East Bay Chapter Startup
Posted by Warren Enos on 20 Apr 2008 | Tagged as: Chapters in the News
ORGANIZATION MEETING SET FOR MAY 14TH
The first major organization meeting to restart the East Bay Chapter is scheduled for Wednesday, May 14th, 11:00am, General Mess, Coast Guard Island, Alameda.
CDR John Sammons, USPHS (RET), CAL-MOAA Secretary, has invited more than 35 former chapter members and interested national MOAA members living in Alameda County to meet for lunch and begin the important work leading to an active chapter.
Col Lee Lange II, USMC-Ret, Director, MOAA Council and Chapter Affairs, will meet with the group and provide important and useful information about organization content and process.
Noting that there are 680 MOAA members and auxiliaries liviing in Alameda County, CDR Sammons said, “By restarting the chapter we will be providing a venue where individuals with similar backgrounds and interests can get together periodically either for a social event or an informative or patriotic event.”
With a focus on legislative action he said, “We can be a powerful voice for all retirees regardless of their service or status. Politics depends on influence and influence is numbers driven. There are close to 50,000 MOAA members in California and CAL-MOAA is striving to represent them in Sacramento. We employ a “legislative advocate” read lobbyist as our voice. One initiative that we in CAL-MOAA are considering is to exempt all or part of military retired pay from state income taxes. This will be a long process and might not succeed but we are seriously considering the effort.”
For a successful startup, it will be important to attract as many potential members to this first organizational meeting. “At a minimum 15 to 20 stalwart folks are needed to get stated,” CDR Sammons cautioned. He went on to say that if any of those contacted are auxiliaries, or know auxiliaries, it would be important to attend and invite others since they are a vital part of any new chapter.
National MOAA will reactivate the charter when the restart happens. According to the California Secretary of State the charter earlier was only suspended and it can be reactived relatively simply. In addition, National MOAA has agreed to assist with some of the startup costs.
One Response to “East Bay Chapter Startup”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
This new approach has a very good chance of succeeding. Namely because it’s outside the previous attempt to do it within the confines of the Coast Guard manuel. However, the demise of the previous Chapter was without doubt the lack of Retired Officers willing to step forward and take the few required leadership positions. So from my past experience in Chapter formation and reformation I offer these considerations - namely you must have at least four individuals that come forth dedicated to Chapter formation. Also forget the lapsed Chapter name and let the new prospective leadership choose what they wish to be known as. As Bill Gavitts like to state - justs my 2 cents.