<CORSA Chapters> Club policy about CORSA

[Brown, David]

Barry,

We have nothing in our by-laws regarding this.  Although I would not
consider not being a CORSA member, we have some very good & helpful
Corvair folks in our club who are not members.  Most have made it clear,
for whatever reasons (some won't give a reason) that they do not want to
join.  Some have been members in the past, but did not renew.  I brought
up the idea of mandatory membership to our board several years ago & was
soundly rebuffed.  This is including the fact that all of the board are
CORSA members.  We use a little peer pressure for those who are not,
until they join.  We don't have a large club (about 65 members) of which
there are only about 6 to 10 of a core group of about 20 who can be
counted on to help out or participate in club functions routinely.  We
don't want to promote any situation that would eliminate members, and
like most clubs, are constantly supporting avenues that help attract new
members.  That being said, we manage to have about 3/4 of our membership
enrolled in CORSA.  We do promote it at club meetings & our newsletter,
but failing that, we don't see fit to force anyone to join.

Dave
Corvair Houston, President

-----Original Message-----
From: chapters-bounces at corvair.org [mailto:chapters-bounces at corvair.org]
On Behalf Of BEllison at bbafiberweb.com
Sent: Wednesday, November 30, 2005 7:20 AM
To: chapters at corvair.org
Subject: <CORSA Chapters> Club policy about CORSA

Hey Guys - just joined, but mainly for a particular question that's
splintering Corsa SC.  This is the perfect group to ask, w/o causing
havoc on Virtual Vairs.  I do NOT want to start an argument on ANY
forum.

Background: I'm current President of Corsa SC, and will continue to be
on the board for 2 more years as a Member at Large.

Several years ago, Corsa SC amended the by-laws to require club members,
after one year membership to also be a member of CORSA.  There were a
few members in good standing that refused so they were "grandfathered"
into Corsa SC.  There's one left and he pays an extra $10/year which we
forward on to CORSA.  It gets too complicated to explain in email all
the intricacies of the amendment, but you get the idea.  Basically, if I
dropped out of Corsa, I would not be allowed to participate with Corsa
SC.  (Not that I personally ever would - wonderful people, and w/o
CORSA, the Corvair probably won't exist in it's fullness after 10-20
years)

Main question: how many of the other clubs have a similar policy/by-law?

Our goals and our by-laws seem to conflict.

We've had the suggestion of having anyone that refuses to join CORSA,
pay an extra $10 which we send to CORSA.  That seems a viable
alternative.

This year, due to a prospective new member wanting to participate in
events with our club, but refusing to join CORSA, we sent his check
back.  I, and several members of our club, think this is wrong.  We're
discouraging this fellow Corvair owner from driving his car with other
people with like minds and interests.  

We've had several new members join this year, also.  Time will tell if
they will join CORSA.  If they refuse, we'll lose several members.

Don't get me wrong - loosing a few members wouldn't hurt our club
immensely.
We're having almost 40 people show up for a dinner meeting practically
every month.

The 2006 board will have no problem voting this policy down, which will
put it before the membership.  I suspect the membership would also vote
it down, but not 100% sure.  But then again, they voted it in.

Funny how things change, eh?

Thanks for you time and thoughts,

Barry Ellison
CORSA SC 2005 President
65 Black Corsa 140/4 Coupe - driven to work today, now that I've got the
heater working.
65 Red Monza 140/4 Vert
61 White Wagon - next project