Appalachian Cave Conservancy

May 5, 2007 Board of Directors meeting minutes

The ACC Board and friends met at the Perkins Cave Preserve field house. Attendees included board members John Wilson, John Rossi, Bill James, Don Feathers, TM, Tony McGee, Gary Fielden, Terri Brown, and Robbie Spiegel. Also attending were friends Michael Rossi, Will Clark, and Paul Thompson.

Call to Order

The meeting was called to order at 10:23am. Don Feathers moved that we approve the minutes of the last meeting as published. Motion was seconded and passed without dissent.

Executive Committee

First, John said that at the previous meeting Robbie had been replaced by Gary as secretary on information that Robbie would be able to attend few meetings. Robbie advised John that he planned to attend all future meetings. John asked Gary if he was willing to resign in Robbie’s favor; Gary assented. Gary then nominated Robbie for the position of secretary. The board voted Aye with no dissenting votes.

John said that a Conservation Roundtable would be held July 24 at the 2007 NSS Convention in Indiana and asked if anyone would be willing to represent the ACC. John said that he would be present as the chair of the meeting and would prefer not to also present for ACC. Gary said he would if he attended the convention, but he was not sure that he would.

John said that a current issue being discussed in NSS circles was the shortage of members in the 16 to 30 age group, which group is normally the most active in caving. Don commented that was his motivation for inviting Will Clark, age 22 and a very active caver.

Committee Reports

Cave Management Committee

Gilley Cave

[Background: In recent weeks, the members of ACC had been discussing a possible role for the ACC in providing services to the conservation of Gilley Cave, after learning from Scott McCrea of Flittermouse Grotto that the Gilley owners had offered to donate the cave to the University of Virginia at Wise.]

Don said that at VAR there was some talk of a possible cave conservation deal in Lee County, possibly originating from Joey Fagan. Gary said that that might have referred to the sale of a 500-acre tract adjacent to and overlying parts of Unthanks Cave. The property was being sold by a large developer to be divided into housing tracts. Wil Orndorrf and Joey tried to organize a bid on some of the most cave-critical parts of the property. Gary thought that the attempt had failed, but did not have sure information. Don said that Milton Starnes, owner of Daniel Boone Cave, might be willing to help financially in future cases of this kind.

Terri said that her only contact at UVa at Wise was Bob Van Gundi. John said that he had contacted someone there at the lower levels of administration and was told that the fate of such an agreement would likely be decided by the central UVa administration in Charlottesville. John commented that UVa had one of the richest endowments in the country. Terri suggested we contact Tony Scales to see if he could help. John recommended that we should approach the owners and let them know of our interest so that if they are turned down by the university, that we might be considered next in line as the most logical group to handle the stewardship of the cave, by virtue of our proximity to it. John also clarified previous remarks he had made on the role of the Nature Conservancy. He said that the Conservancy has no interest in buying or managing caves except insofar as they contain rare or endangered life forms and therefore is not an appropriate group to help in this case.

John said that money for title searches may be available.

Terri said that Gilley is on the significant cave list, that it is geologically significant. Robbie commented that it has some rare or unique formations, such as the chert donuts.

Bill said that the Earth Day cleanup of Daniel Boone Caverns had recovered about 300 feet of 6-3 and two lengths of 100 and 250 feet of 12-3 electrical cable. Gary has the cable in his barn. The cable will be used at the 2008 Mountain Empire Grotto sponsored SERA/ Spring VAR. Gary said that nothing stored on the far side of the creek on his farm had ever been bothered, but cautioned that he could not guarantee the safety of the cable.

Scott County Blowing Hole

Robbie took a trip with Alan Cressler a few weeks ago and asked him about the human tooth found in 2006. Alan said that he was sure it was an ancient American tooth. The burial had probably been a shelf burial, in which the body is simply deposited on a ledge. Grave robbers frequently lose small bones and teeth from rough handling, so that finger and toe bones and teeth are the most commonly found bones in cave burials.

Tony said that he had bought enough Plexiglas for about 500 cave signs. It was cheap enough to economically replace them when and if they are vandalized or stolen. Tony has ordered some 11”x17” cave signs from a printer (here he showed a specimen of the Perkins Cave sign). Tony will make stainless steel frames to hold the signs. He cautioned that these will be much more costly than the signs themselves.

John said that he will leave sign placement to the specific cave manager in charge.

Gary said that our traditional means of sign placement was to use expansion bolts. Will these signs withstand the stress (of bolting)?

Tony said that the frames will take the stress. The signs will just slip in and out of the frame.

John provided a stack of ACC pamphlets for landowners.

Finance

TM gave the treasury report. The starting balance was $1368.55. We took in $490.00 in membership dues and spent $2.58, for a new balance of $1856.27.

