Need some advice

Pay for any meals out of your own pocket. You will become president-for-life.

Find a cause. Find a worthwile and obtainable project for your organization to get behind. Get a CBL installed in your area. Find and re-habilitate a long missing and important survey marker, such as a corner common to four counties. Something like that.

Stephen

This suggestion might not have enough time to schedule and accomplish, but if your State requires annual CEUs and your State society puts on CEU seminars or short courses, see if you can get them to schedule one in your area and have your chapter help out with it. Not only can some local surveyors get some CEUs, the chapter might make a little money to spend in the form of scholarships or such and it doesn't take a lot of effort to host the seminar or work it. A lot of times the smaller chapters in more isolated places get a big draw on seminars, because it serves surveyors who don't want to travel long distances to get their CEUs.

David, I've been Sec/Trea of our chapter since 2005, and serve on the state society board (and current secretary). You'll likely find that if you do adopt Roberts Rules, things will go smoother and likely quicker. So you need an agenda, and try to follow it. Things do get off track sometimes, so just laugh and say "...ok ok, back to item 7.2...". Everybody wants to go home.

We try and have some kind of New Business item when we can. P & Z issues, changes at the county level for development, maybe have the county recorder or GIS Manager do a presentation, flood control is always a hot topic, NGS is always doing something, actions in the state society and the BTR, talk about surveyorconnect.com and beerleg, etc etc. The list of things surveyors can sit together and talk about is endless, and the networking is extremely valuable.

We always try and have meetings at differnt locations. The variety is good, and it balances the travel for everybody. We usually have 7 or 8 meetings per year (plus 4 state society meetings).

But I think sticking to an agenda makes it go much smoother. It's always great when you feel like you actually accomplished something, aside from just having a couple cold brews & shooting the shyte with your peers, as those tend to turn into just a bitch session for somebody.

I'll email you our basic agenda format. It seems to work well for us. Then for the minutes I just write things down following that format. (edit: I guess you can't attach a file via beerleg emails, so email me and I'll send it to you if you want)

Good luck

The things I have noticed over the years have been:

1) Good presentations/speakers, booked/confirmed enough in advance that you can get the word out. Best if you have the arrangements solid 5-6 weeks before the date -- that way you can announce next month's program at the meeting and word gets around.

2) if you are not tied by tradition to a particular meeting spot, then find a place that has decent inexpensive food and is quiet enough to talk. Bonus if it has a laptop projector or a big-screen TV that you can plug a laptop into. Some potential speakers are happier if they can use their prepared powerpoint. Double bonus if the venue has wifi or net, some speakers want to pull in material off the net. Projector + net can really take the same-old-same-old out of meetings.

3) Spiff the students and associates. If your meetings are a lump-sum fee rather than pay-as-you-go for food, offer a discount for them and make it WELL known. Chapters here have had the policy for years of half-price for students and a bargain rate for the un- or under-employed. Everyone appreciates it, and it creates some loyalty among the students.

3A) I have noticed that the chapters who book a room and then let members pay their own way on the food have a larger consistent attendance than chapters who charge a lump sum. It's hard to get enthused about paying $30 for rubber chicken. Again. (It may be that the $30 "meetings fees" are tax deductable but the meals are not? I don't know. The $30 dinners draw more bigwigs and far fewer students/associates.)

3B) If it's not spelled out explicitly, every month, that there is a deal for students & associates, they will not show up. If it is your general policy and you forget to put it on the flyer, they will not show up.

4) get your local equipment/supply vendors involved and ask for raffle prize donations, raffle off a few things at the close of the meeting. Use the raffle money to subsidize the room fees or the students/unemployed.

Hope this helps!

Congratulations Mr. President. Youth and enthusiasm can bring about a lot of good for the organizations. You can invite speakers to meetings and give a one hour PDH credit (you can create a certificate), follow all the pending legislation and pass on and discuss with local members frequently, try to keep very close contact with regulatory agencies such as planning commmissions county clerks, PVAs etc and invite them to meetings.

