TsuMirren

I'll talk about it. It's not true and it's not supported. There is no will to avoid the processes. There is a will to present the will of the club to the members and allow members to make their choice, but why wouldn't there be. Just to close off even more of the above musing. Even when SMISA do have full control there may not be a need to wind the society up. There may have been a statement from the club early doors, but I believe that was discussed and dismissed early on. I believe that and will continue to work within the commitee and with/for the SMISA members and wider fanbase.

All good points Graeme. On the flip side, if you're saving away then you can't support the 2K or 5K here and there from the club. I know the response to that, I'd the highlight that the 50K loan isn't actually in place yet. We've not had that over 8K suggestion yet, but yes being able to facilitate one may raise itself. I haven't fully thought out any potential side fund, so at the moment it's just a point for long term planning more than current. The 50K could, of course, become the rainy day fund as it would be paid back/be there for use. As we progress I'd hope SMISA would get better clarity on cashflow, which gives better clarity over size of what sort or rolling fund you require or even float that would be appropriate. We're not there though so hard to start working to anything, whilst at the same time we have members who'd like to fund x, y or z.

I don't think we've worked our magic on the PA. We've just not had a chance to pick the costing up. Tenders may be suitable, just from having worked that way in my day job. It's certainly on the to be looked at list. Just, you know, I can't make promises or give timescales so hopefully members and fans in general will appreciate that it hasn't just been dropped. It's not even just the installation, it's the tying in with St Mirren TVs coverage and even whether there's a rights issue of providing coverage in any form.

That's a cracking first post Sharon. [emoji23] I probably shouldn't mention that there's no food tomorrow night.

Must admit, if anyone wants to offer assistance in pricing an item like that then SMISA would be more than happy to work with that person. As it stands, so far, it's not something we've had time to look at.

I suppose the first obvious question is rainy day for what? Things are fairly healthy now, the club is in a good place financially and SMISA's projections are healthy too. I did mention looking at developing a side fund, but it's not been looked in to yet in any detail. There's all sorts of potential ways to handle the £2 fund, my personal view is that saving it all means you can't look at supporting the club. As this is a joint venture, you can easily argue that we should offer some support. By doing that you potentialy remove the need for a rainy day fund.

I got a refund on my away shirt. I'm awaiting home shirts in XXL being back on stock so I can exchange, but like you I'd like assurances about the badge.

They're not, never have been!

No, AFC Wimbledon's Trust are a seperate body. So, obviously, no issue with SMISA operating along that model. Once the deal is complete you may need to change the operating model, but that's probably about it. You may, as with other trusts who own their club, still have a trust feeding in to other entities.

We have a meeting tonight. The campaign is for 1,400, but it does also involve members trying to get friends and family to join.

If the members want to suggest a big spend then they can do so. I've been looking at one recently, which was suggested by a member on here. As with most it's not as simple as suggest it/do it. On this one, which I'll not detail too much just now, it would genuinely help if we were part of the club and weren't independent due to fact it would see a material change to the fixtures and fittings at pitch side. It could also require changes to the safety certificate, additional staff and even perhaps training. The item I discussed at the open day has also been mentioned on here before and once the SMDSA have run their survey and defined need it may well then be costed and added to a future vote.

I missed the initial discussions after the takeover, but I have been involved with the committee since November (I think I missed one meeting) and then voted on since the AGM. The 50K aside, let's face it very few of us were involved in putting the deal together, I'vd been around a fair bit. The USH loan, I actually gave advice that it should all have been agreed by the point we were discussing it and that I viewed it as something that could fall out with the votes at that time. I had no vote, no authority from members and just applied my business knowledge of project managing intervention projects elsewhere alongside the experience at Ebbsfleet. I was also fairly sure it wouldn't be actioned in time, but risk management doesn't tend to involve not looking to do as much as you can. A lot of the other stuff is attached to the takeover deal, so at times there's not much to say about it. There's also stuff that should have and will stay in the meeting room.

