I guess so Joey, just using your logic. Dale wants some action, no problem. He poked his finger in my chest at the Gauley for having Barry at the campground and he gave me the finger at the May Steering Committee. Poke me again Dale or anyone else who fells the need... Get in my face and I'll get in yours. No more mister nice guy.

Mr. Margavage

The BWA has now voted to endorse the AW Council at it's July meeting by voting upon and passing this resolution :

“The club supports BWA involvement with other local paddling groups in building the groundwork organization for a new management group in cooperation with AW. Property management at the local level is important, as is the voice of all members from local paddling groups. Any organized representation should be such that representatives are obligated to express the majority vote of their respective clubs on all management policy."

This wonderful development signals a beginning to the next phase toward making the new AW Council a truly effective managing entity. I'm posting in this existing thread on the Elkhorn Forum (instead of the BWA forum) in order to openly continue the discussion about how this might best proceed and to allow input from other interested (non-BWA) paddlers of the Elkhorn to participate in the discussion.

The BWA resolution makes no mention of who would actually be representing the club on the new Council. As was suggested earlier in this thread the BWA Conservation officer and/or the President seem like logical choices to represent.

I look forward to everyone's thoughts and discussion on this suggestion and how to move the AW Council from concept to reality.
barryg

Probably the first thing we need to do, now that we have decided to move forward with AW's proposal for new management structure and approach is to focus on their proposal and nit pick on it with others from the other representative groups, such as Elkhorn Paddlers and the Vikings and interested donors and develop some dialogue on implementation. This requires a meeting of these persons at some point, although discussion on this forum would also be fruitful. On behalf of the BWA, it does seem logical to have our conservation officer, in this case Leachman, be our point man on behalf of the BWA.

I think Zina's "town hall" meeting approach at the place in Frankfort is a good place to conduct "implementation" discussions for all interested persons to attend, including our "point person". I found that those meetings, by and large, demonstrated tremendous consensus on the property and the issues, regardless of the prior political structures attempted. The AW guidelines seem to satisfy all, so, the council should really be making limited recommendations, conducting basic reporting on management status to AW and the respective clubs, and making the actual arrangements to manage the property which is, primarily, grass cut periodically, garbage picked up and some gravel or pot hole work every few years or so or as needed. Kinda like we have been doing in the past 9 years - generally on some individuals own initiative. Issues such as gates, donation boxes, landscaping, changing room improvements and how to best meet AW's requirement (and the neighbors requests) for port a john or other bathroom facilities given the flood zone it is in, - these are all things that the council will address with AW and their respective clubs.

Just some thoughts ya'll. David, you want this task? Anyone have feelings one way or the other as to who should be the BWA "point man" if not conservation office?

Brent

Yes, I will take on the task upon the BWA deciding that the conservation officer is to take on that role. The steering committee should come up with a recommendation to the club and the club should decide on the proposal (Hanley should we talk about this on the Steering Committee forum). Now that the BWA has decided to move forward with ELC there should be no more debate at the meetings. That is my hope that the debate is curbed since the decision has been made and our president is pretty adamant about not discussing EA. I’m not saying we cant or anything. I’m an optimist and I hope we can move forward in a positive way.

I have not looked at AW proposal lately but in my mind there needs to be a local AW representative to lead the ELC meetings. Someone who is not be involved with EA previously or does not have some sort of personal history with the property.

Guys and Gals, FYI, I do not look at this page very much at all. I only came here because a discussion on the BWA forum.

Ledgeman

I want to be absolutely clear about my intentions. We can discuss this issue at the steering committee meeting, but I'm not going to let it dominate the entire meeting and I'm going to try to keep discussion on a productive level. For the month of August I am going to request of the club that all discussion of the EA issue be kept off the floor. I feel that the club needs a break from this issue, partly just as a matter of perspective. This club is bigger than this one issue and does not need to be consumed by it. Therefore, any motions that we wish to consider will be brought up in September. I'm sorry if this doesn't sit well with some folks, but I am confident that the issue will still be simmering nicely and waiting for us when we get back to it.

I want to say something else. I don't expect the main players in this drama to forget the past and start loving each other, but I do think we can reach some form of resolution. The Irish Catholics and the Protestants, the Israelis and the Egyptians, the Israelis and the Palestinians, the Axis powers and the European Allies from WW II, these groups of people had real reasons to hate each other. They suffered massive casualties, bombed and terrorized each other, fought over huge important issues of political freedom, sovereignty and the right to exist and be self-determined. Nonetheless, these groups have searched for and often found common ground and have, in some instances, formed alliances or become part of the same political entity. That doesn't mean that everyone forgave everyone else and forgot about their missing limbs and/or dead friends and family, but it does mean that as a group they moved beyond their hatred of each other and found common ground.

Surely we can do the same. Surely I am not naive to think that we can get beyond the petty differences that pepper the history of this issue and figure out how to resolve it for the future. I would be ashamed to discover otherwise.

Hanley

Amen to that Hanley. If all those warring factions could put the hatred to rest, for sure we can do the same about some stupid little argument that nobody has the class to lose. . . . . . .