Yamhill County Cultural Plan

Increasing communication, cultivating resources,
and broadening cultural opportunities in Yamhill County

March 1, 2004

By the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition Planning Committee

Drafted by the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition Planning Committee, Susan Watkins, Principal Author

You may review this Plan online at our website, at the Yamhill County Commissioners' office located in the County Courthouse, 535 NE 5th Street, McMinnville, Oregon 97128; and at most Yamhill County libraries. You may obtain a copy of the Plan for a small handling fee by writing to the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition at PO Box 493, McMinnville, Oregon 97128.

Yamhill County Culture is Heritage, Art, Humanities

Heritage is what we receive from our ancestors and the past. It establishes our sense of place and the pride we take in our personal history and the history of the place we call home. Our heritage is influenced by time, diverse peoples and traditions, economic necessity, and the changing face of the land.

Heritage resources include:

• Narrative histories, family and regional traditions, name associations, and folkways.
• Historic objects, structures, buildings, documents, visual images, and collections.
• Museums, cemeteries, and natural features of the land.
• Conservation, preservation, and educational activities associated with each of the above.
• Amateur and professional individuals or organizations pursuing history, archaeology, anthropology, and linguistics.

Art is the creative expression of individuals or groups. Original, interpretive, or adaptive, it is never a copy of work that has gone before. Enduring works of art convey meaning that transcend their time, place, and creator; more homely works of art are valued for their process and relevance to specific events, communities, or individuals. Art is recognized as creative work that withstands the critical judgment of the creator's peers.

Each art discipline is expressed in a variety of media and formats, but the hallmarks are creativity in expression or use of materials, quality of workmanship appropriate to the maker, and a sense of purpose, interpretation, or meaning that can be shared by others.

Art resources include:

• Dance/creative movement and choreography, literary forms of prose and poetry, music interpreted by soloists or ensembles and composition, theatre and playwriting, visual arts in all media, moving images, folk arts, and combinations of two or more art forms.
• Design arts that both support other art forms and are recognized for their own merit, such as costume and scenic design, bookmaking and printing, architecture, and the curation and presentation of exhibits;
• Facilities where art is made, taught, presented, recorded, or preserved;
• Suppliers of arts materials – which may themselves be works of art – such as textiles, instruments, and visual artists' supplies.
• Education, which may be rigorously ongoing or enrichment activities.
• Performances, exhibits, and festivals.
• Amateur and professional individuals and organizations pursuing one or more art forms or serving as art historians or documentarians or as teachers.

Humanities are our cultural and intellectual heritage – the sum of human experience, thought, and expression. The humanities give us knowledge of the past, insight about the present, and wisdom for the future. They teach us about others and help us to know ourselves.

The humanities are for everyone and include history, literature, linguistics, philosophy, ethics, jurisprudence, comparative religion, and the history, criticism, and theory of the arts, cultural anthropology, archaeology, political science, international relations, and interdisciplinary areas such as folklore, women's studies, and American studies.

Plan Summary

The Yamhill County Cultural Coalition Planning Committee (“Committee”) presents this Cultural Plan following more than a year of intense effort identifying existing cultural resources and tapping the visions of cultural leaders, professional and amateur cultural providers, audiences, and others. This document summarizes our process, our goals, and our conclusions. The Plan provides a guide for, and establishes the structure of, the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition (“Coalition”), the body that will be entrusted by the Oregon Cultural Trust to disseminate funds to cultural organizations, activities, and individuals in Yamhill County.

The Committee worked hardest to identify the County's existing cultural assets, to evaluate obstacles to cultural experience, and to synthesize its findings into a clear vision of cultural life in Yamhill County. Based on a year's worth of interviews, investigation, and observation, the Committee proposes five key priorities for ensuring a culturally rich County experience. These priorities are:

• To promote, maintain, and expand cultural activities, organizations, and education throughout Yamhill County.
• To encourage activities that blend aspects of the arts, heritage, and humanities.
• To increase linkage and communication among cultural resources within the County and between those resources and potential audiences.
• To cultivate County assets, including its landscapes.
• To broaden cultural opportunities for diverse and under-served County populations.

This Plan explains the cultural challenges that led the Committee to formulate each of these priorities.

The Oregon Cultural Trust

The Oregon Cultural Trust was established by the 2001 Oregon State Legislature as a long-term initiative to preserve and strengthen the cultural life of all Oregonians. The goal of the Cultural Trust is to build an endowment to provide a permanent source of support for Oregon arts, humanities, and heritage. While building the endowment over the next ten years, the Trust will also distribute grants to cultural organizations, existing cultural agencies, and local Cultural Coalitions to support a vision for cultural development throughout Oregon.

The Oregon Cultural Trust is funded through three sources: private contributions, the sale of specific designated surplus state lands, and the sale of the Cultural Trust license plate. Private contributions from individuals and businesses qualify for a unique tax credit and form the foundation for Cultural Trust income.

By law, the Trust may distribute no more than 42% of its available fund balances each year, and may expend no more than 7.5% on administration. The remaining funds are allocated in three equal portions.

Designated Cultural Partners – the Oregon Arts Commission, the Oregon Council for the Humanities, the Oregon Heritage Commission, the Oregon Historical Society, and the State Historic Preservation Office – receive one-third of the distribution. One third is distributed through a competitive grant program to programs that preserve cultural assets, foster creativity, or strengthen cultural organizations.

The final third is distributed to each of Oregon's 36 counties and nine federally-recognized tribes to help them shape programs that meet local priorities and build participation in cultural activities. Each county and tribe appoints a Cultural Coalition to award grants locally from these funds. This Plan is intended to guide the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition in its use of Cultural Trust funds to enrich County life.

Yamhill County Culture

Overview

The Yamhill County landscape permeates all our investigations: the beauty of the rolling hills, the twisting creeks and rivers, the long rows of nursery plants and grapevines, the oak and conifer forests. Yamhill County is a beautiful place to live and work. Artists want not only to depict County landscapes in their work, they want to exhibit in the countryside as well. Performers want to share their dance, music, and words with the stars and hillsides. Historians want to discover each hidden corner of the County and create trails and other, more ephemeral, links between historic sites, century farms, heritage trees, and economic assets. Human stories become part of the landscape, connecting us to the land and to an economic and eventful past. The urge to blend cultural resources inspires representatives of every cultural category we canvassed.

Yamhill County is a County of Festivals. Each community has its own major and minor festivities. Visiting them all is a challenge; there are so many, they overlap. The best blur cultural lines: In a splendid demonstration of collaboration, private individuals and organizations work with schools and school children in Amity to create a festival of flowers, the Daffodil Festival, featuring visual art, gardens, walking and driving tours, and food. Art Harvest invites participants to tour the Yamhill County countryside while visiting artists' studios. Visitors to Newberg's First Friday stroll downtown while visiting art galleries and local shops that display artists' wares while publicizing their own.

Local festivals also honor our County heritage. Willamina's Timber Town celebration recognizes the community's long logging history. Dayton's Old-timers' Days and Newberg's Old-Fashioned Festival, with the County's largest parade, keep alive bygone pleasures. Old cars grace Amity's wooded park and frogs jump at Yamhill's Derby Day, while McMinnville's Turkey Rama celebrates a bit of history that once provided ample incomes for local turkey farmers. Carlton, Dundee, Lafayette, and Sheridan also honor their past with lively celebrations. And the Confederated Tribes celebrate their history in Grand Ronde, which straddles the County's border.

