It was brought to my attention that the recent election was handled incorrectly.

In Article III Section 5 it states "Commercial Members shall consist of those individuals holding a financial interest in any phase of the Aquarium or Tropical Fish sales, being either fresh or salt water. Commercial members may not hold office, unless 2/3 voting members approve. Commercial members may vote. Commercial members may not solicit at the General Meetings, or at any other Club sponsored functions. Amended Feb, 2002"

The way I read it, 2/3 of the members had to approve me to run for office, not I had to have 2/3 of the votes to win the office. We need to remember this in the future, so this does not happen again. I also think we need to clarify commercial vs. non-comercial members. As a lot of us benefited from CRASE this year.

This is for informational purposes only, as I am not trying to change the outcome of the election.

Donny

You cannot consider anyone as commercial unless they have a Tax ID from the state. Am I correct in this or not? Most of us members have sold coral from time to time whether it may have been CRASE or just random.

Also from what this says, then we can no longer hold meetings at a LFS. Wouldnt that be considered soliciting?
I think these bylaws need some looking into and changing if need be.

I believe that is what Donny is really trying to say. I know Donny is not upset but feels as though if nothing else some amendments and clarification need to be added.

Some members felt that one couple should only recieve one vote. So does that mean spouses don't count? This rule is not in the by-laws but was implied. I really think alot of time and consideration were put into the by-laws but I think it is time to review them.

Example: the two ladies Kerry and Lori that just accepted officer positions would not have been able to vote nor hold office. Because it is their spouse who is the main member. This caused some confusion among voters who were unsure if they should vote. This scenario could have been percieved if the two ladies would have had challengers.

Lori and Donny have regular memberships not commercial memberships. The by-laws are very ambiguous relating to that. The by-laws do not say anything about a tax id or not, simply a financial interest in the aquarium trade.

I believe good discussion and communication are two things this club can greatly benefit from. This topic will be a good avenue to build a better omas.

I would like to hear everyones thoughts on this. Please post or email me at saltclub@hotmail.com

John Leeds
OMAS President 2008

These bi laws need some SERIOUS rewording and some kind of action taken by our 2008 officers. Because if the case of the lfs is correct then why do I pay more than the rest of the people that are in the group? And I also donate a huge % of OMAS profits with my donations hmmmmm! This all seems a bit fishy (no pun intended) to me,anyone else?? If the bi laws say that we cannot host meetings I guess thats fine but I'm pretty sure that the March 2007 membership drive was the largest meeting of the year. And I'd also have to guess that the raffle brought in a decent amount of cash that night. Not to mention, Scott did ALL of the preparations by himself. Like we've always said, we enjoy OMAS, but it's time for a change.

I left the meeting the other night with a lot of mixed feelings about all of this. Our club has a lot of potential that does not get used, and I know I have tried to make omas a better club but stuff like this makes us want to step back and reevaluate omas. In the past 3 years omas has went from 12 members to at least 40 or more and still climbing. I think that the reason a lot of us, were a little upset over the outcome and how it was handled is that we want omas to be a bigger better club than it has been and are looking forward to new programs and a a lot more effort out of our officers than has been in the past year. I am not griping,and we do appreciate everyone,I am just expressing my feelings and others feelings that have been communicated to us. Sorry if I upset anyone with this post we just want omas to be as big and as great as it can be. Other opinions are valued please post your feelings on this matter so we can all see/discuss them openly like adults.

I think it would be in the best interest of the club if "Commercial" was better defined. These days most hobbyist buy, sell, and trade. I am sure when the by-laws were written by the "founding fathers" commercial was to mean a "brick and mortar" store, wholesale operation, or manufacturer. I am of the opinion it would be in the best interest of the club from a support point of view that the commercial affiliates should have limited input into club decisions and direction.

I think we need to find out why some of these by-laws were changed in the first place and go from there.


(Also from what this says, then we can no longer hold meetings at a LFS. Wouldnt that be considered soliciting?)

If the meeting is held at a LFS for education purposes I dont see a problem.As far as the other problems such as multiple people voting within a single membership and what is considered commercial vs regular member.I think we should put this to a vote.

