BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT: Julie Abel –JabberDesign, Lincoln Brackett-Brackett & Co., Mike Carey – Del Sol, John Jerome – Butler Pantry, Angela Holmes-Century 21, Fred and Janet Schmidt, Toni Trudell-Park House, and Marilyn Starring-Star of Saugatuck

ABSENT: Kevin Tringali, Bill Smith, Ben Barton, Jodi White

AUDIENCE IN ATTENDANCE: George Waden – Homebodies; Sandra Randolph-Good Goods; Mike Gallagher-Fun & Sun Entertainment (Segway Tours); Jane VerPlank-Saugatuck City Council/Victorian Inn; Seth Getz-Business Mastery

PUBLIC COMMENTS: Sandra Randolph (Good Goods) Lighting in Saugatuck is sad – some lights are in trees but not lit. Jane VerPlank said should go to the city with questions about lighting. City had to cut back on lighting this year due to budget cuts, and only had $10,000 for lighting – company has been contracted to come once a week to check lights that are not working. Tree in front of Kilwin’s is a problem – tree in front of Pumpernickel’s has been resolved. Janet Schmidt - Rose Garden was out last night. Jane VerPlank - will check into why it was out. Lightastic is scheduled to come in every Friday to take care of lighting issues – if they come in any other day than on a Friday they charge $300 per visit. Also have problems with the current lighting if water gets into the light and trips the fuse. Sandra Randolph - Can SABA send letter out to membership asking them to light up their own stores to create more atmosphere with lighting since city’s lighting budget was cut. Comments were made on how nice Douglas looked.

Angela Holmes - Looking for volunteers to help with Sparkle. John Jerome – maybe SABA should be involved with city in looking for another company to provide lighting when the city begins planning for next year. Angela Holmes – SABA would like to be more involved with city when they are setting their budget.

SECRETARY’S MINUTES: Correction to November minutes – Jodi White was not in attendance at the November meeting. Julie Abel moved to approve with changes. Motion seconded by Toni Trudell. Motion approved.

TREASURER’S REPORT: No treasurer’s report.

MARKETING COORDINATORS REPORT: Janet Schmidt – Sparkle has collected $6,555.00 in donations this year; this does not take into account the $2,000 that Sparkle already had in its account. It also does not include ornament sales. Sparkle/SABA is planning on using that $2,000 as seed money for next year.

Sparkle is responsible for lighting the Rose Garden, pet and bathroom parks, Coughlin Park gazebo and Wick’s Park.

Sparkle Lighting Ceremony was very successful on Friday night. There were approximately 400 present at the ceremony. A large number of parents very pleased that the time had been moved to 5 p.m., and that it was able to kept outside and thanked Janet. Mill Pond (Laura and Melanie Durham) provided cookies and hot chocolate. Triangle provided front end loader used to usher Santa into town. Monica Looman, Saugatuck city clerk, is the city’s events coordinator helped setting up event. Bruce Simonson, head of Saugatuck’s DPW was also extremely helpful with Friday’s Lighting Ceremony. Both Bruce and Monica gave their personal time Friday to help set up and troubleshoot any last minutes issues to allow the event to come off successfully.

Carriage Rides –The rides ran November 21st for Holiday Preview and this past Friday evening and Saturday afternoon. Ridership has been great and the company is a delight to work with. Rides are actually running extra hours –seems to be a lot of people wanting to ride. Bud Baty from Douglas and Mike Carey from Saugatuck are the housing carriages. Nancy Ayers said she would provide housing for the carriages, but due to hills and distance it really wasn’t going to work to use her storage unit.

Discussed lighting downtown and Janet monitors it all the time.

SABA Bucks update: Michigan law now requires gift certificates and the like need to have a 5 year life, so Bucks have been changed accordingly. In addition, it will be necessary to give change which is not anticipated to be a problem as we only issue Bucks in small denominations. Merchants will be informed of these two adjustments by e-mail and a sample of the “Buck” of them to see. Although sales continue strong, it was brought to our attention that the law had changed, and the “no change” policy was not only not permitted, but made some hesitant to purchase. Thanks to the quick turnaround, merchants are reimbursed the minute they turn in the certificates. Want to thank SABA member Gary Kott for researching this information and bringing it to our attention. Marilyn Starring asked if you give someone a gift certificate as a donation, where they don’t pay, does it still have to have the 5 year expiration date. Toni Trudell – law is very detailed in regards to this. If you give someone as a donation you may want to call them vouchers, that way they are not a gift certificate. If you call it a gift certificate it falls under the new law rules. Gary Kott found the information via Mid-Michigan Notebook article. Janet Schmidt will investigate this, but doesn’t anticipate a big problem with this change. Angela Holmes– asked Fred to send out an e-mail in regards to this subject once all the details are nailed down.

