Call to order: Mark Van Hoose, Midwest Area Exec called the meeting to order at 2:45 pm. Jon Williams, the Alternate Midwest Executive was also present.   

• Secretary: Deb Esselman, WI, was voted as temporary Secretary for this session by unanimous vote.
• Ben Bosshart was appointed as Parlimentarian
• Delegates: Secretary did Roll Call and all states were represented.
• Minutes: Motion was made and seconded to accept the minutes from the Midwest Rally held in May as published. Motion carried.
• Candidacy Announcements Midwest Executive/Alternate: Mark Van Hoose, OH, announced his bid for the position for Midwest Exec.  Jon Williams announced his candidacy for the alternate position.
• Evening Activities: Todd Warner reviewed the activities and what time everyone had to be there.
• Candidates: All Candidates hospitality Room this evening.

• GUESTS
• John Williams and Dennis Taitano-Budget in Washington DC:
• Reviewed the staffing challenges for the agency. Congress prioritizes use of funds differently than proposed by the Agency.  Funding for Administration of programs has been basically disregarded by Congress and this has made it increasingly difficult to get programs out.
• View FY 2003 as a baseline and a starting point. Budgets have been reduced about 6%.  Budgets do not fund pay raises and inflationary increases (rent, etc). These costs have to be absorbed by the budget received.  Had to absorb costs for tobacco buy-out program.
• Budget planning has been increasingly difficult. Start planning based on a midline between House and Senate and then add another 1% across the board cut.  Pay increases will also have a significant effect.
• Dr. Penn will be leaving.  “A dismal story of rising workload and eroding funds.”  The real challenge is understanding the dollars we have and the impact it will have on program delivery.
• There has been a greater recognition in Congress that FSA is doing less with less, not more with less. We have insufficient resources to keep all the offices currently open. Antiquated IT equipment does not help.
• Question: What kind of costs have been saved by contracting out payroll, etc?  A: We must run the government more like a business and mandates have been sent out stating more time must be spent on programs and less on administrative activities.
• Question: Some alternate systems in admin are not working properly.  What can be done? A: We have to work through these problems but the system in place will be used.
• Question: COR notices have stated that DCP payments were made erroneously but in reality the payments were issued correctly, but the report was not corrected.    The fact is that the agency is performing better than the reports show and there seems to be no review done on the reports so they are correct.  ALSO: there should be consolidation in some items to save money and time: ex, RMA doing crop reports when FSA is already doing this. Elimination of redundancy would enhance service to farmers and save significant money.  No answer was made.
• Question: Notice FI-2750: Discussed duty stations and ability to designate a residence as duty station to save money.  A: There will be more notices coming out to clarify this issue.
• Question: Does anyone do any studies on processes done under the web system? Many things put out in reality do not save time. A: Reductions have not really been based on technology systems.  No answer on studies.
• Question: Where is the workload system at this point?  A: Discussion was held on how to manage budget performance. Work measurement is now viewed as activity reporting.  The traditional system provided good information but the information was not brought back to the field level adequately.  How productive is each county office?  How do we move to more efficiency and what baseline will be used?   Have a vision to line up workload with actual work. Suspended work measurement at this time. Established a stream-lined version of peak work activities.  Now developing a program to tie this in with time and attendance system. Lined up piloting with 600 employees at this time. Conservation programs are focus area for now.  One state for each region and 5 county offices in each test state. Plan to run pilates for 60 days, sometime prior to FY 2008 get reporting done across the country.  Should facilitate benchmarking. Once the cost to adminster programs is determined, then efficiency can be determined.  Need better handle on cost of key activities. Should have better forecasting tool for budgeting for county offices. 
• Conventions: Discussed the proposal to only have NASCOE officers to attend rallies only and execs to attend state conventions. Discussed how much members want representatives reimbursed.  If NASCOE to pay 50% or states to reimburse 100%.  Area Chairs were reimbursed $150 for rallies and $250 for National Convention for 2006. Discussion was held on the value of reimbursing Alternate Execs in order to have them learn the position and when they become Execs, they can take the job competently.
• COMMENTS: 
• States should be given the option to have a National officer and the state should cover 50% of cost.
• Suggest a televised link with National officers at state conventions as a way of having national representation with minimum cost.  If states could not afford to reimburse costs.
• Needs to be personal approach on a national level into consideration of the time and cost involved.  There is a great value to be able to visit with the National officers.  The state would cover 50% of cost if national officer would attend. This might improve moral.
• NASCOE should pay transportation up to a certain dollar amount for Area Chairs and Alternate Execs to attend Area Rallies and national convention.
• Discussed travel money for publicity award recipients. To date the Exec Committee has approved such assistance. All delegates also approved a motion that would provide travel cost coverage for publicity award winners to the national convention.
• SUMMARY: Execs would be present and reimbursed 100% by NASCOE.  If states would want a National officer, the state would pay 50%. Delegates responded that some level of reimbursement should be given to area chairs and alternate execs.

