Gene Klodzen
07-17-2001, 07:46 AM
The following unofficial observations were submitted by John Hubby for your information.
To all Chapters and Members
The NAWCC conducted its Annual Business Meeting at the National
Convention in New Orleans on Friday, July 13, 2001. The following will
provide a general summary of the actions taken at the meeting for your
information. Please note these are NOT the official minutes, which will
be reported later this year.
Should you have any questions about this, please contact me at
pastimes@juno.com.
John Hubby FNAWCC
2nd Vice President
---------------------------------------------------------------
The 2001 NAWCC Annual Business Meeting commenced at 8:00 am, presided by
outgoing President George Orr. The meeting was called to order, and
President Orr advised that copies of the audited financial statements for
fiscal year 2001 were available at the back of the room.
The minutes of the 2000 Annual Business Meeting, which were published in
the October 2000 Bulletin, were approved.
President Orr noted that the Bylaws require that the election of Officers
and Directors, and approval of Bylaw changes be certified. He stated
this had been done as required by the Chairman of the Nominating and
Election Committee.
The President's report was then presented. President Orr noted there had
been numerous changes during his administration. These included several
staff changes including the hiring of a new Executive Director, Dr. Nancy
Connelly, a new School of Horology Director, and an Assistant Curator.
Previous Treasurer Gerry Freedman had resigned, and David Wood had been
appointed Treasurer. Significant changes have since been made in the
budget process and how the financials are reported, including a monthly
financial report available to the members. There have been substantial
cost reductions including the combined mailing of the Bulletin and the
MART. A major continuing concern is the decline in membership, which has
been about 2 to 3 percent but appears to have increased recently to as
much as 6 percent on an annual basis.
President Orr reported that efforts have been increased to focus on
membership retention. A mentoring program has been sent to all Chapters
among other efforts that have been made. He also reported great success
with the Suitcase Instruction Program and asked all interested to contact
Fred Tischler. He then introduced the new Executive Director, Dr. Nancy
Connelly.
Dr. Connelly presented her report, and stated that in the four months she
has been in Columbia her focus has been to create a team effort and to
integrate various departments to work together. The School of Horology
now has a new Director, and the course work is under review to consider
possible courses in conservation, more basic clock repair training, and
other improvements. A lot of time has been spent to improve community
relations and to work with volunteers. She also noted there has been
some success from the grant writing program she had been working on prior
to being appointed Executive Director, and that additional grants were
expected to be received. Finally, she observed that the AAM
self-assessment program for Museum accreditation was well in hand and she
expected to meet the August 15 filing date.
David Wood then presented the Treasurer's Report. He noted that the
Bylaws require the audited financials to be presented at the Annual
Business Meeting, and that copies were available for those interested.
He also mentioned that a memo has been included with the reports which
should help people understand the report. He stated that fiscal year
2001, which ended March 31, had been a difficult year. Although the
audited report shows assets over $11 million, we are asset rich and cash
poor. Revenues for the year were slightly less than expenses, and we had
to tap reserves to pay some bills. Overall expenses are rising in spite
of significant cost reductions in several areas due to inflation,
salaries, etc. While this can be managed in the short term, for the long
term it would be intolerable and additional funds must be found to
support operations. Membership dues were tracking generally to budget
during most of the year but a definite decrease has been seen in the
first two months of this financial year.
Treasurer Wood also mentioned that the budget process had been changed to
broaden the input and include key staff in setting the premises. Other
improvements have seen a tightened spending behavior and the start of
building of the Museum and Library Endowment Funds.
Incoming President Doug Cowan then took charge of the meeting. He said
he was strongly impressed by the size of the task ahead, and was taking
action to change how Council do business. Major delegations of tasks
have been made which previously were mostly done by the President.
These delegations include that 1st Vice President Judy Draucker will be
responsible for governance issues including Bylaw changes such as
including the School of Horology, and will be working closely with the
Bylaws and Procedures Committee to ensure that appropriate changes are
made and the Procedures manual will be completed.
President Cowan advised that 2nd Vice President John Hubby had been
delegated responsibility for technology and communications. He said we
are underutilizing the Internet and its potential for providing improved
member services. A new Web Committee will be formed, replacing the
Technology Task Force, and will be working to enhance our web presence.
Regarding communications, he advised that Council had approved the NAWCC
NEWS as an official venue for NAWCC announcements, and that we hope to
have every Chapter involved as well as the membership. Every effort will
be made to ensure all members are kept informed of what is going on.
