President's Report - GEAR 2022

We had 18 Dogwood members (11 coaches) at the Greater Eastern Area Rally July 13-17, 2022 in Lewisburg, West Va. There were approximately 190 coaches/towables present; the Eastern Area has 24 chapters and about 20 were represented at the Rally; with a dozen vendors. Beginning Wednesday, July 13^th, there were seminars and meetings as you would normally expect for this event and entertainment every night with singers, announcements and give-aways. 

 

Our first big event was the Chapter Fair on Wednesday evening held right after the First Timer’s Seminar. Dogwood laid out a great display; we handed out nearly 50 Dogwood Flyers (pamphlets) and talked with nearly every first-timer present. For our efforts, we took home the Blue Ribbon (First Place) that came with a check for $25, and I just discovered in my pile of papers an application that I need to forward to Pat Allen! 

The Presentation

The Interview

On Thursday morning, the 14^th, I attended Rhett Porter’s seminar on FMCAssist and walked away amazed at all the items covered. FMCA now has 74,000 RVs and 8700 towables; there are approximately 324 chapters. FMCAssist is a medical evacuation policy, not a medical insurance policy. However, did you know that with FMCAssist, your transportation expenses are covered for ANY trip greater than 75 miles from your home and that includes expenses for relatives to stay or be with you and pets to be boarded (only cats and dogs, no pot belly pigs or parrots, etc.). And ANY trip means what it says – you could be on a cruise ship somewhere, and if needed, FMCAssist will get you off that ship and home. If you are on a car trip out in the mid-West visiting the grandkids and become medically disabled and need transportation back home, you are covered. We all have FMCAssist just by being FMCA members. I encourage you to go to the FMCA website and read all about it. I also will try to get Rhett Porter’s presentation to show at our next rally. 

 

Later that day I attended the “Let’s recruit and grow our family” seminar led by Phyllis Britz. I attended for two reasons: first, Phyllis is replacing Gaye Young as our Area President and, never having met Phyllis, I wanted to see her and hear what she had to offer. Second, I was interested in to hear her ideas on recruitment and chapter growth. Two themes came up in the discussion – first that is difficult to find folks to staff the officer positions and second, that no chapter has an actual training program to show folks what the various chapter jobs entail. We all had rules and bylaws, but no real training program to speak of. One of the chapter reps brought a really difficult issue to the table (that we don’t have, fortunately); e.g., her chapter’s rules limited membership to 35 families. They currently had 35 but sent her to recruit anyway and she was stumped as to what to do. We all told her to go back and revise her standing rules.... 

Later that afternoon I attended seminars on things you can fix (“Don’t Call a Tech”) and some really neat items that I need to add to my toolbox (“Meters, Gauges, Gadgets, and Gizmos). Of course, my toolbox already weighs 25+ lbs,  but I need more “stuff”. 

 

Thursday evening served as Opening Ceremonies and entertainment by a folk-rock group called “A Band Called Honalee.” 

On Friday morning, Ken Lewis, National VP, and Rhett Porter gave a seminar on the other benefits and discounts offered by FMCA. Big ones are discounts for new tires and for RV insurance, membership at COSTCO, health insurance for those not old enough for Medicare, travel insurance, etc. Again, too many to describe here, but I am trying to get a copy of their presentation to share with the club. And please go visit the FMCA website for all the details on all the discount programs. 

Saturday morning was all about business. We started off with a President’s Roundtable led by Phyllis Britz. She split us into teams; my team discussed Chapter Leadership with focus on how to get folks to volunteer for the lead positions. Again, we all had rules and by-laws, but who reads that stuff? So a suggestion was to put in our newsletters (and, BTW, Dogwood is one of the few chapters to have a newsletter!) on a regular basis a paragraph or two on the lead positions. This to help folks understand what’s required for the job and take the mystique away, or the fear that newcomers might have of “stepping on the toes” of the older members. Besides, who really knows what their job description is in this outfit? 

 

Then we transitioned to the Eastern Area Business meeting. Berkley Alexander gave us our financial picture which passed the audit committee, and each area VP gave his/her report. Our Area VP is Andy Deal and I suspect all these reports will be posted on the Eastern Area web site, for which there is a link to on our Dogwood Blogsite. All of the VPs were really glad that this rally went down, for it is kind of a re-awakening after the Covid Shutdown pandemic of the past two years. Apparently, several chapters shut down or folded up during this time. I volunteered for the Audit Committee with Wilt Greenwood  and Jim Griffin. For leadership, the Northern VP position is open due to Phyllis moving up to replace Gaye, and nobody (at the meeting anyway) was nominated/voted to replace her. The Northern area covers mainly Pennsylvania with parts of New York and New Jersey. What I noted was that all clubs, like ours, no matter where they are centered, have members up and down the east coast, and a few on the west coast!  Next year’s GEAR will also be in Lewisburg on October 4-7, 2023. 

 

Saturday night, Connie Tilman arranged a chapter potluck dinner for us in the Blue Ribbon Building, and we had a prospective new member couple, the Smiths, join us for dinner. 

 

In the end I want to thank the Dogwood folks that made it to this rally – Buelows, Tilmans, Dudziak, Cummings, Alexanders, Robinsons, Brinkleys, Mimms, Wolfes, Greenwoods and us. (I believe) a good time was had by all, and I’m looking forward to next year.

Thanks to Jim, Paul, and Robi for the pictures and videos!

Regards,

Ed Herbert

Dogwood President