Well, thanks guys. It shows that sincere thought was given before responding. I now realize this is a difficult question, but it really shouldn't be. This is unfortunate and poses a potentially tremendous personal financial risk for people wanting and willing to serve. I have been in a court room one time in my life on a business related issue. The judge ruled in our favor, but the legal expenses and the financial losses encountered by our company while this dragged through the legal process were staggering. It was truly an unbelievable experience. I hope I never have to go through it again.

I know of friends who have spent in excess of $30,000 just for personal legal representation. In all cases they won, but the expense for representation was devastating for them when unprepared. Lord knows how they would have survived had the judged ruled against them. I mean, who has in excess of 30K laying around for something like this, and for a hobby to boot?

Yes, our club is incorporated and we will have to address the issue raised about including such when listing the name of the club. Likewise, here is what I learned from your input. I need to contact two people. Carl Maroney with AMA and Larry Johnson, but Larry isn't available to the membership so he is out. That leads me back to Carl. It also sounds like taking out a commercial policy specifically for the leadership is something to look into if I can't get specific responses to my questions from Carl. I wonder how many clubs do this? I wonder how many officers and CD's think about it?

As with any insurance company, things like fraud among other illegal issues will leave you high and dry, and with greater problems than merely financial. The examples I provided were under the assumption that club business and functionality are within AMA policy expectations. Here is the kicker. Regardless of how well a club or event is run, unintentional errors can and will enter into a host of scenarios that would be extremely difficult to list. The question still remains. Will the AMA insurance coverage pay for individual legal representation and damages, or are the leaders and CD's of our clubs at personal financial risk? I honestly don't know the answer. Not meant to be sarcastic, but you guys don't know either, or the answer is, it depends. Well, as far as I'm concerned the only logical response to this is that unless the AMA states otherwise you have to assume you aren't covered by the insurance. You darn sure wouldn't want to find out the answers when it comes time to get an attorney.

After posting my original questions, and before realizing that Carl Maroney would be to best go to person, I drafted an email to Dave Brown asking the same questions. I am going to send Dave another email stating that I understand that Carl is the person I should have sent the email to and then copy Carl. Let's hope for a favorable response. From your input, I should expect more vague responses. I hope not.

Thank you for your time and input. I will let you know what I learn from this, but I won't be serving in any capacity in the future until I have confidence in the answers.