MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT
You may recall that last month I noted we are facing a challenging situation with need for more active involvement from our members. We would like to report that more members stepped forward to help as a RSO; volunteered to work on range maintenance; or helped with or lead one of the scheduled range events. Unfortunately, there has been no change with regard to increased participation and as a result we had to cancel June’s Family Range Day.
So let me explain why your help is so important. You may or may not know that a part of the club’s agreement with Umatilla County as well as our landlord, is that we are required to train new shooters in order to remain on the property as a ‘training’ site. Each year, we have had a goal of 200 new shooters come to the range for training. To qualify as a training site with the County, we need to be giving out certificates for training, such as in Hunter Safety, Women on Target, Family Range Day, etc., as these all fall under the ‘training’ heading. We have met this goal in the past through monthly events for new shooters. However, this year we canceled the June Family Range Day because no one has stepped up to coordinate this event and it is possible that may happen again in July. Women on Target was successfully done with 85 new shooters, and Steve Anderson has done First Shots. But we still need to continue Family Range Day events, and soon it will be time for Hunter Safety. It is imperative that we work together to meet our goal of 200 new shooters per year.
You may ask why someone from the Board doesn’t lead the events. It’s quite simple. Some Board members are leading and coordinating events, helping with range maintenance, volunteering as RSO’s, etc., but we are also busy doing other necessary duties for the range on top of full-time jobs. And as previously noted, there is only a few who are doing all the work, and many are tired and worn out from being the only ones doing the work to keep the range operational. Since we are a non-profit self-supporting club, it falls to all of us to pitch in. And again, for our range to continue to exist, we have to provide training events, and to do this, we need your help.
To summarize: unless we meet the requirements outlined by Umatilla County as well as our Landlord, wherein we provide training for new shooters, it could eventually result in loss of our ability to continue using the property. That may sound extreme, but unless we fix this problem, it could one day become a reality.
So let me close by telling you that we need help in July for Family Range and, and, August is National Shooting Sports month in which we have had the range open on the weekends so the public can come out to shoot. To successfully provide these opportunity, we need RSO’s to come forward for all events we provide. If you have trained to be a RSO, PLEASE let us know you are available to help.
If you have suggestions on how we can improve things; and/or what you think will encourage more involvement, we would like to hear them. You can email us at: suggestions@eergunclub.com
Thank you – Dennis Boland, President