Membership

Tony distributed 106 membership solicitations.

Don said that the new ACC tee shirts were ready or just about. He said several people inquired about ACC at the Spring VAR.

Tony asked if anyone will take a membership kit to the NSS Convention.

Terri said she could represent the ACC at the Appalachian Karst Symposium at the Gray fossil site/ museum, where she will present a paper. [the symposium was subsequently rescheduled for spring of 2008].

Fundraising

Don told the tale of the tee-shirts. He asked for Carolina Blue in 50/50, then decided to change to the more expensive Ultra Cotton in light blue, but never got a confirmation. When the supplier delivered the shirts in Carolina Blue, Don agreed to accept them at his own expense at a bargain price and renewed the ACC order for the Ultra Cotton shirts. Don assumed responsibility for mailing out the tee shirts to renewing members.

TM reported that she had emailed acknowledgments for donations. Those acknowledgments should constitute appropriate recognition if the donor seeks to deduct the cost from taxes.

John offered to take some of the current batch of tee-shirts to the NSS convention.

Old Business

No old business was raised.

New Business

John said that Don needs to tell us what we can do to help with the 2008 SERA Cave Carnival/ Spring VAR. Don said he had not yet confirmed the date with the campground owner. He said that Appalachian Caverns will offer pre-SERA camping.

Regarding the nonprofit status of ACC, Don wondered whether that would help with the licensing and tax aspects of the SERA. He specifically said it might affect our liability for the hotel tax levied by Bristol. Don said it might be possible to structure this as a restricted access event with no taxes or licensing.

John suggested a motion to present the SERA/ VAR and delegate operations to Mountain Empire Grotto. Tony so moved.

This led to additional questions and comments: Don said that SERA events levy $1.50 per head for SERA itself. TM queried whether the profit, if any, would go to MEG or ACC. Don projected a minimum attendance of 600, based on past SERA and VAR attendance figures. He said that NSS does not give money to support regional events. SERA donates $500 and gets back $1.50 per head. VAR donates $600 and gets back $3.00 per head. Don said that we could build a $5.00 charge into the attendance fee to cover our obligations to SERA and VAR. Gary said there is a lot of firewood at his farm to cut and split and sell for the grotto at the Event.

John brought up Tony’s motion to present the Event. Additional discussion ensued: Don pointed out that the agreement of joint responsibility for the Event was contingent on MEG’s agreement. Tony said that if ACC is primary sponsor that liability protection would be better than MEG’s.

At 11:13am, a neighbor arrived and introduced himself as Paul Thompson, a local farmer and caver.

Following Paul’s arrival, the motion was finally put to a vote and passed without dissenting vote.

The discussion returned to the sale of firewood. Don said that the campground permits fires; there are fire rings on the site.

John asked if there was any more new business; none was offered.

John said that Board member Christine Smith had not attended a meeting for a year. Terri said that Christine had just bought a house and was probably preoccupied with it. She said that she would call Christine. Terri pointed out that Christine had secured MEG’s promise of assistance with the cave trip at this year’s Virginia Highland Festival.

Gary suggested that we maintain a stand at the Gray fossil site with ACC pamphlets. He suggested Terri approach the site personnel about this at the September karst conference at be held at the site.

John brought up the subject of cave field trips at the 2008 SERA/ VAR. He said that trips to Perkins should be guided trips, with a maximum of two per day for a total of six over three days: the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday of the SERA/ VAR. With a quota of twelve cavers per trip, up to 72 people could see Perkins. Don suggested that Will Clark and Wes Combs could be trained as guides. Tony suggested that we could limit visitors to Perkins by invitation-only pre-registration. John summarized the question by asking whether ACC would be comfortable with trips into Perkins. Terri moved that ACC sponsor guided trips to Perkins during the 2008 SERA/ VAR. Don seconded. The motion passed without dissent.

Adjournment

John adjourned the general meeting at 11:28am and called to order the cave management meeting..

Cave Management Meeting

John said that he had appointed Jason Lachniet the mapping superintendent but had so far failed to get the existing survey notes from Paul Gaskins.

Tony said that he was equipped and ready to work on the Perkins cave gate.

John said that he proposed to do a short survey which would tie in the Wilson entrance to the main entrance. He said that with one helper he could finish in about ½ hour.

Robbie suggested that a team continue the DOM area survey.

The cave management meeting adjourned at 11:32am.

Post-Meeting Notes

Bill, Don, Gary, and Tony worked on the gate and came close to finishing. John and Terri surveyed the entrance to entrance connection. Will, Robbie, and Paul surveyed in the DOM section.

The Appalachian Karst Symposium has been rescheduled for spring of 2008 to complement the 2008 SERA/ VAR.

On May 19, Paul Gaskins gave the survey notes to Robbie, who relayed them to Jason Lachniet..