Annual Holiday SABA Party will be Thursday, Dec. 10 at the Butler from 5 to 7 p.m. It will be a cash bar, and you need to bring a non-perishable food donation for Christian Neighbors.

Winners of holiday home decorating contest have been selected. Thank you to Lincoln Brackett who judged Saugatuck and John Jerome who did the same in Douglas. There will be a feature article with pictures in this Sunday’s Lakeshore edition of the Grand Rapids Press.

Winners are as follows:

SAUGATUCK

HOLIDAY HOME DECORATING:

1st Terry Leshuk & Dean King, 558 Mason Street

2nd: Joni Cook, 344 Lucy Street

STORE FRONTS:

1st The Olive Mill, 220 Culver

2nd Spice Merchants, 115 Butler Street

INNS:

1st Bayside Inn, 618 Water Street

2nd Wickwood Inn, 510 Butler Street

SPECIAL MENTION (No Category) The White House Bistro, 149 Griffith

DOUGLAS

HOLIDAY HOME DECORATING:

1st Gary Alpers & James Codde, 129 Tower Harbor Court, off Ferry

2nd Dan & Kelli Heneghan, 90 Union Street S

TORE FRONTS

1st Thomas Greene, 23 Center

2nd Brackett & Company, 34 Center

INN The Kirby House, 294 West Center Street

INN The Kingsley House, 625 West Main St., Fennville

Judges were board members and merchants - with Saugatuck judging Douglas and vice versa.

Next Open House at Salt of the Earth – 11th or 14th of January –they are a new member. This will be for members only and their guest, cash bar and appetizers.

‘One Big Fish’ television preview features Saugatuck/Douglas will be this Sunday, December 6th, on Digital Preferred Comcast Cable, channel 90 from 10 to 10:30 a.m. The board has been invited to view this screening at Mike Carey’s house – plan to bring a dish to pass and arrive by 9:30 a.m. SABA will do a press release prior to the airing so the public will have advance notice of the show, of we will have a DVD available for an early 2010 meeting for viewing.

SABA phone – our new phone number is 857-1626 along with being able to leave information on upcoming events, it is making tracking very simplified – all ads are running with it, as well as, local write ups and it is getting very heavy usage.

Also using public TV, channel 21, to get information out – a lot of viewers of this local channel.

Was on the Van 92.7 the day of the Holiday Preview. Janet was on Mike Johnson’s Saturday morning show ‘The Grind’.

Angela Holmes – Erin Wilkinson is an association SABA member and an unofficial unpaid staff member. Erin is taking photographs for SABA of all events to build our photo library. Julie Abel – will make sure to give Erin credit of any of her photos that we use on our web site.

Toni Trudell – Open House with local lodging was held in conjunction with SABA holiday party last year and was very successful. Toni currently has 10 lodging owners that will be at their inns to showcase them between 3 and 5 p.m. prior to the Holiday Party. Toni will provide Fred with lodging participant’s names, and he will send out the information to membership. Lincoln Brackett - Maybe should break it down – have x amount from 3 to 4 and x amount from 4 to 5. Toni suggested having it from 4 to 5 p.m. Angela Holmes – Can’t make it to all of the lodging, but can go to facilities you haven’t been to in the past. One lodging owner suggested that we do this in the spring also because they are closed for the season now. Angela Holmes – good idea will have Trudi follow up. Mike Carey – A possibility for next year - set it up to feature 2 lodging establishments every week to spread it out a little more and maybe more people would come. Trudi will poll lodging and get their input. Lincoln Brackett – We also talked about the opposite - having lodging owners come to town to visit stores. Lincoln can work with Toni on that for the Spring. Janet Schmidt - Right before Spring Preview would be a good time to do this – good for merchants but might be tough for some of the lodging. John Jerome – suggested possibly having a couple merchants sign up per week for preview. Marilyn Starring – suggested that it be done by bocks instead.