Section 5 Commercial Members shall consist of those individuals holding a financial interest in any phase of the Aquarium or Tropical Fish sales, being either fresh or salt water. Commercial members may not hold office, unless 2/3 voting members approve. Commercial members may vote. Commercial members may not solicit at the General Meetings, or at any other Club sponsored functions. Amended Feb, 2002

If you have a tax id number for a business thats not your main source of income would this make you commercial or a smart reefer?I think myself and the other officers need to get together and go over all this with a finetooth comb so there wont be anymore mistakes.

( I think that the reason a lot of us, were a little upset over the outcome and how it was handled is that we want omas to be a bigger better club than it has been and are looking forward to new programs and a a lot more effort out of our officers than has been in the past year. I am not griping,and we do appreciate everyone,I am just expressing my feelings and others feelings that have been communicated to us. Sorry if I upset anyone with this post we just want omas to be as big and as great as it can be.)

What outcome are you upset about? OMAS has done more this year then we ever have done.There is no place to go but up.This club has gone though many ups and downs over the years.IMO it has grown leaps and bounds over the past couple of years.All we need is particpation from all the members.I am excited myself on what we can do in 08.

(It was brought to my attention that the recent election was handled incorrectly.

In Article III Section 5 it states "Commercial Members shall consist of those individuals holding a financial interest in any phase of the Aquarium or Tropical Fish sales, being either fresh or salt water. Commercial members may not hold office, unless 2/3 voting members approve. Commercial members may vote. Commercial members may not solicit at the General Meetings, or at any other Club sponsored functions. Amended Feb, 2002"

The way I read it, 2/3 of the members had to approve me to run for office, not I had to have 2/3 of the votes to win the office. We need to remember this in the future, so this does not happen again. I also think we need to clarify commercial vs. non-comercial members. As a lot of us benefited from CRASE this year.

This is for informational purposes only, as I am not trying to change the outcome of the election. )

Donny

I agree Donny and if you want the position of VP then im ok with a revote.

Over the last couple of years I have watched your club come and go. Seems to me your primary objective SHOULD be to get more members off their asses and actually get involved. There are only about 6 of the club members [if that] that actually do anything. This is plainly evident by the activity on this board as well as reef central and what I hear in the store. We all have busy lives but growth will come if more than just a couple of people get involved. Are any retailers helping you grow with the exception of Oddballs???? I don't think so, shouldn't that also be an area of concern. More people should voice their opinions - TRUTHFULLY talking about this stuff [not I might offend or I'll just tell you what I think you want to hear] could make some good impact on the club as a whole. Hell, I'm not even a club member and have posted more about these issues than the current membership. Again, just stating what I see from the outside - my apologies for those I have offended now and in the future!!!!!

Scott - Premier Aquatics [enough confusion already right?]

Scott I am not offened, I appreciate your honesty. I have known for a while now that the local retailers do not send very many new members to the club. I understand that our club is mainly made up of people who already have a tank and the necessary basics to keep a reef tank. What incentive does this leave the local retailers to build the club, a group of educated buyers who have the skill to buy a smaller coral and grow it out. Members who can utilize the internet and have the abillity to ask questions in forums reguarding DIY, Fish health, and Coral health. I am aware that some people trade with the LFS but other than that what as a club do we have to offer LFS? Sales of frags and fish? Earlier this year I spoke to you and the other LFS owners about the new commercial membership where omas members are encouraged to go to each of your stores. I hope this will increase omas to LFS traffic and LFS traffic to omas. Just like you I hope that what I have said hasn't offened you, my goal is a better omas for us all.

