ASSOCIATION MEETING & AWARDS EVENT

Please join us Monday, April 28, for our Annual Association & Awards Meeting.

The Program will include: 

● Membership Awards 

● President Awards to councils and units 

● Announcement of First District Commemorative Scholarship winners 

● Honorary Service Awards  

● Dinner and More!

Wendy Tateishi, VP Membership

membership@pta1.org

CALIFORNIA STATE PTA CONVENTION

The registration for CAPTA Convention is going on now. We encourage councils, units, and out-of-council units to attend, if possible.

Conventions are an excellent opportunity for all PTA leaders to connect, train, advocate, and return valuable information to your unit and councils. Please, share with all units and encourage them to attend!

Convention delegates will vote on the incoming Board of Directors, several resolutions, and bylaw updates. By sending voting delegates to Convention, you ensure your association’s voice gets heard.

Please check your bylaws on how many delegates per association can attend. Also, as a safe practice, please make a motion and record in your minutes who your delegates are, and the expenditures allowed (per diem food, mileage, hotel).

A reminder of voting delegates by PTA level:



    District PTA Voting Delegates = 3 maximum

    Council PTA Voting Delegates = 2 maximum

    Unit PTA Voting Delegates:

         15 – 250 members = 2

         251 - 500 members = 3

        501 – 750 members = 4

     751 – 1,000 members = 5 voting delegates



Each level of PTA can send as many non-voting delegates as your association votes to send.

Our First District PTA convention dinner is on Friday, May 2, 2025, at 6:30 PM.

Convention registration for voting delegates is open until 5:59 PM on Friday, May 2, 2025.

Please feel free to reach out to me with any questions.

Mariana Bustos, VP Special Events

districtevents@pta1.org

REPORTS NO LONGER NEEDED

As of 2025, historians are no longer required to submit a Historian Report to First District. 

The change was announced at the February 24, 2025 FDPTA Association meeting. California State PTA leadership voted this year to eliminate the requirement. The reason behind that decision was that the data is no longer being utilized and the submission compliance rate state-wide was a struggle for districts.

Some additional information to consider:

• Given the change in the reporting requirement, PTAs may want to consider whether or not they wants to keep the historian position, and if so, what sorts of duties that position should have. In many PTAs, the historian position had evolved into simply being the tracker of hours. However, in some councils and units, historians have other responsibilities — like planning the Founders Day celebration. Here’s a page from the CAPTA website that describes other things that can fall into a historian’s duties, depending on the unit or council’s traditions or desires: https://capta.org/how-to-incorporate-your-historians-work-into-your-pta-all-year/.
• Units may want to consider if precious volunteer time is best spent in a historian role — especially units and councils with limited volunteer/exec board participation. Units and councils that have trouble meeting quorum or lack other important positions might want to consider looking at their bylaws and thinking about which positions they truly want to have as part of their executive board. For example, units and councils that don’t currently have a Membership VP or a Legislation VP may want to consider if a historian position should be replaced by one of these positions that is directly aligned with the essential mission of PTA. Note that any changes to positions requires a bylaws revision through the standard bylaws update process.
• For units and councils that currently have historian as one of the positions in their bylaws, it is still a formal seat on the executive board. As a result, the PTA should still plan to fill it for 2025-2026. It’s just that one of the main duties of historians (submitting the historian report up through channels) is no longer needed.



• We do not presently know if or when the bylaws template will be automatically updated by California State PTA to reflect any changes regarding historians, but the 2024 bylaw template from 10/24 has some language that now shows the historian as an optional position, similar to a financial secretary (optional positions are italicized):

• ARTICLE V – OFFICERS AND THEIR ELECTION
• ***SECTION 1. Each officer or board member of this association shall be a member of this association.
• SECTION 2. The officers of this association shall be a president, executive vice president, _______________ (_____) vice presidents, recording secretary, corresponding secretary, treasurer, financial secretary, financial reviewer, historian, and parliamentarian. These officers shall be elected annually with the exception of the corresponding secretary and the parliamentarian, who shall be appointed by the president subject to the ratification of the executive board.
• For units that files a 990-EZ for State Tax Return: the 990-EZ form asks for a list of officers on page 2, Part IV, and asks for an average number of hours per week devoted to the position. Some units used the historian spreadsheet info to populate these fields. However, rather than pulling from a comprehensive historian spreadsheet, the PTA can just ask each officer for an estimate of their average hours per week and put that in this section.

Historian Job Description (From Nov 2024 Toolkit on capta.org) – Note: the content regarding collecting and recording volunteer hours is now obsolete.

Jennifer Vargo, Secretary

secretary@pta1.org

ELECTIONS

Every year, PTAs elect officers for the following year at an Association meeting. The timing of your annual election meeting is dictated in your bylaws (Bylaws, Article V, Section 7) and should be no later than the second week of April. This date helps to ensure a smooth transition for incoming board members, giving them time to meet with their predecessors and receive materials. It also allows the president-elect, and members of the new board, time to attend the California State PTA Convention and First District PTA Leadership Conference training. 

