PRESENT: Luke Shorty, Celeste Branham, Bill Guindon, Pam Proulx-Curry, Diane Lebson, Jenni Tilton-Flood, Kelsey Preecs
Committee members convened at 3:32 pm using virtual meeting platform.
Tilan Copson was present for staff support. Maryalice Crofton was in a legislative work session that concerned the Commission biennial budget. She had sent a message to Luke regarding discussion items.
URGENT AND TIMELY MATTERS FROM VOLUNTEER MAINE STAFF
Commission and subgrantee responses to Exec Orders compliance directive. Responses for both the Commission office operating grants and AmeriCorps pass-through grants were submitted to CNCS on February 26. Yesterday (Monday), an email came that essentially rejected the responses. Maryalice replied asking what was inadequate or not clear in the accompanying letter or email narrative. Regional CNCS staff replied that the responses were being further reviewed so the status is not clear. AAG Forster has advised Maryalice to wait and not act.
New Debt Resolution Letter. Monday evening, the Commission received a debt collection letter for the OIG final investigation report for the Axiom AmeriCorps program. There had been a resolution letter nearly a year ago and the federal AmeriCorps agency sent a closeout letter in September. This debt collection is due to be paid soon. Staff are working on understanding the basis of the repayment.
Distribution of Exec Director duties. The search is progressing but there is likely to be a gap of several weeks between Maryalice leaving and the new Executive Director starting. Committee members discussed how best to cover leadership in the interim which they guess will be about two or three weeks. Because the state processes and HR onboarding take time, an interim would need to come from the inside. They agreed to discuss with Chelsey Fortin-Trimble and recommend a specific person if the period of time was longer. For a short period of time, it seemed likely tasks and duties of the Exec Director could be covered by the staff. Maryalice has already started to distribute routine duties among staff for short term coverage. For example, the task forces staffed by the Executive Director now have alternates and some management processes also have alternates. Luke suggested getting a short report from Maryalice on that distribution.
Because interviews and completing the process should be done before the March 21 Commission meeting, plus there are other factors that will sort out by then, the members decided to hold a special Executive Committee meeting before the March 21 business meeting. (March 21 at 9am)
Update from work session on MOCA budget (Housing and Economic Development). The work session is today and Maryalice is there. Cannot report because the committee is still working.
GENERAL UPDATES AND PLANNING
Luke gave Executive Committee members a heads up that, with the nomination of Michael Duguay as Commissioner of DECD. The college is looking to distribute his duties among senior staff including Luke which will change is ability to continue chair the various committees (Executive, Financial, and Search). Members expressed appreciation for the advance notice. He will discuss delegating duties with Pam and Bill.
Jenni shared news about Public Policy. Her term on the board ends this year and she talked with Luke about how to bring someone on as co-chair of Public Policy so there could be a smooth hand-off. With his agreement, she approached Tade Sullivan who agreed to be the co-chair. He will join Executive Committee as well.
Service Programs Task Force needed a chair. Kelsey Preecs has agreed to take on this role and will join the Executive Committee.
Report from Commission representative(s) to national leadership convening. Diane reported highlights from her experience. Tom Meuser attended with her. First, she focused on the group meeting with Jennifer Bastress Tahmasebi who is the interim director of the federal AmeriCorps agency. She brought 5 executives from the agency who spent 2 hours briefing the leadership of state commissions. JBT, as she is known, thanked Commissions for their response to the Executive Order compliance process. She also shared they anticipate one-third of their staff will be cut. Regarding funding, they are watching the continuing resolution situation. Best case scenario is that the Senate funding plan will be used. She noted that morale at the agency has bottomed out and she’s trying her best to keep employees supported. She’s done a few things that show she is the right leader for this time. Second, Diane reported on the Hill visits she and Tom made. They met with Senator King’s staff and Diane thanked Jenni for her outreach which set up the discussion. They also met with Representative Pingree’s staffer. With Senator Collins, they had a chance to talk with the senator for 10 minutes and had a longer conversation with one of her staff. It was positive because they were asking for flat funding for the AmeriCorps agency. That stood out from other organizations that are asking for increases. The odd thing was with Representative Golden’s office. Neither he nor his staff could meet. Tom and Diane are working on meeting with one of the district representatives in state. Diane noted that any good news we can share with Hill staff would stand out because the extreme volume of communication they receive now is about problems and objections. She noted Tom went into recruitment mode, asking people to present at the volunteer managers’ conference. The third area she reported on was ASC as a resource. She recruited a couple of potential mentors for the new Executive Director. The ASC work groups for staff (communications, programs, etc.) were noted and she felt could be plug in a little more to be very involved with what happens. She also discussed States for Service which is the advocacy arm and she recommended paying the membership as an investment. Jenni invited Diane to bring the greater ASC involvement to Public Policy for expanded discussion. It was mentioned that Chelsey is the board representative to the States for Service. Jenni also asked Diane how her panel presentation went. The panel audience was Hill staffers. The topic was the impact of AmeriCorps on communities and other panelists were Texas, Louisianna, and West Virginia. The attendees were standing room only which she was surprised at. There was a brief discussion of whether there were insights about the proposed federal 2026 budget and Diane indicated it also needs to be monitored.
Discussion of bill to fund Service Fellows and establish alum disaster response group. There are two bills. Not possible to update information because Maryalice wasn’t present. Public Policy will be discussing these in the morning.
VOLUNTEER MAINE COMMISSION MEETING AND AGENDA REVIEW
Regular standing agenda for March 21. Provide Tom and Diane chunk of time on the agenda so they can report on the leadership meeting. Celeste suggested the identity statement be revisited by the new Institutional Effectiveness and Accountability Task Force.
There being no other issues to discuss, the meeting ended at 4:43 pm.