Letter from the President - December 2014

Dear Members:

As I will be retiring (again) from my ASC responsibilities following the forthcoming December Membership meeting, I will leave my usual comments about club operations in the very capable hands of each Director to be related to you both in their December website updates and in their personal reports to the Membership on December 11.

Instead I will appreciate your indulgence of my using my last President’s message for the purpose of thanking those with whom I have had the pleasure to work in the continuing development of ASC into being the best sportsmen’s club possible.

When thanking people one always has a great fear of inadvertently forgetting to include someone whose contributions have been significant. In the event I do so in this instance I offer my most sincere apology.

I believe a great deal has been achieved and will continue to be achieved with respect to the objectives we set out a few years ago that include:

1. Adopting and never violating comprehensive financial management policies and controls. This has permitted ASC to emerge from the shadow of insolvency with antiquated facilities to a position of financial strength that has allowed us to make significant annual investments in the club’s physical facilities without incurring indebtedness and while constantly enhancing  our financial resources
2. Forcefully doing everything possible to eliminate the historical inclination of ASC to reflect an insular group of different cliques to instead reflect the atmosphere of a single club with a variety of activities to be enjoyed by every member within a family oriented environment stressing the need to attract, maintain, and grow family, youth, and female member participation.
3. To expand the number of training courses being offered to our members and their families in all club disciplines with an overriding concentration at all times on SAFETY. The number of training courses being offered is expected to continue growing in terms of both subject matter and frequency such that, as one member recently mentioned, our training department might soon be justifiably referred to as “ASC University”.
4. To continue being a good community neighbor in all matters including  sponsored  community events, youth scholarships, assisting various law enforcement departments by providing needed training facilities and with respect to  all relevant environmental matters.

None of that which has been, and will continue to be, achieved would be possible if there did not exist broad membership support for your BOD and that support exists only because we have in place a BOD consisting of members whose knowledge and capabilities are consistent with their specific department responsibilities along with an overriding concern about the club as a whole. The amount of time and effort contributed by our BOD cannot possibly be quantified in a brief message such as this. However, if you multiply by a factor of ten whatever you believe might describe the time, efforts and contributions of your BOD that would not be unreasonable

As such, I offer my heartfelt thanks to every BOD member who, when invited to accept a BOD position, agreed to do so understanding from the outset that they were committing to pursuing precise objectives in a professional and businesslike manner and incurring extensive demands on their time.

Having been a member of numerous ASC and other BOD I can state without the slightest degree of exaggeration that you have a BOD that is truly unique as there is a complete absence of territorial conflict or personal rancor and instead there is unanimity in terms of attitude and willingness to do whatever is best for the club as a whole at all times.

Because there are so many members that do so much for the club it is often unwise to mention only a few individual names. However, there are times when the contributions being made on behalf of ASC are so outstanding on a day by day, week by week, month afar month basis that not thanking them by name would be unjust.

Therefore, I offer a special thank you on behalf of all ASC members to Brad Reichter, Al Croteau, and Jimmy Lombard. All any of us need do is ask ourselves the simple question of what in the world would we have done without their unceasing efforts in so many different areas.

In closing may I wish every ASC member and their families a happy, healthy and safe Christmas season and an outstanding New Year.

Sincerely,
Dick Reichter, President