John Leeds
OMAS
President 2008

Here is what I want from this club.
1.
I have lots of frags of corals that are currently going to Odballs, as much as I know Scott would hate to lose these, I want to be able to help others expand thier selections in thier tanks, this is also what I want in return as well. I want to expand my current selections as well. I want to be able to take something to a meeting and trade for something else. If you dont have something for trade and are starting out, Hell I have plenty to help out fellow reefers. I joined this club to aquire a larger variety of corals without blowing a considerable amount of cash down the drain. Although at this point I have succeded in doing this. I know there is a lot of corals out there that I dont have and am interested in, as I am sure this goes for alot of others as well. I am not sure what the deal was, but when I posted I would be bringing lots of corals to one meeting there were people concerned I would offend the place holding the meeting. There was only one person that approched me that night and even asked about what I had brought. I was told to expect this, but thought that maybe by me posting before hand might help. Its not like I was asking a ton of money for the frags. I even had a couple to give away as freebies for people just starting up a tank.
2.
Education, I for one know the basics for keeping saltwater and corals. I personally would like to see more info on keeping params, lighting issues, heat issues, compatability for corals as well as livestock, coral placement is a big one for me as I have learned the hard way and lost some nice pieces to being misinformed or guesssing. I would also like to see something on diseases and pests, and how to eliminate these.
3.
Dues, raffles, and other money from meetings. I know we have a PAR meter for the club and some books, but how about some other things as well that a lot of us cannot afford. Like fishtraps, low phosphate testing equipment, maybe some other better testing equipment, also how about aquiring some instructional DVD's on some of the things I have listed for the library. Even some corals bought from the club and used for donor lists since alot of members have a hard time giving up thier own stuff.
4.
Better communication from members, Like Scott said there are memebers I have not even seen post on this forum. There are a few members that post on this forum. The forum on RC has more members from COMAS post than OMAS.
I am the type of person that learns more about others from conversing on forums. The meetings are nice, but how much can you learn from a person in a couple of hours.
5.
Look into changing the meeting, I have no idea what else would work better, I just know that I have a lot harder time making it to meetings on Saturdays.

Thats all I can think of for now, but I know there are some other issues I would like to bring up.

Well what it comes down to is people getting into the hobby,getting a huge interest and then losing all focus on their tank and moving on.This is a tough hobby in ways,you end up spending alot on getting your tank set up and going,things go wrong and your done with it.
Thats why you see alot of new faces at meetings and then the LFS and after a few months they disappear.In this hobby people come and go,its hard to keep a steady group of members.Nothing is perfect sometimes you gotta just try your best and hope things workout for the better.
I think John is taking the club in a very positive direction and I think we should all try our best to help and accomplish the things we set out to do for the club,that includes working with our LFSs we need their help as well..

Donny
OMAS

Beverage Director :P

Thanks Gary, All are great points
1. I agree you should be able to sell via the selling forum here and deliver to the meetings, no problem. Except when that meeting is at a LFS the owners would most likely prefer no competition inside their store.
2. We are working on the meetings now so thanks for the input.
3. The library is in great need of updating Lori and I have talked about buying some new books in January. Everyone please send us suggestions.
4. Communication, yes I agree the more on this forum the better. How do we get it, Good discussion like this one are a great start.
5. Meeting time, I am open to what the masses want. My personal opinion doesn't count here. My understanding is that only a few have conflicts with Saturday night while most say it gives them time to make it to the meetings.

Again Gary thanks for the input. Please feel free to look at my agenda for 2008 that I added to the omas.org site. The agenda talks alot about several things you pointed out. Everyones input is welcome.


http://www.omas.org/agenda.htm

John Leeds
OMAS President 2008

I agree with this Donny, but man this thread has been up for over a week now, and the only people to reply is both Scotts, Jarod, John, yourself and I. I think thats a load of crap. I know I have not been with OMAS long, but has it always been this way? How come no one else has voiced thier opinion? Does anyone else care? I know at the October meeting when George asked for opinions on how to make this club better, I seem to recall the same people in this thread voice thier opinion. I just think this is sad.
I understand this is a very hard hobby to keep up, but isnt that what fellow members are suppose to do? Its kind of hard to do this when only talking to fellow members once a month.
We need to pump the importance of this site and get more members to come here and ask questions if they are having problems, this will help keep more members from burning out from lack of intrest or just plain disgust from a problematic tank.
As far as the reefcentral area of OMAS, it is hurting this site. People need to be more focused here than RC. I have been linking to this site in some of my threads hoping to get more members to post here instead of there. I think its funny to recieve replies on the RC site when I know they are members here and have read my threads from here.
With that being said anyone got any suggestions on how to accomplish getting the members on this site, besides making it mandatory to post once a week here to retain your membership?

