JR,

The demands and requirements would change once we had enough people on the council and a president elected. That list would be cut in half as doing away with some of the things I outlined makes them obsolete. Writing the column, taking pictures, traveling to every show. Also, the VP's would get paid an annual salary of some kind commensurate with the time they need to put in to play their part. In reality as the AMA moves from this organization to more of a buyers club for insurance and perhaps a lobbying effort for FCC the need for district vp's and so on would be eliminated. Keep in mind those vp's are all involved in meets and contests yet they rarely do more than show up and attend it. It is the responsibility of each club to handle it's meets and contests. They can have their own CD's and what is the only requirement normally you ask? AMA insurance coverage...

The need and requirements of VP's under my plan is reduced and perhaps eventually eliminated. While many of you want the AMA to continue to deal with making contest rules and the nats the bottom line is that only a handful of the 178,000 AMA members use those services and the MAJORITY I believe could just as well live happily ever after without them.

So right now the attractiveness of the job doesn't look great but if we have enough people on the council these rules and requirements would be changed.

I know my club/field is average. Why? Because I've been through about a half dozen of them in my life in different locations and they are all about the same. Bunch of sport flyers who just want to fly and have fun and must have AMA to fly at the fields. Average guy is 52 years old and retired but there are quite a few younger flyers mixed in. An extremely small percentage of any of them ever participated in a contest or went to one. Their main goal is this. And this is the important one if you read nothing else. Build, go to the field, talk a bit, fly a bit, talk some more, go home... If your local club/field varies from this it is by far the exception and not the rule.

I'm sure if members could pay half of what they pay now in dues for insurance and FCC lobby services only they would vote quite strongly in favor. With every dollar going to good and fair use the AMA would achieve what I believe it's biggest goal is "to service the wants and needs of the membership".