• Committee Reports:  All complete reports will be published in the NASCOE newsletter.
• Awards: Rosy Kahl, IA Discussed sick leave and the states will certify sick time.  Distinguished service awards deadlines were discussed.  Herb suggested the deadline remain the same due to time constraints in order to get awards in time for convention. Awards must be certified by state officers, so they cannot be submitted electronically.
• Benefits: Kay Lumsden, MI: Rosie gave the report. Contact state benefits chair and they will get theme park tickets from Kay.  Please allow enough time to get the tickets.  Coupons are available on NASCOE website. JM Marketing is offering insurance through AFLAC but be sure to compare.
• Emblems: Mindy Trogdon, IL: Can order convention packets from www.thenascoestore.com.  Trying to get FY year lined up with FSA FY.  See attached report.
• Membership: Will Herr, IN not present, Jon Williams gave report: Reviewed the report and it will be in the NASCOE newsletter. Discussed the video presentation of awards and all agreed that it was a great enhancement to the award presentation.  Cumulative awards will continue to recognize many years of membership.  Honorary Life Time cards.  Should NASCOE provide the laminated cards and the states order them or should the states download them and print them at the state cost. To be a life-time member, you must pay your dues each year of employment. The only benefit is that the person would given free registration at the national convention.  Discussion was held and a motion was made to have the electronic membership card to sent to the states.  Motion carried. Discussion was held on membership committees and that each state should have a committee that would follow up on membership.
• Publicity:Barb Stoll, OH: NASCOE NOW: Now being issued every 2 weeks and are all employees getting access to it.  All states receive the information and all feel that everyone has access to it.  There is a link on the NASCOE website for the latest issues. Some states only forward to directors and not to ALL FSA Employees.  There is a form on the National Site for press releases.  Can copy and format them for local information, it is encouraged to send press releases.    Suggestion was made to archive NASCOE newsletters electronically rather than keep paper copies. No objections were made to saving them electronically.  Midwest area photo to be taken on Saturday at 5:00 pm at the fountain in the lobby.
• Scholarship: Tom Oasen, WI;  Elliot Stevenson from WI was the winner from the Midwest Area.  Need to have more information on the application with eligibility requirements.  In the event of a tie, the area chairperson will decide the winner.
• Legislative: Tammy Eibey, IA:  Legislative Conference: Have to decide if members want a full or mini leg conference. COMMENTS: Feel a need for a full conference in light of the farm bill discussions. Tammy discussed the possible need for fly-in money to be set aside. SUMMARY: recommend a full conference and money to be set aside for possible fly-in. CAPWIZ: need to decide if NASCOE wants to continue at $6,000 for one year, a 1% discount for two years and 10% discount for 3 years for a saving of $2,000. There are currently 2,000 registered users and there were 11,000 messages sent regarding FSA tomorrow.  Discussions were held on the effectiveness with CAPWIZ and the usefulness of the program.
• PAC: RASCOE has been handling publicity for PAC. Do we want to have NASCOE continue to reimburse a RASCOE representative to be at Rallies and conventions?  Cost currently is around $2,400.  SUMMARY: If favor of continuing to help RASCOE with the cost of sending representatives.  INITIATIVES:  Tammy reviewed some of the initiatives discussed in the legislative meeting that would be included in discussions regarding the farm bill.
• Programs: Shelly Odenkirk gave report for Jake Bourget.  The form now used is adequate and will not be changed.  The program chair goes to the negotiation session and that seems to be working well. Discussion was held on how information is submitted to the county offices.  Will recommend that each state have a Program Chairperson so members will have someone to contact.
• Negotiations/Consultation: Betsy Mace, IL  Will give report on Friday.
• A motion was made and seconded to accept committee reports as presented. All in favor, motion carried.
• Candidacy Announcements for NASCOE Positions: President-Dan Root, Vice President-Bonnie Heinzman, Secretary-Darlene Schouten. Treasurer-Larry Segars.
• 2007 Rally: Midwest Area: Will be holding the Rally in Michigan. Will not be a joint rally for next year. Date and location to be announced at a later date. 130 people attending 2006 joint rally. The Administrator, DAFO and program personnel attended the rally.
• Questions for Adminstrator: need people willing to ask questions at Friday’s session.
• OASCOE presented their awards since this convention will also be their state convention. Service to NASCOE: Shelly Odenkirk;  Service to FSA: Judy Clark; Service to Ag Community: William Davenport. Sick leave awards are not determined at this time.
• Adjournment: A motion was made and seconded to adjourn the meeting.  All in favor, motion carried. Meeting was adjourned at 4:35 pm

