An interesting number when when considers this little agenda item…
Removed the censors
Brian,
The Mayor was absolutely in favor of a makerspace he regularly visit’s other facilities just yesterday he was over at Tyler Station another great facility that are doing Maker activities.
The Garland team was absolutely any ally in hopes of expanding makerspaces in DFW.
Please don’t let the negative people here speak over the great accomplishments they city of Garland and Mayor Athas. The entire council has publicly supported a makerspace and the majority just did not like that location which is a shame but guess what the battle may be loss but the war is not and I see a bright future in working with citys and corporations to help expand makerspaces throughout DFW.
Robert Davidson
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Walter I really think you are incapable of telling the truth…
I was at the city council meeting and if you watched it you would know that you are telling a lie again…
The discussion was not even around a makerspace it was very simple don’t tear the bldg down. I even said that in my own presentation to the council. It was not even close the majority of the people spoke were absolutely against tearing the bldging down.
Here is the video of the council meeting for anyone who wants to watch.
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Robert the feeling is mutual. I have found your grasp of the truth, less then stellar.
I’ll review the video again and actually do a talley this time. The nice thing about having actual recordings of the events (that are actually open to the public or members) is that people can watch it on there own and make their own decision…
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Stan I agree with you fully and our guys fell for his wonderful talk and he
was using them and u to try to save his influence, with OUR work and money
Yes. And a phone call. No matter how it’s sliced, he appears to be an ally. He had enough (whatever it takes) to become mayor. He has an interest in bringing a makerspace to Garland. Staying in contact strikes me as mutually beneficial.
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I thought the Carrollton site was mostly self-funded? (DMS paid to get the Carrollton site off the ground) Is that not the case?
Lets look at this a bit.
Section 2.4 Special Meetings
- The Board of Directors may hold special meetings as needed at a time and place set by resolution of the Board of Directors.
- Special meetings of the Board of Directors may be called by or at the request of any Director also serving as Chief Executive Officer or President, or by any two Directors.
- Notice of special meetings shall be given to each Director at least seven (7) days prior by any other member of the Board. Such notice may be given by any method as may be designated from time to time by resolution of the Board of Directors, and shall state the place, date and time of the meeting and the matters proposed to be acted upon at the meeting. The Director to be contacted shall acknowledge personal receipt of the notice within twenty four hours of receipt.
- Notice for a particular special meeting can be waived if all Directors are present and at the start of the special meeting the Directors unanimously vote to waive such notification. Otherwise, no business shall be considered by the Board of Directors and the only motion which the Chairperson shall entertain at such meeting is a motion to adjourn.
The first item simply says the Board may hold special meetings. The second, specifies who may call the meeting. The third, defines the requirements for notice. The fourth, deines a process for waiving notice.
Nowhere, does it say "any time a quorum is present, a meeting must be called, or that the Board may not meet outside the context of an official meeting where action is taken. In fact, it does the opposite of what you say - it allows the Board to call a special meeting whenever necessary, but makes no requirement at all, regarding when a meeting must be called. Not one word in there. Not even a phrase that could be called an inference.
Section 2.5 Quorum for Meetings
- A quorum shall consist of three-fifths of the Board of Directors represented in person, or with consensus, by a secured and authenticated real time medium, provided that access to this medium is presently available and accessible to all members of the board.
- Except as otherwise provided by these Bylaws or provisions of law, no business shall be considered by the Board of Directors at any meeting at which the required quorum is not available, and the only motion which the Chairperson shall entertain at such meeting is a motion to adjourn.
In this, the first rule establishes what a quorum is, and the conditions which satisfy quorum. The second, says, if a quorum isn’t present at a meeting which requires one (aka an official meeting of the Board) the only motion must be adjourn (in other words, a quorum must be present to adopt a resolution).
Again, not one word, or even a suggestion, that anytime 3 Board members are in physical proximity to each other, having a discussion, discussing issues, or anything else, a meeting must be called. Zero.
I will admit to the absurdity of arguing with you on Talk. We all know from long experience that you’d rather be boiled in oil, than admit someone else is right, or give anyone else the last word. So my bad, and I apologize to everyone else here for prolonging it. But your argument, is without truth, without foundation, and misleading in the extreme. And by now, anyone who can read knows it.
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As has been stated often, outside of a board meeting the individual board member have NO AUTHORITY…
You’ll met, in secret, and decided to spend DMS funds. You can try to spin that all you want, but you well know you broke the law.
Remove the censors
Nope. We spent Robert’s funds, and agreed to vote on it at the next meeting, which we did.
So, first argument blew up, now trying for a second. If we have no authority outside a meeting, then why does it matter if we meet informally?
Anyway, pointless to continue, enjoy the last word.
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Nice spin, but what actually happened was a quorum decided to have Robert pay up front and reimburse him at the next meeting. Which means you agreed to spend DMS funds in an illegal board meeting.
So sad this needs to be explained, but what you are quoting is an explaination why your interpretation of the rules are wrong. As you well know from city councils, your meeting was illegal.
So, if you really want the last word, feel free to post again. This debate is a waste of my time.
Remove the censors
This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.
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I think you may think more people are more upset by this than actually are. Of course, that’s probably because I don’t think this is a “resignation-generating event”. And we tend to think “everyone” thinks what we think. (I’m sure there’s a litany of psycho-logical terms that cover this, but I’m not about to pretend to know them). The truth usually lies somewhere in the middle, so I hope the current BOD and anyone who reads about this in the future understand our complaints, and strives for greater transparency, complete above-board-ness, and overall more excellence. I see no reason for anyone to resign over it, let alone whomever “yall three” is. I would hope for these things regardless if something had been done I may (or may not) agree with.
