DDS4X4
October 8th, 2005, 05:17 AM
Kathy and I had planned a trip west to Yellowstone in 2005. As it worked out, we were able to represent Great Lakes at the United Annual business meeting in July at Big Sky, Montana. I apologize for this report not being very timely as I was waiting on some details from United and they were slow in coming, due to an unexpected medical issue in the United's Secretary's family.
The first day agenda consisted of Board of Director reports, Land Use reports and Association Reports. Note, if you read the latest United Voice, our report, as well others, was quite abbreviated in the Voice. Hopefully you received the Fall issue of the Voice and can read more details regarding these various reports in that issue. By the way, if you did see my picture in the Voice, for the record, I have not joined nor did I represent the Rustbelt 4X4 Trailriders Association, just ask Wayne Rainhard, he was their Delegate. Apparently an editorial error by residency, just cause we are from Ohio and not Michigan.
Tuesday started with a presentation of a Certificate of Appreciation to Montana’s Congressman Dennis Reburg for all his help with Land Use issues and retaining access to Public Lands in Montana. Note, Dennis is Montana’s only Congressman and he requests help from all our Congressmen to fight this important battle. So keep writing those letters, sending those emails and making those telephone calls and personal visits with Congressional members from your state. United President Wayne Groom then presented the Strategic Plan for United, that the Board has been working so hard on for the past year. The Board had been tasked, at the 2004 Annual meeting, with developing a membership restructuring plan to address the members needs now and into the future. The initial plan presented was very similar to the final plan that was voted on and accepted by the Delegates, but it took a lot of discussion (hours) and circling of the wagons during the Delegates Caucus before the plan was ready for a vote. WOW, was that a learning experience. My wife actually enjoyed the Caucus, but then she took debate and Roberts Rules of Order in high school.
Wednesday morning, United Treasurer Billie Jeanne Fish presented the Budget for United. Then the Delegates Caucus continued. We were originally scheduled to complete our business by noon on Wednesday, however, as indicated above, would you believe we finally wrapped up the business of the Annual Meeting by about 5:30 PM. Good thing they planned the Awards Banquet for 7:00 PM.
Briefly, the new Membership Plan approved is structured to promote United as an Association of associations and to provide rewards to those associations, like Great Lakes, that provide membership and dedication to UFWDA. The main emphasis of the restructure is in dues and votes for the associations. The Organization fee will be $1000 and it will be waived thru 2009 if all members of the organization join United. The dues are related to an individual member fee currently at $25. If all members join United the membership fee is discounted to $10, if only some of the members become members of United then their membership fee is only discounted to $15. If an Organization, such as Great Lakes has done in the past, joins United and pays for all its members to join United, its costs remain the same, at $10 per member, for 2006. There was a dues increase approved for 2007, to increase the individual dues to $30, with the full membership organization fee discounted to $15, a $5 increase per member for 2007 and no additional dues increases thru 2010!
The association voting schedule is based upon 2 votes per organization plus a graduated scale of additional votes, tied to paid United members in the Organization. As follows, for up to 99 members, 2 additional votes; 100-499 paid United members, 3 additional votes; up to 5 additional votes for greater than 1000 paid United members in the Organization. The details are in the Bylaws and SOP as printed in the Voice.
Other noteworthy topics and comments during the Annual meeting were:
- the Voice needs more good news and events stories,
- the Standby Program is again being promoted, send contact information from your Association to Carol Jensen - Pacific Northwest FWDA,
- John Stewart, United Director of Environmental Affairs, is available for seminars, just ask,
- Adopt-A-Road/Trail is a new United endeavor, get involved and Do It, send your success stories to the Forest Service to circulate among other FS districts, Carla Boucher, United Legislative Advocate, can help with this,
- Board members have been assigned regional contacts, Great Lakes is on United President Wayne Groom’s list, so expect to hear from him, Pat K, they would also like an Association contact name for Environmental and Land Use issues, do we have anyone … or volunteers ???