Deborah Esselman

Secretary

• Call to order: Mark Van Hoose, Midwest Area Exec called the meeting to order at 2:45 pm. Jon Williams, the Alternate Midwest Executive was also present. 
• Delegates: Secretary did Roll Call and all states were represented.
• Area Elections: Mark Van Hoose, OH, was nominated for Midwest Area Exec. A motion was made that nominations be closed  and Mark be eleceted  by unanimous vote for the position for Midwest Exec.  All in favor, motion carried.  Jon Williams was nominated for Midwest Area Alternate.  A motion was made and seconded that Jon be elected by unanimous vote for the position for Midwest Exec Alternate.  All in favor, motion carried.
• GUESTS
• Teresa Lasseter, FSA Administrator-gave the opportunity for questions:
• State Plans- There was no real direction given to the states when formulating plans. DAFO will follow up and ensure that the states are working with all associations.
• Q: At this time the employees feel like we have an advocate but there is concern that many of the things that the COF is doing is not getting credited.  Then if this type of work could get credited that administrative dollars could go along with that.
• A: Assure all that everyone who makes the decisions for dollars will be told what FSA really and that FSA does want to be part of the future in the next farm bill.
• Steve Connelly, DAFO. Thanked all for their input.
• John Chott: Assistant to DAFO
• Q: Records moratorium. Will this be lifted?
• A. At this time all records must be kept.
• Steve Sanders-IT Management
• Q: What can be done to prevent other IT migrations occurring during busy times? 
• A: Point Taken.
• Q: System Administrator position taken out of county office has caused additional costs to FSA and why does the POC have to be OCIO?
• A: An audit was the cause of the POC taken out of the COF. When OCIO was created, there was a lot of interest in how business practices would be set up. OCIO inherited some bad business practices concerning service delivery.  Some things related to security and the current practices did not meet the new standards. Internal control review has determined that password administration should not be done in the COF.  Centralized password administration needs to be applied to even the System 36. This is an issue now.  Past practices cannot stand. Has less to do with trusting employees and more to do with separation of duties. In the past a condition would be identified and fixed. Now it is looked at as a possible risk factor, vulnerability, or weakness, it has to be corrected. The prevailing idea is that passwords must be centralized to avoid the possibility of risk.
• Q: Timing out of screens has caused problems with GIS and will this also be problems with other programs. 
• A: The timing out of the screens was a result of the audit.  There may be inconsistency with trying to fix the time out situations.  The web based applications must be developed to deal with the time out situation in a manner that does not interrupt applications.  If there is not enough communication to maintain the connection, it will disconnect the program you were working in.  At this time, there are no solutions. Will have someone look at possibility to hold programs if timed out.
• Q: What is being done with geo-spatial data?
• A: Pilot projects to get GIS integrated with farm records and crop reporting, have found that it is not working at hoped. Right now Washington is back at square one with dealing with geo spatial technology.   Specialists are working with ESRI and hopefully will determine that more applications could be used within the system. The amount of data on the system is the cause of the slowness of the system and IT is trying to determine how to make this entire GIS system work better.
• Q: How quickly does Washington become aware of problems in the field. 
• A: Many times it is not uncovered until states notify Washington, however, an new alert system has been implemented that should improve the time when IT realizes that there is a problem. Steve is well aware of the web system not working correctly lately.
• Q: How can funding be secured to enable IT to work correctly and provide good reports?
• A: continue to communicate needs with programs and IT issues.  Washington doesn’t have an appreciation for reports and queries that are useful tools for the COF. There are many concerns regarding Privacy Issues that must be taken into consideration.  If time savings could be translated into dollars, IT would have more of a platform to use for correcting the situation.
• Q: Are still going to have ArcView and ArcMap or will we go to one systems?
• A: Eventually we will use one system, but not until all states have worked through the CLU process.
• Q: How much does it cost per computer?
• A: Based on more of a seat cost rather than a per/computer cost, but there is not a number available at this time.
• Q: When might we get a high speed color printer?
• A: Cost is very prohibitive despite the need. 
• Q: What is the proper way to request IT equipment?
• A: There is a notice coming detailing procedure regarding IT maintenance.
• Richard Richardson-OCIO
• Discussed how OCIO is accountable for ALL systems for ALL agencies and this is causing concern with other agencies because they are also held accountable to the standards.
• GIS bandwith is a major factor and part of the process to improve GIS applications.  There are some new server capability being explored.
• There are built in on-line alerts in place to notify IT if there is a problem. However, program applications have not been created in such a manner that it can create an effective backup system and this causes problems with the system.  Richard described how it works for centralized activities that break down.  Individual program applications are more difficult to track problems.
• Funding for computers was cut and $45 million will have to be absorbed by the agency.