Each community in the County has a unique identity that these festivals help preserve and promote. But maintaining identity and reaching out can be a challenge when each town shares little of its neighbors' experience.

A significant part of this divergence may be economic. Although median household income exceeds the Oregon mean, wealth is not evenly distributed throughout the County, and many families struggle to meet basic needs.

Agriculture is the County's biggest industry, with nurseries and greenhouses bringing in almost half of the agricultural dollars. Agricultural uses are located primarily in the central and eastern parts of the County. The western third of the County, centered in Sheridan and Willamina, is logging country, and those communities still feel the economic loss experienced by that industry as a whole. The area is also strongly affected by decisions made by the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, which operate the Spirit Mountain Casino just across the County border, the leading tourist destination in the state in 2002. Willamina – which itself is cut by the county line – and Sheridan must work with both Polk and Yamhill Counties in planning their future.

Northeastern Yamhill County, on the other hand, is poised to boom, with wine and grapes leading the way. At least five of the proposed specific appellations for wine grapes in the Willamette Valley will identify northern Yamhill County locales. County communities closer to Portland have become attractive “country homes” for Portland workers who don't mind a harrowing commute. This prosperity is a mixed blessing, as Portland's larger array of cultural activities siphons off both talent and audiences from the north County. Initial results from the Committee's cultural participation assessment survey indicate that at least as many may travel outside the County for cultural experience as attend events within their own communities.

The area around Yamhill and Carlton remains primarily agricultural, although the wine industry and related tourism are making strong inroads here, too. McMinnville, as both the largest town and the County seat, continues to dominate the County's economic and cultural life. Newberg has grown considerably both economically and in population in recent years, boasting the County's largest private employer, a spirit of philanthropy, and a strong community effort to fund a cultural center. Both cities benefit from the presence of four-year colleges and a community college campus.

Highways 99 and 18 afford access to Portland and coastal beaches, but are viewed chiefly as drive-throughs for non-residents. Apart from Spirit Mountain Casino, the Evergreen Aviation Museum, and a handful of art galleries, wineries, and seasonal produce markets, local enterprise has not taken advantage of these significant transportation corridors.

Barriers to economic growth center on lack of transportation opportunities, including minimal public transit, the clogged two-lane highways that push through the centers of Newberg and Dundee, and the lure of the Portland area's broader mix of goods and services. But this isolation is not necessarily a cultural detriment. Yamhill County retains the ability to define itself, without reference to Portland's potentially overwhelming cultural milieu.

Ensuring that all County residents and workers can access cultural assets is also a challenge. The lack of County-wide and special event transit hampers the ability to bring events and audiences together. Some local groups already are addressing this concern. Vans shuttle McMinnville retirement center residents to Linfield Chamber Orchestra concerts, and the Amity 21st Century bus is available for rent to a variety of cultural organizations. The County needs more resource sharing and more attention to access to cultural experience.

Language barriers also inhibit cultural exploration. More than ten percent of County residents identified themselves as Hispanic/Latino in the 2000 census, and this group is the County's fastest growing minority. Spanish is the primary, and perhaps only, language spoken by many of these residents. But few Spanish-language performances are staged, and few Latino groups participate in the County's larger cultural experience. Cross-cultural experiences are limited. Similar barriers exist between English-speaking and Native American groups.

Individuals who responded to the Committee's cultural participation assessment overwhelmingly reported that their lives were enriched by cultural experience. They saw positive economic benefits for their communities as well. But more than half perceived the County as currently failing to meet residents' cultural needs. They are most likely to learn about activities happening locally, because their information about events comes primarily through word of mouth and information they see posted where they live, shop, and work. They are most likely to attend arts events, and least likely to engage in humanities activities.

Vision

With this overview in mind, the Committee adopted five priorities to guide the Coalition in its initial years of funding and encouraging cultural growth in Yamhill County. Building on existing County resources, the Coalition will award grants to proposals that:

1. Promote, maintain, and expand cultural activities, organizations, and education throughout Yamhill County; and/or
2. Blend aspects of the arts, heritage, and humanities; and/or
3. Increase linkage and communication among cultural resources within the County and between those resources and potential audiences; and/or
4. Cultivate County assets, including its landscapes; and/or
5. Broaden cultural opportunities for diverse and under-served County populations.

The Committee envisions a rich County cultural life, derived from strengthening the distinct identities of its constituent communities. Communities can build on existing festivals, exploring and expanding the concepts they celebrate, and publicizing these celebrations and related cultural assets throughout the County. The Committee intends that the people of Yamhill County use the Cultural Coalition as the foundation for a wide variety of efforts to identify, communicate, preserve, enhance, and create significant resources in the arts, heritage, and humanities.

The Planning Process

Funding

The Committee was fortunate to obtain a $5,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (“NEA”) to underwrite its efforts to create a Cultural Plan. These funds helped the Committee get an early start on its work and enabled the Committee to identify local cultural resources, build a website, hold public meetings, produce, distribute, and evaluate the resources inventory and cultural participation assessment, and prepare a draft Plan for public review.

Participating as Cultural Partners, the Arts Alliance of Yamhill County, Gallery Players of Oregon, and Linfield Chamber Orchestra provided important seed money to get the Committee started on its mission.

In late August, the Committee received $4,942 from the Oregon Cultural Trust. With these funds, the Committee will format, print, and distribute this Plan, update and maintain its website, establish and promote the Cultural Coalition, and embark on implementation of the Yamhill County Cultural Plan.

Cultural Asset Inventory

The Committee elected first to identify local cultural resources. “Cultural resource” was originally broadly defined, to include any object, event, organization, or person that someone saw as culturally enriching. But the Committee recognized the need to be able to distinguish items, individuals, and events of cultural interest from those of a primarily noncultural nature. To aid the Committee and the Coalition in identifying assets that qualify as cultural resources, the Committee drafted the definitions of art, heritage, and humanities printed at the beginning of this Plan and adopted the following statement:

The Yamhill County Cultural Coalition reserves the right to define particular items, individuals, or organizations as cultural resources and further reserves the right to determine which cultural resources it publishes and/or posts on the Coalition website, www.yamhillcountyculture.org.

To be defined as a cultural resource, an item, individual, or organization must be an art, heritage, or humanities resource as defined by the Coalition and must not be pornographic or obscene, as those terms are defined in the law.

The Coalition may choose not to post confidential information about items that are valuable, fragile, or personal. The Coalition will not publish or post resources identified as “confidential” by their custodian, but will work with custodians to make those resources available for research and other serious inquiry.

To identify cultural resources, the Committee drafted a Cultural Resources Inventory. The Inventory was circulated at meetings of diverse organizations, made available through the County Commissioners' office and through some public libraries, and posted in both English and Spanish on the Committee's website, www.yamhillcountyculture.org. The Committee received more than 111 responses.

In posting results, the Committee was mindful of the privacy of individuals such as collectors or the caretakers of assets like heritage trees. The Committee adopted the following policy to guide its work and the work of the Coalition:

The Yamhill County Cultural Coalition recognizes that some cultural assets are inherently valuable, fragile, or personal. Examples include collections of rare or valuable artifacts, personal and family histories, and sites of historic, biological, or geological interest that may be located on private lands.

