The Board of Directors for the Shasta Board of Realtors held their regular monthly meeting on March 26^th. Topics under discussion included these items:  Budget, Bylaws, Legislative, and Long Range Planning. Also under special consideration was the exciting new Green Task Force, for which more information will follow. Another special topic was the possible inclusion of Modoc County and/or Trinity County into the membership. Since both those groups are much smaller by comparison, they might benefit from membership and access to our program. Of interest was the recently passed deadline for membership application and renewal, which now stands at 753 members. Obviously membership is down, but within range to continue to meet budget planning requirements needed to continue our very comprehensive membership program.

At the meeting, I presented information to the Directors about the Communication Committee’s somewhat experimental online private social network community at Ning. The site is similar to Facebook in format, except that it’s private. The invitation only membership is limited to affiliates and members of our board. The idea is to promote internal communication among our group, and to capitalize on the web’s ability to develop vibrant social networks with rich content.  This could supplement MLS Bulk e-mail, but also has features that e-mail can’t match. The challenge is that since the network doesn’t yet exist, it has no real form or content yet. And until it does exist, nobody can tell if it would be useful. A few invitations have gone out, but until and unless it reaches some tipping point, it remains just a concept. I think the best way to learn about it may be to join in and try it. I posted an image below that shows how it looks. I know the image is wide and bleeds into the blog sidebar text, but I thought you should see it full size.  If you’d like to pop in, or to participate, shoot me a note in e-mail and I’ll send you an invitation. skip_murphy@hotmail.com. You can also contact Tracy Prahl at the board office to be invited at 223 0410 or tprahl@shastamls.com.  Skip Murphy