He noted that Council had approved the establishment of a Chapter
visitation program, which will be at no cost to the NAWCC. It is hoped
that the members of Council and Museum Trustees will be able to visit
from 80 to 100 Chapters each year.
In discussing membership, President Cowan noted that a few years back we
had nearly 39,000 members and lots of cash. We now have fewer members
than 10 years ago and the trend is down, similar to many other hobby and
professional organizations. He noted we also alienated wrist watch
collectors when their Chapter was disenfranchised, and that we needed to
revisit how to work with them and be able to offer something of interest
in the NAWCC. The value of membership must be raised, continuing such
things as fine tuning the Bulletin. We need to do much more for young
members.
With regard to the financial situation, President Cowan stated we are not
in any imminent danger of going broke, as there is presently over $1
million in cash. However, we have reserved $730,000 of that as a
"firewall", and the remaining 250 to 350,000 is not sufficient for long
term viability. Turning around the membership loss would stabilize this
but that will not happen overnight. Raising funds for the Museum and
Library Endowment Funds is a key priority but that will also take time.
Regarding fundraising for the Museum, he stated that the Museum is not
drawing enough revenue to offset the total cost and that traditionally
nearly all Museums have been funded by income from endowments. Ours is
no different, but it does take time to build those funds, and that the
new executive will be highly focused on that and raising other revenue.
For a time, it may look like we are collecting dollars instead of clocks.
In support of all this, President Cowan advised that Council has passed a
resolution that the operating budget expenses will be adjusted regularly
to balance revenue. If dues income goes down, expenses will get cut.
That could mean cutting jobs which is not easy or desirable but could be
necessary under these circumstances. Council has been asked to help in
all ways to support both fundraising and cost control. He then pledged
that to help the budget he personally will not take any cash out of the
NAWCC during his term. He will report his travel expenses, but will
donate all reimbursements back to the NAWCC. He mentioned there are a
number of Chapters who have been helping with donations of items for the
Library and School, and members who are helping in many ways.
President Cowan then introduced Roger Gendron, a member who had requested
the opportunity to make a proposal to the membership.
Roger reviewed the events leading to the present financial difficulties,
with the construction project overrun depleting cash reserves, and the
larger facility costing more to operate. He noted falling membership as
a real problem as well, all of this leading to cash flow shrinkage. His
comparison was that to fully fund the NAWCC and NWCM, a dues increase of
at least $20 would be required, and that was simply unthinkable. Roger
then made the following challenge:
* To reduce the drain on membership dues that are now supporting the
Museum and Library, he proposed that a challenge be made to find 200
members, or groups of members such as Chapters, Regionals, or collective
individuals, to pledge to donate $2000 each year for five years to the
Museum Endowment Fund, and to donate $1000 each year for five year to the
Library Endowment Fund. That would raise an endowment of $2 million for
the Museum and $1 million for the Library. The interest from these funds
would provide about $150,000 annually which would be used to offset the
amount now being provided from member's dues. Although this would not be
a complete solution, it would give the needed support to enable other
initiatives to succeed.
Roger stated he had prepared checks to give to the Museum and Library
accordingly, and now needed 199 other members or groups of members to
subscribe to the proposal and that would put the building of the
endowment funds on a solid footing.
President Cowan thanked Roger, and also mentioned that Chapter #159
British Horology had pledged $500 toward the Endowment Funds.
President Cowan then advised that Council had spent more than five hours
of its meeting reviewing the budget situation and had concluded that the
projected cash shortage could not be turned around quickly enough to
avoid a need to increase dues to cover increased costs projected over the
next two years. He then announced that annual dues for membership
renewal would be increased by $5 to $50, effective January 1, 2002.
Also, that a fee of $10 would be charged for reinstatement of members
whose memberships had lapsed for more than 120 days. International dues
would remain at $55 pending a review of mailing charges.
He said this was a very difficult decision, with a "Catch 22" answer that
with membership declining, a dues increase may accelerate the decline.
On the other hand, without it we would be in danger of exhausting our
working cash reserves. He emphasized that it was only fiscally
responsible to solve the problems and he was determined that they would
be solved, but the dues increase was needed to gain the time needed to
get the other fundraising efforts in place and working, such as had been
proposed by Roger Gendron.
