The meeting commenced with the Pledge of Allegiance. Ron Wright mentioned that Rita Donaldson's visitation would be held on September 28 at the Warrenton location of the Pitman Funeral Home. There was some uncertanty as to where this will actually be held, as our website mentions the Wright City location, and other people were told that it was to be held in Wentzville. Hopefully it will be straightened out.
Dave Lucas' Acro Sport won several awards, and was on the cover of "Sport Aerobatics" magazine. We acknowledged Dave's achievements, and he was later gifted with a coupon book.
The Chapter's participation in the St. Louis County Fair and Airshow was deemed a success. We made $210.00 profit from soda and water sales. Despite this, a lively discussion ensued as to whether we will participate in future airshows. It is possible next year's airshow will be the last, so this could be a moot point. We have until next spring to defer this issue.
The Chapter earned $1,600.00 for our participation in the B-17 visit. We probably would have done better (we usually do), but another organization's last-minute B-17 visit encroached on our customer base.
President Karsten asked everybody to start thinking about nominations for standing committees. Those will be taken at the October meeting. It might be a good idea to attend that
meeting if you are interested in being on a committee.
Karsten also asked for suggestions as to equipment purchases. Some suggestions are: A large, fixed air compressor, assortment of aircraft hardware, portable swamp cooler, some aviation oil for emergencies. Be thinking about items that would see a lot of usage by various people, but is too expensive to purchase on your own, and suggest them next month.
Visitors were recognized and applauded.
Young Eagles: 106 Young Eagles were flown during the recent Silver Swallows rally. Laura Million has agreed to be our next Young Eagle Coordinator! George Stephenson is highly excited about this event, and wishes her well. Jan McKee announced a YE rally in Alton on September 30. She said they expect a turnout of 4,000 people. Everybody is invited to come and fly, or work the ground crew.
The open house at Greenville Airport on October 6-7 was announced.
Dues:
Treasurer Jim Hann stated that between our checking and savings accounts, we have more money than we need for normal expenses (actual amount is available upon request). Not only do we not have express purposes for this money, but we may be in violation of the spirit of the 501 (c) 3 rules under which we are a nonprofit organization. Therefore, we are proposing to cut dues in half (to $30.00/year). Ron Wright pointed out that we are required to announce this 2 months prior to voting on it. We only have two more meetings this year, so the vote will take place at the
November meeting. (Note that the November meeting may be held one week earlier (11/19/06) due to Thanksgiving weekend interfering with the normal meeting date.) A lively discussion ensued on this issue, with several dollar amounts being thrown about. Our fund raisers have served us well, and one school of thought says that if enough people buy grocery store coupons, we could reduce dues to $0.00/yr and still be in good shape. Another assumption is that we may
pick up enough "new" members to make up for the dues reduction. Many folks decided the value they recieved from Chapter membership wasn't worth $5.00/month, so they didn't renew. A reminder...this issue will be up for a vote in November.
Dave Doherty said that coupon books will be on sale again. The Chapter will buy 100 books this year. See Dave if you want to buy a book.
Another money saving strategy:
Newsletter printing and mailing costs constitute a significant chunk of our monthly expenses. On a normal month, we are spending $60.00 to $80.00, which amounts to $600.00 to $800.00 per year (remember that there are no newsletters in July and December). This amount can be greatly reduced if all Chapter members who have Internet access would agree to get their newsletter from our website. The bylaws state Chapter membership includes the right to a printed, mailed newsletter, but if someone VOLUNTARILY agrees to get his or her newsletter elsewhere, we can legally remove them from the mailing list. Please note that some people have been getting their newsletters in this manner for many years.
A problem arose when our editor e-mailed the newsletters directly to the members. Often, e-mail addresses were invalid, resulting in the mailings bouncing back, complete with attached newsletter. This was a big issue when dial-upwas being used. We have since posted the newsletter on the Chapter website and notified members via the Yahoo bulletin board. This has been problematic for some people who are not members of Yahoo. Therefore, we will attempt to once again contact our members directly via e-mail, but only to notify them that the newsletter is available on the website and provide a link. We encourage everybody with Internet access to avail themselves of this chance to save money while recieving the newsletter in full color and highest resolution.
