Southwest High School 40 Year Reunion Planning Committee Notes

Date:  12/1/2019 via Zoom, 7:30-8:15pm CST          

Participants:   Paul Barber

                           Margaret Kinsella Johnson

                            Veronica Konold Legan

                            June Jobin Breneman

                            Kris Robb Evans

                            Christi Siegel (Samples)

                            Betsy Rummell Messman

Event Date:  July 25, 2019, time TBD

Venue: Embassy Suites Bloomington at 2800 American Blvd West, Bloomington MN 55431

Menu:  Cash bar, heavy hors d’oeuvres, dessert bar.  Consider “late night” apps or snacks

Rooms:  Hold block of rooms for guests; suggestion to rent room for committee members to use

Financials:  Current balance with Wells Fargo is about 2K.  Downpayment for venue is $500.  Suggestion was made to look into an alternate bank account.  May need another signer on the account in addition to Paul and Alan

Outreach: 374 Classmates; only have emails for @50%.  Plan is to email event invitations; some by snail-mail if needed.

Theme:  It was suggested that we see if we can ‘tell our story’ to help with publicity; e.g. the fact that we had a huge influx of other cultures in our class.  Suggest polling other committee members for ideas

Save the Date:  Announcements should go out soon, and include asking for help to find “missing” classmates (and possibly memorials?)

Memorials:  Suggestion to make picture board, but concern this will be difficult as there are too  many; same with finding specific info in obituaries.  Veronica will join Christi in working on this.

Additional Weekend Events:  Friday night Happy Hour, possibly at Bunny’s, Cowboy Jack’s (near the Embassy Suites) or a 50th and France venue.  Committee nixed Sunday picnic.

Survey :  Plan is to send out a survey to all of the original members to ask if they can make the next meeting, and if they are still interested. (Post-meeting discussion suggests that we drop those from the list that have not yet participated, and to keep those that are available closer to the event in the loop.)

E.G.:     Can you attend the next meeting (specify that it will be live, in-town)?

              Can you help with long range planning or only the week of the event?

              Which committee would you like to work on (list)

              Do you have suggestions for a theme?  (list the ones already proposed)

Next Meeting:  Sunday Jan 5^th at 6pm Central time, at a local venue TBD.  Remote participation via zoom. (Local attendees come a little early)