Lots of folks like the idea of a Regional Flying Site owned and operated by the AMA. That idea comes with a tremendous cost, both in dollars to the average modeler and in rights to the users in addition to the risks to the organization due to the increased liability of local political decisions. Most modelers are human enough not to worry if it is not THEIR ox that the politician is busy goring which speaks directly to the 'ownership' and control issues of a RFS. Most politicians willingly stick it to remote organizations that are perceived as having deep pockets while they will protect their local voters and supporters.

I am convinced that there are viable alternatives that accomplish the same end goal of more viable flying sites. Lets investigate those and discuss improvements rather than try to create a new and more expensive way to do things.

Currently there is a program within the AMA (you can find out more about it in your club's Charter Renewal Packet) whereby the AMA will participate financially in the club field development and improvement process if certain requirements are met. Lets pursue that and improve it a bit with the direction headed towards providing long term flying sites for as many as possible at a low a cost to the organization as possible. This avoids the control issues as they remain within the local community of modelers known as the 'club'. This puts the local flyer in the middle of the political process rather than the moneyed organization from afar. In fact, there are more good things that can be said about this approach than all the negative things that can be found about the RFS idea.

One of the problems with flying sites is that many are too small to provide for noise protection using distance as an effective barrier. I am sure that this is the biggest reason long term flying sites are lost around the country. So lets modify our 'program' to provide for that need. Remember, as a flying site operator (club) you do not have to USE all the land you fly over, but you do have to CONTROL it. This means the smallest effective site will allow for the recovery of downed aircraft in a fairly large area.

P-51B suggests around 80 to 90 acres, which is great just for over fly and recovery rights. However it does very little for noise complaints. Hence my comment about 150 to 250 acres. It has never been said that you could not own the surrounding land and lease it out to an agricultural operation. In fact, a good flying site only needs DIRECT absolute control of about 10 to 15 acres IF the surrounding land has PERMANENT noise exclusions (for model aircraft), over fly, and recovery rights assured by deed restriction or ownership. Personally I vote for the ownership as that insures some income to offset the acquisition expense AND (actually more importantly in some areas) it can maintain the agricultural tax definition of the land. Ten acres of 250 is trivial, but 10 acres of 50 is significant. Food for thought.

Another problem addressed in the current 'plan' is longevity. The requirement is for a long term lease or ownership of the flying site before AMA funds might be available. I think we need to define "long" term. For my club, 20 years is considered the lowest number that would be considered long term. Remember if you assume that you are going to move in X years, your entire development cost MUST be recaptured from somewhere in that time frame. Do you really want to have to recover more than 5% of your investment each and every year?

The current AMA program has no provision for investment recapture which means each and every year is a new year to the program. If we write up some sort of recapture agreement, the program can grow without impacting national dues. Something like the club will collect $X as an initiation fee for Y years and share that with the AMA until the investment (interest free?) is recovered. Or maybe just a repayment schedule. The goal is to make the program grow and effectively impact the average modeler without raiding his pocketbook.

We (the AMA) can address the above issue in several different manners. One is the definition of "long term" and another is ownership. It makes a lot of sense for the AMA to participate in the development of any field OWNED by an incorporated, Chartered AMA club. We might take that to mean that the level of financial participation for that type of field should be significantly higher than for a site leased or rented by any club, incorporated or not.

Possibly we need to investigate ways the AMA could help a local, incorporated, Chartered Club BUY its field if certain standards were met. Those standards probably should include things like the club would have to be a Chartered AMA Club for some time (3 to 5 years?) and have approval (EC?) of the club by-laws, the size of the site, and some others we need to talk about. This might mean direct financial assistance, or possibly providing a guarantee to the local financial institution financing the acquisition. That needs to be discussed and worked out in detail to make our program more effective.