Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, October 21, 2003.

1. The meeting was called to order by Renato Monteiro, OS Chair at 6:22 p.m. Present at the meeting were Stephen Billups, Tim Roughgarden, E. Alper Yildirim, Nick Sahinidis, Tamas Terlaky, Stan Uryasev, Goran Lesajo, Mary Fenelon, Marina Epelman, Stefan Voss, David M. Gay, Bob
   Fourer, Andrew Miller, Shabbir Ahmed, Mohib Tawarmalani, Leon Lasdon, Ariela Sofer, Matthew Saltzman, Victor deMiguel, Zelda Zabinsky, Suvrajeet Sen, Zsolt Ugray, Wiecek Marqatet, John Birge, Warren Adams, Monica Gentiu, Arvind Kumar, Onur Seref, Nicolas Stier, Fernando Ordongz, Julie Higle, Pitu Mivchandani, Andreas Schulz, Kevin Furman, Khosrow Mosirvazivi, Guvenc Sahin, Michelle Hanna, Ravi Ahuja, Alia Stanciu, Mihai Banciu, Andrew Hall, Janos Pinter, and Renato Monteiro.
2. OS Officer Report (by Renato Monteiro).
   1. Renato thanked the following OS officers whose terms are expiring: Eva Lee (Integer Programming), Tamas Terlaky (Linear Programming and Complementarity), and Jim Orlin (Network Flow Programming)
   2. Renato announced the results of the OS section election of officers, which was conducted via email and was completed October 10. Tamas Terlaky was elected to the position of Chair-Elect. He will serve a one year term as Chair-Elect, followed by two years as Chair. The following people were elected to serve two year terms as vice chairs: Ismael Farias (Vice Chair of Integer Programming), Florian Potra (Vice Chair of Linear Programming and Complementarity), Lisa K. Fleischer (Vice Chair of Network Flow Programming). Stephen Billups was re-elected to serve a third (and final) one year term as Secretary/Treasurer.
   3. The following Vice-chairs will serve the final year of their two-year terms: Janos Pinter (Vice-chair for global optimization), Alex Shapiro (Vice-chair for stochastic optimization), and Yin Zhang, (Vice-chair for nonlinear programming).
3. OS Chair Renato Monteiro (chair of the prize committee) awarded Tim Roughgarden the 2003 optimization prize for young researchers for his paper titled ``The Price of Anarchy is Independent of Network Topoloty.'' The prize committee consisted of Daniel Bienstock, Yinyu Ye, Christodolas A. Floudas, and Andrzej Ruszczynski. Tim was given a plaque and a check for $1000. Tim then gave a 15 minute presentation of his work.
4. Secretary/Treasurer report (by Stephen Billups):
   1. The final audited report for year 2002 indicates that the OS section received $2,178.00 in revenue from membership dues and $85.25 in interest, for a total of $2,263.25 in revenue. (NOTE: following the meeting, an accounting error was discovered at the INFORMS office, so 2002 dues revenue was underreported by roughly $900).
   2. Expenses in 2002 totaled $1900.67 from $1000 for the Optimization Prize, $118.47
      for the prize plaque, 112.10 for advertising for the Optimization Prize in SIAM News, 596.10 for refreshments for the fall meeting, and $74.00 for labor from INFORMS headquarters.
   3. The year end balance for 2002 was $9,369.74.
   4. The (unaudited, and incomplete) financial report for 2003 as of 9/30/03 indicates dues revenue of $2035.00 and expenses of $222.30 (SIAM News advertisement). Major expenses for the year have not yet been recorded. Current balance as of 9/30/03 was $11,181.70.
5. Section and Society Committee Report (by Tamas Terlaky)
   1. Tamas outlined the history of the Subdivision Council and the Section and Society Committee. Tamas also explained representation issues; in particular each society appoints its own representative to the Subdivision Council, whereas there is roughly only one representative for every 5 sections. Tamas mentioned that some of the sections are considering forming alliances so they can better control their representatives to the subdivision council.
6. Discussion of Proposal to Change Bylaws
   1. Renato Monteiro described the proposal to change the bylaws of the section. Following are the main points of the proposal:
      1. Change bylaws to elevate the status of the OS from section to society
      2. Change procedures governing amendments to the bylaws to allow voting by email and to allow the votes to be processed by a teller (such as an INFORMS staff member) instead of the Secretary/Treasurer.
      3. Change the makeup of the OS council to include only current officers plus the immediate past chair (this change reduces the size of the council by eliminating past vice-chairs), thereby streamlining decision making, and limiting the obligations of the vice chairs to their two-year term.
   2. Suvrajeet Sen asked whether we could have sections within the society. Tamas Terlaky answered that it is possible. Kathy Stecke, (INFORMS Vice President for Sections and Societies) added that we can have special interest groups inside of the society. Tamas mentioned that the next meeting of the Sections and Societies Committee is Jan. 24, 2004, and the INFORMS Board meets Feb. 18th, so transition to Society status can be completed by Feb. 18
   3. Renato Monteiro asked if anyone was opposed to the proposed changes to the Bylaws. No one was.
7. Dr. Suvrajeet Sen, Program Director of Operations Research and Service Enterprise Engineering of the Division of Design, Manufacture and Industrial Innovation of the National Science Foundation gave a 15 minutes presentation on the Operations Research and Service Enterprise Engineering Programs at NSF.
8. The meeting was adjourned at 7:35 p.m

Submitted by Stephen Billups, OS Secretary / Treasurer.