CCFFR Business Meeting Minutes
The 60th Canadian Conference for Fisheries Research
Delta Hotel Centre-Ville
January 5, 2007
I. APPROVAL OF THE AGENDA
The business meeting for the 60th Canadian Conference for Fisheries Research (CCFFR) was called to order by President Dr. Jeff Hutchings with the aid of his plastic “fish comb”. This was noted to be a versatile instrument not just for grooming but to call attention to the chair with a simple tap on the table or even a glass full of your preferred beverage. It appeared to be water in this instance. Also, with a little bit of waxed paper, it could also be used as a musical instrument. The proposed agenda was tabled and with no contrary minded a motion to approve was passed (Lark/Curry).
II. APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES OF JANUARY 6, 2006
Andrew Cooper presented the draft minutes of the 2006 CCFFR. These had been made available on the website and at the registration table prior to the business meeting. A few minor amendments were noted and a motion to approve the minutes with these amendments was passed (Boisclair/Lark).
III. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Dr. Hutchings stated that it was a great pleasure for him to acknowledge all the efforts of the organizing committee and volunteers for this year’s CCFFR. Special thanks were extended to both Dr. Daniel Boisclair as local arrangements chair and Dr. Nick Mandrak as program chair. Their hard work has once again made the CCFFR a stunning success with an exceptional venue and a diverse, interesting, and relevant program. The sponsors to be thanked for their financial support were:
Many of these sponsors have supported the CCFFR for several years and their continued contributions and the contributions from new agencies have been vital to the success of this meeting. It was noted that this list of potential sponsors should be documented and review by the CCFFR organizing committee on an annual basis. Other volunteers of note were Dr. Chris Taggart of the Department of Oceanography at Dalhousie University. His continued management of the CCFFR website has been a vital contribution to the CCFFR organization.
IV. TREASURER’S REPORT
Dr. Andrew Cooper presented the financial report for CCFFR 2006. In summarizing the financial statement for last year he noted that participation was once again high with 404 registered participants in 2006. Revenues totalled $72,830.95 and expenditures where $60,725.14. The high-level of participation had left a sufficient surplus for the following year (2007). The financial objectives for any post meeting surpluses have been to commit 6 to 8K to the CRTF and to leave a minimum of 5K to direct to security deposits and insurance for the next meeting. It has been important for the local arrangements chair to budget a meeting that is self sufficient based on a moderate level of participation. This conservative approach along with donations from sponsors has allowed the meeting to operate successfully with a modest surplus for subsequent years.
The combined registration for SCL and CCFFR has worked well this year. All registration monies were collected by the local arrangements chair and deposited into the CCFFR account. This eliminated the need to charge SCL for their participation after the meeting.
This year student volunteers for AV support were payed $100 from the CCFFR account. This is a change from previous year’s in which volunteers were offered free registration. This helps with the bookkeeping (re. number of participants recorded for banquet purposes) but it was also noted that the amount for volunteers is now being noted as a significant expenditure. It will be up to the local arrangements chair to budget for student volunteers as they see fit.
The treasurers report was approved (Lark/Fox). This will be posted to the CCFFR website.
V. CLEMENS-RIGLER TRAVEL FUND
Dr. Howard Powles reported on the Clemens-Rigler travel fund for 2007. He extended thanks to Dr. Rob Mackereth at the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources for once again chairing the selection committee. He also thanked the local arrangements chaired by Dr. Boisclair and the CCFFR secretary-treasurer Dr. Cooper for their work in getting excellent financial support to the travel fund. The CRTF financial report was made available to the meeting (table attached). Dr. Powles noted that contributions from the CCFFR and DFO matching contribution arrangement made up the majority of this fund for 2007.
Andrew Cooper noted that the DFO equal contribution agreement would likely continue over the next few years, with the amount to remain the same at up to $6K. The administrator of this money is the office of the Associate Deputy Minister of DFO Science Sector but more specifically within the Ecosystem Science Directorate. This is currently lead by Director General Sylvain Paradis. It has been important to initiate the paper work for this contribution agreement well before the meeting. The contribution agreement requires signatures from the President of CARS, from the ADM of Science in DFO, and final approval by the Deputy Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. This paperwork has taken a couple of months in the past and should be initiated by early September.
There was also some discussion with regards to how money has been distributed to students. Most awards range of $150 to $350. The main factors to determine this are travel distance and whether the student has received an award in previous years. The objective is to support as many students as possible with more money being given to long distance travellers. The current selection committee members are Rob Mackereth (chair), Andrew Cooper (as Secretary-Treasurer for CCFFR), and Howard Powles (representing CARS). John Post was conscripted to be a new member of the CRTF selection committee to assist with finding a more systematic approach to award amounts and to assist with fund raising when required. Motion to nominate J. Post was passed (Boisclair/Taylor).
VI. UPCOMING MEETINGS
· Officers and Arrangements – 2008 (Halifax, NS)
President – John Casselman (Queen’s University)
Local arrangements chair – Paul Bentzen (Dalhousie University)
Program chair – Mark Ridgway (Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources)
Secretary-Treasurer – Andrew Cooper / Julie Deault (DFO)
Nominations chair for 2009 – Eric Taylor
Paul Bentzen announced that he was presently negotiating with a venue but could use some advice on how to approach hotels in order to obtain reasonable rates on meeting rooms and hospitality. Several of the previous year’s local arrangement chairs offered to discuss and help with any questions Paul might have regarding these including a sage remark by D. Boisclair to perhaps purchase the Guns n Roses CD entitled “Appetite for Destruction”, the track “Welcome to the Jungle” may serve as general guidance.
