District X-2011/07

141 MODEL AVIATION
District X
Lawrence Tougas, District X Vice President; [email protected]
Arizona, California, Guam, Hawaii, Nevada, Utah
LET ME CONTINUE my discussion about
attracting new members to both your club and
the AMA. One of the most effective tools in
your arsenal is the AMA’s Introductory Pilot
Program (IPP).
In my travels around the district, I find that
the IPP is not a well-understood program. It is
open to FF, CL, and RC disciplines. Put
simply, it allows non-AMA members to fly
while covered by the AMA’s liability
insurance for 60 days provided they do it
under the direct supervision of a clubdesignated
Introductory Pilot Instructor. This
includes allowing a potential member to bring
his or her own airplane and flying it under the
instructor’s direct supervision.
To become an IPP instructor, you must be
designated as such by one of your club’s
officers. There is a form to do that and a $5
annual processing fee per instructor applies.
This program allows you to expose
potential new members to our sport for an
extended period of time, without forcing them
to make a commitment to either the AMA or
your club upfront. It becomes a more natural
way of enticing the curious visitors who come
to your field to take up modeling. Without the
IPP, non-AMA members are limited to a
single flight. That’s not enough time to make
a decision about a hobby that will require the
time and financial commitment that modeling
does.
Once you’ve decided to designate some
IPP instructors at your club, I encourage your
club to adopt a policy of making any potential
member covered by the IPP a temporary
member of your club. Let him or her fly up to
60 days at your field while in the IPP.
During this time you’ll be able to get to
know each other, build a bond, and let the bug
of modeling get a good bite into this person’s
psyche. Chances are if the person is inclined
to pursue modeling, he or she will join your
club and the AMA before the 60 days are up,
and you’ll all be better for it.
Regularly scheduled opportunities for
prospective new modelers to participate in a
hands-on modeling activity are other great
ways to build your club’s membership. Your
club could designate Saturdays from 9-11 as
fly-for-free time. The club should have a
model that would be appropriate for a
beginner to try his or her hand at. If you are
offering RC modeling, a simulator on a laptop
might be a good addition to the trainer
aircraft.
This chance to fly could be advertised in
the weekly “this weekend” section of your
local paper, on Craigslist, and at your local
hobby shop.
Most people have seen large signs in the
front yards of homes that are for sale. Often
there will be a mailbox attached to the sign
filled with sales brochures. A great idea to
advertise the fly-for-free service is by putting
one of these mailboxes on the gate at your
field. If someone comes out to your field
when no one is there, he or she can have a
flyer to take home and peruse until they can
return for the opportunity to fly. The flyer can
give some background about the club, when
meetings are held, and when you hold your
learn-to-fly sessions.
The IPP and weekly fly-for-free sessions
can be great tools for spreading the word
about modeling. Please give it a try and let me
know how it works for your club. I’d love to
hear your ideas on this subject and about how
your club builds its membership so please
write.
I am happy to announce that Gary Hover has
agreed to work with me on establishing a
Western United States AMA flying site. Gary
led the charge to do the same in the 1990s in
Visalia, California.
We are forming a small committee to work
on this issue. We’re looking for people with
experience in fundraising, environmental
impact reports, conceptual art, project
management, real estate law, and
construction. If you have experience in these
areas please contact me. I’d love to have your
experienced help.
The city of Tracy, California, has
expressed some interest in a flying site being
part of a sports complex they are developing.
Discussions with Tracy are at the most
preliminary stage right now and I really don’t
know where they will lead.
What I do know is that I would like in one
way or another to have a year-round flying
site here in the western United States that all
AMA members can enjoy. If you would too,
please join the team.
Utah modeler Todd Sheridan answered the
call to become Utah’s newest associate vice
president (AVP). Todd is a resident of
Pleasant Grove, Utah, and is married with
three children. He’s a graphic artist working
in video game development, television and
film effects, photo manipulation, and web
graphics.
Todd enjoys a wide range of modeling
with an emphasis on Combat. He travels to a
number of Utah clubs to support their events
and manages a thread on RC Groups
dedicated to Utah modeling. Please help me
welcome him aboard.
I hope you’re taking advantage of our District
X website: www.ama10.org. There are many
more stories published there than I have room
for in this column. The website is a perfect
place to find out about what is happening in
the district. The blog is the place to go to find
these stories; so far there are 30 and counting.
You can subscribe to an RSS feed so
you’ll be alerted when the blog is updated.
The blog page lists the five most recent posts;
to see the rest click on the “go to archive” link
near the top of the page to see the entire list.
If you or your club has an article you’d
like run on the website, please send it to me
and I’ll post it.
That’s it for now. Until next month, may you
have nothing but happy landings.
Lawrence Tougas
Vice President
1827 Santa Monica St.,
Fairfield CA 94533
Tel.: (707) 480-2053
[email protected]
www.ama10.org
Associate Vice
Presidents
Tim Attaway, Chula Vista CA
(619) 427-6392; [email protected]
Denny Baker, Brentwood CA
(925) 513-1224; [email protected]
Duke Chung, Honolulu HI
(808) 421-1094;
[email protected]
Greg Clemensen, Las Vegas NV
(702) 870-6242;
[email protected]
Kevin Houser, Oro Valley AZ
(520) 490-7657;
[email protected]
Tim Johnson, Downey CA.
(562) 965-4288;
[email protected]
Rick Maida, Morgan Hill CA
(408) 778-6885; [email protected]
Scott Malta, Merced CA
(209) 723-4202;
[email protected]
Todd Sheridan, Pleasant Grove UT
(801) 358-8345;
[email protected]
Roger Willis, Buckeye AZ.
(760) 604-6773;
[email protected]
Contest Coordinators
Ellis Hall, Fair Oaks CA (North);
(916) 217-6302;
[email protected]
Tim Attaway, Chula Vista CA;
(619) 427-6392; [email protected]
District X Volunteers
New District X AVP
Todd Sheridan of Utah.
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