The Coalition respects the privacy and safety of sensitive resources and personal data. Individuals, families, and organizations possessing sensitive or private assets may identify them as “confidential” when submitting the asset to the Coalition's Cultural Resources Inventory. The Coalition will not attempt to verify the confidential nature of the asset nor identify its location, but will work with resource owners to make cultural assets available for legitimate research and other serious inquiry.

The Coalition will make a good faith effort not to publish or post non-public information about individuals without that individual's consent.

Committee members combed phone books and consulted membership lists, registries, newspapers, directories, and personal contacts to capture museums, historic structures, significant local sites, and individual artists, historians, and experts. Although the Cultural Resources Inventory was translated into Spanish, no organization able and willing to disseminate it in the Latino community has been identified. The Committee did not attempt to circulate the Inventory among the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde.

Cultural Participation Assessment

The Committee also attempted to canvas residents' cultural experiences. This effort was less successful. The Committee developed a cultural participation assessment survey and posted it on the website, but physical dissemination proved more difficult. Most surveys were distributed at cultural events, creating a self-selecting audience of aware, cultural participants. Although this technique worked to identify assets, it failed to identify gaps in the County's cultural fabric. With the help of a student intern, the Committee sought a less-biased response by asking local businesses to distribute assessments to their employees. Several dozen individuals responded to this survey. These respondents enthusiastically endorsed the expansion of cultural opportunities within the County. As with the assets inventory, the assessment was not successfully distributed in either the Latino or Grand Ronde community.

The Committee views its efforts to identify and publicize cultural assets and to survey the County's cultural successes and needs as an on-going effort, which the Committee intends the Coalition to continue.

Committee members also met with diverse County groups, including service organizations and government officials, to explain its goals and to harvest the visions of those organizations and their members. This process proved slow and, while valuable in publicizing the Committee and the Cultural Trust, yielded little by way of visions for Yamhill County's future. The Committee therefore decided to convene a “focus group” representing all aspects of the County's cultural life. Artists, performers, writers, government leaders, historians, collectors, patrons, and representatives of important local industry were among those invited. Although most invitees were unable to attend the specific event, many offered their help and guidance .

About twenty-five cultural leaders attended the Committee's Envisioning Summit. Others met individually with Committee members. These individuals eagerly shared their personal visions and, just as eagerly, collaborated with other attendees to develop a conceptual framework for Yamhill County's cultural future. The Committee posted its report summarizing the Summit on the website.

Committee members also examined their own understanding of the County's strengths and needs and their own dreams. The Committee developed a logo, a visible cultural symbol, to identify the Coalition and give it a concrete presence in Yamhill County.

The Committee combined these visions to develop its priorities for awarding grants and benchmarks for measuring success. The proposed structure of the County Cultural Coalition also grew out of the Committee's assessment of the County's cultural strengths and needs. The Committee prepared a Draft Plan summarizing its efforts and vision in January, 2004, and presented that Plan to the public at two well-publicized meetings. The sixty-plus individuals and one Boy Scout troop that attended the meetings endorsed the Plan's basic structure and conclusions and offered constructive comments regarding potential strategies for achieving Plan goals.

Finally, the Committee considered whether the Coalition itself should become a nonprofit organization with the power to solicit tax-deductible donations. Many of the programs proposed in this Plan, as well as existing projects such as the Cultural Resources Inventory and the website, could be maintained by a Coalition with an independent source of funds. Ultimately, the Committee concluded that the Coalition should make this determination, based upon the experience it develops in reviewing, awarding, and evaluating grant applications. The Committee reasoned, first, that the Coalition should not compete with local cultural providers for scarce dollars; and second, that the Coalition can accomplish its priorities in other ways, for example, by soliciting proposals that correspond to specific goals, by issuing Requests for Proposals on particular themes, and by welcoming collaborations with other County and Tribal Coalitions and cultural groups.

This document – the Yamhill County Cultural Plan – represents a synthesis of each of these inputs.

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The Plan: Priorities, goals, strategies, and performance measures

The Plan includes the five identified priorities, challenges confronting each priority, goals for meeting the priority, strategies for achieving goals, and benchmarks for measuring success.

The Plan uses a chart format to match goals for achieving each priority with strategies for achieving goals and with specific benchmarks to measure success. These benchmarks are measurement tools designed to tell the Coalition whether its grant-awarding strategies are succeeding in attaining overall Plan goals. The degree of success in meeting overall benchmarks will allow the Coalition to determine whether to modify or adhere to the Plan as written.

Benchmarks represent achievement of milestones towards desired outcomes, and may be expressed as quantitative values or qualitative improvements. Both types of benchmark indicate change from an original condition or baseline. The cultural resource inventory and cultural participation assessment provide some anecdotal data supporting the beliefs reported in this Plan about the quality of cultural experience in Yamhill County. But the Committee has not established baselines for many of the areas the charts cite. Establishing baselines for the values the Coalition needs to measure will be a key task for the Coalition in its first years. The Committee believes the Coalition can best accomplish this task by evaluating a designated “control group” – a core group of local organizations and individual events – which the Coalition will canvas annually for specific data, such as audience size, funding, and number of events, as well as qualitative indicators, like participant enthusiasm. Developing baselines and measuring changes periodically will give the Coalition a good picture of the impact of the Cultural Trust and this Plan on Yamhill County. Benchmarks can be adjusted to reflect baseline changes.

But benchmarks associated with priorities will not reflect the success or misdirection of particular projects. Grant applicants will be asked to develop their own benchmarks as part of the application process. In addition, all grant recipients will be required to submit a concluding report, and in some cases, progress reports, summarizing their experience in the following general categories:

Quantitative:

• Attendance or interest in the project's outcome as measured by the number of tickets or products sold or used, registrations taken, or other measure as appropriate; whether this met the projects' target threshold.
• Financial profit or loss and whether this comported with grant recipient's expectations.
• Financial support, by source.
• In-kind support, by source, including volunteer help.
• Grant recipient's analysis of success or failure in meeting these goals.

Qualitative:

• Audience response to the program, gathered orally, through evaluation forms, or by numbers of products sold or distributed, as reasonable and appropriate.
• Attendance by targeted audience; attendance by underserved audiences.
• Degree to which art, heritage, and humanities resources participated in or were used in the project.
• Degree of success in meeting benchmarks described in application.
• Unpaid publicity received due to public interest.
• Extent and type of program revisions required to meet financial and attendance goals.
• Degree to which program shared resources with other groups or activities.
• Grant recipient's analysis of success or failure in meeting these goals.

The Committee expects the Coalition to refine these qualitative and quantitative measures as it gathers experience in awarding grants and evaluating projects. As suggested above, the Coalition may revise this Plan if the goals it establishes fail to promote Plan priorities or if new needs arise in Yamhill County.

Plan Priorities

Priority One: Promote cultural activities and organizations

The Coalition will consider grants for projects that promote, maintain, or expand existing cultural activities, organizations, or education throughout the County.

Challenge:

Cultural resources, including human energy and support funds, are currently stretched thin. To preserve and enhance the richness of cultural life in Yamhill County, the Coalition must be able to recognize individuals and organizations that create or support the cultural assets we enjoy. The Coalition should have the option of using scarce dollars to build support for local cultural organizations, individuals, education, and events. The Coalition should also have the flexibility to direct funds to organizations and projects experiencing crisis.

Increased number of traveling events, exhibits, and performances.

Encourage applicants to establish/stage programs in multiple locations within County.

