Post submitted by Kelly Shane
Since it’s beginning in 1989, AHRMA members have elected twelve Trustees, six each from the Western Region and six from the Eastern Region. In the United States the dividing line is the Mississippi River, and in Canada the provincial line of Ontario and Manitoba. Due to population, historically the Western Trustees have been from California. Over the years, several members from east of the Rockies have run for Trustee. However with the exception of two Trustees from Colorado and Utah in the early 90’s, and a current Trustee from Louisiana the large number of members in California, Oregon and Washington (695 members or 53%) have outvoted the other nineteen states in the West.
At the January Board of Trustees meeting I submitted a proposal to the Board to form a Central Region so that Central Members will be able to elect Trustees from their Region and thereby have a voice in how our member owned organization is managed. The new Central Region would be carved out of the Eastern portion of the Western Region and the Western portion of the Eastern Region. The total number of Trustees will remain twelve with four Trustees in each Region. The Trustees in each region will be elected only by the members in that region. Each of the three regions will be approximately equal in area and driving distance.
This is not a decision that will be made lightly. Please leave your comments in the section below.
-Kelly Shane
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Hopefully, and assuming our current Trustees have been listening to the membership recently. The archaic process of “pulling out their ballots from Vintage Views, filling it out, and walking out to their mail box and mailing it”. Will not be required in the future.
Far more value by instituting a web-based voting system that reigning Trustee distribution.
As I read this proposal the goal is to get more Trustee representation on the AHRMA Board from the Central area of the country. That is not a bad thing. Will more Trustees from the Central area of the country lead to more AHRMA events, both National and Regional in that area? Who knows?
Membership trends in AHRMA have shown that in areas of very popular AHRMA Nationals, membership numbers climb. This was the case in the Midwest during the AHRMA Mid-Ohio event years, and in the Pacific Northwest during the long run of Chehalis Events. When those popular AHRMA events went away, AHRMA membership numbers dropped in those areas. AHRMA membership numbers have also increased in the South Central area as a result of the very successful Diamond Don’s Riverport National and a resurgent AHRMA South Central Regional series.
Increased Trustee representation from the central area of the country should come from the increased member numbers in the South Central region, from more members in that area running for trustee positions, and from more members in that area voting. The membership base is there, more of them just need to start paying attention by pulling out their ballots from Vintage Views, filling it out, and walking out to their mail box and mailing it.
There have been times where I thought a trustee was not doing a good job of handling our club’s business. Geography was never a factor in my opinion.
I believe the consensus here is to rationally consider any proposal that potentially can increase our membership and thus viability of the organization. Trustees in the central region should be able to participate and or attend events that eastern and western trustees can’t. They would be a face associated with a name at the events and they should focus to develop the new region. What possibly is wrong with that?!
Focusing on a local region is, in fact, the exact opposite of what a trustee is supposed to do. The Trustees are for the entire organization, and represent all of us, not just a local area. They’re not “Regional Trustees”. I would argue our most effective trustees take this message very seriously.
I am a advocate of your proposal for a couple reasons. First, I don’t think it hurts the integrity of the current organization in any way. And secondly, trustees in a central region have an opportunity to really participate/attend events in their region and to grow the org.. Thats very difficult to do with trustees in Ca. and the east. If this org doesn’t grow, it’s like any business, it dies!
This Geo-political balance of racing regions and trustees seems to make better sense. I think it would benefit the organization and members. New members sometimes don’t understand the vital nature of trustees, and directors.
I don’t vote for a trustee based upon where they come from. I vote based upon candidate stance on issues and vision for the organization’s future. I see this proposal as creating fragmentation rather than unity. I do not see it as based upon an in-depth analysis of AHRMA membership needs. Before more changes are made to the AHRMA structure, I recommend planning and development of strategic goals and actions focused on those goals. This effort should include membership surveys of organization needs and prioritization of the findings.
This is a bold and desperate effort by Trustee Kelly Shane to gerrymander the voting regions and thereby concentrate the power of the northwest region Trustees This proposal undermines many AHRMA members’ voting power for the benefit of northwest Trustees. ALL ROADRACERS SHOULD OPPOSE THIS. Northwest Trustees should instead focus on growing our organization and making the motocross discipline more financially viable by including more riders and classes.
Where is the mission statement and goals of AHRMA listed? I did not find them in the bylaws. Seems like it should to promote all approved forms of vintage racing wherever and whenever possible and further this idea with the intent of best serving the membership and racing categories. It should not matter what the arbitrary members classification is, where the trustees are from, or what they ride. All members should have the same value in the organization. If a Central Region helps create more events than good for them. One would hope more events creates more interest. Those who said the trustees represent all disciplines of Vintage racing are right on the money. It is easy to do the easy things, but a real leader does the tough things. Seems like I hear some trustees/promoters want to go with providing the majority/more popular categories the greater part of the effort as opposed to working on improving the less popular but still attended and desired forms of racing. I applaud the Southwest region promoters for the events they have. They are making a concerted effort to revive?/improve and expand. I would expect the AHRMA leadership to fully support and help them.
Mike: The mission statements for each AHRMA discipline are in the drop down menus on the AHRMA web site. Go to the home page and hold your cursor on the “ABOUT” link near the top of the page and to the right of the AHRMA logo. You will get a drop down menu that shows each of the discipline, click on each one to see it’s mission statement.
Gerrymandering at its highest level to protect West Coast Trustees that have become irrelevant to the larger National Membership. AHRMA is about events with old bikes, not about trustees.
Carving out a new “WEST” region that would include 0 of 12 Cross Country events, 0 of 12 Dirt Track Events, 0 of 6 Next Gen events, 3 of 12 Roadrace events, and unfortunately for the off-road members 0 FULL AHRMA VMX / PVMX events, although there are 3 co-sanctioned events run by outside groups that we can participate in.
If there is a problem lets solve it, but not by carving out a “SAFE” region to elect the same Californian trustees that created the above race distribution in perpetuity
Sorry, that should have been lessens, not lessons.
John Bowman
Germantown, TN
Your proposal magnifies the voting power of the West and Central members and lessons the voting power of the remaining members in the east. Per your numbers, the current members per Trustee is 219 – West (1,316/6) and 295 – East (1,770/6). Under the proposal, this would change to 202 – West (808/4), 175 – Central (700/4), and 377 – East (1,508/4).
It would seem more appropriate to have four regions: West, Central, Southeast, and Northeast. That should divide the population fairly evenly with three Trustees from each region. It would still achieve your goal and not penalize the 50% of membership now living in the East by lowering their Trustee count by two.
In the end, the success of AHRMA is not dependent on the location of the Trustees, but the Trustees listening to and serving the members. This is best done with relevant events close enough to members to allow participation. I participate in trials. Last year, 11 of 16 trials events (almost 70%) were in the West. Over 50% were in California or Washington. As a Tennessee resident, I simply cannot drive that far. This is the first year that I will participate in multiple events. The reason for my increased participation is simple: more trials events within a one day drive of my home. The AHRMA schedule this year is far better than previous years. Half of this year’s events are within an eight hour drive from my home. I plan on being at most of them.
John Bowman
Germantown, Tennessee
So, the east, with the same membership as the other two regions COMBINED, would be represented by only 4 trustees? That is disproportionate representation.
Makes sense to me. As a westerner, I don’t understand why the midwest in included in this region. I would suggest, though, that Colorado, Wyoming, and New Mexico be included in the west and that Indiana and Michigan be include in the Central. And what is with Louisiana, anyway? They’re a long ways from the west and yet one of the western board members is from there? Regardless of what happens with the rest of this idea, move Louisiana wholly into the east.
Can somebody lay out a rational best-case result for this? I guess I just don’t understand the point. I’m a Minnesota. Is the implication that we’ll have more races in a central/midwest region? There’s still no more racers geographically.
I’ve have literally never heard somebody say “I’d love to join, but there’s just no trustees near me”.
I am for it if you think it will lead to an increase in membership and racing opportunities.
This is a great organization and I would like to find ways to help it grow.
Brian Reid
Biloxi, MS
All proposals deserve due consideration, but I see the idea of Mr. Eulberg’s suggestion to divide the Board by discipline as counterproductive. Trustees should represent all members in their geographic region, regardless of how the regions are organized. I do not believe we need to divide the board by RR / OR. The board and membership need to come together, not create change that further divides us. AHRMAs best virtue is that it is the only national organization which includes all forms of vintage focused racing. I agree that each discipline is unique and requires separate handling and operational independence. However, trustees that do not represent all of our member’s interests, outside of their personal interests simply do not belong on the Board, no matter where they are from. As a side note, I’ve thought it odd that AHRMA’s board is an even number (12 members) and since the executive director has no vote the board can split. Most boards and committees are set up from their inception as an odd number to avoid this.
I believe AHRMA has too many items and opportunities already in the works to embark on such a monumental task at this time…maybe consider it later.
If you are willing to make such a large change like this, why not make the change to give roadrace their own trustees and off-road their own trustees. THAT is a trustee change I would like to see. We have separate rules, venues, and race directors….we need and want separate representation. Keep the twelve trustees, simply make 6 off road trustees and 6 road race. There will be an added unintended benefit…elections will become less contentious because either side will no longer be trying to wrestle control of the board from the other side.
Mr. Eulberg’s suggestion makes at least as much sense as Trustee Shane’s and deserves the same level of consideration.
I also agree with this. If trustees are elected to serve all the members, why does their geo location even matter?
Splitting this up to have offroad trustees and roadrace trustees keeps the balance automatically. The executive committee can/should handle any issues that escalate beyond discipline. Apart from people trying to influence rules outside their primary discipline of responsibility, I’m not sure what other issues and conflicts exist.
The one thing I see being in the north central part of the proposed new region is not alot of participation as for races, and it’s been hard to get younger racers to go back to vintage from modern bikes. Most of races and racers are in Colorado south. There is a big void in MT WY ND SD, we need some southern western and eastern boys coming north to show these boys up here how much fun we can have on vintage bikes. If we can do that there might be a chance at growth. I know of one ranch that have a great modern XC race right now. I haven’t approached them yet because I’m not sure of interest yet of who would come north to Montana yet.
My 2 cents , I’m for a central region of we can get some partisipaton.
First, I’m not from the new central region that is proposed. I believe that a newly organized central region could tap into the enthusiasm of the members and become a viable and competitive region onto itself. Geography and distance is one of the main factors within AHRMA and this would address that. A central region should be able to encourage growth.
I agree that using the Missippi river as an east/west border is dated. I think that giving the middle ground memebers some weight is a good idea.
I like the idea of having an equal amount of representation. Hopefully it would help bring AHRMA closer as an organization! I’m anxious to hear from others how they believe it will affect the future of our organization!
Eddie Parks Fluvanna, Tx
This is written in first person, but I can’t see who wrote it.
I would like to hear more about how this may benefit the members. It would seem that representatives from that region were never barred from becoming trustees. Would creating a region centrally afford a new regional championship for the members in that area of the country to chase? Sorry if it’s a redundant question. I welcome any info and am open to it!
You are correct, members from that region were never prohibited from running for Trustee. However the overwhelming numbers of members in the 3 coastal states nearly always out vote the rest of the region.
There will be a separate rule proposal later in the year to revamp the National Championship for MX (and possibly Trials) that will include Regional Championships.
I think that combined, AHRMA can increase membership and provide more events with a Central Region.
With the new voting rules, will this end up with another unannounced poll on a private Facebook page that few people know about, and then becomes official doctrine? Nothing to stop the East or maybe even the West coast from planting and voting in their Trustee candidates, just like the recent elections.
In view of the above, I can’t see any advantage for having a Central Region unless the original voting rules are reinstated. There are good reasons for each region to self-rule.
Appreciate the reply Kelly. This has proven to be an interesting discussion with a lot of good ideas. I agree with Arthur K. There are plenty of changes to address first.