April 2017 - Lnc-business - Moellman Enterprises Email

Email Ballot 2017-06: Move Archive Records to CO
by Alicia Mattson 04 Apr '17

04 Apr '17

We have an electronic mail ballot. *Votes are due to the LNC-Business list by April 3, 2017 at 11:59:59pm Pacific time.* *Co-Sponsors:* Harlos, Hayes, Bittner, Demarest *Motion:* Move to budget an additional $5,000 (budget line 90) to relocate the historical records in the Duke Street basement and in the off-site storage facility to a location in Colorado to be determined by Historical Preservation Committee Chair. The facility will be paid by for and under the control of the LNC and will be obtained at a cost equal or less to the price paid for the similar facility in Virginia. The Executive Director will be directed to send out up to two fundraising emails to cover this expense and the prior budgeted Historical Committee expense (credit to budget line 25). -Alicia

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to post subcommittee meetings on LP.org
by Wes Benedict 04 Apr '17

04 Apr '17

We've got our events function working on LP.org. Events are limited to national LP events, LNC meetings, LNC subcommittee meetings, and state conventions. That's a quick summary of what's allowed there. No local meetings or routine state party meetings. https://www.lp.org/events/ To have an event listed, like a historical preservation committee meeting, or an affiliate support committee meeting, send the details to Bob Johnston <bob.johnston(a)lp.org>. Thanks, -- Wes Benedict, Executive Director Libertarian National Committee, Inc. 1444 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314 (202) 333-0008 ext. 232, wes.benedict(a)lp.org facebook.com/libertarians @LPNational Join the Libertarian Party at: http://lp.org/membership

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Email Ballot 2017-07: August LNC Meeting
by Alicia Mattson 04 Apr '17

04 Apr '17

We have an electronic mail ballot. *Votes are due to the LNC-Business list by April 3, 2017 at 11:59:59pm Pacific time.* *Co-Sponsors:* Goldstein, Hagan, Hayes, Bittner *Motion:* The site for the August 19-20, 2017 LNC meeting will be Kansas City (MO or KS). -Alicia

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Fw: Emailing: 2017-02-Staff-End-of-Month-Reports-Draft
by Tim Hagan 03 Apr '17

03 Apr '17

The February End-of-Month Financial Reports are attached. Tim Hagan

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Agenda item requests
by Nicholas Sarwark 03 Apr '17

03 Apr '17

Dear All, If you have agenda item requests for the upcoming LNC meeting, please email them to me. -Nick

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Re: [Lnc-business] Email Ballot 2017-06: Move Archive Records to CO
by William Redpath 03 Apr '17

03 Apr '17

I also think this should be discussed in Pittsburgh, so I will change my vote to "Abstain." Bill Redpath -------------------------------------------- On Mon, 4/3/17, Joshua Katz <planning4liberty(a)gmail.com> wrote: Subject: Re: [Lnc-business] Email Ballot 2017-06: Move Archive Records to CO To: lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org Date: Monday, April 3, 2017, 5:48 PM I vote no. While I don't have strong objections, I think too many different concerns are implicated, and that this can be considered next week. Joshua A. Katz On Mon, Apr 3, 2017 at 4:33 PM, James Lark <jwl3s(a)eservices.virginia.edu> wrote: Dear colleagues: I hope all is well with you. I am writing in my capacity as Region 5 representative to vote "aye" on the motion. As always, thanks for your work for liberty. Take care, Jim James W. Lark, III Dept. of Systems and Information Engineering Applied Mathematics Program, Dept. of Engineering and Society Affiliated Faculty, Dept. of Statistics University of Virginia Advisor, The Liberty Coalition University of Virginia Region 5 Representative, Libertarian National Committee ----- On 3/24/2017 4:02 AM, Alicia Mattson wrote: We have an electronic mail ballot. Votes are due to the LNC-Business list by April 3, 2017 at 11:59:59pm Pacific time. Co-Sponsors: Harlos, Hayes, Bittner, Demarest Motion: Move to budget an additional $5,000 (budget line 90) to relocate the historical records in the Duke Street basement and in the off-site storage facility to a location in Colorado to be determined by Historical Preservation Committee Chair. The facility will be paid by for and under the control of the LNC and will be obtained at a cost equal or less to the price paid for the similar facility in Virginia. The Executive Director will be directed to send out up to two fundraising emails to cover this expense and the prior budgeted Historical Committee expense (credit to budget line 25). -Alicia ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/ listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp. org -----Inline Attachment Follows----- _______________________________________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org