Encourage events, exhibits, and performances that travel throughout the County; encourage schools to participate.

Increased revenues of County cultural professionals and organizations.

Prepared annual report for public and Oregon Cultural Trust assessing Coalition's success in achieving priorities.

Measured and compared changes in “control group” data annually.

Offer all citizens the opportunity to tell their stories, through words, photographs, artifacts, or other means, at annual event.Familiarize media with County cultural activities.

Introduce and publicize the image and purpose of the Cultural Coalition.

Compile data for “control group” of organizations /events covering each cultural category and each community, including size and nature of their audiences, costs of each event, and people and organizations involved to determine whether all categories are developed, new programs introduced, all parts of the County and all segments of the population are served, and unsuccessful programs are assisted or abandoned.

Local youth are traveling or studying at institutions of higher learning, locally and outside Oregon.

Yamhill County secondary school students read and write in English and are able to identify basic elements of poetry, art, design, and music.

Yamhill County high school graduates possess a basic knowledge of the history of ideas, philosophy, events, the arts, science, literature, and music in Western civilization and of the individuals who contributed to these achievements.

Develop model curricula for teaching art, heritage, and humanities at the elementary and secondary levels.

Examples: Work with existing groups, such as Rotary Clubs or Chambers of Commerce, to develop leadership training for cultural providers and participants. Offer training in writing and obtaining grants. Facilitate opportunities for existing programs to refocus and re-energize.

Help cultural organizations formulate capital campaign plans.

With local cultural organizations and individuals participating at cost or pro bono, sponsor an annual event incorporating and recognizing major financial supporters of art, heritage, and humanities.

Establish an advisory committee to help cultural providers identify and pursue additional funding sources.

Consider obtaining non-profit status for the Coalition.

Priority Two: Encourage interdisciplinary activities

The Coalition will consider grants for projects that blend aspects of the arts, heritage, and humanities.

Challenge:

Too often cultural activities focus on one means of expression, without regard for the implications that expression has on other aspects of our creative lives. Interdisciplinary activities provide depth to our experiences and encourage each of us to learn more, do more, and live our lives more richly. The possibilities for projects that blend art, humanities, and heritage are boundless. With improved inter-organizational and geographic communication, cultural providers can work together to increase audiences and reach new corners of the County, physically and metaphorically. By tapping into and celebrating the variations in individual cultural interests, providers can discover new strengths and audiences will find new outlets for their own expression.

Priority Three: Increase intra-County communication

The Coalition will consider grants for projects that tend to increase linkage and communication among cultural resources within the County, and between those resources and potential audiences.

Challenge:

Discussions with artists, historians, writers, collectors, and others continuously turned up the same frustration: a lack of inter-community and inter-disciplinary communication and coordination within the County. The communications deficiency affects cultural providers as well as audiences. Organizations and individuals have no systematic mechanism for sharing resources such as stage sets, costumes, equipment, knowledge, or performance space, and the County lacks a central clearinghouse for publicizing and coordinating events. Local newspapers provide information about local events and local individuals of interest, but only infrequently advertise activities, organizations, or individuals in other communities. Two strong exceptions are the major festivals, which receive good publicity County-wide, and Brush Strokes, a new monthly publication of the small Sheridan Sun, which covers artists and exhibits throughout the County.

Priority Four: Cultivate County assets

The Coalition will consider grants for projects that incorporate under-used County assets, including Yamhill County landscapes, into our cultural lives.

Challenge:

Artists, historians, and others expressed frustration at the lack of opportunity to engage the beautiful Yamhill County landscape in art, performance, heritage, and other projects. Although the County boasts several small parks and three rivers, there are no extended trails or marked historical routes or, outside of city parks and college campuses, opportunities for art or performance in a natural setting. Correspondents proposed projects that use art and performance to interpret history or use historic events as a basis for art or performance projects.

Priority Five: Broaden cultural opportunities

The Coalition will consider grants for projects that broaden cultural opportunities for diverse and under-served County populations.

Challenge:

The Committee identified populations that may currently be underserved in Yamhill County, including Latinos, Native Americans, youth, seniors, and the hospitalized and disabled.

The Committee experienced great frustration in devising ways to reach out to the Latino community. Latinos comprise a growing element of County population and surely bring cultural traditions and individual expertise and interests that can enrich life for all County residents. In addition, non-Latino artists, historians, and others expressed a strong desire to include Latinos among their members and audiences. The Coalition will make broadening Yamhill County's cultural experience to include Latinos both as presenters and recipients of culture a key priority.

Spirit Mountain Casino has been Oregon's leading tourist attraction in recent years. Its profits enable the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde to improve their people and their community. The Tribes' generosity sponsors cultural as well as social activities and organizations in both Yamhill and Polk Counties. Yet their voice is muted outside their own community. The Committee hopes the Coalition can help connect all peoples within the County.

Currently a great many art programs aimed at youth exist in the County, but few based on heritage or other humanities. Moreover, some communities have complained about lack of positive activities for youth in general, resulting in vandalism, drug use, violence, and depression. The Committee believes the Coalition can connect arts, heritage, and humanities groups and individuals with youth experts to design programs that benefit culture, youth, and communities.

Programs for seniors are hit-and-miss at best. Although retirement communities frequently provide rides for residents, transportation to events and learning opportunities within the County remains inadequate, and proposals should incorporate transportation elements – bringing audiences to events or events to audiences. In addition, programs that speak to seniors' special needs – for example, the need to express one's individuality after retirement or after children move away – need to be developed and made widely available. Programs that allow seniors and youth to collaborate should be encouraged.

About 16% of County residents have a disability, according to the 2000 census. Hospitalized and disabled populations face some of the same challenges as seniors. Many cannot travel to events. At present, aside from visual art exhibits at Willamette Valley Medical Center, little is done to bring events to shut-ins. Local TV and radio outlets may be available to cultural organizations eager to expand their outreach to this audience. Mentally disabled individuals face special challenges but can benefit from contact with art, performance, heritage, and nature as surely as those without special needs.

The Cultural Coalition

The Cultural Coalition must also have an agenda of its own. As noted above under The Planning Process, the Committee's vision for the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition includes some Coalition activities that will require funds, including completing the Cultural Resources Inventory and maintaining the website. Several Plan strategies envision an annual event staged by the Coalition or with its support, to recognize achievement and excellence and to introduce grant beneficiaries to the community. The Coalition's work will not be complete if it cannot publicize its activities and develop programs to nudge County groups into a richer vision of life.

Some funds will be available from the Cultural Trust for Coalition administration. But the Committee prefers to keep as many of the few state dollars as possible available for grants. The Coalition may look to local colleges for interns to help with administrative tasks. And, the Committee has structured the Coalition to enable it to seek non-profit status if experience suggests that the Coalition seek its own funding to maintain on-going Coalition projects.

Updating the Plan

The Coalition may amend this Plan from time to time, as it deems necessary to achieve Plan priorities and to fulfill the promise of the Oregon Cultural Trust. Proposed changes will be noticed, and community members will have an opportunity to comment before any changes are adopted. Proposed revisions must also be forwarded to the Oregon Cultural Trust Board for review, comment, and approval.

Plan priorities may be revised if substantial quantitative and/or qualitative evidence supports the conclusion that (1) specific priorities have been achieved and no longer need be emphasized by the Coalition or (2) new priorities essential to a vital, exciting, accessible cultural environment have been identified. Goals, benchmarks, and strategies may be revised as necessary to better address existing, revised, or added priorities.

