Meeting Minutes – February 4, 2023

Meeting Location: PMC, 11420 Hwy. 190, Hammond

• Fellowship before meeting
• Collection of dues (Rick Albrecht) and selling of shirts and caps (Richard Robles)

Invocation and Pledge of Allegiance – Harold Choate

Welcome and Introduction of Guests– 4 guest present, Mike Copeland, Reid Morgan, Robert P?, Doug BR?

Officer Reports:

• Vice-President – George Campagna- Still working on field trip date at Gator Millworks, George Lewis is going to help with arrangements. We’ll have that settled by the next meeting. George drove by the place. It looked like it was in the final phases of construction but was very impressive. Harold contacted Netterville Sawmill. Their main mill burned just before Covid but they are up and running again. Our contact, Jerry Beauchamp is going to talk to the mill manager to see about having a tour. Harold is to call next week for a reply. George announced we have been invited to participate in the public event the Baton Rouge Zoo does annually. We passed this year but will participate next year when we have time to get organized on what we want to do. George asked for suggestion about activities we can do with children. Jackie Parker suggested having the child write their name on the edge of a piece of wood and then using a plane to remove it. The child is given the chip to keep. Jim Landry suggested making animal cutouts that can be drilled using a brace and bit for a pencil holder. This event takes place in April. It’s a 2 day event, but George has in mind just doing 1 day. George has copies of the meeting schedule if anyone needed them. They are also posted on the website.
• Secretary – Harold Choate- 21 people attended last month. We had 4 visitors. The activity on FaceBook is impressive however we need more content from the club to post.
• Treasurer – Rick Albrecht- Check with Rick for details. Only about 2/3’s of us have paid our dues at this point so please see Rick if you haven’t paid your dues for 2023 yet.
• Webmaster – Open
• Community Service – Lee Owens- Thanks to everyone for volunteering to work on the O’Brien House Chest of Drawers project. It’s a large project and all are needed to complete it. The teams are led by Jackie Parker, Keith Bryan, Robert Cheramie, Cody Henderson, George Campagna, Brian Stauss, Harold Choate, Lee Owens, and Hal Canning. Jim Landry reported on the wood he and Keith Bryan got from Brazos Forest Products. They had Brazos plane the wood to 13/16″ thick and do a straight edge on one edge. Rick Albrecht suggested 4 teams share a gallon of polyurethane in order to save 25-30% on the cost. Jackie Parker and Bob Chambers suggested using shellac to finish the inside of the drawers. Discussion took place about the type of joinery and dimensional tolerances. Robert Cheramie brought a side panel and Harold Choate brought a face frame for Show and Tell.
• Education Outreach – Open

New and Ongoing Club Business

• Notes From January Executive Meeting- We talked about asking the organizations we do Community Service work for to post details of our projects on their websites and social media pages. Richard and Lee are working on getting the website more current regarding the Community Service project pictures. Rick Albrecht suggested we get a branding iron with the club logo to mark our projects with. There were numerous comments about this virtually all in agreement. George Campagna suggest using stickers instead of a branding iron. The reaction from the club was not pretty, they want to burn the logo into the wood! LOL
• Bird House Coordinator- Richard asked for volunteers to be the Birdhouse Project Coordinator. Richard outlined the duties he had in mind: 1) Getting commitments from the members to build birdhouses 2) Determining how and where the birdhouses will be delivered 3) Coordinating receiving and inspecting the finished kits are done correctly 4) Coordinate getting the kits delivered to SwampFest. Richard said he would be involved but needed someone to take care of the details. Art Miller volunteered to accept the job. Jim Landry has the name of the person he worked with to get a donation. Richard announced the model birdhouse Bob Bewick built and mounted on a stump will be used to show the kids what they’re building.
• Keith Bryan requested assistance in identifying what kind of pest is in his attic. He would like to borrow a game trail camera or something like it to see what he’s dealing with.
• Robert Cheramie offered to give someone a DeWalt planer he doesn’t need.

Members Questions/Concerns

Safety Topic-Don’t use a sawblade with a chipped tooth. You should either get it sharpened or replace it. Replacing the blade is the best way because most sharpening services do not use the blade manufacturer’s method or standard when the work on a blade. They usually have one method and use it on all the blades they do.

Skill Topic: SketchUp Demonstration – George Cenac

Show-and-Tell

Adjourn

Please bring the following items to the meeting: