GPS June 2020

President’s Message
Rudi Anders
Dues Are Due
Jerry Jensen, our Zoom commander, ably hosted
our just concluded Annual meeting of the GPS Board of Directors. We
had almost perfect attendance, I hope we can fix that for our next meeting,
planned for September 2020. The two hour meeting allowed us to
focus on membership retention and our budget. I hope the Board can
continue to meet via Zoom every 3 or 4 months because we can adjust to
unforeseen contingencies more quickly. These meeting will also allow us
to work more effectively by not being time-constrained to 2 hour per year.
Membership: As I’ve written in past months, we do not want to
raise dues. The GPS Board of directors agreed. The implications are
that we will not cover our costs with dues – no surprise, because we’ve
not done that for years. But if membership declines…. ? So it’s obvious
that we ALL must work to keep members. Elsewhere in this issue
you’ll find the Dues Envelope and a statement concerning membership
options. Please find that envelope today, write a check or pay via PayPal.
That helps us by not having to contact you again and it prevents you from
forgetting to renew or losing the envelope.
Budget: Since last June, we have been fortunate in raising $11K in
direct donations and over $8K via donation auctions. We’ve taken steps
to reduce costs by going from 12 to 10 issues of the Specialist and do not
have some start-up costs we had in the past year. But we still anticipate
a shortfall of $10K to $12K. As noted above, the Board has agreed to not
increase dues nor cut Specialist costs by further reducing the number of
issue. So we will continue to ask for donations and continue our donation
auctions and sales. We will also provide an incentive:
The GPS Board has decided to donate at least $3,000 in matching
funds to members who send donation with their dues. So please help – do
your part and your gift will be matched by our gift.
Thanks: This is also a good time for me to express my thanks to the
GPS Board and officers for their work. I’m reminded that when I joined
the Society one of the perks of being on the Board was that its members
received – at the very least a reimbursement for their hotel costs. Ah, the
good old days – that ceased in about 1992. So consider that these folks
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German Postal Specialist