The Coalition will evaluate the entire Plan annually. The evaluation will include an assessment of progress toward the Plan's long and short term goals in preparation for the Coalition's report to the Oregon Cultural Trust.

The Coalition

The Committee envisions a dedicated, diverse Coalition Board. Coalition members will be knowledgeable about and keenly interested in both Yamhill County and cultural questions. Under the County's mandate from the Oregon Cultural Trust, Coalition members must represent not only art, heritage, and humanities, but also the County's diverse communities, as well as business, the media, and humanities institutions like libraries and colleges. Yamhill County is fortunate to be rich in all of these resources.

The Coalition will have much exciting work, especially in its early years, laying the groundwork for evaluating grant applications, awarding grants, publicizing cultural events, and measuring and reporting successes and difficulties. This Plan will serve as a framework to guide the Coalition through its first challenges and to help it shape better plans for future efforts.

Coalition members must have strong County connections. Members must reside or work in Yamhill County or represent an organization or business with roots in the County. Initial appointments will be made by the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition Planning Committee, and will be subject to approval by the Oregon Cultural Trust. The appointments committee solicited nominations from cultural organizations, government entities, local businesses and media, and individuals throughout Yamhill County.

Initial appointments will be for one, two, or three-year terms. Terms will end on December 31 of the first, second, or third year of service, as appropriate. Thereafter, the Coalition will appoint its own successor members, all to terms of two calendar years. A member may serve two consecutive full terms and may be reelected to the Coalition after a minimum one-year hiatus.

The Coalition will do its best to ensure that the diverse populations and far corners of the County are continuously represented. New members should be those applicants who best complement existing members. That is, the Coalition should recruit new members from organizations, geographical areas, and backgrounds not represented by existing members.

Members will be expected to support the arts, heritage, and humanities in Yamhill County and to participate in County cultural events. Members are also expected to attend Coalition meetings. Unexcused absence from two successive meetings will be cause for replacement. During their term of office, members may not receive individual Coalition grants. Members who are principals in an organization seeking a grant must disclose their affiliation and may neither vote nor participate in the Coalition's deliberations regarding the proposed grant.

The Committee will submit its recommendations for the first Yamhill County Cultural Coalition to the Cultural Trust with the Cultural Plan no later than March 1, 2004.

Coalition Bylaws

The Committee has developed Bylaws to govern Coalition operation. These are attached in the Appendices.

Grants Administration

When funds are available, the Coalition will award grants on a competitive basis to proposals that:

• Fulfill one or more of the priorities established in the Yamhill County Cultural Plan.
• Result in a demonstrable benefit to County residents and visitors.

The Coalition will use an application process designed to encourage applicants to expand their ideas without burdening them with onerous requirements that might dissuade some from applying. In awarding funds, the Coalition will respect the privacy of applicants and the confidentiality of fiscal and proprietary information they submit, to the extent allowed by law.

The Coalition must be alert to fairness and accountability issues. Fairness will include assurance that, over time, grants are fairly distributed to individuals and organizations bringing cultural experience to all parts of the County. Accountability will include measures to indicate when the promised product has been completed.

The Coalition will have the power to award grants to individuals as well as to organizations, with appropriate safeguards to protect the public funds.

Funds may be distributed in installments, and each subsequent installment may be predicated upon achievement of specified project goals, submission of appropriate reports, or similar appropriate criteria. The Coalition may recall funds if they are misused, if the applicant fails to comply with grant conditions, or if projects are abandoned. The Coalition shall have recourse to law to recover misappropriated funds.

Decisions may be made in private. Coalition decisions will not be subject to appeal. The Coalition will endeavor to provide a brief indication of its reason for rejecting an application. Unsuccessful applicants who wish to reapply in subsequent grant cycles must first ask the Coalition for a confidential, constructive explanation of the basis of the Coalition's decision. To be considered, the new application should correct any deficiencies the Coalition notes.

The grant application process is described in more detail in the Appendices.

Appendices

Click to view the
Envisioning Summit Report
Cultural Resources Inventory form
results, to date, of the Cultural Resources Inventory.

The Yamhill County Cultural Coalition Planning Committee

In November, 2002, the Yamhill County Board of Commissioners selected 17 members to comprise the Yamhill County Cultural Trust Coalition Planning Committee. Most members had volunteered for Committee work.

We were a diverse group culturally. Ten of the original members represented the arts community, four represented County heritage, eight represented humanities, and six represented related fields, including government, education, and natural resources. Several members represented more than one area.

While the Committee had broad experience and interest in the various cultural categories, it represented less diversity of community. Nine of the original members lived in or near McMinnville and three in Newberg. Dayton boasted two members, and Amity and Dundee fielded one each. No Committee members lived in Sheridan, Willamina, Yamhill, or Carlton or their parts of the County, although one member had been an active part of the Willamina community for many years. Only one of the original appointed Committee members was a native Spanish speaker, and she resigned after only three months. One member, who resigned after devoting much hard work to the Committee, had ties to the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, whose interests strongly impact southern Yamhill County.

As the Committee's work progressed and the Cultural Trust extended its deadlines for Plan completion, Committee membership changed. At present, the Committee boasts ten members, all but one of whom is active. The cultural categories are still well-represented, but our geographic diversity has diminished. We have one Dayton member, three from Newberg, and six from McMinnville. The Committee's voices are strongest in the areas of visual arts, heritage, and natural resources. Men are underrepresented on the Committee (two out of ten), and there are no youth. We have no native Spanish speakers.

The Committee has been fortunate to have two active and very able advisors: Marilyn Dell Worrix and Mary Stern. Marilyn is a member of the Cultural Trust Board and, consequently, keeps the Committee current on state-wide news. Mary is a Yamhill County Commissioner and former board member of the Arts Alliance of Yamhill County.

The Arts Alliance of Yamhill County has ably served the Committee as fiscal agent.

Meetings/Outreach

The Committee has met at least monthly beginning December, 2002. In addition to its own meetings, the Committee has reached out to diverse community groups, providing speakers and information about the Cultural Trust and Committee work and soliciting attendees' comments and advice.

At its first meeting, the Committee selected a chair, Debra Hatcher, and subsequently formed three subcommittees, one for each broad cultural category. Later, the Heritage and Humanities subcommittees merged. These subcommittees used data gleaned from cultural inventories and assessments, individual conversations, and the Envisioning Summit (below) to identify goals within their category. The full Committee later merged these goals and identified priorities for Coalition action.

The Committee created a website early on and has continuously used that site to advertise its work and to solicit responses to its cultural asset inventory and cultural assessment surveys. The website is www.yamhillcountyculture.org. A comprehensive cultural calendar is posted on the site.

The Committee held an Envisioning Summit in June, 2003, inviting over 100 community leaders in fields as diverse as parks, mask-making, and children's ballet. Twenty-five individuals attended, offering their observations on Yamhill County's cultural richness and their dreams for the County's cultural future. The Committee's Envisioning Summit Report is posted on the website.

The Committee held two additional facilitated public meetings in January, 2004, to present its Draft Plan for review, discussion, and comment. Individuals unable to attend those meetings were able to view the Draft Plan and submit comments online. Over sixty adults and many youth attended the open meetings or read the Plan online and participated in review of the proposed Draft Plan.