OLD BUSINESS Jane VerPlank - Mt. Baldhead – completed except for the hand railings. There are 20 more steps than before and are of much sturdier construction- 302 steps. There will be an official opening – not sure when this will be.

Mason Street is completed and very pleased how it turned out – Triangle did a fantastic job with a project. Pleasant Street is not completed – drainage issues have been addressed and will be paved in the spring. Lucy, State, Vine, Spear will be done next year. There is a problem with Lucy Street – it was contaminated and must be worked on when water level in this area it at its lowest. All contaminated soil must be removed and put in a special containment area. If any water is found the water would also have to be taken to a special containment area as well, that is why it is essential that this project be done when water table contents are at their lowest levels. Janet Schmidt –This was explained very well by the city at the meeting it held for Lucy Street residents. Other streets being worked on next year are expected to be completed before Lucy Street project is undertaken.

Need a volunteer for the sign ordinance working committee – city would prefer to have a downtown merchant from Saugatuck. Angela asked Fred put out a separate e-mail for a volunteer to sit on this working committee.

NEW MEMBERS: Fancy Nancy & Framers Alley – Grandpa’s Circus and Segway’s

MEMBERSHIP RENEWALS: 60 members have not renewed. Lincoln Brackett will take over Bill Smith’s list since he is gone. Janet Schmidt - Need to get the brochure out earlier this year. Closing date has past – board members you must be firm and wrap this up.

DRUG STORE WALL - 1 open space. Offered to the first person on waiting list they didn’t get back to Fred, so he is going to contact the second person on the waiting list.

BROCHURE – If you have any extra brochures please let Janet know because she can use them.

Julie Abel asked if it would be possible to highlight some services in upcoming newsletters. Janet said she could do that.

EVENTS MEETING – John Jerome– Overall Holiday Preview Weekend went well. Seems to have gotten more bang for our buck with advertising – planning on same day next year. Candy Cane game very popular - had 95 participants very close to number of participants we had last year. We will be doing Festive Friday’s for the rest of the month of December. Angela Holmes – next year also plan on being open later on Saturday’s as well. Lincoln Brackett – Should consider doing a name contest for Saturday nights. Janet Schmidt needs to set dates for 2010 now in order to get them into various publications deadlines by the end of the year. Janet is looking at different ideas on how to get info out on holiday shopping season i.e. table tent cards, postcards to ‘Save the Date’ to mention a few. Angela Holmes – Want to get bag stuffers out by Labor Day. Marilyn Starring – That’s too late – need to get bag stuffers out by early July – need to get information in people’s hands when the masses are here. Janet said she planned on having them ready by Venetian Festival.

Winterfest – Valentines/President’s Day weekend – All events are calendar on web site.

HARBOR MEETING – Marilyn Starring wasn’t able to attend the last meeting. Did speak with Harold Thieda (board member) think they are waiting are for some funding information to come back. Believe that Felicia Fairchild from CVB is spearheading this project.

NEW BUSINESS:

WORKSHOP – None needed at this time.

EVENTS MEETING –To be scheduled for January.

Mike Carey –Just want to clarify - we used all reserve money that we had placed in a CD’s to balance this year’s budget? Correct. Mike Carey -When next year rolls around there will be a huge chunk of money ($10,000) that we will not have available to us. Angela Holmes – We have already recruited a large amount of business to become SABA member; don’t know that there are that many more businesses to join. Dues will go up if we can’t find other ways to raise funding to support the projects that we do. There were some budget items cut – Kiosk’s were big expense last year – Events that we are hosting we hope to turn more of a profit. Marilyn Starring - We will have to cut our existing budget if we don’t get these 60 people who have dues that are outstanding. Fred Schmidt - We currently have $11,000 in outstanding membership dues.

UPCOMING DATES TO REMEMBER:

Holiday Party – Thursday, December 10th – 5 to 7p.m. at The Butler – Bring non-perishable food items.

Carriage Rides: Fridays & Saturday December 4&5/11&12/18&19

Fireworks: New Year’s Eve – December 31st – Midnight over the Kalamazoo River

Winterfest Weekend – February 12-15 – Stew & Brew February 14th 2 to 5 p.m. @ White House Bistro

Next SABA Monthly Board Meeting – Wednesday, January 6th 8:30 a.m. – Saugatuck City Hall

PUBLIC COMMENT: None

Meeting adjourned