ORIGINAL: abel_pranger
ORIGINAL: Liberator
Wow you guy's want to hammer Horrace no matter what he does. I think those are pretty good rules, all pretty much common sense.
You sort of have to take one of two approaches when assigning rules. Assign some and enforce the heck out of them, or let things sort of ride and don't worry about enforcement. Oddly enough, you probably tend to get the same end result out of both approaches.
The big difference is the blood pressure level of whomever has to be the enforcer.
Liberator-
Your words sound familiar - I've heard them around one of the clubs I belong to. What I have a problem with:
Common sense rules - No such thing. People either apply common sense, or they are forced to follow rules. The club members were IMHO much more involved in the club, as contrasted to being mainly users of the field, when they held the resposibility for safety, among other things. The level of member involvement has declined proportionately to the degree of control via rules and decision-making by 'The Board' vs by the democratic process.
The approach to rules over the past several years has been toward more (IIRC, 37 at last count, so the 24 that Horrace posted for his club isn't such a much), and enforce them loosely. My problem with this is at least twofold. First, rules that are not vigorously and uniformely enforced are handy tools for control freaks that would enforce them selectively. Second, in the event of an accident, the probability that a safety rule was being broken at the time increases with the number of rules on the books. Club rules are incorporated by reference into the AMA safety code, and violating any of them could result in the voiding of insurance coverage. I'm sure it isn't just AMA either - in a big money liability situation, I don't doubt that lawyers for my HO and PUP carriers would be scouring the club books looking rules violations that would be used by them to brand my actions as reckless in argument to limit their losses.
Rules that can not or will not be enforced cause more problems than just loss of respect for them and their makers.
Abel
Abel
In your past posts, you have stated a lack of interest in being a club officer on grounds that you have personal liability concerns, IIRC. Also, IIRC, your club has at least a couple of unusual requirements placed on it by the land owner that most other clubs do not have, which you have described here, one time or another.
That being the case, how can you belittle the efforts of those that will step to the plate and run your club? If you feel that strongly, and have that much personal insurance protection, why not step up yourself, run for office in your club, and accept the potential liability you would have others accept? If successful, you can try to reduce the number of rules.
Horrace has made it clear in the past that his neck is on the block in some capacity as the trust deed holder for his club, IIRC. If, in that situation, he has had a hand in the making of rules, who is to blame him?
OTOH, some clubs, such as the one I belong to, are run with very few rules and a lot of communication between the members. When someone does something another considers rude, we can all still talk about it and resolve things. Each club is different.
Certainly, those club with members that are more risk adverse than other clubs are going to have more rules.