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Event Description
2016 MHJCA Annual Meeting
Our Annual Meeting was held at Poughkeepsie Galleria community room with 14 attendance including 11 voting members while 16 proxies out of the 36 membership voting count was received. With that, we had confirmed 27 members to satisfy the quorum required by the By-Laws, Article VI – Section 1, according to our Secretary.
Following the 2015’s Financial Report by our Treasurer to which received no questions, we officially announced the changes we proposed with respects to our By-Laws and had been approved as follows:
1) Amended Article VI – Section 1 Board of Directors: The Board is responsible for overall policy and direction of the corporation. The Board shall have up to 9 and not fewer than 2 members. The Board receives no compensation other than reasonable expenses.
2) Added Article IX – Section 1 Dissolution: The dissolution of corporation shall be conducted in pursuant to the law defined by the New York State Not-for-Profit Corporation Law, Section 1003.
Should anyone wish to review our 2015 Financial Report, please let us know by writing via email.
In addition, we had an open discussion regarding the “Advertisement Email and Fees” in which some members brought up opinions such as;
· Only corporate members should be allowed ads
· OPTOUT choice could be included in email when sent out from our Group-mail
· Corporate members should be waived such fees
· Appropriate fees can be set as needed
· Maximum amount a NPO allowed to earn from such fees would be $50,000
This particular subject is still pending but hopefully will be decided soon. All opinions from members will be carefully considered when reviewed by the Board in the future meeting.
All Board and Annual Meeting minutes could be furnished upon request. If you wish to have a copy, please request so in writing via email.
Our future as a community group is bright since our reputation is growing more than ever and thus it seems more inquiries for our cultural program is coming in. Your contribution in any form will always be very much appreciated.
Following our Annual Meeting, we had a special DVD premiere, “Tomiko’s Story – Hiroshima Survivor”. Yes, it was about a story of our member, Tomiko-san, who was born and raised in Hiroshima. After her horrific experience during atomic bomb when she tragically lost her family but miraculously survived, she found a new life with Mel-san to whom she married. It was absolutely sad yet heartwarming story as it would give you a peace at the end. While we could never imagine the true horror and devastation she experienced, we are bound to tell to others, especially new generations, together that this is our, ALL HUMAN’s, history and we must make sure this would never be repeated. This film was created by a Japanese photo journalist, Mr. Yusaku Kanagawa, and the original title was not disclosed due to his public debut planned in the near future. So we were extremely honored to be given the opportunity to preview this special story to share with Tomiko-san and the world.
After taking a brief break, we held a seminar for Medicare Q&A, as a part of our senior program started last year. As more and more Japanese living in NY, not necessarily all citizens but many are permanent resident, reaching senior age don’t go back to Japan to live the rest of their lives surrounded by relatives and under much better healthcare systems, more education programs needed than ever, it seems, to provide with Medicare information. So, that was the main reason this seminar was intended, for information and education purposes. In addition, we wanted to add something to attract members along with our Annual Meeting because majority people seem to avoid anything too formal or boring such as “meeting”... Nevertheless, there were 12 people attended and brought up many questions throughout the entire 2 hours.
Midori Shinye
Project organizer and Seminar Instructor
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