to find qualified invited speakers, create an enticing programme, etc.
The frame and overall decisions for the meeting should be made by early October 2003.
We should ensure that all possible means of announcing the meeting are employed including emailing the members, announcing in journals and at neighbouring societies as well as via the Secretary of the World Federation of Parasitologists (WFP).
6. It was noted that Jorun has somehow dropped off the Boards mailing list. To keep our Bulletin editor informed of the SBSP activities Jorun should be re-included in the Board mailing list.
The SSP email list apparently is flawed and needs to be updated continuously. Charlotte will send the 'bad' email addresses to the respective local treasurers for them to check up on the correct addresses.
Charlotte Maddox-Hyttel
Copenhagen, June 25, 2003