The Committee considered all public input, as well as its own visions, before finalizing the Plan for submission to the Oregon Cultural Trust. The Cultural Trust must approve Yamhill County's plan before its Cultural Coalition can begin to work.

BYLAWS OF YAMHILL COUNTY CULTURAL COALITION
(An Oregon nonprofit Corporation)

Article 1. PURPOSE

The purpose of the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition shall be to lead the community in implementing the Yamhill County Cultural Plan.

Article 2. BOARD OF DIRECTORS AND MEMBERSHIP

Section 1. Powers and Qualifications. The affairs of the corporation shall be managed by the Board of Directors. The board may exercise all powers vested in the corporation.

Section 2. Functions. The role of the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition Board of Directors (hereafter called the Board) shall be to set policy for the organization, administer funds from the Oregon Cultural Trust and other sources, and lead the community in implementing the Yamhill County Cultural Plan. The Board will measure progress of the County Cultural Plan through the use of appropriate benchmarks, ensuring that Arts, Heritage, and Humanities are all represented. It shall ensure that the County Cultural Plan is implemented in a way that fairly encourages county-wide participation in cultural activities. It shall update the County Cultural Plan, in accordance with the appropriate section of the Plan, as the need arises. It shall keep the Coalition website, yamhillcountyculture.org, up to date, and submit annual reports to the public and the Oregon Cultural Trust.

Section 3. Members. The Board shall consist of not less than seven nor more than fifteen members. Members must reside or work in Yamhill County or represent an organization or business with roots in the County. Members will be expected to make a financial contribution to the Oregon Cultural Trust. Members will be expected to attend selected events and/or activities funded by the Coalition, including some outside their primary areas of interest. During their term of office, members may not receive individual Coalition grants. Members who are principals in an organization seeking a grant must disclose their affiliation and may neither vote nor participate in the Board’s deliberations regarding the proposed grant.

Term of membership shall be three calendar years. Initial terms shall be adjusted to assure that only approximately one half of the directors’ terms expire in any given year. Terms end on December 31 of the third year of service. A member may serve two consecutive three-year terms. A person may be reelected to the Board after a minimum one-year hiatus. If a member misses two successive meetings without an excused absence approved by the President or Vice-President, their membership may be terminated and they may be replaced at the next Board meeting.

Section 4. Compensation. Board members, including the Executive Committee, shall receive no salary. They may be reimbursed for "out-of-pocket" expenses, including transportation at the IRS approved mileage rate, upon approval of the Executive Committee. This does not preclude the Coalition from contracting necessary staff functions, such as a web-master, administrative assistant, clerical help, etc., after it has determined that it will be impossible or impractical to have the task done by dedicated volunteers.

Section 5. Vacancies. Board members will elect new or replacement members as required. New members should be those applicants who best complement existing members; that is, the Board should recruit new members from organizations, geographical areas, backgrounds, etc., not represented by existing members.

Section 6. Executive Committee. The Executive Committee shall be responsible for carrying on the work of the Coalition. It shall be composed of five members of the Board: the President, Vice-President, Treasurer, Secretary, and the Grants Committee Chair. The Executive Committee shall meet at least monthly. The Board may add additional officers and appoint them to the Executive Committee as necessary and appropriate to its work.

Section 7. Committees. There shall be a minimum of one standing committee; A Grants Committee, which shall identify funding sources for projects, solicit and review proposals, and make grant recommendations to the Executive Committee and Board. The President, or the members of the Board, may add additional standing committees and from time to time create ad hoc or special committees as the need arises.
Section 8. Members. This corporation shall have no members

Article 3. MEETINGS

Section 1. Annual Meeting. The first called meeting in each calendar year shall be termed the annual meeting for the purpose of electing officers, standing committee chairperson(s) and adopting a budget.

Section 2. Regular Meetings. The Board shall meet as often as it desires, but no less than quarterly.

Section 3. Notice of Meetings. Notice of the time and place of any meeting of the Board of Directors shall be required. Notice of the time and place of any special meeting of the Board of Directors shall be given by the Secretary, or by the person or persons calling the meeting, by mail, telegram, email, or by personal communication, over the telephone or otherwise, at least seven (7) days prior to the date on which the meeting is to be held. Attendance of a member or director at any meeting shall constitute a waiver of notice of such meeting, except where the director attends a meeting for the purpose of objecting to the transaction of any business because the meeting is not lawfully called or convened. Neither the business to be transacted nor the purpose of any meeting of the Board of Directors need be specified in the notice or any waiver of notice of such meeting.

Section 4. Quorum. The majority of the duly elected Board of Directors at the time of the board meeting shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of business. The act of the majority of the directors present at a meeting at which a quorum is present shall be the act of the Board of Directors. At any meeting of the Board of Directors at which a quorum is present, any business may be transacted and the board may exercise all of its powers.

Article 4. ACTIONS BY WRITTEN CONSENT

Any corporate action required or permitted by the Articles of Incorporation, Bylaws, or laws of the State of Oregon to be taken at a meeting of the directors of the corporation may be taken without a meeting if a consent, in writing, setting forth the action to be taken, shall be signed by all of the directors entitled to vote with respect to the subject matter thereof. Such consent shall have the same force and effect as a unanimous vote and may be described as such. Email consent shall be deemed the same as in writing and signed.

Article 5. WAIVER OF NOTICE

Whenever any notice is required to be given to any member or director of the corporation by the Articles of Incorporation, Bylaws or laws of the State of Oregon, a waiver thereof in writing, signed by the person or persons entitled to such notice, whether before or after the time stated therein, shall be equivalent to the giving of such notice.

Article 6. STANDARDS OF CONDUCT

Section 1. General standards for directors.

A director shall discharge the duties of a director, including the director’s duties as a member of a committee;

• (a) In good faith;
• (b) With the care an ordinarily prudent person in a like position would exercise under similar circumstances; and
• (c) In a manner the director reasonably believes to be in the best interests of the corporation.

In discharging the duties of a director, a director is entitled to rely on information, opinions, reports or statements, including financial statements and other financial data, if prepared or presented by:

• (a) One or more officers or employees of the corporation whom the director reasonably believes to be reliable and competent in the matter presented;
• (b) Legal council, public accountants or other persons as to matters the director reasonably believes are within the person’s professional or expert competence;
• (c) A committee of the board of which the director is not a member, as to matters within its jurisdiction, if the director reasonably believes the committee merits confidence.

Section 2. Director conflict of interest.

A conflict of interest transaction is a transaction with the corporation in which a director of the corporation has a direct or indirect interest. A conflict of interest transaction is not voidable or the basis for imposing liability on the director if the transaction is fair to the corporation at the time it was entered into or is approved as provided below:
A transaction in which a director of the corporation has a conflict of interest may be approved:

• (a) By the vote of the board of directors if the material facts of the transaction and the director’s interest are disclosed or known to the board of directors; or
• (b) By obtaining approval of the Attorney General

Article 7. INDEMNIFICATION OF DIRECTORS AND OFFICERS

Section 1. Concerning Lawsuits. The corporation shall indemnify any person who was or is a party or is threatened to be made a party to any threatened, pending or completed action, suit or proceeding, whether civil, criminal, administrative or investigative (other than an action by or in the right of the corporation) by reason of the fact that he or she is or was a director, officer, employee or agent of the corporation, or is or was serving at the request of the corporation as a director, officer, employee or agent of another corporation, partnership, joint venture, trust or other enterprise, against expenses (including attorney's fees), judgments, fines and amounts paid in settlement actually and reasonably incurred by him in connection with such action, suit or proceeding if he or she acted in good faith, and in a manner he or she reasonably believed to be in or not opposed to the best interests of the corporation, and, with respect to any criminal action or proceeding, had no reasonable cause to believe his conduct was unlawful. The termination of any action, suit or proceeding by judgment, order, settlement, conviction, or upon a plea of nolo contendere or its equivalent shall not, of itself, create a presumption that the person did not act in good faith and in a manner which he or she reasonably believed to be in or not opposed to the best interests of the corporation, and, with respect to any criminal action or proceeding, had reasonable cause to believe that his or her conduct was unlawful.