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I think you may be right.
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One of the great things DMS can be proud of is we have raised money internally to get where we are. There have been a few significant corporate donations by Dell (approximately $30K cash) through their matching funds by employees (half of those donations are from members). Currently we have two great corporate sponsors: Mouser which has given E-Lab some great equipment in the $10K range for several years and SolidWorks which has given us two professional suites to use on our server in house for several years now plus hundreds of student licenses that our members can obtain. Not sure of exact value, but would guess easily in excess of $10K year.
But these donations are out of close to $2 million we have raised internally from members. So I’d guess 95% is what we raised. Lots of fancy Makerspaces that get a lot of attention when they open but have received multi-million dollar grants. While that is great, I think our DNA is based on volunteerism (no employees) and a cooperative spirit of “We can do it ourselves” it is also why I believe we are fiercely independent and look with a jaded eye to anything that comes with strings attached. I think Makerpaces that were started on massive grants will face hardships when the grants dry up.
We have very much to be proud of - what we have collectively built is awesome and inspiring. As we get bigger challenges become more complex.
Example: When we were bringing in $30K/yr we could send in our IRS 990 annual informational return on postcard, no long form and no 990-T tax return. Now we have file long forms or each, must have our accounting system GAAP compliant, Now we have to be state compliant, need audited Financial Statements for doing business such as for loans and leases, have quarterly sales tax returns, etc. We are currently taking in dues at about $770K+ (up $120K in 11 months) annually and growing about $13K annually every month with increased membership.
We have gone from having to decide “Hot Dogs or Hamburgers” for open house because we couldn’t afford both to having lasers shipped from China and Vacuum Formers air freighted in from the UK (that’s the only way they ship).
That has also brought on increase scrutiny by regulatory agencies: When we opened here things were sparse - CA was in Purple, what is now CA was “the Fortress of Solitude” basically a place to lay about play pin pong and store odds and end. When the FM came through there wasn’t much to look at. PlasmaCam needed exhausr vents as did kilns but there wasn’t much here.
Now we argue over inches of boundary for committees because we are so crowded with tools. The things we can now do are somewhat of a shock, because it has slowly built up and like a frog in water being warmed slowly, we are noticing it.
Why do we have problems in Wood Shop with dust collection? Because we have tons of tools that allow to make tons dust and chips. It wasn’t a real problem when we moved here.
We’re growing and with that comes pains, it’s why we are now having to rely on more professional advice - because it is beyond our institutional knowledge. But we have a lot of that - you’ll notice that we are starting to tap into that knowledge for advice with the advisory groups - this also gets the membership more involved. We are changing and evolving and trying to keep the Maker spirit and or sense of community alive and stronger.
More folks become involved the less any one person has to and the stronger our community becomes. It is very likely we will hit 2,000 members by the end of next year. That will create a lot of challenges as well as opportunities - when we look for additional space we will have almost a one million a year in come to support that.
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The Dallas Makerspace Board of Directors would like to extend a warm thank you, to Mayor Athas, and the Honorable City Council members and citizens of Garland for considering and appreciating the positive influence that a Makerspace can have on your community. We are humbled, that Garland has included us in their process, and asked the Dallas Makerspace to become involved and support the possibility of a new Makerspace in Garland.
While the Armory proposal did not come to fruition, we appreciate the Council’s continuing support for Making in its community. We support the efforts of Council and Staff to develop a plan to locate an appropriate site, and create a facility that will enable the citizens of Garland to enjoy the full benefits of a vibrant Maker Community full of Garland citizens. We thank you for thinking of the Dallas Makerspace as a resource that could help you make this happen, and look forward to meeting our neighbors.
Our warmest regards,
The Board of Directors of the Dallas Makerspace.
I was thinking maybe something more makerish. Say, using the laser, or cnc router. A nice plaque. Maker-style 
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OK. So the essence of the deal was that Garland was going to put up land and building (at an incredible price) and DMS was going to put up money and labor. The end result would be a second site for DMS and the Second Best Makerspace in the World for Garland. And Mayor Athas was in favour (possibly to the point he is willing to resign over the failure).
Is that a fair summary?
That’s a fair summary but would add this to it to get a better idea:
The Garland space was approximately 4X Carrollton, had a paint booth big enough for commercial trucks, 4-5 auto work bays with exhaust extractors plus overhead gantry, a commercial kitchen, 25+ classrooms, parking for ~ 300 cars, and welding shop/blacksmith building.
These are all items specifically we want but don’t have.
So long as you remember, that nothing was ever promised directly, yeah, that’s pretty close.
The final result, is that the Garland City Council now has nine (well, 8) votes in favor of a Makerspace (somewhere in Garland) and has appointed an Assistant City Manager to develop a location and a plan. And that means they’re serious, and its very likely to happen. And they have a real serious checkbook to use, and the kind of numbers they’re talking, they mean to spend a little (to them, a gigantic amount for us) to do it right.
I think they will settle on some form of hybridized approach, a combination of DMS, and a rec center. Or maybe, they will try it closer to our way. Hard to say. But they’re researching Makerspaces in general, and it’s being done by people with a lot of experience developing things. So I’m optimistic about its’ future.
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Frankly, considering the politics and very visible maneuvering around the spirit of laws and regulations to justbarely come inside the letter of rules and regulations exhibited by the majority of the Garland City Council, I will be actively campaigning against having anything to do with working with them.
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