With your licenses and location of Ohio River Valley, I presume you are now in Kentucky. If so I look forward to meeting you at the upcoming State Board meetings of which you will be officially a voting member Thursday. There is a more comprehensive meeting Wednesday night also. I have revised the KAPS brochure to list local surveyors and for each chapter to take that template, insert member names and numbers and put the brochures all over the region. Most people don't understand surveying and the brochure answers a lot of questions and gives them a list of local professional society members.

Some good advice has been posted above.

Keep the regional informed on the workings at the state level. Do you attend state meetings?

Do the other regionals in your state have good ideas?

Send out email notices several weeks before the meeting, with a reminder the day before. Mail them to those that do not have email (they are out there).

Finding a place with good food, group seating and that is quiet enough to run a meeting can be a challenge. There are probably restaurants that are eager to have a group, ask around. Perhaps thay can give you a deal.

Try to find speakers; some ideas:

A well informed local vendor.
The DOT employee who runs the GPS grid.
The County GIS rep.
The call before you dig folks (or what ever it is called where you are).
A local historian.

Invite your County Clerk to a meeting. Chances are she does not really understand what we do. If nothing else, she may provide insight to services some of your members did not know about.

Find local issues that need surveyor input. Our county clerk scanned the filed maps and made them available on line. However, due to taking the low bidder on the scanning contract, many maps are not legible. We met with the new clerk, explained the problem. It took years, many emails and committe meetings, but eventually we got things corrected, or at least they agreed to correct scans when we tell them Map No. XXX is a bad scan. We were lucky to do this while there were still funds to find.

Following the intent of Roberts Rules is a good idea. You don't have to be militaristic about it, but the structure they provide to a meeting helps.

The agenda suggestion is a good one. Have reports by the president, treasurer, secretary, accept the previous minutes, repots by on-going committees and old and new business.

Provide an opportunity to listen to concerns. This often comes under new business.

Ask for volunteers. There is always the guy who says "someone has to . . ." then steps back and complains. Get him to help!

Push for associates (the non-licensed) to attend. If you are like our group, we are getting older. There are not too many younger surveyors.

Plan a summer or holiday social event. We invite significant others to our January dinner meeting. A few years ago we teamed up with a neighboring regional for a dinner ruise on the Hudson on a glorious August evening.

Don't let the apathy get to you!

Good luck.

Ken

I was CLSA Sacramento Chapter President in 2005.

Don't let them talk you into more than one year.

1. We did a public service project; a boundary survey for Habitat for Humanity. That got a lot more interest from the membership than you would think.

2. Started the LS review series of classes. That is now a big revenue source for the chapter and you don't have to charge very much. The instructors are volunteers.

Somehow I managed to kick of the resurgence of the Sacramento Chapter. I did it by staying out of the way and letting other members with ideas launch them. Anything you want to do there will be 20 voices telling you it can't be done; ignore them.

Thanks for the suggestions

They all sound great. My first meeting as president is tomorrow evening, so we'll see how it goes and take it one month at a time. I really appreciate the help guys.

Thanks for the suggestions

From experience..your presidency can only be as rewarding as your membership allows it to be. Having been President of my local chapter as well as the State association, I can tell you it is like pulling teeth trying to get the members to become involved. You can attempt to get guest speakers on topics of interest, (if you can get your members to tell you what they are interested in), keep them informed what is going on at the state and national levels by becoming involved and participating at the State level. If you must, bring in guest speakers on topics you are interested in and hope your membership shows up to support you. It may be an attorney on a legal interpretation of a new court case..or legislation....title company on issues of common interest..etc. In any case... congratulations and I wish you success.

Thanks for the suggestions

I didn't have to do the meetings, the Chapter VP did that.

It is true in any volunteer organization 0.1% of the Membership will do 99% of the work.

It is a volunteer, part-time job, do what you can but don't let it take over your life.

> Pay for any meals out of your own pocket. You will become president-for-life.

Yeah....right... more like:
"Find someone to replace you after your term is up, or you'll become president for life."