The New Hampshire State Dental Society “season” has begun with a Board of Trustees Meeting held in Concord at the state society office on Thursday, September 14th. As with most “first meetings”, this one ran long – three and a half hours long! But a lot of issues were discussed and I will share those with you. A summary can also be found at http://www.nhds.org/members/index.cfm.

 

But first a word about the Trustee position. There are nine Trustees, one from each geographic component making up the state society. The Trustee is not appointed by the component President, but nominated for a two year term. If there is more than one nomination for the position, then a state-wide election at the annual state meeting would determine the result. This never happens since there’s never more than one volunteer for the position. Why mention it then? Because it points out that the Trustee doesn’t represent just the interests of his/her component, but is a state officer representing the entire state.

 

The discussions:

 

  1. Dental students can now be members of NHDS. It was decided to waive the dues of the first ten student applicants. There are currently two student members.

 

  1. The annual budget was presented by Treasurer Dr. Rich Berryman. Although the budget showed a slight deficit ($28,000), we were assured we’d be fine by the end of the year.

 

  1. There was a long discussion of Dental Society Governance. It was a kind of quality assurance review of the effectiveness of the State Society as a representative of member dentists. We barely scratched the surface, but did discuss some other possible models for representation. We’ll hear a lot more about this as time goes on.

 

  1. Dr. Howard Bookman will be stepping down as the editor of the Society’s newsletter after the fall issue. Past president Dr. Chuck Albee is currently the front runner to fill that position. The position of editor had previously had no structure, so we spent considerable time discussing the selection process and length of term.

 

  1. We talked about the next annual State Society meeting to be held 17-19 May, 2007 in Meredith at the Inn at Church Landing. I would urge all of you to consider attending. I’ve been the past two years and it is a GREAT meeting. CE, entertainment and the accommodations are fantastic. It would be even better if we could get a group to go!!

 

  1. An extensive report was presented highlighting information on twelve Not-for-Profit dental clinics across the state. The report might serve as a valuable reference for future ventures.  

 

  1. NHDS will explore establishment of a Discussion Forum on its website, with hopes of developing information sharing and mentorship.

 

  1. The BOT resolved to seek information pertaining to the application and acceptance statistics of the hygiene and assisting programs of the NHTI. There is some confusion about the number of graduates of the two programs.

 

  1. Whew!

 

I respectfully submit this summary report of the BOT meeting. I apologize for any errors or omissions that may appear as a result of my interpretations.

 

Terry Bradigan, DDS, Trustee