He also discussed the Strategic Governance Advisory Group, which had been
mentioned earlier. The members include Bill Lazarus as chairman, Nick
Bonura, Terry Brotherton, Clark Eldridge, Ward Francillon, Doug Minty,
Wayne Preston, and Steve Sadowski. To assist in rebuilding or reinventing
the NAWCC, this group will be charged to look at the way we govern and
everything about how we manage the business. We will be reporting the
results and set time lines for accomplishment.
Finally, President Cowan told all present that he could sense the good
will of members toward the NAWCC, and that we needed to stay focused and
work together to get through this period.
President Orr then opened the floor for questions.
A member asked if the NAWCC had retrieved its property from the Willard
Museum, thought to include a tall case clock. President Orr and Museum
Trustee Chairman Ralph Fletcher responded that they were unaware of any
items that had been loaned; however this would be checked out and all
property retrieved if there was any.
A member asked, regarding Roger Gendron's proposal, that instead of
getting the $1000 or $2000 from individuals, why not consider assessing
Chapters? President Orr pointed out that the donations could come either
from individuals, groups of individuals, Chapters, Regionals, or any
combination.
A member directed the question to Treasurer David Wood, that increasing
the dues by $5 would not seem to help because of possible additional loss
of members and we would be back where we started. President Cowan
requested to answer this, and stated that it took over five hours to
reach a conclusion on this one as it was very difficult to decide what to
do. However, the increase was seen as essential to give us the time to
get the endowment funding programs really working. He also stated there
is a big risk whatever way we go and that is the risk that Council
decided to take since it will add dollars in the coming year. He also
observed that at least in the year following the last increase of $5,
there was no change in the rate of membership decline.
Steve Sadowski asked would it not be better to assess the Chapters, say
$100 each? President Cowan responded that this idea had been discussed
in Council, as well as others to add a fee at registration for Regionals
and the National, and those had been turned down since they would be paid
for by a minority of the members. However, it might be worth asking
Chapters to consider the idea.
Gene Volk pointed out that the $10 reinstatement fee for lapsed members
would complicate the registrations at Regionals. President Cowan noted
this, however he believed the details could be worked out.
Rochelle Gaenger announced that she and Dan would pledge to contribute
$1000 to the Library Fund in response to Roger Gendron's challenge.
There was then a call to adjourn, which was seconded and the meeting was
adjourned.
To all Chapters and Members
The NAWCC conducted its Annual Business Meeting at the National
Convention in New Orleans on Friday, July 13, 2001. The following will
provide a general summary of the actions taken at the meeting for your
information. Please note these are NOT the official minutes, which will
be reported later this year.
Should you have any questions about this, please contact me at
pastimes@juno.com.
John Hubby FNAWCC
2nd Vice President
---------------------------------------------------------------
The 2001 NAWCC Annual Business Meeting commenced at 8:00 am, presided by
outgoing President George Orr. The meeting was called to order, and
President Orr advised that copies of the audited financial statements for
fiscal year 2001 were available at the back of the room.
The minutes of the 2000 Annual Business Meeting, which were published in
the October 2000 Bulletin, were approved.
President Orr noted that the Bylaws require that the election of Officers
and Directors, and approval of Bylaw changes be certified. He stated
this had been done as required by the Chairman of the Nominating and
Election Committee.
The President's report was then presented. President Orr noted there had
been numerous changes during his administration. These included several
staff changes including the hiring of a new Executive Director, Dr. Nancy
Connelly, a new School of Horology Director, and an Assistant Curator.
Previous Treasurer Gerry Freedman had resigned, and David Wood had been
appointed Treasurer. Significant changes have since been made in the
budget process and how the financials are reported, including a monthly
financial report available to the members. There have been substantial
cost reductions including the combined mailing of the Bulletin and the
MART. A major continuing concern is the decline in membership, which has
been about 2 to 3 percent but appears to have increased recently to as
much as 6 percent on an annual basis.
President Orr reported that efforts have been increased to focus on
membership retention. A mentoring program has been sent to all Chapters
among other efforts that have been made. He also reported great success
with the Suitcase Instruction Program and asked all interested to contact
Fred Tischler. He then introduced the new Executive Director, Dr. Nancy
Connelly.
