A BIG thank you to the more than 200 Deep Roots Owners who attended our Annual Meeting and/or who voted in the recent election. The Annual Owners Meeting’s energy was boosted by our Benefit Concert that followed, with electric music all afternoon provided by the talented rock and Americana musicians of College Hill Kids. The band donated their services and attendees opened their wallets, raising money for our co-op. THANK YOU!!
The Annual Owners Meeting is a time when the co-op’s decision making is in our owners’ hands, and you spoke out! We are pleased to present here the election results for new board members and by-law changes.
2025 Board Members Elected: The top vote getters this year were incumbents Spoma Jovanovic and Cecelia Allen, so they have been re-elected to three-year terms. Andrea Li was also elected to a three-year term, her first on our Board of Directors. Congratulations to all three and welcome aboard to Andrea! And, for the first time in Deep Roots’ history, we will have a run-off ballot for the fourth board seat which will be for a one-year term (to fulfill an early vacated board seat). Benjamin Free and Lisa Hinton Donkor both received the same number of votes on the first ballot. Active owners (those who’ve made purchases in the last year), please look for the email soon providing instructions for how to cast your vote in the run-off election. Remember, you can read more about Ben and Lisa here.
Our deep appreciation goes to all the other candidates, all of whom were exceptional people with talents and interests that made voting difficult for us all. We hope to see them run again for a board seat—we have openings every year. Better yet, we hope they and all other owners will consider investing time on one of our board committees (or propose a new project or committee). Thanks again to the other candidates: Lisa Blakley, Hanna Garner, Brandon Martin, Jonathan Stephens, Rykiell Turner, and Pennington Vanstory.
By-Law Changes: All the proposed by-law changes passed with wide margins. Please see here for the proposed changes and rationale: Proposal #1: 197 for, 5 against; Proposal #2: 196 for, 3 against; Proposal #3: 192 for, 9 against; Proposal #4, 194 for, 8 against.
Thanks to the 2024-2025 Board Members: As we wind up the board’s working year, I want to extend my personal thanks to the 2024-2025 board members for their service this past year. They were exemplary in every way and continually put the interests of all owners at the front of the oversight and planning as directors.
Though all board members contribute to deliberations, planning, and decision making, they also take on special tasks. Brittany Peters and Mollie Blafer led our Board Development Committee which yielded a record 11 candidates this year for the Board of Directors. Their attention to the legal requirements of the process and needs of the candidates displayed care and kindness throughout. Cecelia Allen, Joel Landau, and Khaila Daye did the meticulous, thorough, and important work of updating policy governance and by-laws documents. Drew Dix and Mollie Blafer managed with staff members GM Matt Davis and Outreach Coordinator Genesis McCarty many new promotional videos, fundraising programs, and planning for our successful Annual Owners Meeting. Joel Landau, Debra Smith, and Khaila Daye spearheaded research and investigated options and discussions for among other financial issues, our LIMe program, owner equity, and the owner loan pay-back process. These matters are critical to the long-term financial well-being of the co-op. A big round of thanks as well to our board members who served Deep Roots for several years but had to step aside before their terms expired, Eric Smith and Suzanne Wilcox.
In addition to providing oversight and feedback to the General Manager and abiding by proper governance procedures, your Board of Directors moved $100,000 off the debt side of our balance sheet this year. We have more to do, but due to the generous support of owner-lenders, who forgave interest and/or portions of their original loans, we were able to pay back more owners than ever. We are committed to continuing an accelerated pay back schedule to owner-lenders, as store finances permit.