Ken Johnson, Commodore

How is the Club Doing?

I have a two-part answer to this common question, as we complete the first third of the 2012 (how time flies!).

On the qualitative level, we are doing very well, although there are always concerns.  By the qualitative level, I mean the spirit of the Club – the attitude of members.  The Clubhouse is busier – more events and more rentals – a key indicator for our overall success.

Our goal was to have the Club work from the members up, not down from the Board and Officers.  Our rate of volunteerism remains high, with a broad base of members contributing to projects at the Club – witness the many Club members who contributed time and effort to repaint the Clubhouse.  Our social and educational programs are strong and varied, with good turnouts for the events, including the First Fridays.  The Clubhouse has been very busy after racing (huge crowds this PSSR weekend) – with the bar largely staffed by volunteer bar tenders.  A number of members signed up at the Status of the Club meeting in early April to help on a variety of projects: working on our whalers and Race Committee boats, volunteering for the Opti NW regional regatta in October, helping on the web page and computer systems, maintaining the Clubhouse as well as working behind the bar and contributing to our social and educational programs.

We already have a number of young sailors-to-be signed up for our Learn-to-Sail programs, with ads in several local publications.  One new member signed up his young son to all seven of the “guppy” programs!

The Supporting and Sustaining membership program has been very successful – we have raised over $18,000 to date from over 40 members – to me this is a great vote of support towards the efforts we are all making and to the Club’s future.

While each of our efforts needs one or two leaders, it is a broad base of volunteers that is important – if we leave all the work to our leaders, they inevitably will burn out, and projects will not get done.  Best to take on a specific task, and get it done – and let others take on the next project.  So my one concern in this area is that we may rely on certain individuals to spend too much of their time on a variety of Club projects – we need to get things done, yes, but we all need to live a life away from the Club and get others involved.

On a quantitative level, the answer is hopeful but less clear.  It is just too early to get a good read on the financial position of the Club.  Our financial position is even to slightly ahead of last year – cash in is slightly ahead and expenses are even to slightly lower than in 2011 – a good start. As to membership, we have added over 90 new members so far this year, with over half being adult/family memberships!  Excellent progress as the membership events directed toward the Shilshole community and the May open house were very successful.   We are now working on the renewals from 2011 -– many members wait to renew in April when evening racing begins.   With all the changes in dues, we did not send out invoices early in the year, and we have found that a number of members did not renew until we recently reminded them.  We are sending out another renewal notice, but if you haven’t renewed, please go online and do it now!

Race participation so far is ok but not great – we had 10 fewer boats register for Center Sound than in 2011(2 fewer Club members and 8 fewer non-Club members), continuing a disturbing trend over the past few years.  However, PSSR, with 70 registered boats, had the same number of boats as two years ago and just one fewer boat than last year, and a higher number of CYC boats than in several years. Evening racing now in its second series –  Lake evening racing looked strong in all fleets except the Thistles –  Sound Wednesday racing again had 25 registered boats and a number of Melges 24s practicing, but turnout is around 20 boats, and the Thursday evening dinghy racing remains light.  So we have not turned the corner yet on race participation, and need to continue working this important issue.

By the next Leadline we will have a good read on membership, race participation and financials, and we will report then on where we stand.

Meanwhile, there remains much work to be done – so ask yourself how you can help CYC!