Section 2. Defense Against Lawsuits. The corporation shall indemnify any person who was or is a party or is threatened to be made a party to any threatened, pending or completed action or suit by or in the right of the corporation to procure a judgment in its favor by reason of the fact that he or she is or was a director, officer, employee or agent of the corporation, or is or was serving at the request of the corporation as a director, officer, employee or agent of another corporation, partnership, joint venture, trust or other enterprise against expenses (including attorney's fees) actually and reasonably incurred by him or her in connection with the defense or settlement of such action or suit if he or she acted in good faith and in a manner he or she reasonably believed to be in or not opposed to the best interests of the corporation and except that no indemnification shall be made in respect of any claim, issue or matter as to which such person shall have been adjudged to be liable for negligence or misconduct in the performance of his or her duty to the corporation unless and only to the extent that the court in which such action or suit was brought shall determine upon application that, despite the adjudication of liability but in view of all circumstances of the case, such person is fairly and reasonably entitled to indemnity for such expenses which such court shall deem proper.

Section 3. Regarding Legal Expenses. To the extent that a director, officer, employee or agent of a corporation has been successful on the merits or otherwise in defense of any action, suit or proceeding referred to in this Article, or in defense of any claim, issue or matter therein, he or she shall be indemnified against expenses (including attorney's fees) actually and reasonably incurred by such person in connection therewith.

Section 4. Regarding Good Faith Conduct. The corporation may pay for or reimburse reasonable expenses incurred by a person who is a party or is threatened to be made a party to any threatened, pending or completed action, suit or proceeding, whether civil, criminal, administrative or investigative if such party furnishes the corporation a written affirmation of their good faith belief that he or she acted in good faith and in a manner which he or she reasonably believed to be in or not opposed to the best interests of the corporation, and, with respect to any criminal action or proceeding, had no reasonable cause to believe that his or her conduct was unlawful, and the party furnishes the corporation a written undertaking, executed personally or on the party's behalf, to repay the advance if it is ultimately determined that said party did not meet such standard of conduct.

Section 5. Regarding Indemnification. A director of the corporation who is a party to a proceeding may apply for indemnification to the court conducting the proceeding or to another court of competent jurisdiction. On receipt of an application, the court, after giving any notice the court considers necessary, may order indemnification if it determines the party is entitled to mandatory indemnification in which case the court shall also order the corporation to pay the party's reasonable expenses incurred to obtain court ordered indemnification, or if the party is fairly and reasonably entitled to indemnification in view of all the relevant circumstances, whether or not the conduct of the party was in good faith, in a manner which the party reasonably believed to be in or not opposed to the best interests of the corporation, and with respect to any criminal action or proceeding, the party had no reasonable cause to believe that his or her conduct was unlawful.

Section 6. Indemnification by Board or Legal Counsel. Notwithstanding anything contained above, the corporation shall not indemnify a director unless authorized in the specific case after a determination has been made that indemnification of the director is permissible in the circumstances because the director has met the standard of conduct set forth above. Such determination that indemnification of a director is permissible shall be made by the Board of Directors by a majority vote of a quorum consisting of directors not at the time parties to the proceeding; provided, however, if a quorum of the Board of Directors cannot be obtained, the determination shall be made by special legal counsel selected by the Board.

Section 7. Rights Under Indemnification. The indemnification provided by this Article shall not be deemed exclusive of any other rights to which those indemnified may be entitled under any Bylaw, agreement, vote of shareholders, or disinterested directors or otherwise, both as to action in his or her official capacity and as action in another capacity while holding such office, and shall continue as to a person who has ceased to be a director, officer, employee or agent and shall inure to the benefit of the heirs, executors and administrators of such a person.

Section 8. Insurance. The directors of the corporation have the authority on behalf of the corporation to authorize the purchase and maintenance of insurance on behalf of any person who is or was a director, officer, employee or agent of another corporation, or is or was serving at the request of the corporation, as a director, officer, employee or agent of another corporation, partnership, joint venture, trust or other enterprise against any liability asserted against and incurred by such person in any such capacity or arising out of his or her status as such, whether or not the corporation would have the power to indemnify him or her against such liability under the provisions of this Article.

Article 8. OFFICERS

Section 1. Officers Enumerated. The officers of the corporation shall be a President, a Vice President, a Secretary, a Treasurer (each of whom must be a director of the corporation), and such other officers and assistant officers as may be deemed necessary by the Board. These officers shall be elected by the Board at each annual meeting and shall serve until his/her successor is duly elected and qualified. In addition to the powers and duties specified below, the officers shall have powers and perform such duties as the Board may prescribe.

Section 2. Tenure. The officers of the corporation shall hold office until their successors are chosen and qualify in their stead. If the office of any of the officers becomes vacant for any reason, the vacancy shall be filled by the Board.

Section 3. President. The president shall be the chief executive officer of the corporation; the president shall preside at all meetings of the Board and Executive Committee; he shall supervise management of the business of the corporation, and shall see that all orders and resolutions of the Board are carried into effect. The President shall liaison with County and State officials. The President shall execute deeds, leases, promissory notes, bonds, mortgages and other contracts or documents requiring a seal, under the seal of the corporation, except where required by law to be otherwise signed and executed and except where the signing and execution thereof shall be expressly delegated by the Board to some other officer or agent of the corporation.

Section 4. Vice President. In the absence or disability of the President, the Vice President, shall perform the duties and exercise the powers of the president, and shall perform such other duties as the Board shall prescribe.

Section 5. Secretary. The Secretary shall notify all Board members, or Executive Committee members, as appropriate, of upcoming meetings and shall post the Board meeting notice and agenda in accordance with applicable public meeting notice law. The Secretary shall attend all sessions of the Board and Executive Committee and record the minutes of all proceedings in a book to be kept for that purpose, email a copy to Board members as soon as possible after the meeting and present the minutes at subsequent meetings. Board meeting minutes shall be provided to members of the public who submit a self-addressed envelope with appropriate postage. The Secretary shall perform such other duties as may be prescribed by the Board or the President, under whose supervision he/she shall be.

