Membership Records
The Anne Arunel Radio Club maintains a number of permanent records on a remote server to avoid loss or damage. These include all sorts of things, various ruling documents, records of financial transactions and so on.
Within those records are the Membership Folders, typically one per member. Inside your Membership Folder are things like application forms, renewal forms, photography release forms, yearly survey forms, waiver forms and PayPal transaction forms, for those who have paid dues using PayPal.
We keep scanned copies of all paper documents we receive from you, and .pdf copies of the forms listed above that you have completed online. However if you joined the club prior to our initiation of online record keeping likely we still have the paper copies on file in the Secretaries Cabinet, in the Secretaries Closet of the Club House. Starting in 2020 we will have a volunteer working on scanning those records into our electronic storage.
Now here is what the average member should know.
1. We retain all records. Meanwhile most of the key membership information is stored in the club's Master Roster. For instance that Roster contains the results of your latest Yearly Survey, and latest Photography Release. This means every time you file a new one, it replaces the old one in our current records. Since the Photography Release covers both approval and disapproval of photography of your or your family, it should be filled out by everyone, even if you want to say "NO" to photography. Prior to Nov. 2018 the AARC had a photograpy policy built into the Application Form's waiver, which gave away many of your photo rights. Signing a newer Photography Release form gives you back those rights, as the language supercedes the older doucment.
2. Since each new Photograph Release form replaces prior documents, once you have signed the newest version of the Photography Release (Nov. 2018) you do not need to sign one yearly. The Photography Release is filed by the calendar year in which it was agreed to. A copy is stored in your Member Folder, and a second copy is filed in the Photograpy Release folder with those of all other members, where only the most recent is retained. In your personal Membership Folder all are retained. If you change your mind about approval, we will make every effort to remove photos with your likeness in them. However we do retain earlier documents to show that we had approval when we posted it.
3. On the other hand we use the Yearly Survey to allow us to inform various chairpersons and team leaders as to members interest in their activities. We do want one of these filed each year. We instituted a door prize at our Holiday Party to encourage doing this. But be aware we only retain one of these surveys per year. So if you fill in a Yearly Survey in January, filing another in October does not get you two door prize tickets. It just replaces the one you sent in January. For the benefit of the Holiday Party Door Prize, the year is considered to begin on the day of the Holiday Party and end the day before the next Holiday Party.
4. The Bylaw required Waiver, which appears on the Applicaiton Form, the Membership Renewal Form and the Waiver Form, must be agreed to by all adult members. Its intent is to prevent members who are engaging in amateur radio activities, which may at times be dangerous, from suing the club should they be injured. In other words, buy engaging in the activity yor are personally accepting the risk involved.
5. Note in paragraph 4 above, the Waiver is part of the Applicaiton Form, the Membership Form, and the Waiver Form. Also note that the Waiver must be agreed to, at least once, by each adult member of the AARC as a Bylaw requirement for membership. Obviously if you filled in an Application Form or a Membership Renewal Form you have already done this. However in many Family Memberships one member pays the dues, and signs the forms. This means the other adult Family Members need to sign one of the three forms, and the Waiver Form is designed for this purpose. Again, this Waiver need only be agreed to once, and then only by adults in Family Membership's who have not signed the Application Form or Membership Renewal Form. .
6. Many of our Members seem to believe that filling in a Membership Renewal Form is a waste of their time. Some simply send checks to the Treasurer and think they have completed the renewal process. At one time that was the case. But as of the November 2019 Board Meeting the Membership Renewal Form is now required in order to renew. You expect your Board members to keep a club Roster which is both current and correct in its information. The Renewal Form is our once a year chance to make sure our Master Roster has the correct information. We need to know about call sign changes, name changes, address changes, email address changes, membership type changes, family member changes, phone number changes for cell, home or work? Filling in the form takes only a few seconds. Please help us out here.