• OLD BUSINESS
• Committee Reports:  All complete reports will be published in the NASCOE newsletter.
• Awards: Rosy Kahl, IA Discussed sick leave and the states will certify sick time.  Distinguished service awards deadlines were discussed. Herb suggested the deadline remain the same due to time constraints in order to get awards in time for convention. Awards must be certified by state officers, so they cannot be submitted electronically. First timer awards must be turned by noon on Saturday for judging.
• Benefits: Kay Lumsden, MI: Rosie gave the report. Contact state benefits chair and they will get theme park tickets from Kay. Please allow enough time to get the tickets. Coupons are available on NASCOE website. JM Marketing is offering insurance through AFLAC but be sure to compare. JM Marketing will not be requesting a listing of members, but he asked to get list of non-members because that list is significantly less and easier to check.  There was discussion on having members sign a waiver option sheet with JM Marketing to allow releasing information.  Discussion was held on this issue.  This is an issue that needs to be determined. Both recommendations will be taken to the Exec Board.
• Emblems: Mindy Trogdon, IL: Can order convention packets from www.thenascoestore.com.  Trying to get FY year lined up with FSA FY.  See attached report.
• Membership: Will Herr, IN not present, Jon Williams gave report: Reviewed the report and it will be in the NASCOE newsletter. Discussed the video presentation of awards and all agreed that it was a great enhancement to the award presentation. Cumulative awards will continue to recognize many years of membership.  Honorary Life Time cards. Should NASCOE provide the laminated cards and the states order them or should the states download them and print them at the state cost. To be a life-time member, you must pay your dues each year of employment.  The only benefit is that the person would given free  Discussion was held and a motion was made the that the electronic membership card to sent to the states.  Motion carried. Discussion was held on membership committees and that each state should have a committee that would follow up on membership.
• Publicity:Barb Stoll, OH: NASCOE NOW: Discussed archiving national records. Told about area website at www.wiwasocoe.org.  Any suggestions or corrections should be sent to Barb.  Certificates were given to area publicity judges.
• Scholarship: Tom Oasen, WI;  In the event of a tie, the area chairperson will decide the winner. 7:00 is the auction and all proceeds will be used for scholarships.  Tom encouraged everyone to bring their checkbooks and buy a lot.
