Fifth Meeting of the Board
of the
International Association
for Urban Climate
Sunday, 11 June 2006
Wallenberg Conference Centre, Göteborg
University, Göteborg, Sweden
Agenda
1. Welcome
and agreement on agenda
2 President’s remarks
3. ICUC-6 – update on conference
4. Treasurer’s report
4.1
Closing of SJSU bank account
4.2 Interim account in Singapore
5.1 Presentation by potential candidate
sites
5.2 Discussion
5.3 Registration fees
6. Committee reports and issues arising
6.1 Awards
6.2 Bibliography
6.3 International Representative
6.4 Membership
6.5 Nomination
6.6 Teaching Resources
6.7 Newsletter
7. New Business
7.1 IAUC
as a registered charity
7.2 Archiving practice/policy
7.3 IAUC
website
7.4 Fund raising
8. Other business
Minutes
The meeting was opened at 3 pm.
Present: Arnfield (past sec.), Bitan, Bornstein (treasurer), Grimmond (pres.), Kanda, Lindqvist (organizer ICUC-6), Mills, Roth (sec.), Salmond and Voogt
Late: Dousset (new member as of Aug 06)
Absent: Barlow, Emmanuel (new member
as of Aug 06), Fortuniak, Gallo (new member
as of Aug 06), Klysik (past organizer ICUC-5), Kuttler, Oke (past pres.),
Quorum is 6 voting members (7 are in attendance).
1. Welcome and agreement on
agenda
Sue Grimmond
opened the meeting by welcoming all Board members in attendance. The agenda for
the meeting was approved and adopted.
2. President’s remarks
Sue Grimmond
thanked everyone for attending and welcomed Jennifer Salmond to her first Board
meeting.
Sue Grimmond in particular thanked Sven Lindqvist and the local
organizing committee for their great effort organizing ICUC-6, Matthias Roth
for his work leading up to ICUC-6 and the Board meeting, Gerald Mills for his
fantastic effort in putting together, editing and publishing the Newsletter,
Janet Barlow and Dale Cunningham (at Reading University) for their work
regarding the membership database and urbclim, James Voogt for his help on the
website and ensuring the smooth transition in the location of the website from
IU to KCL, Bob Bornstein for his role as chair of the Awards Committee and
Treasurer, Jennifer Salmond for her role as the chair of the Bibliography
Committee and for leading the Awards Committee during ICUC-6, Arieh Bitan and
James Voogt in their role as inaugural Board members who will be leaving in Aug
2006 and all Board members for various activities during the last few years.
Sue Grimmond mentioned that it is important to get more people involved
in general IAUC activities and suggested to actively recruit people willing to
contribute.
Sue Grimmond raised 2 important long-term issues which need to be
considered:
(i) Fund raising. At present many activities
are carried out by dedicated members at the expense of considerable time and
energy – a situation which is not sustainable in the long run. Sue Grimmond
cautioned that any potential fund raising activity need to be evaluated
carefully as not to expend more effort than will be gained in return. Research
Assistants are a potentially viable solution.
(ii) Archiving. IAUC has and will be
generating documents which need a physical home.
Sue Grimmond
once again thanked everyone for attending and those who have written reports
for their submission.
3. ICUC-6
– update on conference
Sven Lindqvist
gave a brief overview of the ICUC-6 pre-conference organizational status. He
reported that:
(i)
The
last 3 years were an interesting journey and more work was involved than
anticipated.
(ii)
After
initial difficulties everything fell in place with the great help of his daughter
(Maria Lindqvist), Jenny Linden which was paid through RA funds and Sofia
Thorsson an ex-PhD student who came back to help out.
(iii)
All
last-minute technical glitches should be fixed by now.
(iv)
Because
of the tight scientific program the session chairs should be reminded to keep
time.
(v)
Evening
(social) program has been ready for about one month and has been reviewed.
(vi)
More
than 290 delegates are expected. More student attendees are expected that
anticipated with the consequence of fewer full-paying delegates and hence less
income from registration costs. The University agreed to pay for the rental of
the conference facilities which will offset the short-fall in registration
income and a balanced conference budget is expected.
(vii) The total conference budget is expected
to be around US$100,000 (excluding help by University staff).
(viii) The University will cover an
eventual loss.
Bob
Bornstein asked about the possibility of PowerPoint files of presentations
becoming available on the web as is increasingly the case for AMS conferences.