Dr. Connelly presented her report, and stated that in the four months she
has been in Columbia her focus has been to create a team effort and to
integrate various departments to work together. The School of Horology
now has a new Director, and the course work is under review to consider
possible courses in conservation, more basic clock repair training, and
other improvements. A lot of time has been spent to improve community
relations and to work with volunteers. She also noted there has been
some success from the grant writing program she had been working on prior
to being appointed Executive Director, and that additional grants were
expected to be received. Finally, she observed that the AAM
self-assessment program for Museum accreditation was well in hand and she
expected to meet the August 15 filing date.
David Wood then presented the Treasurer's Report. He noted that the
Bylaws require the audited financials to be presented at the Annual
Business Meeting, and that copies were available for those interested.
He also mentioned that a memo has been included with the reports which
should help people understand the report. He stated that fiscal year
2001, which ended March 31, had been a difficult year. Although the
audited report shows assets over $11 million, we are asset rich and cash
poor. Revenues for the year were slightly less than expenses, and we had
to tap reserves to pay some bills. Overall expenses are rising in spite
of significant cost reductions in several areas due to inflation,
salaries, etc. While this can be managed in the short term, for the long
term it would be intolerable and additional funds must be found to
support operations. Membership dues were tracking generally to budget
during most of the year but a definite decrease has been seen in the
first two months of this financial year.
Treasurer Wood also mentioned that the budget process had been changed to
broaden the input and include key staff in setting the premises. Other
improvements have seen a tightened spending behavior and the start of
building of the Museum and Library Endowment Funds.
Incoming President Doug Cowan then took charge of the meeting. He said
he was strongly impressed by the size of the task ahead, and was taking
action to change how Council do business. Major delegations of tasks
have been made which previously were mostly done by the President.
These delegations include that 1st Vice President Judy Draucker will be
responsible for governance issues including Bylaw changes such as
including the School of Horology, and will be working closely with the
Bylaws and Procedures Committee to ensure that appropriate changes are
made and the Procedures manual will be completed.
President Cowan advised that 2nd Vice President John Hubby had been
delegated responsibility for technology and communications. He said we
are underutilizing the Internet and its potential for providing improved
member services. A new Web Committee will be formed, replacing the
Technology Task Force, and will be working to enhance our web presence.
Regarding communications, he advised that Council had approved the NAWCC
NEWS as an official venue for NAWCC announcements, and that we hope to
have every Chapter involved as well as the membership. Every effort will
be made to ensure all members are kept informed of what is going on.
He noted that Council had approved the establishment of a Chapter
visitation program, which will be at no cost to the NAWCC. It is hoped
that the members of Council and Museum Trustees will be able to visit
from 80 to 100 Chapters each year.
In discussing membership, President Cowan noted that a few years back we
had nearly 39,000 members and lots of cash. We now have fewer members
than 10 years ago and the trend is down, similar to many other hobby and
professional organizations. He noted we also alienated wrist watch
collectors when their Chapter was disenfranchised, and that we needed to
revisit how to work with them and be able to offer something of interest
in the NAWCC. The value of membership must be raised, continuing such
things as fine tuning the Bulletin. We need to do much more for young
members.
With regard to the financial situation, President Cowan stated we are not
in any imminent danger of going broke, as there is presently over $1
million in cash. However, we have reserved $730,000 of that as a
"firewall", and the remaining 250 to 350,000 is not sufficient for long
term viability. Turning around the membership loss would stabilize this
but that will not happen overnight. Raising funds for the Museum and
Library Endowment Funds is a key priority but that will also take time.
Regarding fundraising for the Museum, he stated that the Museum is not
drawing enough revenue to offset the total cost and that traditionally
nearly all Museums have been funded by income from endowments. Ours is
no different, but it does take time to build those funds, and that the
new executive will be highly focused on that and raising other revenue.
For a time, it may look like we are collecting dollars instead of clocks.
In support of all this, President Cowan advised that Council has passed a
resolution that the operating budget expenses will be adjusted regularly
to balance revenue. If dues income goes down, expenses will get cut.
That could mean cutting jobs which is not easy or desirable but could be
necessary under these circumstances. Council has been asked to help in
all ways to support both fundraising and cost control. He then pledged
that to help the budget he personally will not take any cash out of the
NAWCC during his term. He will report his travel expenses, but will
donate all reimbursements back to the NAWCC. He mentioned there are a
number of Chapters who have been helping with donations of items for the
Library and School, and members who are helping in many ways.
President Cowan then introduced Roger Gendron, a member who had requested
the opportunity to make a proposal to the membership.
