Dues Confusion

Discussion
1

[Marcy said...]

2. The reason LP CA is charging dues is that it costs money to carry

out the delegates/members wishes (votes). Relying on voluntery
donations alone may not be fair, since conceivably someone voting at
a local meeting or convention sustained by donations may not have
contributed any funds at all. I say this scenario may not be fair
because I personally believe in putting your money where your heart
is.
<<

Expanding upon Marcy's comment..

Dues at the rates set barely cover the costs of retaining and getting members, and publishing California Freedom. In fact, without MARA, it is cost-prohibitive for the state party to send out direct mail to build/retain membership, since our bylaws give 60% of membership dues to the counties, and the remaining 40% is not near enough.

Donors are generally approached with a project to fund in mind. It is not ethical to divert funds raised under those pretenses to just maintain basic membership levels and services. Yet, unfortunately, this is exactly what National has found itself having to do. The state party does not want to destroy its credibility with donors by diverting funds raised for a specific purpose to the general fund, yet it is very difficult to raise funds to pay for basic member services like renewal mailings and member communications the members are unwilling to support fully with their own dues. Hence, dues are set roughly to cover these basic needs.

Furthermore, National has effectively bailed on any obligation to life members. These funds were never set aside (accounting-wise) to support the continuing costs of these members, as they should have been. Now, that obligation falls on the state and county parties to fulfill, with no support from national expected. Funds from life members joining in the future will first be split 40/60 with the appropriate county, then the state portion will be segregated from the general fund (hopefully interest bearing, depending upon the legality), with only a fraction used each year. It is recommended the county does the same with their share.

Rich

2

All these are good points, but it should be noted that the LPC itself
has in the past done the same kind of unethical fundraising National has
been accused of having done. Starchild will no doubt remember the
disastrous telemarketing campaign in, I believe, 2000 when the LPC
contracted with a professional telemarketing firm to raise money. I was
on the LPC Executive Committee at the time, which narrowly approved the
plan to raise general funds in this way. I opposed the plan, but as
usual, I was outvoted. When the telemarketers called me, they read a
script that the ExCom never approved, which stated that they were
raising money to assist our candidates in paying their filing fees.

Starchild posted to this list a description of his own telephone
conversation with the telemarketer. He not only questioned her about
her knowledge of the party and its ideology (of which she knew nothing
at all), but also asked her how he, as a candidate for the Assembly,
could apply for these funds to defray his own filing fees. Of course,
she couldn't answer any of his questions because the script didn't
include any such details. All of the money raised during this campaign
went straight into the LPC general fund treasury and was never earmarked
for candidate support. Mark Hinkle was the LPC Chair at the time, and
the telemarketing campaign was managed by Aaron Starr, who is now the
LPC Chair. It was Starr who approved the deceptive telephone script.

This is why we in Alameda County have not signed on with the MARA
program, and will likely be managing our own membership recruitment and
retention efforts. We have waited entirely too long to have our dues
payments trickle down from Panorama City, often only after repeated
nagging to ExCom members and the state treasurer. I will be far more
comfortable managing our own funds and cutting a regular monthly check
to the LPC for its 40% share. It's about time we turned this party
around and made it a bottom-up kind of organization rather than the
top-down structure that has caused all of these problems.

Terry Floyd, Treasurer
Libertarian Party of Alameda County

3

Terry,

  Hear, hear! I'm glad there are people around with memories like yours; yes I did take that telemarketer's call and write about it, though I'd almost forgotten the episode. It would have been amusing were it not so dismaying. Indeed it is an apt parallel to the kind of ethical lapse in fundraising that Richard Newell cites the national party as engaging in. There is also the very fact of paying a telemarketing firm to make phone calls in the first place instead of seeking volunteers for the task. The willingness of the LPC to take on such unnecessary expenses raises doubts about their claims to be unable to manage basic aspects of membership, such as sending renewal letters, without seeking more money from the counties.

  For example, we have yet to see a full breakdown of the LPC's costs associated with direct mail despite requests for the information. Aaron Starr has based his claim that it costs $60 to get a new LPC member on these unspecified costs. However I sent a message (which LPC Secretary Dan Wiener refused to post to the county officers list) noting that the LPC could pay somebody $10 an hour with a $10 bonus per new member to walk around doing absolutely nothing but soliciting memberships at
libertarian events, anti-war rallies, marijuana events, gun shows, etc., and even if the person only got one new member every four hours, that membership would cost $50, not $60.

  I suspect that if those costs are analyzed with an eye toward saving money, they can be reduced. A few years ago when the state party was paying its Executive Director Juan Ros over $60,000 a year, it was claimed that they couldn't get the job done by anyone qualified for less money, but you tell me that current ED Dave Ruprecht makes only $35,000 a year (plus fundraising commissions, as Juan got). A couple minor ways in which they could improve their current financial outlook are by loosening the advertising restrictions on California Freedom in order to attract more ads, and making it party policy not to pay for meeting space for ExCom meetings -- those are just a couple things that immediately occur to me.

Yours in liberty,
        <<< Starchild >>>

4

Here's new episode: I just received a telemarketing call from the national LP requesting a monthly pledge donation since the party had eliminated it's dues. The caller was surprised when I mentioned that the CA LP party had doubled it's dues and suggested that, unless national is a fan of boxing and keen on the strategy of the one-two punch, the ideal time to ask pledges was not following a doubling in dues.