• Legislative: Tammy Eibey, IA:  Terry gave a report on pending bills that need to have support in congress.  Information is on the website. Kevin Dale, OK, presented information on coalitions. A motion was made to seek a contact in each state and award them at the national level and get travel reimbursement. The committee also encouraged states to build contacts. Legislative Conference: Have to decide if members want a full or mini leg conference. COMMENTS: Feel a need for a full conference in light of the farm bill discussions.  Tammy discussed the possible need for fly-in money to be set aside. SUMMARY: recommend a full conference and money to be set aside for possible fly-in.  CAPWIZ: need to decide if NASCOE wants to continue at $6,000 for one year, a 5% discount for two years and 10% discount for 3 years for a saving of $2,000. There are currently 2,000 registered users and there were 11,000 messages sent regarding FSA tomorrow. Discussions were held on the effectiveness with CAPWIZ and the usefulness of the program.  PAC: RASCOE has been handling publicity for PAC.  Do we want to have NASCOE continue to reimburse a RASCOE representative to be at Rallies and conventions? Cost currently is around $2,400. SUMMARY: If favor of continuing to help RASCOE with the cost of sending representatives. INITIATIVES: Tammy reviewed some of the initiatives discussed in the legislative meeting that would be included in discussions regarding the farm bill. There was a lot of discussion on the topics that need to prioritized in the event of either a new farm bill or just an extension. Many points were made regarding what FSA can do and how programs could be administered in a more efficient manner by other agencies, too.
• Programs: No report.
• Negotiations/Consultation: Betsy Mace, IL  Had 9 items submitted for negotiation.  She discussed how the items were separated and sent on for discussion.
• Committee Chairs were recognized by Jon Williams and thanked for all their hard work.  Certificates were presented to all the Area Chairpersons.  Membership: Will Herr, IN  Emblems: Mindy Trogdon, Legislative: Tammy Eibey, IA, Publicity:Barb Stoll, OH, Awards: Rosy Kahl, IA, Scholarship: Tom Oasen, WI, Negotiations/Consultation: Betsy Mace, IL , Benefits: Kay Lumsden, MI, Programs: Jake Bourget, WI
• Certificates for awards judges were also presented.
• A motion was made and seconded to accept committee reports as presented. All in favor, motion carried.
• NEW BUSINESS:
• NASCOE representation at conventions: a motion will be made at the general session regarding maintaining present policy regarding the officers attending only rallies and area chairs receiving reimbursement.  Award winners also to receive travel reimbursement.
• Pictures will be taken at the fountain.
• 2007 Rally: Midwest Area: Will be holding the Rally in Michigan. Will not be a joint rally for next year. Date and location to be announced at a later date.  130 people attending 2006 joint rally.  The Administrator, DAFO and program personnel attended the rally.

• Adjournment: A motion was made and seconded to adjourn the meeting.  All in favor motion carried.  Meeting was adjourned at 4:15 pm.  The banquet and award presentations to be held at 6:30 pm.

Respectfully submitted,

Deborah Esselman

Secretary