6 December 2023, Time: 7:30 PM EST

Notes submitted by Seong Myeong Su Daesaseong, South Downs Chronicler.

Magister Lorenzo called the December meeting to order. Our Seneschal, Lady Raven Helmsplitter started recording the meeting and greeted the populace joining the Zoom meeting. Lady Raven read the Kingdom Anti-Bullying statement.

Officers’ Reports

Seneschal, (Lady Raven Helmsplitter)

• Schedule for this month:
  • This is the last meeting for 2023
  • Stay tuned for January 2024, still TBD. January in-person dates are 1/17 and 1/31 (5th Wednesday potluck)
• Baronial calendar has been updated for 2024 with the in-person dates through June 2024.
• Castle Wars was a huge success! Thanks for everyone who came out, and everyone who helped make CW happen 🙂 
  • We will have our post-mortem later on in the meeting
• Many, many thanks to Isabetta for securing our new storage unit, and for everyone who helped move our stuff there.
• His Excellency and I went to Bert Adams for a site visit to scout out the site for RedTower 2024 (RT 50!). Waiting to hear that our requested reservation date is approved.
• We need to start thinking about what KLE we might put in a bid for, as every barony is required to submit a bid for a KLE
• Midwinter A+S is coming (3 February 2024)! Piers and Eirikr will present their bid later on in the meeting.
• Officers:
  • Please check your officer page on our website to make sure your info is correct – especially links to external websites (kingdom, for example). If there are any updates needed, please get your updates to Eirikr (I believe he has a form to use).
    • Populace – please also check your listing in Dramatis Personae > People of South Downs. If you have updates (or are not listed), please let Eirikr know and he’ll update your listing.
  • Their Excellencies would like to meet with all the officers (and deputies) sometime soon (possibly in January, after the holidays), to discuss what we want to do in 2024.
• Our pause during the pandemic made our usual processes, well, weird. I want to get back on track with our normal terms of office, and am looking into what the usual/expected terms of office should be. In the meantime, I’d like to have all the officers let me know when they started their terms.

Herald (Magister Lorenzo Petrucci)     

• Not much news with submissions, contact me if you need help with submitting anything
• Castle Wars Awards
  • Lady Roisin / Lord Ælfic – Order of the Broken Bow
  • Her Exuberance Anna / La Magnifica Justina – Argent Comet
  • Noble Ajax – Award of Arms
  • Acharya Mewadi Margavati – Order of the Falcon’s Faith
  • Mistress Veronica – Order of the Red Raven
  • Baroness Sunneva – Swift’s Heart
  • THL Kurt – Writ for Pelican

Knight Marshal (Lord Eiríkr Pálsson)

• Practices have been going on, last week was canceled for weather
• We should have practice for the next two Sundays, won’t have practice Christmas eve
• Will start looking for a deputy to help take over and help run practices.
• Had a lot of fighters that came out for CW and got reauthorized

Rapier Marshal (Captain Brendan de Hay)

1. Practices have been proceeding, weather and other events permitting.  Sundays starting around noon (concurrent with armored practice).  Schedule changes, cancellations, and any other relevant information is shared on the FaceBook group “Atlanta SCA Fighting,” and sometimes other locations depending on circumstances.  Loaner gear is usually available, but it doesn’t hurt to check the “Atlanta SCA Fighting” group in advance.  Sometimes when I’m not available, the “stunt marshal” might not be able to bring it.
2. BTW, “Atlanta SCA Fighting” is still visible publicly and searchable, but is now “Private” to keep the bots out.  If you have any trouble at all finding practice announcements, feel free to reach out directly to me or Ld. Eirikr.  It should be readable to anyone, but you’ll need to join in order to post.
3. Thanks to everyone for working together to keep practices happening.  I wouldn’t mind having a deputy step up who could take over from me in the not-too-distant future.
4. Big shout-out to folks recently giving rapier a try.  Looking forward to seeing more folks having fun!  Just before Castle Wars, we had several new authorizations, and a couple of new auths at CW.  The field is getting bigger!
5. The castle is now as functional as it’s ever been.  It still needs paint.  It’s really nice to see it stored indoors again, but let’s please keep in mind that it really does need a work day sometime for a sprucing up (new paint will also help protect the wood from bugs and weather).
6. Castle Wars:  The Meridian Order of the Blade Invitational tournament Saturday morning went well (Congratulations to Lady Ogata on her victory!), and the new meleé scenario from Ldy. Ogata was well-received.
7. HYDRATE!