Hopefully, your Nominating Committees have been hard at work selecting the best candidates for each of the offices in your PTA. Once the slate has been completed, a nominating committee report is signed by each member of the committee and provided to the association at least 28 days in advance of the election meeting (Bylaws, Article V, Section 4e).

The annual election meeting is planned and run by the president. The president gives a 30 days’ written notice of the election meeting, as stated in the bylaws (Bylaws, Article VII, Section 2). The president adds “Election of Officers” on the agenda under “New Business.” The secretary or the Membership VP needs to bring a current membership list to the meeting to verify eligibility to vote and to be nominated. Only members who attend the meeting and have been members for at least 30 days, and whose dues are paid, are eligible to vote at the election or to hold office (Bylaws, Article V, Section 5).

To hold the election, the president first asks the parliamentarian to read the parts of the Bylaws pertaining to Nominations and Elections (Article V, Sections 1, 2, 4a, 4e, 5 to 8, and 11). Next, the president asks the chair of the Nominating Committee to give the Report of the Nominating Committee. The chairperson of the Nominating Committee reads the report and notes any changes to the publicized slate. The president then restates the slate and asks each person to stand as their name is called. Next, the president calls for nominations from the floor. The president should restate the nominee for each office, and then ask for nominations from the floor. After asking for nominations from the floor, the president closes the nominations.

If there is only one nominee for each board position, the president then calls for a voice vote stating “The bylaws state that if there is one nominee for an office, a ballot may be dispensed with and the election held by voice vote. Is there any objection to this procedure? Hearing none, the following are presented for election” and re-reads the slate. Then the president calls for the vote for the slate, saying “All those in favor say ‘aye,’ those opposed say ‘no.’”

If there are two or more nominees for an office, the election must be held by ballot. The president appoints a tellers committee with a chairperson and at least two tellers. Tellers distribute, collect, and count the ballots. The results are reported in writing to the president by the tellers committee with the following information: 



• Total eligible voters
• Total votes cast
• Number needed to elect (majority vote – ½ + 1)
• Number of votes received by each nominee.

The president announces the voting results and who is elected, but the number of votes cast for each nominee is not announced unless requested. The complete tellers report is recorded in the minutes. The chairperson of the tellers committee then makes a motion to destroy the ballots.

All PTA officers, including the parliamentarian, have the same voting privileges as other members. To protect the impartiality of the chair of the meeting, the president should only vote when the vote is by ballot.

For information about elections, check the First District website bylaws and parliamentary procedure page, and the CAPTA toolkit nominations and elections page.

If your association has not yet elected your nominating committee, contact me for guidance on how to proceed.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions regarding elections or any other parliamentary and bylaws procedures.

Lenka Kendall, Parliamentarian

parliamentarian@pta1.org

COMPLETE AND UPLOAD YOUR FINANCIAL REVIEWS

MID-YEAR FINANCIAL REVIEW REPORTS ARE DUE NOW!



All unit and council PTAs must conduct financial reviews semiannually (twice per year) or upon the resignation of the treasurer, financial secretary, or any check signer or at any time deemed necessary by the executive board.

Financial reviews are required by both our insurance company and the California Attorney General’s office to ensure that PTA funds are being spent on expenses and purchases that the association has approved, and that the money is being accounted for correctly and transparently. Failure to perform these reviews can result in the insurance company not paying claims if theft or mismanagement of funds is suspected.

FINANCIAL REVIEW SCHEDULE



The schedule for your PTA’s financial review is based on your PTA’s fiscal year. If you are unsure about your fiscal year, check your PTA’s bylaws.

Fiscal Year July 1 to June 30

• Mid-year financial review period is July 1 to December 31
• Year-end financial review period is January 1 to June 30

Fiscal Year June 1 to May 31

• Mid-year financial review period is June 1 to November 30
• Year-end financial review period is December 1 to May 31

For more information about conducting the financial review, please visit the California State PTA Online Toolkit:

PTA Financial Review

• Financial Review Schedule
• Purpose of a Financial Review
• Preparation for a Financial Review
• Financial Review Procedure and Recommendations
• Financial Review Report

FINANCIAL REVIEW FORMS – Both of the forms below must be completed for EACH bank or merchant account your PTA owns, including all checking accounts, savings accounts, and PayPal/Square accounts.

• Financial Review Checklist
• Financial Review Report

Questions? Council PTAs and out-of-council PTA units, contact your First District PTA mentor. In-council PTAs, contact your council finance team.

CALIFORNIA STATE PTA LEGISLATION CONFERENCE

In January, we had 28 PTA members representing First District PTA at the California State PTA Legislation Conference. We had the opportunity to learn about the top issues facing our schools in California and met with 5 legislators. 

If your unit or council didn’t have a representative in Sacramento, please make plans to join us in 2026!

Visit our website to see past issues of "You Heard it Here First!"