Section 6. Treasurer. The Treasurer shall have the custody of the corporate funds and securities and shall keep full and accurate accounts of receipts and disbursements in books belonging to the corporation and shall deposit all money and other valuable effects in the name and to the credit of the corporation, in such depositories as may be designated by the Board. The Treasurer or designated assistants, shall disburse the funds of the corporation when proper to do so, taking proper vouchers for such disbursements, and shall render to the President and directors prior to and at the regular meetings of the Board, or whenever they may require it, an account of all his transactions as Treasurer and of the financial condition of the corporation, i.e. profit and loss statements and a balance sheet. If required by the Board, the Treasurer shall give the corporation a bond in such sum, and with such surety or sureties as shall be satisfactory to the Board, for the faithful performance of the duties of his office, and for the restoration to the corporation, in case of his death, resignation, retirement or removal from office of all books, papers, vouchers, money and other property of whatever kind in his possession or under his control belonging to the corporation. Annually, in accordance with procedures established by the Board, the Treasurer shall report to the Board a planned budget for the coming fiscal year, and the Board shall authorize expenditures which are consistent with the budget and policies adopted by the Board.

Section 7. Vacancies. Vacancies in any office arising from any cause shall be filled by the Board at any regular or special meeting.

Section 8. Compensation. The compensation, if any, of all agents of the corporation shall be fixed by the Board.

Section 9. Removal. Any officer elected or appointed may be removed by a majority of the full Board whenever in its judgment the best interests of the corporation will be served thereby.

Article 9. ADMINISTRATIVE AND FINANCIAL PROVISIONS

Section 1. Fiscal Year. The fiscal year of the corporation shall be the period from July 1 to and including the following June 30.

Section 2. Loans Prohibited. No loans shall be made by the corporation to any officer or to any director.

Section 3. Corporate Seal. The corporation shall not have a seal.

Section 4. Books and Records. The corporation shall keep current and complete books and records of account and minutes of the proceedings of its Board and committees having any of the authority of the Board .

Section 5. Amendment of Bylaws. These bylaws may be amended at any regular meeting of the Board by a two-thirds vote, provided that the amendment has been submitted in writing at a regular meeting at least 60 days previously and a copy sent to the Oregon Cultural Trust.

Section 6. Annual Report and Review. An Annual Report and Financial Review shall be required. A copy shall be made available for inspection by the public.

Section 7. Committee Structure. Each committee of the Corporation may establish such Committee structure and governance as shall be acceptable to such committee, and consistent with Board policies.

Section 8. Authorized signatories on Corporate Accounts, Stock Powers and Investments. The Board shall establish by resolution authorized signatories for the transacting of business on all corporate accounts, stock powers and investments.

Section 9. Rules of Procedure. The rules of procedure at meetings of the Board of Directors of the corporation shall be the rules contained in the current edition of Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised. They shall govern the Board in all cases to which they are applicable and in which they are not inconsistent with these bylaws, the Articles of Incorporation and any special rules of order the Board may adopt. Although this group should operate with some formality given its state-mandated function, it should employ the principles of consensus as outlined in the "Procedure in Small Boards" found on page 470 in the 10th edition as much as practical.

Article 10. DISSOLUTION

In the event of dissolution of this corporation assets shall revert to the Oregon Cultural Trust. Dissolution shall be performed in accordance with ORS 65.621 through 65.631.

APPROVED by the Board of Directors the 25 day of October 2006.

Grant Application Process

The Yamhill County Cultural Coalition will award grants on a competitive basis to proposals that:

• Fulfill one or more of the priorities established in the Yamhill County Cultural Plan.
• Result in a demonstrable benefit to County residents and visitors.

Both individuals and groups may seek Coalition grants. Groups need not be ongoing organizations, and applicants need not be legally recognized nonprofits. But all applications must be based on the priorities described in the Yamhill County Cultural Plan.

Grant funds will be limited. The Coalition receives its funds from the Oregon Cultural Trust and community contributions to the Cultural Campaign of Yamhill County. The amount of funding the Coalition may award depends both upon the funds businesses and individuals donate to the Oregon Cultural Trust in the previous fiscal year and upon the amount of carry-over funding, if any, maintained by the Coalition. The Coalition cannot guarantee that it will have any funds or any particular level of funds to distribute in any year.

The Coalition's grant year begins July 1, when the Oregon Cultural Trust begins to distribute funds to County and Tribal Coalitions. The Coalition has just one application period each year.

Grant applicants should generally consider Coalition funds to be supplemental and not the sole source of funding for their projects. Only in rare cases will the Coalition not require matching funds in at least a one-to-one ratio.

The Application Process

The Application consists of:

• The Cover Page. Please follow the existing format. You may recreate the form on your computer using the same format.

• The narrative which shall describe the proposal in not more than three (3) pages of 12-point type, in sufficient detail for the Grants Committee to understand:
  • a brief history of organization/applicant,
  • the planned project - identifying specific individuals and tasks,
  • the Cultural Plan priority, goal or strategy the proposal addresses,
  • a time line,
  • description of target audience (number, age, gender, ethnicity, etc.),
  • quantitative and qualitative evaluation procedures,
  • any intended partnerships,
  • requested amount.

• Itemized project budget in table format (one additional page) list sources, types (money, materials, labor) & amounts; in-kind contributions must clearly specify the work that will be done, required number of hours, realistic hourly wage for each task, name(s) of recipients

• Additional information, if applicable. If not, include a brief explanation.
  • letters of agreement from collaborating entities,
  • copy affirming your 501(c)(3) status,
  • list of Board of Directors/Trustees and their affiliations,
  • not more than two documents supporting this project and/or past projects. (Optional; these will not be returned.)

No Appeal. Grants will be awarded by the full Coalition after review of the Grants Committee's recommendations. The Coalition will endeavor to provide a brief indication of its reason for rejecting an application. There will be no appeal. Unsuccessful applicants who wish to reapply in subsequent grant cycles must first ask the Coalition for a confidential, constructive explanation of the basis of the Coalition's decision. To be considered, the new application should correct any deficiencies the Coalition notes.

The Coalition and Grants Committee will respect the privacy of applicants and the confidentiality of fiscal and proprietary information they submit, to the extent allowed by law. Deliberations and decisions will be made in private as permitted by law.

Grant Administration Guidelines

In making awards, the Grants Committee and the Coalition will be alert to fairness and accountability issues. Fairness will include assurance that, over time, grants are fairly distributed to individuals and organizations bringing cultural experience to all parts of Yamhill County. Accountability will include measures to indicate when the promised product has been completed.

The Coalition will have the power to impose appropriate safeguards on awards to protect public funds. These safeguards may include on-going communications, including structured progress reports, between the applicant and either the Coalition or another organization serving as fiscal agent or overseer for the project. Projects undertaken by a single individual will be subject to oversight criteria to ensure that the project goes forward, if appropriate, in the event the individual applicant is unable or unwilling to follow through as promised. Funds may be dispensed in installments, with subsequent installments dependent upon receipt of satisfactory interim or final reports, including meeting pre-established progress benchmarks.

The Coalition may recall funds if they are misused, if the applicant fails to comply with grant conditions, or if projects are abandoned. The Coalition shall have recourse to law to recover misappropriated funds.

Successful applicants will be required to submit final reports to the Coalition, for its use in assessing its own achievement and in revising Plan priorities, goals, and strategies, and for public review. The Coalition may hold an annual event to present successful applicants to the public in order to expand community awareness of cultural activities and cultural providers in the County. The Coalition may require successful applicants to participate in this event.

In general, the following are not eligible for Coalition grants:

• Scholarships;
• Operating costs, except as part of a viable crisis recovery plan;
• Projects whose primary focus is advocacy of a particular political or religious viewpoint or which primarily benefit a political, religious, labor, fraternal, or athletic group or commercial venture;
• Fund-raising efforts, except those in which fund-raising is incidental to a project that meets Cultural Plan priorities.