Kentucky Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty
Minutes of Board Meeting, March 11, 2013
Present: Pat Delahanty, Kaye Gallagher, Kate Miller, Ben Griffith, Ray Schweri,
Maria Hines, Richard Mitchell, Mark Meade, Sherriall Cunningham, Randy Wheeler,
Alvin Seals
Meeting was called to order promptly at 6:30pm. We spent a few minutes building
the agenda for the evening since none had been published.
1. Minutes from December were approved without any additions or corrections.
2. Finance Report. Kaye updated our finances since our last report in December.
The most notable item on her report was the Tides grant “Sheila’s Fund” award of
$40,000 was deposited in our account. Starting balance for the period 12/1/12 thru
2/28/13 was $20,165.40. Ending balance was $63,604.47. Income for the period
was $48,224.02 and expense was $4,784.95. Motion was made and seconded to
approve the report. Motion passed without any discussion.
3. Consideration of proposed changes to the By-Laws. Pat reported that he had
very little feedback from Board members after he had sent the by-laws out for
review. Don Stern had voiced several concerns or questions, but Pat was able to
answer all these to Don's satisfaction. As we looked over this final draft, we made a
couple of minor corrections by motion, discussion, and approval. These changes
were: Article IV Board of Directors, Section 6 Quorum, the words “of the directors.”
were added to the lone sentence in this section. In Article XI, the typo “WPPA” was
changed to “KCADP”. We hada short discussion about whether the “membership”
of KCADP was required to vote on these changes; the original by-laws had no
provision for this procedure. The Board was the entity empowered to change the
by-laws. Motion was made and seconded to approve the by-laws with the minor
corrections. A clean copy will be issued to the secretary to sign as well as Jeff Segal,
legal counsel who helped us with these revisions. This will then be filed with our
organizational file.
Kaye suggested that even though Jeff Segal has refused payment for his pro-bono
service that it would be appropriate to give him a $35 gift card. Board members
approved this action consensually. Kaye will see the gift card gets to Jeff.
4. Legislative Session Update. Pat gave a short story recap that no bills that were
filed this session will advance. However, Senator Carl Collins has secured a promise
from Senator Tilley that the Judicial Committee will hear the abolition bill sometime
in between the end of this session and before the next. It will probably come up ina
hearing that will also consider the bill that attempts to address some of the Death
Penalty system fixes recommended by the ABA report. If this happens, it is very
likely that legislators will have to consider the cost of implementing “fixes” and may
be more receptive to considering the less expensive option of abolition.
5. Protocol update. Protocol legislative hearing was held and the new protocol
was adopted. Judge Shepherd must now rule on the new protocol and already there
have been some legal challenges filed to implementing this new protocol. There is
some hope that the judge may find reason to send the protocol back to the
legislature for another review and fix. This could significantly delay the 7 death row
cases that are close to having death warrants issued.
6. Hiring of the new organizer. The position has been advertised and we have
received 8 applications to date. There is a small committee of Pat, Kaye, Kate, Ben,
and Zach that will interview any candidates that look promising. This process
should start in the very near future. Pat invited any other Board member who is
interested in being involved with the interviews to contact him.
7. State Fair. We have previously discussed the notion to approach our member
organizations about taking the responsibility for one day of booth sitting during the
State Fair. This will invite an active participation from member organizations. We
would supply the organizations with parking passes and basic instruction for booth
sitting. A committee was formed to begin assembling information packet for these
organizations to consider. This new committee is Kate, Randy, Sherriall, and we
discussed someone approaching Don Stern to serve. They will contact the
organizations to see if any will step forward. Member organizations will be
highlighted at the booth with a sign hanging on the curtain if they wish, but the
materials at the booth will be solely focused on abolition.
8. ACLU funding for Innocence. In a somewhat related item to the State Fair, Kate
reported that funding from the National and State ACLU offices may provide enough
for 3 or 4 exoneree visits to the state. We will consider bringing in an exoneree in
the period leading up to the State Fair and may even find the way to have an
exoneree be a presence at our booth on some high traffic days.
9. Booklet development. As Pat as described to us in the past, there are three
booklets being developed to help specifically in approaching legislators. The first
will be Kentucky murder victim family survivor stories, the second will be Kentucky
stories of Innocence, and the final booklet will have some voices from Law
Enforcement community. There is funding available from ACLU and Catholic
Conference to help cover the costs of these publications. The Catholic Record is
involved with laying out the copy in a professional and pleasing manner. The
booklets are coming along nicely.
10. Fundraising. The Board was encouraged to set up more local events for
bringing people in to highlight abolition work and to raise funds.
11. Setting the New Number of the Board of Directors. As we have approved the
changes to the by-laws, we considered that these new by-laws ask the Board to set
the number of Board members to serve. After a brief discussion, a motion was
made, seconded and approved to set the new number at 21 Board Members. We
already know that Alvin’s wife is interested in serving as well as two lawyers from
Lexington. We feel free to begin filling these vacancies. According to the by-laws, all
terms for Board Members are for one year. This period begins at the March annual
meeting.
12. Officers for 2013-14. After briefly asking those presently serving about
continuing, Sherriall asked to be released from her Vice Chair position. A motion
was made and approved to appoint Kate Miller as the new Vice Chair. Another
motion was made and approved for the other officers to continue on with another
term. These are: Chair- Pat Delahanty, Treasurer- Kaye Gallagher, and Secretary-
Ben Griffith.
8. Next meeting date. June10, 2013, 6:30pm, at the Catholic Conference Building
in Frankfort.
We adjourned shortly before 8pm.
Respectfully Submitted, Ben Griffith, Secretary
