[NSRCA-discussion] FW: [NSRCA-dist7] Current NSRCA issues

[Jim Quinn]

Thanks, Dale.
 Jim Quinn 




________________________________
From: Dale Olstinske <dale at cadence.com>
To: "nsrca-discussion at lists.nsrca.org" <nsrca-discussion at lists.nsrca.org>
Sent: Tue, December 4, 2012 1:58:00 PM
Subject: [NSRCA-discussion] FW: [NSRCA-dist7] Current NSRCA issues

Jon C, Scott and Jim, glad to see you all speaking up. I for one, appreciate all 
you and the rest of the "volunteers" do for us. I believe most of the membership 
feels the same. As Jon points out below, things have not been perfect, but 
certainly the intentions were good. Keep up the good work guys.
Dale Olstinske
D7 AVP
Chairman Sequence Committee

From: nsrca-dist7-bounces at lists.nsrca.org 
[mailto:nsrca-dist7-bounces at lists.nsrca.org] On Behalf Of Jon Carter
Sent: Monday, December 03, 2012 7:05 PM
To: 'General pattern discussion'
Cc: CA, AZ, HI, NV,UT
Subject: [NSRCA-dist7] Current NSRCA issues

To all NSRCA members - There have been a few posts on the NSRCA list regarding 
our upcoming election and current issues that I think must be responded too. 
Just to be clear while I am a member of the current Board of Directors (D7 for 3 
years) and I have served as Chairman of the NSRCA Judging Committee for 4 years 
and I am running for NSRCA President, I am primarily writing this as a pattern 
flyer who happens to have some knowledge of how the NSRCA is governed. The first 
point I would like to address is the "tone" of these posts. They seem to imply 
that the Board of Directors (BoD) has some "secret" agenda to ram through these 
Bylaw changes and "disenfranchise" some portion of the membership. Please! The 
BoD is made of dedicated, active pattern flyers. We all volunteered to serve on 
the NSRCA Board because we love pattern and we want it to grow and thrive. I 
believe that every member of the BoD is an active CD and runs one or more 
pattern contests every year! Does this mean that the BoD has not made some 
mistakes? Of course not, the current BoD failed to get a general membership vote 
on these Bylaw changes that were discussed at great lengths at the July NSRCA 
BoD meeting. Then we forged ahead with an online election. This was in error. We 
had not followed the rules of our organization nor had we communicated properly 
with the membership. As soon as this was brought to the BoD's attention we 
immediately began working to rectify the mistake. It takes a little time in any 
organization to correct the course. I think that our response time of generating 
correct paper ballots and getting them mailed out was not excessive. As we move 
forward, we must ensure that our communication with the membership is both 
timely and complete.
There also seems to be a feeling that the printed K-Factor is the "only" 
official means of communicating NSRCA business to the membership. I am not a 
lawyer but I have read the Bylaws pretty carefully (especially lately!) and I 
cannot find this stated. In fact, the current Bylaws already discuss and allow 
the electronic dissemination of the K-Factor. (Note 1) When the NSRCA began it 
truly was the "only" way to communicate with the membership. That was a long 
time ago though! We now get e-mail, we read news sites devoted to pattern, we 
have an "official" NSRCA discussion list, we have dedicated NSRCA discussion 
lists for most of our individual districts, heck, even though I don't use it 
very much we have an "official" Facebook page! I certainly don't think it is too 
much of a hardship for members to subscribe to the NSRCA discussion list. That 
being said the printed K-Factor is still relied upon by a few members and we 
need to continue to keep it available. Please keep in mind though that as an 
organization I believe we need to move away from paper and towards electronic 
media! We need to carefully manage the transition but it needs to happen. I 
currently maintain my membership in 4 local AMA clubs and one AMA club in 
Indiana and they all rely on electronic communication as their primary point of 
contact with their membership!
This brings me to the actual proposed Bylaw changes. The bylaws were discussed 
at great length at the July BoD meeting. I think you will all realize when you 
receive the actual ballot in the mail; most of the Bylaw changes are minor in 
nature. Clarification, correction etc... I certainly urge a "Yes" vote on all of 
these. The significant change that has been proposed is to allow the BoD to 
choose how an election (for executive office and District vice president) is 
conducted. Putting aside conspiracy theories, the BoD is not attempting to 
disenfranchise anyone in the organization. One possible, easy way to do this is 
to have each member indicate a preference for electronic or postal communication 
with the NSRCA. (This data would be entered in their profile when they renewed) 
Then for the next election the members who want to electronically vote can and 
the members who want to vote by mail also can. These problems are certainly not 
insurmountable and I assure you there is no "vast conspiracy" involved. I urge a 
"Yes" vote on this issue also.
Another issue that has been raised is the NSRCA's relationship with the AMA. As 
I indicated in my brief resume the current BoD is well aware of this problem and 
steps are already being taken to repair this relationship. If I am elected I 
believe we can finish this process and have a strong and productive relationship 
with the AMA. Let us not forget that all of us are AMA members and that the 
NSRCA is the official SIG for pattern in the USA!
On a more positive note, what can we do to promote pattern in the USA and grow 
the NSRCA? Two areas that I believe are important are promoting F3P in the USA 
and strengthening our ties with the Classic Pattern community. In D7 we have 
started running some rounds of Classic Pattern at our AMA contests and I have 
received overwhelmingly positive feedback. If the numbers of pilots who express 
interest in this grows some clubs might actually host some Classic only events. 
The synergy here is obvious. Our current NSRCA District 7 Intermediate season 
champion started flying AMA pattern because he attended one of these "mixed" 
contests. He tried AMA pattern and he liked it! The key here is fun and the more 
flyers we expose to the fact that pattern is not a "chore"; that it can be fun 
the better! We all do this (pattern) because we love it and enjoy it, let's not 
lose sight of that.
In terms of F3P the NSRCA is the recognized promoter of F3P in the USA and I 
think we need to put some effort behind this. This is another area where we can 
leverage of the natural synergy between these two disciplines.
In summary I am excited to be a part of the AMA and the NSRCA! We have 
challenges before us but also great opportunities. If elected as NSRCA President 
I look forward to growing our organization and ensuring that we preserve and 
promote the sport of pattern in the USA.
Thanks
Jon Carter
Candidate for NSRCA President

Note 1 - from current bylaws.
Section 2 - Communications

a. There shall be a newsletter type of publication produced on a target of 
monthly basis wherever physically and fiscally possible. Normally this 
newsletter will be sent to all eligible members.  For promotional and 
communication purposes the Newsletter may also be sent to others deemed valuable 
to the purposes of the NSRCA. These other recipients may include, but are not 
limited to, officers of the AMA, and officers of other Modeling Societies and 
AMA Special Interest Groups (referred to as SIGs).

b. The editor of the Newsletter shall be appointed by the NSRCA Board of 
Directors.

c. The communication and transport of the newsletter is not limited to current 
mail services and can also employ the use of electronic options as they may 
present themselves today and in the future. (bold type added by me for emphasis)
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.nsrca.org/pipermail/nsrca-discussion/attachments/20121204/16b4d7be/attachment.html>