- Safety Awareness, Chris Tefke, United Four Wheel Drive Awareness Coordinator, would like to see more regional classes scheduled. Indiana FWDA just completed a successful series of training sessions. It can be a great promotional tool and raise some funds. He has not heard from Great Lakes, here is another opportunity for an experienced 4-wheeler to step up and fill a void within Great Lakes … anyone???
- Communications, when receiving an email from someone within the organized Four Wheel Drive community, as a courtesy, please at least respond immediately with an " acknowledge receipt" message so the sender knows you received the message and it didn’t disappear in cyberspace.
The Awards Banquet started off with a plentiful array of ribs and chicken on the Montana Smokehouse buffet. The usual awards were presented with the United Four Wheeler of the Year going to Mickey Goodweiler of the Nevada United Four Wheelers Association, with Delegate Phil Bender accepting on Mickey’s behalf. The United WWWebsite award was reinstated and there was a tie for first place between Southern FWDA and Colorado Association of FWD Clubs. GREAT LAKES website was mention as a third place finisher, not bad considering there was no second place! Congratulations and an ATTA BOY go out to previous webmasters Jeremy Vohwinkle and Frank White and current webmaster Sean Spaniol.
To check out the United link to our website, go here http://www.ufwda.org/web_awards.htm
The United website currently has links to summaries of many of the presentations at the annual meeting. One goal of United’s is to be a resource center for full size four wheel drive enthusiasts. Check it out at http://ufwda.org there is a lot of information.
The 2006 United Annual meeting will be held in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, so GLFWDA should have plenty of representation there. The dates are July 12-14, 2006 at the Double Tree Inn. Southern 4WDA is the host with trail rides at Wind Rock OHV Area.
We enjoyed meeting new wheelers and putting a face with a name for many we have read about in the United Voice. Thanks for the opportunity to represent a GREAT Great Lakes Four Wheel Drive Association. By the time we made it back to Ohio, we had added more than 5000 miles to the Grand’s odometer. Today I say, better in July than in September, with the price of gasoline. We are just thankful it was a SAFE trip. Get out and have FUN!
The first day agenda consisted of Board of Director reports, Land Use reports and Association Reports. Note, if you read the latest United Voice, our report, as well others, was quite abbreviated in the Voice. Hopefully you received the Fall issue of the Voice and can read more details regarding these various reports in that issue. By the way, if you did see my picture in the Voice, for the record, I have not joined nor did I represent the Rustbelt 4X4 Trailriders Association, just ask Wayne Rainhard, he was their Delegate. Apparently an editorial error by residency, just cause we are from Ohio and not Michigan.
Tuesday started with a presentation of a Certificate of Appreciation to Montana’s Congressman Dennis Reburg for all his help with Land Use issues and retaining access to Public Lands in Montana. Note, Dennis is Montana’s only Congressman and he requests help from all our Congressmen to fight this important battle. So keep writing those letters, sending those emails and making those telephone calls and personal visits with Congressional members from your state. United President Wayne Groom then presented the Strategic Plan for United, that the Board has been working so hard on for the past year. The Board had been tasked, at the 2004 Annual meeting, with developing a membership restructuring plan to address the members needs now and into the future. The initial plan presented was very similar to the final plan that was voted on and accepted by the Delegates, but it took a lot of discussion (hours) and circling of the wagons during the Delegates Caucus before the plan was ready for a vote. WOW, was that a learning experience. My wife actually enjoyed the Caucus, but then she took debate and Roberts Rules of Order in high school.
Wednesday morning, United Treasurer Billie Jeanne Fish presented the Budget for United. Then the Delegates Caucus continued. We were originally scheduled to complete our business by noon on Wednesday, however, as indicated above, would you believe we finally wrapped up the business of the Annual Meeting by about 5:30 PM. Good thing they planned the Awards Banquet for 7:00 PM.