I'm told that can have very strong opinions, so to counter this I often just stay quiet when something like this comes up. I didn't say anything at the meeting when this topic came up a while back, but since it seems to be a hot topic, here goes. I don't really understand why it matters if people post here or ReefCentral. Why does posting here make OMAS a better club? If it weren't for the restrictions on some posts related to selling, and a few other restrictions, I think most clubs would probably not bother to even have their own forum sites. ReefCentral in my view is a much larger and more diverse community than this, and it can provide a greater depth of information and as such I'll tend to spend more them there than here. The goal in the end is to provide a place(s) for people to share their experience, get ideas, seek answers to problems, and in general foster community. Sure, there are advantages to posting on either site, and depending on your perspective and needs, you may be more inclined toward one site over the other. So to me it's probably better to just encourage posting, at either place, rather than driving folks one way or the other and potentially dropping off one or the other group who prefers one over the other. If I'm missing something here, please feel free to clue me in, but I really don't see why it seems to be a big deal that posts get put on ReefCentral and not here.

With any club or organization there are always a few people who will tend to be more vocal about their positions and opinions than others. That doesn't mean that the quiet ones don't have opinions, or don't care, just that they may not be ready to share their views, or they may find that their needs are being met and they don't have any issues they feel need to be solved. We need to remember that in a club like this the only real commonality is that we all have marine (and in the case of OMAS, probably a reef) aquarium. Other than that you find people of all points of view, age, experience (both aquarium and life) and all levels of desire to be involved. Once you come to terms with this then you can begin to enjoy the club for that diversity and not get upset that everyone doesn't come to each meeting with a list of items they want to "fix". I respect and support those who have ideas on how to "improve" the club, and am willing to help in that goal where I can, but we also need to respect the perspective that what one person may find an improvement, to another may seem less important.

I just hope we don't spend too much time trying to be "better" and lose the enjoyment of what we do have already. While it's easy to get focused on what we don't have, or what we haven't done, let's also take time to enjoy the people we do have and what we have done. While I've only been with the club now less than a year, it's helped me re-energize my 15+ years in the hobby. I've made some new friends, and really enjoyed the great group of people I've met. And let's keep the dicsussions positive and constructive, you don't attract new members when your meetings are filled with discussions about how little involvement there is, or how the club isn't very energized... So maybe our OMAS aquarium is filled half way right now, let's just make sure we take the perspective that it's half full, not half empty!

I have been trying to get more members to use this forum because for me it seems simplier to direct new peole that I meet to omas.org where they can see the forum link rather than try and explain reefcentral.com and how to then find forums and then find the omas forum. Yes I could link the reefcentral forum to the omas.org site but I felt posts had dropped off enough there that it was time for something new. Several members will not even visit RC because of flame issues in the past, not in the omas forum but on that site. The other reason that I encourage members to come to this forum is because our store sponsors have a voice here and can post sales and answer posts more directly.

I appreciate your input and opinion and I don't think it was "too Strong". I hope that I haven't rubbed you or other members the wrong way with my enthusiasm for my new postion. Omas has made great progress in the last two years 2007 was the best. George was a great president who did great things within the club. I would just like to build upon what he started. This thread is great for me because I know I live in a bubble surrounded by friends and family where when we discuss omas it can be one sided. The club doesn't need vast improvements but just some tweaks here and there. Please tell me in the upcoming year if I start to go off track or to far with something my only goal is a better omas while keeping all of the great things about omas now.

Yes definately half full not half empty

John

I can't speak for others, but I know I haven't been offended at all by the discussions of improvements. I welcome them, just want to caution against too much time spent on improving and not enough enjoying. And I also admit that in areas like this I'm pretty easy to please, so I've always been pretty happy with OMAS. I'm just happy to have found even a few other folks in the area who share my passion for reef aquariums.

