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Advertised weeky with Mailchimp email to OHCA members; ~2X/week via oakhillnj.nextdoor.com; a large number of (realtor-style) large road-side signs (printed by Sean)

EXPENSE REVIEW as of 6/25/2016 (Glenn Cashion, Treas): Attached is the summary for today’s Block Party, with associated expenses, budgeted vs actual, and current membership and cash on hand (after anticipated deposits on Monday). This summary reflects known expenses as of today. If there are additional expenses, I will update the summary.

Expenses:   Budget (6/8/16)       Actual
Food:        $1,350                 $2,310
Ice Cream:      250                      260
Mr. Happy:       778                      990
DJ:                   450                      450
Total:    $2,828                $4,010
+42%
Income: $255 (6/25/16)
90 (6/21-24)
Total: $345
Net Expenses: $3,665
+30%

New members= 7
Current Membership = 265
Operating Cash on hand June 25, 2016: $2,144.74
Operating Cash on hand July 2, 2015:    $6,197.61

Location: Lyons was great and all the residents were super friendly (the neighbor on the corner with the pond even joined the OHCA that day from what I understand).

HOWEVER sun was an issue for the inflatables which led to less use and having to move one. I would suggest we move to Tatum. There are only houses on one half of the street, the street is always shady and my brother-in-law who helped with setup and breakdown lives at the end of the street. Would just need permission from his neighbor and we are good to go.

Inflatables: I think that we keep them, they had limited use do to being scorching hot to touch, if we move to Tatum this will not be an issue. Maybe price out some other options at a lower cost.

Food: Food was great but definitely a spot we can cut major costs, I agree with both Lee and Glenn's suggestions of an old school backyard BBQ setup.

Time: 3-7pm would be idle, when we were breaking down a lot or attendees were still hanging out talking

Lase Tag: Absolute hit and FREE...just would have been better to be closer to the event. Good news is that Kevin's, who owns the company, hose is on Tatum!

Other: Volunteers were super helpful, wristbands and tickets made for tracking much easier, someone told me that events like this and the association make Oak Hill such a desirable place to live which was great to hear.

With that all said we definitely learned some lessons and will be better prepared for 2017 and at a lower cost. Onward and upwards...E-mail to follow about our next meeting and event.

Based upon the Block reactions that I heard and read, I think it was an over the top success. What's most important is to get the buzz going enough to make people feel they "want to be a member of the Community" and have fun at the events. I predict Next year will be a lot better attended. But a good example of the "buzz" was that we had a family of 5 + 2 grandparents stop by at the check in booth ask all about us... they were buying on upper Borden and had an inspector at their home-to-be at that moment. They said they will join as soon as they close. I really appreciate your keeping us on the path and alerting us to our financial status. And your accounting didn't include any Community Taste With a Twist lunches - and I anticipate 2 of them in 2016. If we move a smidgen into the red this year - I consider it as investment for next year and beyond. And we didn't have to rent tents thanks to Sean's Corporate generosity.

It was awesome, but there are some changes that will probably make us even better. I think most of you covered the main things... if the Lyon Rd families will let us have it again, then we need to set up most everything at the Pelican end since that was in shade the whole afternoon. Shorter hours - yes. I think the 3 to 6p zone would be best only because folks have a life and most moved on by 5pm. The ice cram is okay - selections were so-so, and it came too late in the day and consequently missed many families. But the cost was pretty low too. The food was excellent... but wow for money. Renting a 6ft grill and swapping off grilling might be a solution... but that food from the food truck was really yummie. I really suggest port-potties since so many folks left for the toilet and I don't know how many came back. I know a mom took her little girl home for the toilet, and a friend went home for the toilet... but both those folks came back 'cause I was chatting with them. I personally drove the DJ to my home to use our toilet at about 4:45p.

The bounce house were good entertainment for the munchkins - the one that moved to the Borden end was not used much and maybe good only for the very young. We probably could get by with one bounce house and a few more games. TicTacToe was in the "too hot zone" and needed a volunteer to operate it. Badmitten? I dunno. I suggest that the tables be set up as "L's" to improve chat possibilities.

I saw some BYO beer. I will have to check about that, but it probably will not hurt us for insurance... but if we supply beer - I am pretty sure that is a whole new insurance issue. Lastly, someone from our Board must have called our insurance carrier, since he has asked me to call him this week to assure that all D&O's understand our coverage. For whatever it is worth... I suggest that we have one person as our insurance contact...whoever that person is. Otherwise Chris will get confused and send mail to the wrong address... as he has in the past. Just a thought.

Again thanks to everyone who was on top of this event... but especially my thanks to Sean and his magic and energy and Rebecca and her tireless thoroughness for heading up this successful thing. Sean - your volunteer recruits were excellent - especially Megan whom I worked with the most. Please thank Dakota, Kristen and Megan for me.
best regards, Lee

Thanks for all your hard work, Rebecca. Some of my thoughts:

Other food options should be considered. The old “neighbors cooking hot dogs and hamburgers” approach would be a lot cheaper.

For sure, shorter duration.

I don’t think we get ~$1,000 of use out of the inflatables.

I would not be in favor of beer at the block party.

Lastly, our operating cash is very low and we need to be extremely frugal for the rest of this year and first quarter of next year. We currently have $2,144 in checking account. Anticipated bills, w/o any White Street Media expenses, are Halloween Parade--$1,200; Santa event--~$250; Insurance due in Feb-$679, which totals $2,129.

Our objective is not to eat into our savings account; however, such a prospect appears bleak.

**********

Rebecca lacobellis(6/26/2016)

The block party was a complete success. People have already voiced their excitement for next year.

Please note, the food was budget was based on an attendance of 100 people. We had almost double.

We learned a few things for next year:

-Later hours and shorten it by 2 hours (maybe 3-7)

-Price out bounce houses with other vendors

-More shade/ tents

-Possibly beer/ brewery truck ( people would pay on their own)

BLOCK PARTY SETUP PLANS (Rebecca, 6/23/2016) This morning a few of us met to go over the final logistics for Saturday’s event. I am going to apologize in advance for the length of this email but I want to pass along all the information I have and ensure I am not missing anything. The event is from 12-6 and we are going to begin set up around 11:15. A letter will be placed on Lyon Rd residence doorsteps, today or tomorrow, providing them with parking details. As of now, we have 10 confirmed volunteers ( Lee, Helen, Liz – Lee’s wife, Glenn, Sea, Me, Susan Figurelli’s dad, and three students that Sean is in contact with).

We will have two sign in/ sign up tables, one at each end of Lyon, for arrival. Upon arrival, people will be given bracelets for entry and one ticket per person for ice cream. All members and their household are free, non-members or nonresidents must pay or sign up for membership ( if applicable). New members will be given an OHCA magnet and newsletter. Lastly, we will only accept cash and check for new member payment and non-member entry fee. We have two bounce houses, a DJ, a food vendor and an ice cream truck all compliments of OHCA for members and paying people.

We need some of the volunteers to take two hour shifts to work the sign in tables. If your name is below, please confirm you are ok with this:

Additionally, I have noted that the following people will be handling the following tasks. Please shoot me an email if I am incorrect or if I am missing something.

I have also attached a map to show the set up. Please note, I am not good with maps and adobe and of course it is not to scale. Nothing will be on anyone’s lawn either. I just didn’t know how to make the map look pretty.

Please let me know if I am missing anything at all. I hope to see all of you on Saturday!!