Roger reviewed the events leading to the present financial difficulties,
with the construction project overrun depleting cash reserves, and the
larger facility costing more to operate. He noted falling membership as
a real problem as well, all of this leading to cash flow shrinkage. His
comparison was that to fully fund the NAWCC and NWCM, a dues increase of
at least $20 would be required, and that was simply unthinkable. Roger
then made the following challenge:
* To reduce the drain on membership dues that are now supporting the
Museum and Library, he proposed that a challenge be made to find 200
members, or groups of members such as Chapters, Regionals, or collective
individuals, to pledge to donate $2000 each year for five years to the
Museum Endowment Fund, and to donate $1000 each year for five year to the
Library Endowment Fund. That would raise an endowment of $2 million for
the Museum and $1 million for the Library. The interest from these funds
would provide about $150,000 annually which would be used to offset the
amount now being provided from member's dues. Although this would not be
a complete solution, it would give the needed support to enable other
initiatives to succeed.
Roger stated he had prepared checks to give to the Museum and Library
accordingly, and now needed 199 other members or groups of members to
subscribe to the proposal and that would put the building of the
endowment funds on a solid footing.
President Cowan thanked Roger, and also mentioned that Chapter #159
British Horology had pledged $500 toward the Endowment Funds.
President Cowan then advised that Council had spent more than five hours
of its meeting reviewing the budget situation and had concluded that the
projected cash shortage could not be turned around quickly enough to
avoid a need to increase dues to cover increased costs projected over the
next two years. He then announced that annual dues for membership
renewal would be increased by $5 to $50, effective January 1, 2002.
Also, that a fee of $10 would be charged for reinstatement of members
whose memberships had lapsed for more than 120 days. International dues
would remain at $55 pending a review of mailing charges.
He said this was a very difficult decision, with a "Catch 22" answer that
with membership declining, a dues increase may accelerate the decline.
On the other hand, without it we would be in danger of exhausting our
working cash reserves. He emphasized that it was only fiscally
responsible to solve the problems and he was determined that they would
be solved, but the dues increase was needed to gain the time needed to
get the other fundraising efforts in place and working, such as had been
proposed by Roger Gendron.
He also discussed the Strategic Governance Advisory Group, which had been
mentioned earlier. The members include Bill Lazarus as chairman, Nick
Bonura, Terry Brotherton, Clark Eldridge, Ward Francillon, Doug Minty,
Wayne Preston, and Steve Sadowski. To assist in rebuilding or reinventing
the NAWCC, this group will be charged to look at the way we govern and
everything about how we manage the business. We will be reporting the
results and set time lines for accomplishment.
Finally, President Cowan told all present that he could sense the good
will of members toward the NAWCC, and that we needed to stay focused and
work together to get through this period.
President Orr then opened the floor for questions.
A member asked if the NAWCC had retrieved its property from the Willard
Museum, thought to include a tall case clock. President Orr and Museum
Trustee Chairman Ralph Fletcher responded that they were unaware of any
items that had been loaned; however this would be checked out and all
property retrieved if there was any.
A member asked, regarding Roger Gendron's proposal, that instead of
getting the $1000 or $2000 from individuals, why not consider assessing
Chapters? President Orr pointed out that the donations could come either
from individuals, groups of individuals, Chapters, Regionals, or any
combination.
A member directed the question to Treasurer David Wood, that increasing
the dues by $5 would not seem to help because of possible additional loss
of members and we would be back where we started. President Cowan
requested to answer this, and stated that it took over five hours to
reach a conclusion on this one as it was very difficult to decide what to
do. However, the increase was seen as essential to give us the time to
get the endowment funding programs really working. He also stated there
is a big risk whatever way we go and that is the risk that Council
decided to take since it will add dollars in the coming year. He also
observed that at least in the year following the last increase of $5,
there was no change in the rate of membership decline.
Steve Sadowski asked would it not be better to assess the Chapters, say
$100 each? President Cowan responded that this idea had been discussed
in Council, as well as others to add a fee at registration for Regionals
and the National, and those had been turned down since they would be paid
for by a minority of the members. However, it might be worth asking
Chapters to consider the idea.
Gene Volk pointed out that the $10 reinstatement fee for lapsed members
would complicate the registrations at Regionals. President Cowan noted
this, however he believed the details could be worked out.
Rochelle Gaenger announced that she and Dan would pledge to contribute
$1000 to the Library Fund in response to Roger Gendron's challenge.
There was then a call to adjourn, which was seconded and the meeting was
adjourned.