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Meeting Notes January 2026

    Board Meeting 
    January 21, 2026

    Board Members in Attendance:                 
    X    Kansas Guthrie, President             Kirsty Pinchuk, College Relations
    X    Priya Bowman, Treasurer        x    Gayle Young, Membership
    X    Heidi Hand, Secretary            
    x    Deborah Jeffries, Professional Develop.            
    x    Cecelia Love-Zhou, Communications            
                 

    Call to Order:   
    The SHRM Salem board meeting began at 4:05 pm virtually. It was presided over by Kansas Guthrie, president and recorded by Heidi Hand, secretary. 

    Programs
    Deborah provided an update of upcoming presentation topics. Danielle is scheduled as the speaker in February on well-being. In March the Willamette University MBA candidates will host the chapter meeting. Kirsty will coordinate with them on the meeting topic and provide a summary for the website. April meeting will be the re-scheduled December topic of “Resilient Leadership” by Scott Sadler. Deborah is developing program content ideas for May and beyond, including a Legal Update. Checks for the January and February speaker fees will need to be prepared and Deborah will provide the details to Priya. For future payments it’s best practice to ask for an invoice from the speaker.

    Member Update
    Gayle is beginning to research ideas for membership events. She is gathering info from several wineries and the Marion Berries baseball team. We will ask members what type of event they would enjoy attending in the upcoming membership survey. 

    Member Survey
    Deborah sent out a draft of the membership survey. Kansas will create the survey in Survey Monkey and work with Cecelia to send it out via email and text message. 

    Travel Policy
    Priya will draft a travel policy for review at an upcoming board meeting.

    Other Discussion:
    •    Cecelia suggested having a power point presentation before the membership meetings to show announcements and membership information.
    •    The group received the 2026 calendar from Kansas and reviewed the information.

    •    The Board decided to rotate catering between board members who have debit cards. Heidi planned the January catering, Gayle will handle February, Kansas March and Priya April.
    •    The PO Box lapsed due to non-payment and miscommunication with former board members. The board decided to sign up for a new PO Box at the same post office on Commercial St as the prior PO box.
    •    Priya will pick up the treasurer documents from Heidi on January 22.
    •    Kansas is working on obtaining a D&O insurance policy. Once the new policy is in effect the old policy will be canceled.

    Other Business:
    •    Kansas informed the Board on January 7 via email that Alicia Carnine is not able to join the Board after all due to time constraints.

    Action Items
    •    Gayle – Order lunch for Feb Meeting. Once survey received, select top 2 venues for membership events.
    •    Priya – follow up with Heidi on banking & new PO Box
    •    Kansas – secure the correct insurance and cancel the incorrect insurance
    •    Kansas & Cecelia – finalize the survey and send to members
    •    Cecelia – social media improvements, advertise the survey on all socials and the SHRM Salem page
    •    Heidi – upload meeting minutes for 5-7 years (if we have them) to the SHRM Salem website; banking and PO Box

    Adjournment
    The meeting adjourned at 5:05 pm.