[at-l] Fighting the changes.......

[nightwalker.at at gmail.com]

Well, I'm a paid-up member, volunteer, and still don't like the changes of the past few years.

It's a business now. Maybe thay was inevitable, but us old folks are not required to like it.

And speaking just for myself, I differentiate between the local clubs and the Big Org. I can't speak fot others.

FrankenLooper
Going hiking TONIGHT!

-----Original Message-----
From: Rosalind Suit <rosalind.suit at verizon.net>
Sent: Tuesday, February 16, 2010 3:15 PM
To: Frank Looper <nightwalker.at at gmail.com>; Leslie Booher <lbooher at charter.net>; Carla & Dave Hicks <carla_dave_hicks at verizon.net>;  <at-l at backcountry.net>
Subject: Re: [at-l] Fighting the changes.......

Well, Frank, et alia.....

If what they miss is the volunteer  AT club of the past, they need to 
consider whether the part they really miss is the way it was 
formed/governed, or because it had responsibility for a section of the Trail 
and they could give back to the Trail.

  My feeling is that they have abandoned the volunteer part , the "Let's get 
down and dirty" part !" <G>....with the club membership part.( Maybe it's 
labor thrown out with the bath water they have washed their hands of? )

 Just because a maintaining club may be affiliated with the ATC doesn't 
preclude the need for workers to volunteer to go out and do the actual work 
on the trail maintenance.  Heaven knows each maintaining club needs more 
hands to do the work of trimming and clearing drainage and hauling away the 
cuts from blowdowns....no matter what else.  The Trail needs regular 
surveillance and maintenance.  It doesn't just happen by itself.  And it's 
done by club volunteers, since the clubs are given the responsibility to 
check on, survey and maintain sections of the Trail.....not to 
off-the-street-volunteers. Oh,  volunteers at any time are welcome to lend 
their strength and time to many projects.....and there are those that 
do....but the daily, monthly, yearly care of the Trail is not in their 
hands.  That's the point.

>From my point of view....it's too easy for folks to criticize them that does 
the work....if they're not standing where the workers are standing.  If the 
AT were turned over to the American Hiking Society ( Or the  Crazy Senate 
Committee to Survey National Trails)  right now I'd be right there joining 
to still volunteer  work on the Trail.  And the best way to do that (not the 
only way) is to be an active member of a maintaining club.  Not everyone can 
join a Konnarock Crew, or a Mid-Atlantic Crew, or be a Ridge Runner......but 
anyone can support a maintaining club's work on the Trail through membership 
and time volunteered to protect and preserve the Trail.

 And I won't let the ATC affiliation with my club keep me from the important 
part.....the volunteering that keeps the Trail up and running, alive (which 
means it changes...like everything else). That means I'll stay a member of 
the club, and the ATC.

My sentiments....and commitments.

YMMV......

Rosie/mdhiker
who will now step down from the soapbox and try to keep quiet a while, if 
you please ......
---------------------------------------
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Frank Looper" <nightwalker.at at gmail.com>
To: "Leslie Booher" <lbooher at charter.net>
Cc: "Carla & Dave Hicks" <carla_dave_hicks at verizon.net>; "Rosalind Suit" 
<rosalind.suit at verizon.net>; <at-l at backcountry.net>
Sent: Tuesday, February 16, 2010 1:49 PM
Subject: Re: [at-l] Dissing the ATC....


> Rosie, I think you have my answer, and then some. They just said it
> more literately than I could have. :-)
>
> Happy trails.