June 29, 2018 – PAC Meeting Notes and Action Items:

Present: Ching-Chang, George, Jing-Li, Joel, Jose, Kathleen, Munsup, Piyush, Tony, Ved, and SK Lo (special guest)

Absent: Muktas, Victor

Reports:

AAUC conference in Alaska – Tony & Piyush, SK Lo

The preparation of the AAUC conference in Alaska is going well.

  1. received a total of 18 registrations including 3 EF and 3 PAC board members plus 1 staff (Stephen).
  2. signed and counter-signed the Hyatt House hotel contract to provide up to 20 rooms at a discounted rate of $179/nite + tax which includes free airport shuttle, WiFi and breakfast.
  3. obtained the approval from the EF board to spend up to $20,000 for the conference.
  4. obtained the approval from the PAC board to spend up to $5,000 for hiring a professional facilitator to help us manage the meeting.
  5. submitted a proposed conference program to the EF board earlier.
  6. selected Alice Huang and SK Lo to be co-chairs for the conference.
  7. planned two conference calls with separate groups of attendees to get to know each other before the meeting.
  8. requested that all conference participants submit a short bio prior to the interview with the facilitator. The bios will be compiled and be part of the conference packet.
  9. signed contract with the facilitation company Leadership Strategies Inc. and selected the senior facilitator Mark Smith to be our conference facilitator.

SK also suggest that PAC would use this opportunity to inform participants about 80-20 Initiative and sign up members.

Membership List – Munsup’s Report

We currently have 1,021 members in good standing (both life and paid members) according to Munsup.

Total Reported on May 14 Total Reported on June 29 Gain/Loss Notes on May 14 Notes on June 29
Life Time Members 471 471 0 215 without email or USPS address
Current Active Members (with PayPal Record) 540 610 70 About 300 members are with current payments
Currently Inactive Members 1645 1676 31 Working Email Addrfess
Currently Unreachable Past Members 2295 2304 9 Emails were bounced
Curretly Impposible to Reach 501 509 8 Name Only
Currently Refused To Be Contacted 207 80 -127 Responded No or Blocked
Additionla Address 0 251 251
  5659 5901 242 4.3% Increase

By Laws – Piyush and Tony

Piyush and Tony reported that the ByLaws proposal are almost ready to send to the Executive Committee and Board Members for inputs and approvals. The definition of Asian Americans will be more clear and the new ByLaws will clarify that all Americans regardless of their ethnic background can join the membership of 80-20 PAC.

Financial Report – Jing, Kathleen

Kathleen and Jing reported that we have approximately $ 160,000 in our checking, saving and equity accounts.

General Directions  – Joel

Joel talked about how the 80-20 PAC Facebook page is doing and encourage all members to ‘like’ and share our page and urge our friends to visit the page. To increase our membership, we need to engage the help of young people who are well versed with social media other than newsletters.

Presently, there are three coalition forming efforts that PAC is participating in:

  1. The group of 14 organizations who are working together on FBI Director Wray’s letter and the support of Sherry Chen;
  2. Our own AAUC effort to which PAC has pledged $5 K to hire a qualified facilitator;
  3. and the upcoming Congressional Reception in DC in early September, 2018.

Discussion & Action Items:

Harvard Admission Issue – Ved

Ved gave a summary of 80-20 Initiative efforts being spent on the college admission issue. Getting data from Harvard University to show that Asian Americans are consistently rated lower on “personality” is big step forward.  During the next three months, it is important for the Asian community to become very active and vocal about this case – especially from September to early October to have public conferences, panel discussions, op-eds, debates, etc. These action should take place in Boston, New York, DC and California.

November Initiatives – Joel & All

Joel led a discussion on what 80-20 PAC should do in the coming November Election. Our Board Members joined 80-20 PAC because we are the only nationwide Asian American PAC and as such we should be a voice the upcoming election.

While 80-20 PAC is nonpartisan, most of our Board Members are not happy with the way our country is going with initiatives promoting isolationism, trade wars and anti-immigration. It seems that the present administration has hijacked the Republican party and has divided our country – both parties are self serving and neither party is putting country before partisan politics.

Because of this trend, the Board is suggesting the following Action Items:

  1. Board Members and Chapter Presidents from each of the following regions will study the regional/local issues and make suggestions on which issue/politicians to support in the November elections without regards to political affiliation.
  2. The suggested issues/recommendations will be submitted to the Executive Committee by Friday, August 17, 2018. The Executive Committee will study these issues, and submit them to general Board for approval.
  3. 80-20 PAC will issue Election Guidelines by Friday, September 14, 2018.

Issues Assignments:

  • California – George, Jose and Joel
  • Texas – Ching-Chang, Steven Pei and Kathleen
  • Ohio (mid-west) – Munsup
  • New Jersey (north-east) – Ved
  • DC Area – Samuel Yan, Ting Dai
  • Florida – Ed Lin, Piyush
  • Alaska – Tony Nakazawa

 

Respectfully submitted,
Kathleen To
Secretary