I have good news to announce. The Bylaws Committee has completed their work creating a proposed set of bylaws for the USA Dive Club. Over 75% of the Club's Board of Directors approved the proposed bylaws and the Board has scheduled an online vote by the membership beginning September 4. We will have a question and answer session with the Bylaws Committee at the September 3rd meeting after the speaker's presentation.

We have created a summary of the changes. Click here to view the summary.

Click here to view the complete proposed bylaws.

The biggest change in these proposed bylaws is that members of the Hall of Fame will no longer have lifetime memberships on the Board of Directors. A majority of the Board of Directors, including many members of the Hall of Fame, support this change as the best way to help the Club get and keep volunteers into the future.

Under the proposed bylaws, members of the Hall of Fame can still be elected and appointed Board members. Currently a number of members of the Hall of Fame hold Board positions, including Clare Anthon, Ronnie Farr, John Ficarra, Ryan Goheen, Nils Jacobsen, Julie Manhold, and Robert Shearer. Therefore, the Hall of Fame will continue to be represented on the Board of Directors.

The Board of Directors recommends that members vote "Yes" to support the proposed bylaws.

And, here are two other news items from the Board of Directors.

• The date of the annual election has been set as December 3. We are not planning to have a Christmas party this year due to the pandemic. Therefore, we will conduct the annual election during a Zoom meeting on December 3.
• The Board voted to eliminate the $10 initiation fee for new members. This will remove a small barrier to new member applications and has no financial impact on the Club.