President’s Perspective
Dave Brown, AMA president
Do numbers matter?
I'm talking about the size of AMA and, ultimately, your club. I have received several emails from members who are concerned that AMA lost some of its membership base last year and proposed that reversing this trend should be the organization's first priority. Perhaps they are right, but I will point out a few mitigating facts.
AMA should serve its members in their pursuit of enjoying model aviation. The size of the organization will affect AMA's ability to do that. The larger the membership, the more effective it can be in furthering the goals of its members.
If one person in every five were a modeler, society would automatically provide modelers with frequencies, flying sites, and probably anything else the sport needed. Actually, we would be "society."
With roughly 250 million people in the United States, one in five would mean roughly 50 million modelers. One in 50 would mean 5 million modelers. Obviously, any number approaching that is inconceivable, but the idea that increasing our numbers would be beneficial to our access to facilities isn't lost on us.
Unfortunately, growth isn't a priority for many of our members. In fact, it is opposed by a number who view growth as reducing their access to already overtaxed facilities. Although a few clubs are actively recruiting members in an attempt to grow, some clubs are hampered by too much activity that overwhelms their flying sites. It is an increasing trend for clubs to close their gates and limit their membership to a fixed number.
Ironically, some of those clubs that closed membership—and at one time had a waiting list—are finding themselves with declining numbers. Often, these rules are driven by a handful of people who are accustomed to the days when they could fly without delay because of fewer people at the field.
Often the actual flying done at the field isn't all that much, but it might be heavy on an occasional weekend day. In some people's minds, that warrants limiting the club's membership. The club often shrinks in the end, removing that concern.
Perhaps there is a better way. One alternative might be to have two classes of club membership as an alternative to an absolute limit. For example:
- Allow 60 "Class A" memberships with full privileges and first rights to frequency pins.
- Allow an unlimited number of "Class B" members who have fewer field privileges while paying a reduced rate.
- As Class A members drop out, Class B members are elevated in the order they joined.
- When the field becomes crowded (the club can set the threshold), Class A members have first rights to fly.
Class A members could pay the full rate and Class B members a slightly reduced rate. Some of the Tuesday-night crowd may even prefer to be Class B members if the dues were cheaper. The additional labor available for club projects would be valuable, and the added money in the treasury would allow for more field improvements. This sounds better than a strict membership cap.
For AMA as an organization, the challenge is how to address the potential growth resulting from the explosion of park flyers and their variations—from RC toys to sophisticated small RC models. It's hard to convince someone who has spent as little as $100 on a model airplane that he or she needs to join AMA at $58 and then join a club with dues varying from a few dollars a month to much more.
The difficulty we face is how to make it easier to bring these people into the fold without undermining the current membership base and the income it represents. A few years ago I proposed a tiered membership system in which members would join at the level appropriate to the type of models they flew.
It is obvious to most that some costs—such as those of providing insurance—are not the same for all types of models. When I addressed tiered membership in the past, it was as a way to allow less restriction at the upper end of the aeromodeling spectrum (turbines, large-scale aircraft, racing, etc.) without that advancement increasing the dues of members who fly lighter, lower-performance models.
The case for tiered membership now is more obvious as our sport has expanded in both directions. The popularity of turbines is increasing, while the appeal of small models—sometimes flown indoors—is exploding. The diversity makes the possibility of a tiered membership a reasonable alternative.
We need to address attracting those exposed to aeromodeling through park flyers, but the economics of that will be a challenge. A marketing effort to bring these potential members into AMA at the current dues level is proving difficult, yet creating a cheaper alternative without undermining the existing financial base is challenging in its own right. We have our work laid out for us.
The last time I proposed a tiered system, my efforts were hampered by a number of members, but times have changed and we need to keep pace. The need for such a system is increasing as the membership becomes more diversified. The concept of any AMA member being entitled to fly any type of model is becoming detrimental to growth and is unnecessarily expensive for many. It will be interesting to see the reaction to the concept this time.
Dave Brown AMA president [email protected]
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