4. Treasurer’s
report
4.1 Closing
of SJSU bank account – see report attached
Bob Bornstein explained that San Jose State University could no longer
host the IAUC account and needed to be closed at relatively short notice (<
2 months). His attempts to persuade SJSU Foundation to keep the account open
were unsuccessful as were other efforts to find a new location for the account
within the US, primarily due to fund transfer restrictions imposed after 9/11.
Sue Grimmond asked Bob Bornstein to check the origin of item 1.b.i
(contribution from UN or NOAA?) and the various fees in the final summary (see
attached report).
Sue Grimmond noted that the “Telecommunications” charge (Final Summary,
Item 4; see attached report) was for the IAUC web domain name registration.
4.2
Interim account in Singapore – see report attached
Matthias Roth provided details about the rationale of transferring the
funds from SJSU to a joint personal account in Singapore. This solution became
necessary in the absence of any other viable option and is expected to be
temporary until a more permanent place for the funds can found.
5.1 Presentation
by potential candidate sites
Each candidate/representative gave a 10-15 min overview and answered
questions.
5.2 Discussion
After a brief discussion the Board decided that all three proposals
should be pursued at this stage and the sponsors be invited to provide further
clarifications. To aid in a fair comparison among the proposals, the Secretary
was asked to work out a template to be given to all sponsors which addresses
the following points: (i) Budget should be in 2009 US$ and include costs of
program and extra fee to support IAUC activities; (ii) Budget to be worked out
on the basis of 1/3 student and 2/3 full-paying attendees, respectively and
consider lower fees for students and retired people; (iii) Registration fee to
include book or CD-ROM of proceedings and abstract fee if paper is accepted;
(iv) Profit/loss statement (100% of profit should go to IAUC); (v) Number of
parallel sessions and distance between lecture halls; (vi) Conference theme;
(vii) Statement why proposed location is a good choice; (viii) Plans of local organizing
committee to interact with other cognate societies.
The board further decided that the detailed, final budget of ICUC-5
should be given to all sponsors to help in the financial planning.
5.3
Registration fees
There was a clear consensus that the abstract fee should be discounted
from the registration fee if a paper was accepted. Arieh Bitan suggested to introduce
special fees for senior or retired attendees at the same level as student fees.
Sue Grimmond cautioned that this would have to occur at the expense of all
paying attendees who would likely see and increase in their fees.
The meeting
was halted at 6 pm and re-convened at 7 pm in the Hotel Vasa (minus Arieh
Bitan).
6. Committee
reports and issues arising
6.1 Awards
– see attached report
Bob Bornstein gave a brief overview of recent activities as outlined in
the attached report. Sue Grimmond noted that the new chair will be Manabu Kanda
not Jennifer Salmond as indicated in the report and that the Nomination
Committee will be soliciting nominations for the 2006 Luke Howard award rather
than the Awards Committee.
Gerald Mills informed about his efforts to have the three volumes of
Luke Howard’s books re-published and have copies bound to be given to the Luke
Howard award winners. He further suggested that IAUC takes control over
publishing the books. Sue Grimmond thanked Gerald Mills for his idea and effort
regarding the Luke Howard books and asked him to pursue publishing options.
The number of awards offered by IAUC was briefly discussed with some
members suggesting a reduction.
Sue Grimmond reminded all Board members to support the Nomination
Committee by also actively soliciting nominees for the 2006 Luke Howard award.
6.2 Bibliography
– see attached report
Jennifer Salmond reported that at present the committee consisted
primarily of her alone and that it would be helpful if a working committee
structure could be implemented. She also noted the need to find a new chair
within one year because she will assume a new role as Secretary by August 2007.
James Voogt informed that it was possible at the University of Western
Ontario to use students needing financial assistance to help out as research
assistants on international projects. This could be an avenue for additional
help for simple but time-consuming tasks.
In an effort to increase graduate student involvement a suggestion was
made to have two co-chairs for the committee of which one would be a graduate
student (Heather Thompson) and the co-chairs would report to the Board in
writing before Board meetings.
6.3 International
Representative – see attached report
See report
6.4 Membership
– see attached report
In order to better advertise IAUC activities it was decided to produce a
1-page leaflet that can be downloaded from the website, printed and distributed
as needed.
Janet Barlow suggested to merge the Membership Committee (MC) and International
Representative Committee (IRC) (see report). Instead of the MC which at present
is only one person, this member could sit on the IRC as the Membership
Secretary. An additional person (preferably located in another time zone) could
act as the co-approver of urbclim submissions. James Voogt volunteered to act
in this capacity.