And thanks for the explanation on the forums, I understand a little better now why this forum may be easier for some folks. This is probably my worst blind spot, remember I work in the computer field (for the past 25 years), so it's nothing for me to have a set of bookmarks I open, one here, one at ReefCentral for OMAS, one for COMAS, and a few others, all at the same time. I'll also admit that's probably not something most people do. And I'll be happy to support this site as much as possible, and try to contribute more here as well.

Thanks Lee, I didn't think I had upset you but I wanted to be sure.

I, for one, hardly ever post anywhere. I read the RC forums almost daily, but only rarely have anything pertinent to add to the discussion. At one time, I religiously read this forum, but after two or three consecutive months of no new posts (and no responses to my attempts to draw out some conversation), I quit checking in. Of course, it would also help if the InvisionFree URL wasn't blocked by the firewall at work.

I've shared my thoughts on membership involvement with the officers, past and present. This isn't simply an OMAS forum problem, but runs much deeper within the membership. Until we can find a way to blast our members out of their reefkeeping stupor, I'm afraid we're stuck in the same old rut. We made significant strides last year to generate some excitement in the organization. Some efforts were successful and others, well, not so much. We're building on those successes (and taking some important lessons from the failures) and moving forward next year with even more exciting programs and events.

Stay tuned...

Things will work out fine,I have faith in everyone that has posted to this thread.2008 will be another good year for OMAS and I will be right here to help out and do whatever it takes to get things done.
We have a great bunch of folks here,I know we can work things out...

Donny
OMAS

Im happy, there has been more activity on this site in the past week than 2 mnths combined.

I post on more then these two forums but that's just me. :D
Some folks just dont have time to even browse the forums.

... and many of our members don't use computers.

I salute Donny's more accurate reading of the bylaws and his suggestion that the Bylaws be reworked, amended and updated. And more importantly, I ABSOLUTELY salute the spirit in which Donny has pointed out my mistaken reading of the 2/3rd rule re voting, and the spirit in which he has made his suggestions.

It is very clear that Donny is not complaining or trying to shift election results or club energy. His suggestions re the By-Laws absolutely are in the club's best interests, and I salute Donny's high and generous spirits regarding this entire issue.

I also apologize to all for not reading the ByLaws correctly re the 2/3rd rule.

For the sake of OMAS 2008 however, I believe it is important to recognize 1) that a proper interpretation of the 2/3rd rule MAY have resulted in the same outcome (ie 2/3rd of the membership may not have approved a commercial member's candidacy, 2) more importantly, OMAS has a tremendous slate of officers for 2008 AND has the invaluable support of Donny, and 3) Donny nor any other member is suggesting that there should be a repeat election.

I made a mistake re the election procedure. This is unfortunate, and I apologize. I hate making mistakes. My angst re this mistake would be compounded if the club becomes divided as a result. For this reason, I SALUTE Donny for not letting this happen and believe that the tone that he has set is in the best interest of the club:

1) A mistake was made (by me);
2) Whether or not this mistake would have changed the results of the election is unknown;
3) Divisiveness re the election would accomplish NOTHING of benefit to the club;
4) The election results should be considered done, official and embraced by all so that OMAS can move forward in 2008 in pursuit of the great plans outlined by the 2008 OMAS officers and the 2008 OMAS leadership, which includes Donny and many other active and dedicated OMAS members.
5) The OMAS bylaws should be updated during 2008 per Donny's suggestion.


Peace,
George Davenport
OMAS 2007 President

It's been awhile since I've checked in and it seems things have been busy.

First let me admit that I have a short attention span and got lazy and didn't read the entirety of everyone's posts. So, if it's been repeated, I apologize.

I'd like to be on any committee formed to review the bylaws. I've been looking at other clubs and have formed some opinions. For example, DFWMAS by laws are written very strictly and are intended for the club to make money and are not 'friendly' toward LFS. Boston Reefers' bylaws are written in more list format and are intended more to organize the club.

I don't know when or who wrote OMAS', but they seem very strict and limiting. I don't know that replacing them entirely is the best option, but I think we should review them and leave room for interpretation. We definitely need to define who is a member and who has voting rights.

I don't think selling frags as a hobbyist makes you commercial. Having a garage sale doesn't make you a business.