Letter from the President,
AGM Report
September, 2010

As in the past few years, the OHA board of Directors for 2009 / 2010 remained at four. Considering the challenges we have faced ensuring that all the essential functions are covered, the board has done a fine job not only maintaining the day-to-day function of the OHA, but also creating and implementing changes that will help us move forward into the future.

I would therefore like to sincerely thank Betty Donald, Tahir Ahmad, and Graham Butler for their support and continuing hard work on the OHA Board of Directors. Without them, the OHA would cease to function.

I would also like to thank Jennifer Pottruff and Christina Lamont, who are doing an outstanding job of answering all those emails and phone calls which have absorbed so many volunteer hours in the past.

Volunteers
One of the highlights of this year has been the emergence of new volunteers, as well as an increased interest in the association, in particular from our student members. I know many long-term members will find this particularly heartening, and a good omen for the future of the OHA.

One of our student members, Correne Omland, has created a Facebook fan page for the OHA. We are not very good at giving her enough material as yet, but I hope we can improve on that this year. I actually have no idea what a Afacebook fan page@ is, but thankfully Graham Butler has worked with Correne on behalf of the board. My thanks to both of them for helping us move into the computer age. No doubt Graham will be trying to persuade me to twitter next.

In addition, I want to thank Marianne Beacon, who continues to help arrange events for the OHA, and Joanne Kewageshig, who is keeping an eye on negative media reports for us, so we can develop more accurate and topical information for our web site. John Redden has also agreed to help out with this process, and we hope to get our web site section AHerbs in the News@ up to date in the coming year.

Also, thanks to professional members Nancy Winlove-Smith and Kathleen Leeson, for agreeing to be OHA media contacts. This job is a bit of a gamble - ranging from very quiet to total chaos, depending on media focus, so we are grateful to have their experience in this role.

When I start thanking people, I realize how many members are putting their time and effort into the OHA. Considering the size of our association, we have a much larger percentage of volunteers compared to other organizations.

To give you some idea, the average non-profit expects to get about 3% volunteer participation, and this has been falling steadily in the past few years. If I count up all the volunteers for the OHA, as well as all those members who turn up for meetings and who help in other capacities, our volunteers rate is more like 15 to 20%, and that does not include all those members who donated hundreds of hours in the past.

One of the things the board has been very conscious of over the past couple of years, is trying to make sure that no volunteers ended up with more than they can reasonably handle. In the past, we have had too many people burn out with the work. This can not continue to happen if we are to make progress, so I would like to offer my assurance to potential volunteers that we will do our best not to overwhelm you; and the same reassurance to previous volunteers who still have reservations about becoming involved again.

PMC
Still on the subject of volunteers, we have had a solid and very productive Professional Members Committee all year. Our particular thanks to Susan Elliotson, who struggles to put the meetings down on paper in a sensible format, and to Monika Ghent, who chairs the meetings and keeps us all focused and moving ahead.

The PMC have been working on more guidance documents for professional and student members. We believe that these will be very useful. You can locate them on the professional area of the OHA web site www.herbalists.on.ca. Please take a moment to visit this area if you are an eligible member. In addition to the guidance and information documents, you will also find a fascinating ebook and monographs by John Freemen, and a number of handouts contributed by members. We are always pleased to receive any additions to this area.

In addition, the PMC has tackled such monumental jobs as new entrance examinations and a new professional brochure. The list of work this committee has covered is enormous, so please check out the meeting minutes on the web site.

We presented a seminar in October of last year, AReading the Body@ with Margi Flint, which was a great success. We also have a clinical testing seminar scheduled for October 2nd of this year, and we hope to offer more seminars and workshops for our members and the general public. The OHA intends to present two different types of seminars - those where we invite known speakers into our community, and those where we promote our own members as the experts in herbal medicine in Ontario. Members are invited to submit any ideas for topics or speakers that they would like to hear, or anything that they would be interested in presenting, and hopefully we can produce more than one or two a year.

Most recently we held a barbecue for professional and student members on August 8th. 19 members attended, and I believe everyone had a good time. As this is an annual event, we will look forward to seeing more people next year.

Journal and General Membership
The Journal has been a serious concern this year. Due to falling general membership, it became financially impossible to continue production of the Journal in it=s present form. The board has outlined some of the changes which might allow us to continue publication, but as yet we are unable to find a suitable managing editor. The board remains committed to producing a quality Journal, and this will be one of the main focuses of the coming year.

Our sincere gratitude to John Redden and Christine Dennis for the outstanding job they have done producing a magazine we have been proud of. I hope we can soon create a structure which will allow it to grow and thrive.

Administration
Betty Donald has been working very hard with our web master, Harold Lass, to update and correct the information on our web site. The site has expanded dramatically over the years, and many areas have become outdated and even wrong. Betty has put a lot of hours into this project, and the information on the site is now much better organized, and mostly corrected. There are still some updates to add, but this should happen in the next few months.

One comment we have received is that our site, and in fact the overall image of the OHA, is somewhat old fashioned. Again, this should be a high priority for the board in the coming year.

Finally, the OHA board remains committed to openness. The minutes of all meetings are posted on the web site for members to read. We also continue to send out information updates whenever possible. If you have any comments about your association, about the way it is run, the direction we are going, or anything you would like to see us take on, please let us know.

At the end of the AGM in September 2010, a new board of Directors was elected in accordance with our bylaws. The following people will be serving on the board for the 2010 / 2011 year:
Rick DeSylva (Vice president), Betty Donald (Treasurer/Secretary), Susan Elliotson (Privacy officer), Monika Ghent, Diane Kent (president), Joanne Watson, and Michael Vertolli.

Betty Donald anticipates moving in the near future, and Joanne Watson will act as her backup and eventual replacement.

CCHA
Michael Vertolli and Rick DeSylva have continued as the OHA representatives to the Canadian Council of Herbalists Associations for most of this past year. However, due to the number of his commitments, Rick has decided to step down from the CCHA this year, and concentrate on areas where he feels he can be most effective. Michael has agreed to continue for now. The federal political arena seems fairly quiet at present (at least as far as herbalists are concerned), so one representative should be sufficient at present.

Events
The OHA did not attend any events this year, partially due to the volunteer hours required, but primarily because they have become less and less productive. We do not anticipate attending further events at this time, but will continue to try and have a presence if possible - literature tables, etc.