Cyberspace Communications finances for January 2002

Feb 1 14:22 UTC 2002

Here is the treasurer's report on Cyberspace Communications, Inc. finances 
through January 31st, 2002.

Beginning Balance     $5,964.35

Credits                 $528.00         Member contributions
                          $2.25         Interest
                   ------------
                        $530.25

Debits                   $72.93         Pumpkin Rent for February
                         $45.97         Electricity for January
                        $174.92         Phone Bill
                        $135.00         DSL January 15 through February 15
                          $4.08         Paypal fees (income = $120.00)
                          $1.00         Fee for our sales tax license
                        $115.51         Personal property taxes for 2001
                         $45.00         Renewal of P.O. Box
                   ------------
                        $594.41

Ending Balance        $5,900.19

Our current balance breaks down as follows:

$4,667.33               General Fund
  $148.86               Silly Hat Fund
   $60.00               Spare Parts Fund
$1,024.00               Infrastructure Fund

The money is distributed like this:

$1,597.94   Checking account
  $500.00   8-month 3.00% CD which comes due 5/28/2002
$3,802.25   Savings account earning 1.74% interest annually

There was no activity in the Grex store this month, so the balances remain at:

                         Cash                                    Stock
                     ---------                                ---------
                      $149.40                                  $162.10

We had 3 new members (jimd, vlt, and ghoshda) and one returning member 
(jep) in January.  We are currently at 98 members, 89 of whom are paid 
through at least February 15th.  (The others expired recently and are in a 
grace period.)

Notes:

- January is the month when we finally opened our savings account.  Yay!  
One cramp it puts in my style is that I will generally have to wait until 
the day after the end of the month to post the report, because that's the 
first day I can call to find out what interest we earned.

- The board voted to make aruba, janc, other, and mary the signers on both 
our checking and savings accounts for this year.

- The personal property tax we paid was for the statement of our assets as 
of December 31, 2000.  Normally we would have paid for it long before now, 
but you may recall that we were late receiving the statement (since it was 
sent to the Pumpkin), so we were late submitting it, so we were very late 
getting the bill.

- In fact the cycle wrapped around itself, because this month we also had 
to submit our personal property tax statement as of December 31st, 2001.  
STeve valued our items, and I filled out the forms and delivered them to 
City Hall.  They were on time, so I think that means our yearly bill will 
be divided into two parts.  Not sure when we'll be paying.

Thanks to everyone who contributed in January:

bruin, davel, dpfitzen, eeyore, ghoshda, jep, jimd, robh, russ, stern, 
vlt, witling, and one person who asked to remain anonymous.

Thanks everyone!

If you or your institution would like to become a member of Grex, it only
costs $6/month or $60/year.  Send money to:

Cyberspace Communications
P. O. Box 4432
Ann Arbor, MI 48106-4432

If you pay by cash or money order, please include a photocopy of some form of
ID.  I can't add you to the rolls without ID.  (If you pay with a personal
check that has your name pre-printed on it, we consider that a good enough
ID.)  Type !support or see http://www.cyberspace.org/member.html for more
info.

response 2 of 24:

Feb 4 01:36 UTC 2002

In Item 23, Response #7, we were told:

 Question: What is the tax rate?
 Answer: We take the depreciated value of our assets, divide by 2, and
 multiply by 5.8%.  That's how much we owe each year.

Running that backwards, I come up with $3983.10, which seems reasonable to
me.

response 4 of 24:

Feb 4 01:56 UTC 2002

Because Michigan uses a "state equalized value" of one-half?

response 6 of 24:

Feb 4 02:46 UTC 2002

Only people who can't divide by two.  ...Oh.  I see what you mean.

response 8 of 24:

Feb 4 03:56 UTC 2002

Re #3.9: Don't ask me, man.  But if you want to communicate with those
people, you have to talk their language.

response 14 of 24:

Feb 5 16:43 UTC 2002

The formula to figure out how much of my rent I could deduct from my 
Michigan taxes had a couple different multiplications, but that was 
because I had to compare to different values at different points to 
check my eligability, so it wasn't just gratuitous busywork.  (i.e., 
all those "write the value from line n or $xxxx, whichever is smaller" 
instructions.)

response 16 of 24:

Feb 8 09:26 UTC 2002

In 1897 the Indiana House of Representatives unanimously passed a 
measure redefining the area of a circle and the value of pi. (House 
Bill no. 246, introduced by Rep. Taylor I. Record.) The bill died in 
the state Senate. 

response 18 of 24:

Feb 8 13:14 UTC 2002

Actually, snopes.com (a resource for urban legends) says that this
one *is* true:

        http://www.snopes2.com/religion/pi.htm

(in the last paragraph)

response 20 of 24:

Feb 8 19:39 UTC 2002

I appreciate a response that goes into more detail than "that's not true".
>8)  Can you cite a reference on the mathematician story?