The Blue Hill Co-op Board
The Co-op is organized as a cooperative under Maine law and, as such is owned and controlled by those who hold equity in the corporation and who receive dividends based on the Co-op's earnings and the patronage of each owner.
The Co-op's board of directors creates and monitors policies used by the store's General Manager to guide operations. This process is know as Policy Governance and has been used and refined by the Co-op for most of the past ten years.
The board is elected by the owners and, in turn, hires the General Manager. There are monthly board meetings and board members also take on specific tasks or hold board offices as a part of their service. Board members are not paid for thier work for the cooperative.
Newly Elected Board Members -- September 2009
The new board members are:
Henrietta Clews, Blue Hill
Scott Howell, Blue Hill
Heather Morrison, Blue Hill
Mia Strong, Sedgwick
Ruth Sullivan, Blue Hill
These five will join Chip Angell and Becky McCall on the board. Co-op board representatives serve three-year terms and may stand for re-election. Outgoing board members are Gail Bartlett, Bob Sullivan, Erich Reed, and Deborah Wiggs.
News About the Election
The Blue Hill Co-op recently held an election for their board of directors, which concluded at their annual meeting of owners on Sept. 20.
Five new board representatives were elected to serve three-year terms: Henrietta Clews (nurse-midwife from Blue Hill), Scott Howell (carpenter and farmer from Blue Hill), Heather Morrison (nurse anesthetist from Blue Hill), Mia Strong (community organizer, homeschooling mom, and former business owner from Sedgwick), and Ruth Sullivan (former Co-op Membership & Marketing Coordinator and Cheese Dept. Manager from Blue Hill). They join Chip Angell of Brooklin and Becky McCall of Blue Hill to make up the 2009-2010 Co-op Board of Directors.
Besides honoring outgoing board members, the annual meeting included reports from the board and general manager, statements by the candidates, a potluck dinner, door prizes, and musical entertainment. Prizes were donated by the following individuals and businesses: author Jane Crosen; Strawberry Hill Farms; Zero Balancing with Benjamin Fox; David Walker & Blue Hill Yoga; author and artist Barbara JOY Hare; David’s Folly Farm; and the Blue Hill Co-op Community Market & Café.
Winners of the door prizes were: Steve Benson, Nancy Boothby, Karen Doherty, Edee Howland, Eileen Mielenhausen, Phil Norris, Cecily Page, and Anne Walker.
Special thanks to Lucy Benjamin for assistance with coordinating the annual meeting and to Kevin Poland & Maine Weather for donating their time and talent as musicians.
Gail Bartlett Honored
Gail Bartlett, who has served in numerous capacities at the Co-op, retired from six years of service on the Co-op Board on September 20. At the recent Annual Meeting, Chip Angell honored the outgoing board members, thanking them for their dedication and service. Special metion was made of the award received in June by Gail who served as President recently and whose leadership helped to solidify and elucidate much of the Co-op's underlying structure, policies and by-laws.
Gail is pictured here in Pittsburgh receiving the Howard K. Bowers Fund Award for Cooperative Board Leadership. This is a national award, given to one outstanding co-op leader each year. It is a great honor for Gail, for our Co-op and for our community.
The award, given by the Cooperative Development Foundation, was presented to Gail in Pittsburgh last June by by Karen Doherty, Blue Hill Co-op General Manager.
More About the Co-op Board
Though the Co-op Community Market and Café is the only enterprise operated by Blue Hill Co-op, Inc., it could, in theory, also run other businesses for the benefit of its owners. Note that, other than the owners, there are no outside shareholders or governors.
Meetings of the Board of Directors are currently held the third Tuesday of every month starting at 6:30 p.m. at the Blue Hill Public Library. Owners are welcome to attend and there is a short time at the opening of the meeting for comments from individual owners.
Board contact information as well as a variety of ways in which owners and community members can communicate with the Co-op may be found by clicking this link.
The Ends Policies define the overarching values and purposes of the Co-op.
Minutes of recent Board meetings are available in pdf format.
The by-laws governing the Blue Hill Co-op may be found here.
If you are a Co-op owner and would like to receive a board member application, please contact Eileen at 374-2165 or at membership@bluehill.coop. Thanks for your consideration!