Mark Ridgway thought that the program was still a work in progress and asked participants of the business meeting to send him any ideas they may have over the winter and early spring. Some tentative themes were waterbirds and aquatic food webs. Also the committee would start to think about potential sponsors in and around Halifax including DFO/Environment Canada and perhaps a local tasty beverage company.
· Officers and Arrangements – 2009 (Ottawa, ON)
President – John Post (University of Calgary)
Local arrangements chair – John Lark (DFO)
Program chair – Marco Rodriguez (University of Quebec)
Secretary-Treasurer – Julie Deault (DFO)
Nominations chair for 2010 – Sherrylnn Rowe (DFO)
John Lark reported that the best venue in Ottawa is still the Westin hotel and that he would be making arrangements with them in the New Year. The 2009 meeting would be starting on Friday night Jan 9th (rather than a Thursday) and run all weekend Saturday and Sunday.
· Venue 2010
Winnipeg was chosen to be the venue for 2010, motion passed (Ridgway/Jackson). Nominations for the executive committee will be read during the next business meeting in Halifax 2008.
VII. REPORT FROM THE CANADIAN JOURNAL OF FISHERIES AND AQUATIC SCIENCES
Jeff Hutchings reported on behalf of Moira Ferguson (CJFAS) as she was participating in the student workshop on “How to be a successful scientist” that was taking place in the other room. CJFAS would like to extend thanks to all referees and authors during the year in helping to produce a very high quality journal. The journal’s editorial board is now soliciting nominees for the 2008 Stephenson Lecturer. Manuscripts submitted to the journal were 650. The rejection rate for 2005 was 61%. Impact of the journal based on the number of citation has remained steady. There are currently no backlogs for manuscripts. Publication time is down. A change in editorial arrangements that was reported at CCFFR 2006 has been delayed but is still anticipated to take place within the next year. It is likely that the editorial office will move from the University of Guelph depending on the location of the new senior editor. There has been no word on who the senior editor will be.
VIII. OTHER BUSINESS
· Insurance
John Lark reported that he has examined insurance options regarding the personal liability of the organizers and signing of major contracts. Personal liability insurance for up to $2million dollars can be purchased for the executive member of CCFFR for a fee of $1000/year. This could be done every year prior to the meeting. A motion to approve the purchase of liability insurance was passed (Bentzen/Heath).
Contract guarantee cancellation insurance can also be purchased annually by the local organizers depending on need. This would cost $1500 each time. A motion to allow local organizers to purchase cancellation insurance for the event was passed (Heath/Ridgway).
Retired/Emeritus
· to encourage older researches to continue to share their knowledge with students and the CCFFR/SCL community a motion proposed that retired participants to CCFFR would be eligible to pay the student registration fee. This motion was passed (Taylor/Heath).
· Rob Peters award
There were some concerns regarding the Rob Peters award presented by the SCL during the opening plenary. Several attendees at the CCFFR business meeting felt that it was inappropriate for SCL to feature this new student award at this session. The award was viewed to be only an SCL student award and not open to all CCFFR/SCL participants. At a minimum there should be a joint committee. Also the award was not considered to be in the same league as the Stevenson or Rigler memorial awards and therefore inappropriate to place this student award in the same session as these two prestigious awards. There was considerable discomfort on behalf of the local arrangements and CCFFR executive as they felt that this was brought up at the last minute by the SCL executive and that the meeting organizers had very little choice but to schedule this into the opening session.
A motion was forwarded (Lark/Heath) to strongly state to SCL that CCFFR will only schedule the Stevenson and Rigler awards during the opening plenary session and that all other awards including new student awards should be scheduled at other times in the meeting. This motion failed with only 2 in favour.
As an alternative approach, President Hutchings agreed to write a letter to the executive of the SCL to communicate the discussion that took place and to express CCFFR’s discomfort with the 2007 arrangement for the Rob Peters award. CCFFR would suggest that SCL consider an alternative time in the schedule to present this award. As a suggestion this could be done within an SCL session or at the SCL business meeting.
IX. ADJOURNMENT
The participants of the business meeting once again wished to acknowledge the efforts of this year’s executive committee: Daniel Boisclair (Local Arrangements Chair), Nick Mandrak (Program Chair), Rob Mackereth and Howard Powles (Clemens-Rigler Travel Fund), Andrew Cooper (Secretary-Treasurer) and Jeff Hutchings (President). President Hutching asked for a motion to adjourn, passed (Boisclair/Heath).
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Clemens Rigler Travel Fund - Summary |
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2007 Meetings |
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(Situation on January 2, 2007) |
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Contributor |
Amount |
Totals |
Notes |
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Confirmed |
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CARS/CRTF Surplus from last year |
2821.84 |
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Peter Amiro (Oct 16) |
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CCFFR |
12000 |
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Surplus from 2006 CCFFR/SCL meetings |
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Andrew Cooper (Oct 16) |
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DFO |
6000 |
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Matching funds |
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SCL |
1000 |
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Same as last year |
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(Rolf Vinebrooke Oct) |
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AFS Western Division |
560 |
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$500 US for west coast students |
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Total |
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22381.84 |
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Hoped for - did not come yet |
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AFS Northeast Divison |
600 |
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Contributed last year |
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AFS North Central |
600 |
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Contributed last year |
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1200 |
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Total |
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23581.84 |
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Awards |
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(from Rob Mackereth) |
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Students: 91 |
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Amount: $21,952 |
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Mean per student: $241 |
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Minimum: $150 (previously received awards) |
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Maximum $350 (new, from western provinces) |
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CCFFR: 62 |
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SCL: 33 |
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Ontario: 55 |
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