-- Steve

5

As predicted, it seems they have lost no time in launching new fundraising to make up for the (imho) dumb decision to eliminate dues! Hopefully they are not wasting money they don't have by using a telemarketing company. You didn't happen to ask the person who called if he or she was a volunteer or being paid, did you?

  I guess I don't really see any great irony of the Libertarian Party having dues despite many of us wanting government taxes to be voluntary. The biggest and most obvious difference between the two situations is that the LP is a voluntary, membership-based organization. It is not trying to control the lives of people who live in a particular geographic area, so there is nothing ultimately involuntary about it.

  Having dues also serves a valuable purpose -- it raises the hurdle for any organized group of outsiders who might want to come in and take the party over. This concern cannot be lightly dismissed, because it essentially happened to the Reform Party only a few years ago. We'll never know, but perhaps if they had required dues, they could have avoided their party being captured by Pat Buchanan and his followers.

  The Libertarian Party also does continue to operate on a volunteer-charity basis in one major respect, and that is its candidates. Libertarian candidates get little in the way of funding from the party, and raise money through the voluntary donations of Libertarian supporters. Considering what a major part of LP operations running for office represents, it seems to me that we have a good balance between the two basic approaches -- or did, until this unfortunate move by the LNC.

Yours in liberty,
        <<< Starchild >>>

6

  As predicted, it seems they have lost no time in launching new
fundraising to make up for the (imho) dumb decision to eliminate dues!
Hopefully they are not wasting money they don't have by using a
telemarketing company. You didn't happen to ask the person who called
if he or she was a volunteer or being paid, did you?

No. But given her voice and manner, I would guess she was a hired professional.

I guess I don't really see any great irony of the Libertarian Party
having dues despite many of us wanting government taxes to be
voluntary. The biggest and most obvious difference between the two
situations is that the LP is a voluntary, membership-based
organization. It is not trying to control the lives of people who live
in a particular geographic area, so there is nothing ultimately
involuntary about it.

Neither would the charitable organizations that could replace things like medicaid.

  Having dues also serves a valuable purpose -- it raises the hurdle for
any organized group of outsiders who might want to come in and take the
party over. This concern cannot be lightly dismissed, because it
essentially happened to the Reform Party only a few years ago. We'll
never know, but perhaps if they had required dues, they could have
avoided their party being captured by Pat Buchanan and his followers.

So you are suggesting that such entrance fees serve to us protect against a deep pocketed republican take-over? I'm sorry, but I see them as having the opposite effect and that the case can be made that the opposite is what has already happened.

-- Steve

7

  As predicted, it seems they have lost no time in launching new
fundraising to make up for the (imho) dumb decision to eliminate dues!
Hopefully they are not wasting money they don't have by using a
telemarketing company. You didn't happen to ask the person who called
if he or she was a volunteer or being paid, did you?

No. But given her voice and manner, I would guess she was a hired
professional.

  Bummer. If anyone else gets such a call, and feels like probing a bit, here are some suggested queries:

-Are you volunteering, or being paid? If the latter, can you tell me how much?
-Do you work for the Libertarian National Committee, or for another company?
-Are you a Libertarian yourself?
-Can you tell me what libertarianism is about?
-What is the party's position on [pick an issue]?
-Can you tell me how to get in touch with or make a donation to my local Libertarian Party chapter if I'd rather give to them instead?
-May I speak with a supervisor? [Ask Supervisor the same type questions]

I guess I don't really see any great irony of the Libertarian Party
having dues despite many of us wanting government taxes to be
voluntary. The biggest and most obvious difference between the two
situations is that the LP is a voluntary, membership-based
organization. It is not trying to control the lives of people who live
in a particular geographic area, so there is nothing ultimately
involuntary about it.

Neither would the charitable organizations that could replace things
like medicaid.

  Sure. And I don't see anything wrong with those kinds of voluntary or charitable organizations establishing dues for people who want to belong to those organizations as members and participate in their policy-making, do you? They could still take contributions from anyone, just as the LP welcomes the support or votes of members and non-members alike.

  Having dues also serves a valuable purpose -- it raises the hurdle for
any organized group of outsiders who might want to come in and take the
party over. This concern cannot be lightly dismissed, because it
essentially happened to the Reform Party only a few years ago. We'll
never know, but perhaps if they had required dues, they could have
avoided their party being captured by Pat Buchanan and his followers.

So you are suggesting that such entrance fees serve to us protect
against a deep pocketed republican take-over? I'm sorry, but I see them
as having the opposite effect and that the case can be made that the
opposite is what has already happened.

  I can see your point. And for people who are in the party, I do support making participation as affordable as possible. But IF membership dues are accompanied by a strong adherence to ideology, I think they do have a deterrence effect on takeover-minded outsiders, because what it means is that someone with a strongly different agenda would first have to donate a meaningful amount of money to a group holding positions he or she completely disagreed with. That factor has kept *me* from joining various groups or going to various events I would have joined or gone to in an attempt to influence them had I been able to do so without paying, so I know this isn't something I'm just imagining.

  Also, if membership includes free newsletters or other services that cost money, there is a reasonable argument to be made that basic memberships should be financially self-supporting (i.e. the party should not *lose* money from someone being a member). Of course this hinges on the party managing its costs in a reasonable way and not doing things like hiring telemarketing firms or paying people "professional" salaries. I also support having subsidized low-cost or even free memberships for students, because of the strong need to attract younger voters and activists, and the fact that they are less likely to have solidly held anti-libertarian views than an older person who disagrees with us might.

Yours in liberty,
        <<< Starchild >>>