OCBA Meeting Tonight

The Regular monthly meting for Ocracoke Civic and Business Association will be Wednesday, August 10th at 7pm at the Community Center.

OCBA Meeting July 13, 2016 DRAFT minutes

Meeting called to order at 7:03 p.m.

Board Members present: Rudy Austin, president, Connie Leinbach, secretary-assistant treasurer, Ashley Harrell, treasurer; Teresa O’Neal, Martha Garrish, Chip Stevens, and Wayne Clark. Other members present: Sundae Horn, Nancy Leach, Arleen Burley, Fred Westervelt, Corey Cutright, Corky Pentz, Bill Rich (via speaker phone.)

Minutes: The minutes of the June meeting were approved.

Treasurer’s report: Ashley reported that we received our final check for 2015-2016 of $41,614 from Occupancy Tax; our checking account balance is $48,102.16. Blackbeard’s Pirate Jamboree has a bank balance of $12,997.02. The CD total is $33,924.54.

Travel & Tourism director’s report: Sundae Horn reported that the July 4 events are right on budget. All events went well and feedback was good for the fireworks and all other events. Donald Davis held his storytelling hour for free and about 200 people attended the beach fire at the lifeguard beach throughout the three-hour time period from 7 to 10 p.m.

The group agreed that having fireworks on July 3 went well and agreed that the July 3 date for next year was OK since the holiday will be a Monday and Tuesday.
The new website will go live sometime next month. Sundae requests all businesses to send her a thumbnail photo for inclusion.

Rack cards: Sundae asks that all businesses bring more of their rack cards to the small visitor’s center in Community Square since they are being depleted.
Connie reported that this room is scheduled to be renovated into two rooms. So the visitor info area will be smaller.

Advertising project: Chip Stevens reported that with the funds granted from Occupancy Tax, the first step is to create a strategic marketing plan: branding, a tag line, our investment and where our budget should be. Five companies, recommended by Witt Tuttle, the NC Dept. of Tourism director, were invited to submit proposals and all five did. They are Joyner Media Strategy, Front Row Communications (who is doing our website), Lou Hammond Associates with Berkley Communications (of South Carolina), Lewis Advertising and Magellan Strategy Group. All but Lou Hammond are from North Carolina. All have experience working with municipalities with small budgets. They had until July 5 to respond that they want to submit a proposal; then they are to submit their proposals by Aug. 15. From the five, we will choose two to make a presentation to the board and advertising committee.

Matteus Gilbert: told the group he has just returned from the World Leadership conference in Chicago and has chosen to do a community service project to bring awareness to and help children battling malnutrition and hunger in Eastern NC. He proposes a fundraising 5K race this fall.
Chip suggested that he attach it to an event already in place, such as Blackbeard’s Pirate Jamboree. That way, this event could attach onto the Jamboree’s insurance, marketing, etc. He also suggested a “reverse trick-or-treat.” He will talk to Greg Honeycutt about logistics.

NPS report by Corey Cutright, an NPS law enforcement officer, reported on beach-driving permit sales: 2016: 3,228 total annual and weekly sold in the office from January to July; 5,222 sold online
2015: 3,468 total annual and weekly sold in the office from January to July; 2,766 sold online
There are 59 turtle nests on the beach.

Occupancy Tax Board appointments: The group agreed that we need more time to evaluate candidates. The statute says the OCBA is authorized to nominate two and we have until July 30 (though the statute does not say what happens if this deadline passes without our nominations). Nonetheless, both current OCBA appointees Frank Brown and Clayton Gaskill have indeed agreed to stay on pending our finding replacements. We will get written letters from them attesting to this.

County Manager’s report: Bill Rich suggested that Kris Noble be included in the upcoming advertising committee meetings.
About the trash situation, Bill said it was horrible on Monday because the (new) David’s hadn’t gotten their new truck and weren’t able to come to the island. He said the county has until the end of August to decide whether we want to keep this new company or not and he has told this new company to get on the ball. In the meantime, other interested trash haulers have been calling him and will be meeting with some of these prospects as soon as Aug. 8.

Old business: Amy Srail brought up the just-released passenger ferry feasibility study and said that all should read it. She said the passenger ferry idea was sold to us as a way to relieve the wait time during the peak period, but not to replace car ferries. (At the June 13 meeting with ferry officials, it was said that the ultimate goal is for four passenger ferries and four car ferries, though this is not mentioned in the feasibility study.)

She also said that she is trying to get a copy of the Ferry Division’s dry-dock schedule to find out how they are managing ferry maintenance. They shouldn’t schedule ferry maintenance for June, July and August, she said. Island businesses are off about 30 percent. Martha Garrish noted that the July 4 week was the first week of real “busy-ness” this year. Normally, it starts in June.

A lengthy discussion ensued about the issues with the Hatteras ferries, including the maintenance issues causing more cancellations of runs; what are three ferries sitting at the Hatteras dock when the cars are stacked up in the waiting lines? Instead of working on ferry maintenance are they deliberately trying to make a case for passenger ferries?

The group agreed to: Send a letter to the Ferry Division, CCing several others, that we need eight to nine vehicle ferries for our traffic; we are not in favor of the reduction of vehicle ferries and that we’d like to meet with them and/or someone from the passenger ferry study and talk about the study and the next steps. Talk to Charles Meeker about who to talk to at the state level. David Senseney agreed to call.

Meeting adjourned at 9:39 p.m   Respectfully submitted, Connie Leinbach, secretary