Live Weapons (Master Mathias Blackett)

• Castle Wars was a very big day on the live weapons range, over 50 people show up on the range
• Lots of tournaments and busy time on the range!
• 13 people completed at least one royal round, including a little six year old girl who really enjoyed herself and didn’t want to leave.
• Will need to get more target butts soon, will put together a proposal to purchase new targets, probably around $150 each.
• Had a conversation about the new potential practice location, will go check out the site to see if it’ll work. If it is, we’ll have archery practice Dec. 17th!
• Will probably start looking for a deputy soon

Exchequer (La Magnifica Justina di Silvestri)

• Our current bank balance is $8,117.38 
• Firstly, I am very excited to announce I have a deputy reeve! Lord Salim will be training with me over the next year and has already helped so much with paperwork. He is very skilled in all things reevery and the barony’s financial matters are going to be in such capable hands. We have submitted his request to be warranted and I will include him in the majority of correspondence from my office moving forward. 
• As previously discussed, the Honorable Lady Majda is also joining the reeve team as fundraising special deputy 
• The biggest thing to cover tonight is getting the 2024 annual budget discussed and approved.
• I uploaded a pdf to our facebook group files page and will also add to the Zoom chat 
  • THL Mairghread made a motion to move it to vote, M. Isabetta seconded. 22 for, 1 opposed, vote passed.
• Second approval needed is an overage from castle wars, the only overage. Original approved budget was $1150, the financial committee approved an urgent addition of $400 due to the expected attendance, and the bathrooms needed mid event cleaning. The final total was $1635, putting it $85 over budget. we need the barony to vote to approve this overage 
  • THL Mairghead made a motion to move to vote, Baron Ximon seconded. 22 for, 1 opposed, vote passed.
• Another overage to note for your records, the FC approved $42.20 to reimburse Red Tower Travelers fare, no additional vote is needed
• Salim and I are going to get the ball rolling again on completing the Financial policy update- stay tuned.

Quartermaster (Maestra Isabetta de San Marco) 

• Got everything moved to the storage unit in one day and everything fits.
• Many thanks to everyone who came to help.
• Will head over during Christmas to reorganize and rebuild the spreadsheets
• CW items and walls in the back, so things we need for CW will be out of the way for now.
• Still need a deputy, took over in 2021.
• Payment schedule has been put in place.

Chatelaine (Lady Ogata Mitsuko)

• Nothing to report.

Demo Deputy (VACANT)

• Demos covered by Lady Ogata
• Lady Ogata is planning on taking over the demo deputy position when Baroness Arnora takes over, but if you’re interested, please let us know!

Arts & Sciences (Lady Maryam)

• Castle Wars went well with the various classes and salons hosted. Hoping to see more salons in the future.
• Midwinter A&S is coming! Will have more news soon! Look forward to it!
• In the meantime, keep sharing your projects, interests, and/or rabbit holes you’ve gone down in any way you please! 

Provost (Lord Ælfric Hort)

• Castle Wars saw a lot of classes and Salons being offered for the enjoyment of the attending populace.  26 individual people took 8 different classes with 31 RUM credits received overall.
• There will be no Baronial A&S Class night for the month of December.  January Baronial Class Night should be Wednesday, Jan. 24th – and I am still looking for a teacher for that month and all of the rest of 2024 as well.
• Also be thinking about classes you might want to teach for Midwinter A&S.  I will be putting out a call for teachers soon.
• And finally, on that note, I am looking for a deputy Provost to begin helping me organize and promote A&S Class activities for the coming year, as well as help with coordinating classes for Midwinter Arts and Sciences in February.  Please get in touch with me on Facebook or Discord if you are interested in the position.

Chronicler (Seong Myeong Su Daesaseong)

• Thank you to all who got your reports sent in early!
• Behind on October and November’s newsletters, but will post them as soon as I get them done
• Updating the baronial calendar with the in-person/virtual meetings, should update and in turn update the baronial calendar as well.
• Always looking to interview the populace for each issue, so please fill out this form to get included! Eventually I’d like to collect these into one PDF so we have a good collection of information about our members: https://forms.gle/MNxww3KUQJo2VsEG9
• Please submit photos, art, articles, shout-outs, or anything that you’ve found interesting and want to share! I’ll always be collecting stuff for the newsletters going forward. You can submit either through this form: https://forms.gle/8SyEF9D7c8rMCnZP6 or email me at chron.southdowns@meridies.org.