Briefly, the new Membership Plan approved is structured to promote United as an Association of associations and to provide rewards to those associations, like Great Lakes, that provide membership and dedication to UFWDA. The main emphasis of the restructure is in dues and votes for the associations. The Organization fee will be $1000 and it will be waived thru 2009 if all members of the organization join United. The dues are related to an individual member fee currently at $25. If all members join United the membership fee is discounted to $10, if only some of the members become members of United then their membership fee is only discounted to $15. If an Organization, such as Great Lakes has done in the past, joins United and pays for all its members to join United, its costs remain the same, at $10 per member, for 2006. There was a dues increase approved for 2007, to increase the individual dues to $30, with the full membership organization fee discounted to $15, a $5 increase per member for 2007 and no additional dues increases thru 2010!
The association voting schedule is based upon 2 votes per organization plus a graduated scale of additional votes, tied to paid United members in the Organization. As follows, for up to 99 members, 2 additional votes; 100-499 paid United members, 3 additional votes; up to 5 additional votes for greater than 1000 paid United members in the Organization. The details are in the Bylaws and SOP as printed in the Voice.
Other noteworthy topics and comments during the Annual meeting were:
- the Voice needs more good news and events stories,
- the Standby Program is again being promoted, send contact information from your Association to Carol Jensen - Pacific Northwest FWDA,
- John Stewart, United Director of Environmental Affairs, is available for seminars, just ask,
- Adopt-A-Road/Trail is a new United endeavor, get involved and Do It, send your success stories to the Forest Service to circulate among other FS districts, Carla Boucher, United Legislative Advocate, can help with this,
- Board members have been assigned regional contacts, Great Lakes is on United President Wayne Groom’s list, so expect to hear from him, Pat K, they would also like an Association contact name for Environmental and Land Use issues, do we have anyone … or volunteers ???
- Safety Awareness, Chris Tefke, United Four Wheel Drive Awareness Coordinator, would like to see more regional classes scheduled. Indiana FWDA just completed a successful series of training sessions. It can be a great promotional tool and raise some funds. He has not heard from Great Lakes, here is another opportunity for an experienced 4-wheeler to step up and fill a void within Great Lakes … anyone???
- Communications, when receiving an email from someone within the organized Four Wheel Drive community, as a courtesy, please at least respond immediately with an " acknowledge receipt" message so the sender knows you received the message and it didn’t disappear in cyberspace.
The Awards Banquet started off with a plentiful array of ribs and chicken on the Montana Smokehouse buffet. The usual awards were presented with the United Four Wheeler of the Year going to Mickey Goodweiler of the Nevada United Four Wheelers Association, with Delegate Phil Bender accepting on Mickey’s behalf. The United WWWebsite award was reinstated and there was a tie for first place between Southern FWDA and Colorado Association of FWD Clubs. GREAT LAKES website was mention as a third place finisher, not bad considering there was no second place! Congratulations and an ATTA BOY go out to previous webmasters Jeremy Vohwinkle and Frank White and current webmaster Sean Spaniol.
To check out the United link to our website, go here http://www.ufwda.org/web_awards.htm
The United website currently has links to summaries of many of the presentations at the annual meeting. One goal of United’s is to be a resource center for full size four wheel drive enthusiasts. Check it out at http://ufwda.org there is a lot of information.
The 2006 United Annual meeting will be held in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, so GLFWDA should have plenty of representation there. The dates are July 12-14, 2006 at the Double Tree Inn. Southern 4WDA is the host with trail rides at Wind Rock OHV Area.
We enjoyed meeting new wheelers and putting a face with a name for many we have read about in the United Voice. Thanks for the opportunity to represent a GREAT Great Lakes Four Wheel Drive Association. By the time we made it back to Ohio, we had added more than 5000 miles to the Grand’s odometer. Today I say, better in July than in September, with the price of gasoline. We are just thankful it was a SAFE trip. Get out and have FUN!