There it is! It never takes long for an accusation to appear and let me be perfectly clear, that is an accusation. Not one person at SMISA has told Jack it's a bolt on, so could it be that he'd just imagine that it would go through. It has been explained to Jack that it would be a vote, heck I was actually there on one instance when it happened. We couldn't hold it off the vote just purely because we think it will be accepted and therefore wind up a few people. That would only lead to us being ripped to pieces for not supporting Jack. So, it'll be on there and the members will make their decision. I'm really struggling to grasp what more could have been done. Demand the club doesn't fund the sports scientist, leave Jack without resource during a key stage of the season? Sit Jack down, go over the SMISA process with PowerPoint slides that fully explain the structured system design & methodology of our processes and policies? The club are the ones who've put themselves at risk here. If the vote doesn't go through then they don't get the funding. The funding that hasn't been promised and hasn't been paid.

What got out? Nothing relating to SMISA has actually happened. We haven't voted on this funding, haven't commited to it and certainly haven't funded it in any way. So just exactly what is there for members to know about? We told someone a request would be voted on, that individual misunderstood or was so busy he didn't check. It's getting more and more like the stoning scene in Life of Brian every week.

At the moment there are actually very few ways of SMISA funding the club outside of a vote. There is legacy cash, but that's drying up. The majority of the monthly subscriptions are ring fenced for consortium payments or future payments to Gordon. That leaves the £2 pot as the obvious funding vehicle at the moment. The 50K isn't in place yet, but agreement is close and may lessen requests from the club. I've mentioned before that it could be useful to have a side fund, but that's not something that's been discussed in any depth. Some members may want to contribute more, at the moment that would only be captured via direct contact. We've not had much, if any, contact on that so there's been no member appetite to be fed as such. Some members also say they don't care where there money goes. Trying to administer and facilitate that, with seperate pots or mailing list or voting categories, would be a nightmare so I can only hope those members would still vote now and again.

I'm pretty sure, Indeed certain, that Ben Gordon was released weeks ago. He either tweeted or messaged somewhere a message of thanks at the time.

It's on the vote because Jack Ross made a request and we've had members discussing their wish to support Jack. It is, quite frankly, that simple. It will be tainted, but let's be honest here and state that it'll be through the suspicions of about 9 members on a forum. The majority will believe the explanation about Jacks comments at the open day and understand these things can happen. Indeed, the email that goes out with the vote will explain what has happened. It was raised here, taken on and answered on the same day. There'd been no agreement, no funding had changed hands and it had been previously explained that there would be a vote. That is pretty much the same with any other requests from the club, aside from the obvious USH. Even the USH was a small number of people on here throwing up issues, with no emails sent in or major backlash of any sort. Believe me, I've seen backlash, seen thousands of members leave a week, members be ignored, members be lied to, members being banned and a club basically demanding more money and accusing members of being idiots. There is none of that here, just literally none, since the Buy the Buds deal was agreed and went live. Hopefully the membership of SMISA will be happy with the options within and structure of the upcoming vote. If not, let's work together to bring what's missing to the next vote. I've already had one discussion at the open day with regards the October vote, perfectly happy to have more.

SMISA would only be contributing.

Indeed, but I've stated that no decision had been made and that no finance had changed hands. There's aspects to this that can't be controlled by SMISA, which in this instance has led to innocent error and very light discussion on here.

I'm saying: 1 That the SMISA committee haven't voted to approve any contribution towards funding the sports scientist. 2 That no money has been paid by SMISA to the club for this. 3 That Jack was informed that SMISA would have to put the funding request to a vote. 4 That the funding request will be part of the upcoming spend vote and the result will be actioned accordingly. I've no idea what Jack has been told internally or whether the club decided to finance the resource anyway. That, in a way, is something SMISA can't control. As for players not making the open day, that's a completely different subject. Nobody is knowingly fooling anyone. Should the members vote against the option for the sports scientist then the funds won't be made available.

I did clarify it.

It definitely sounds like assumptions have been made. Not sure if myself and the rest of the SMISA committee need to a launch a full scale enquiry or if we can put it down to Jack getting the wrong impression.

Yes, I believe Jack has indeed jumped the gun and made some assumptions.

All I can say is that I have never voted to approve the funding. Having not missed a meeting recently that by default means that the committee have never voted to approve the funding. You are no doubt correct that rejection of the option would involve interesting discussions. I'd be stunned though if SMISA have actually paid any money, I've not seen any evidence of that having happened.

They're in this season's Joma catalogue.