Social Media Minister  (THLady Agnes Halydaye) 

• Nothing reported.

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Officer (DEIB), (Lady Lily of South Downs)

• Currently not looking for a deputy while we work on some structural changes in the office and things get settled.
• That said, please reach out if you’re interested in the office or want to help. DEIB is our collective responsibility, so help is always welcomed.
• There will not be anything DEIB on the schedule for this month due to the holidays. We will work with the officers to figure out future scheduling.

Webminister (Lord Eiríkr Pálsson)

• No deputy yet, but will start looking for one soon.
• Send in requests if you need your information updated on the website
• Link to form to update you information on the SD website: https://forms.gle/omZbL4QcaDFbHQV78

Minister of Children (VACANT)

• Position is still open, if you are interested, please contact Lady Raven.

Their Excellencies, (Maestro Ximon Cordoba de Martillo & HE Rhiannon verch Madyn)

• Ximon
  • Not much to say, but if you think people should be recognized, please give us award recommendations!

SCA Business

• Castle Wars Post-Mortem

• • Lady Ysabel and Lady Hessa
    • Thank you to EVERYONE who came out and helped out with the event, it was incredible seeing our vision for the event come to life and become a reality.
    • Lots of happy people and vendors who were pleased with the setup of the event. We had the chance to try some new things with vendor services and an info point to help out and check in on people.
    • Spoke with the park, they are building showers and toilets permanently on the site in the cinderblock building. They were pleased with how the group handled our parking passes and they appreciated how we handled it.
    • We were having trouble with the gate codes, but moving forward they may add in multiple codes to help keep the gate from malfunctioning again.
    • We may need to find a way to tell the general population that it’s a closed and private event to help prevent random people from walking through the event.
    • Lost and found is still posted on the FB group, please check to see if you’re missing anything.
    • Please send in names for the volunteer drawing so that people can get a chance to get something after all of the help with Castle Wars.
    • Campsites have stone/rock markers with numbers and numbers on trees, and may want to use them going forward to help organize camps next time.
  • Baron Piers Simmons
    • Only complaint is that the last camp had to walk past parking for the closest porta potty, but the event was fabulous in general.
  • Lady Lily
    • Loved seeing the event stewards in one place and easy to find, and thank you for the food and snacks and general hospitality
  • La Magnifica Justina
    • So many thanks to Dorian for all of his help at check-in, you were a rockstar!
    • Thank you to the event stewards for letting us try new things with the location of check-in, and many thanks to Lady Ysabel for getting more signs to help inform people where to go.
    • Still some things that we can learn and improve on.
    • Going forward if we use this site again for bids since they use a flat fee, $625, but they also charge per person overnight per night. The total fee ended up being $1806, so it may be hard to calculate this bid in the future.
    • Total attendance: 455 people
    • Profit: $2758.40
    • We didn’t have the infrastructure to support late check-in. If we want to have support late check-in, we will need to plan ahead to make sure we have lights and staff to help cover shifts.

• Midwinter Bid

• • • Baron Piers and Lord Eirikr
      • Bid for Feb. 3 2024 at Pafford Hall at UWG.
      • Proposed $15 prereg and $20 at the gate for site fee
        • Myeong Su made a motion to bring the bid to vote, Dorian seconded. Motion passes and the bid is approved.
      • Popchiv and Kingdom Chronicler will be contacted to get the flyer in.

• DEIB Directive

• • Acharya Mewadi Margavati Bai
    • There’s been a directive from higher up to restructure the DEIB office and local offices may be reworked or eliminated structurally. The work will not stop being done and we will still have resources, but we’re not sure how it will work going forward.
    • Things will be shared more as we know more going forward.
    • Many, many thanks to Lady Lily for all of your work!
  • Majster Nikoslav
    • DEIB stuff for the Kingdom is not going away, but will be restructured. The system will be more regional instead of local to help deal with issues as they arise.
    • Many thanks to Lady Lily and Acharya Mewadi Margavati for all of your work in both local and Kingdom offices.

Non-SCA Business

• None reported.

The business meeting was closed @ 9:12 PM EST

The next business meeting will be held on January 3rd, 2024, 7:00 PM EST via Zoom Meeting.