6.5 Nomination
– see attached report
See report
6.6 Teaching
Resources – see attached report
Gerald Mills described his activities as detailed in the report. Sue
Grimmond informed about potential teaching avenues which exist for IAUC: NATO
(Krzysztof Fortuniak suggested
that IAUC could organize a NATO ASI workshop/school on urban climate for a
young researchers.),
WMO, National Weather Services, etc. She suggested that the people involved
should develop specific teaching modules which can be offered to the various
organisations or end-users.
6.7 Newsletter
– see attached report
Referring to his report Gerald Mills remarked that he would like to see
more project reports from “low-tech” projects, i.e. particularly those based on
observations from less developed countries.
Gerald Mills noted that editing the newsletter was very time consuming
and he would eventually like to give up this task. He would prefer to
concentrate more on the development of teaching resources which he promised to
do some time ago but with less progress than hoped for because of other
activities.
7. New
Business
7.1 IAUC
as a registered charity
With the closure of the IAUC account at SJSU Foundation it was necessary
find a new location for the bank account. During the search it became obvious
that the best way to proceed would be to register IAUC as a (non-profit)
organization or society.
John Arnfield explored possibilities to register IAUC as a charitable
organization in England/Wales and explained the pros and cons of such a status.
He informed about the various requirements (need for Trustees, income >1000
Pounds/year, constitution under laws of England/Wales, legal responsibility of
trustees, etc).
7.2 Archiving
practice/policy
Sue Grimmond stressed the need for an archiving strategy. As IAUC
expands and develops it is necessary to keep proper records of correspondence,
e-mails, notes, etc. It would help to engage someone with relevant experience
to advise on appropriate procedures (what to archive and how).
John Arnfield volunteered to contribute to the technical aspects of the
archiving procedure.
Post-meeting note: Sue Grimmond spoke to Midge Oke about this and was told we need to talk
to an archivist not a librarian.
Ø
Action
item: we need to identify a person or book to help us get started.
7.3 IAUC website
The issue was raised whether it will be possible to keep the IAUC
webpage hosted at a University website or if a commercial arrangement will be
necessary in the long term.
7.4 Fund
raising
It will be necessary to acquire funds to be able to e.g. hire research
assistants which can help with the more time-consuming tasks of running IAUC.
In this respect Sue Grimmond thanked Benedict Dousset who arranged
NOAA’s 1000 US$ contribution to IAUC.
8. Other
business
Bob
Bornstein mentioned that a conference with the theme “Coastal Urban Processes”
is planned for the second week of September 2007 in San Diego (US).
Gerald Mills suggested to conduct a survey of members about a number of initiatives that the IAUC was
undertaking with a view to getting some feedback.
The meeting adjourned at 21:20.
16 August 2006
IAUC Committee Reports
Compiled and formatted by
Matthias Roth (Secretary)
8 June 2006
IAUC Account – before April 2006 (Treasurer: Bob Bornstein)
- Revenue
- ICUC5
i. Reg Fees $18820.00
ii.
WMO Support $ 1508.70
iii.
IAMAS Support $ 500.00
- ICUC6
i. UN Support $ 1000.00
Total $21828.70
- Expenses
- ICUC5
i. Printing $12775.00
ii. Bank Fees $ 825.10
iii. Student Awards $ 1000.00
iv. SJSU F&A $ 478.25
- ICUC6
i.
None
Total $15078.35
- Balance $ 6,670.96
Final Summary of IAUC SJSU Account:
up to 6/7/06
Date and Item Debit $ Balance $
1. Balance forward $6,670.96
2. 5/31/05 NOVA
fee -$ 43.61
3. 5% fee on
Item 2 -$ 2.18
4.
5. 5% fee on
Item 4 -$ 43.61
6. 4/18/06
Close account transfer to M. Roth -$6270.81
7. 4/18/06 Wire
fee for close account transfer -$
35.00
8. 5% fee on
Items 7 and 8 -$ 250.00
9. Closing
Balance $
1.75
Bob
Bornstein
IAUC Account – post April
2006 (Matthias Roth)
All
values in Sin$; multiply by 1.58 to obtain approx US$.
1. Revenue
Initial
cash deposit to open account 3,000.00
Transfer
of IAUC funds from SJS university account (6,270.81 US$) 10,011.35
IAMAS
support (500 US$) 778.12
IAUC
awards
Lowry
Memorial Awards (700 US$) 1,072.45
The
Japan Prize (20,741.68 US$) 32,595.55
Interest 6.03
Total 47,463.50
2. Expenses
Account
fees 34.00
Total 34.00
-
.
3. Balance as of 07/06/06 47,429.50
Matthias