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Fwd: FW: January End-Of-Month Financial Reports
by Wes Benedict 03 Apr '17

03 Apr '17

The payment required by the Policy Manual is $60,000, and as Robert has confirmed below, we've sent $62,000. So we're in good shape there. Many thanks to Michael Chastain, who put forward the $25,000 matching challenge to get us there so fast this year (we failed in 2015). https://www.lp.org/double-your-investment-in-the-lp/ We're working on designing his plaque and other materials for the room he is naming at LPHQ: From the policy manual: > 17) Office Mortgage > It shall be the goal of the LNC to completely pay off the office > mortgage as quickly as > possible, and in any case prior to the due date of the 10-year balloon > payment. Towards that > end the LNC shall budget a minimum of $60,000 in each odd-numbered > year to pay down the > principal until the mortgage balance is zero. Fundraising for this > specific purpose shall be > made a high priority. This provision does not preclude additional > fundraising and prepayments > in even-numbered years. Details from Robert Kraus below. Wes Benedict, Executive Director Libertarian National Committee, Inc. 1444 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314 (202) 333-0008 ext. 232, wes.benedict(a)lp.org facebook.com/libertarians @LPNational Join the Libertarian Party at: http://lp.org/membership -------- Forwarded Message -------- Subject: FW: [Lnc-business] January End-Of-Month Financial Reports Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2017 13:56:39 -0400 From: Robert Kraus <robert.kraus(a)lp.org> To: 'Wes Benedict' <wes.benedict(a)lp.org>, 'Tim Hagan' <treasurer(a)lp.org> YTD we have raised $61,759.65 towards the Building Fund & have sent $62,000.00 to BB&T in additional principle payments to pay down the mortgage. Live Free! /*/Robert/*/*/ /*Robert S. Kraus - Dir of Operations Operations(a)LP.org Libertarian National Committee Ph: 202.333.0008 x 231 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *From:*Lnc-business [mailto:lnc-business-bounces@hq.lp.org] *On Behalf Of *Whitney Bilyeu *Sent:* Tuesday, March 28, 2017 1:33 PM *To:* lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org *Subject:* Re: [Lnc-business] January End-Of-Month Financial Reports Thanks for asking, Caryn! I had an inquiry last night about this, as well. Whitney Bilyeu On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 12:12 PM, Caryn Ann Harlos <carynannharlos(a)gmail.com <mailto:carynannharlos@gmail.com>> wrote: Tim, have we yet paid the "Wiener rule" payment for this year? If not, when is it scheduled for? -Caryn Ann On Sun, Mar 26, 2017 at 8:12 PM, Tim Hagan <timhagan-tyr(a)yahoo.com <mailto:timhagan-tyr@yahoo.com>> wrote: The January End-of-Month Financial Reports are attached. The year started with a $42,998 surplus. The reserve is at $242,828. Tim Hagan _______________________________________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org <mailto:Lnc-business@hq.lp.org> http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org <http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org> -- *In Liberty,* *Caryn Ann Harlos* Region 1 Representative, Libertarian National Committee (Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, Washington) - Caryn.Ann. Harlos(a)LP.org <mailto:Caryn.Ann.Harlos@LP.org> Communications Director, Libertarian Party of Colorado <http://www.lpcolorado.org> ColoradoStateCoordinator, Libertarian Party Radical Caucus <http://www.lpradicalcaucus.org> Chair, LP Historical Preservation Committee A haiku to the Statement of Principles: /We defend your rights/ /And oppose the use of force/ /Taxation is theft/ _______________________________________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org <mailto:Lnc-business@hq.lp.org> http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org <http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org>

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End of Month Membership Report
by Robert Kraus 02 Apr '17

02 Apr '17

The latest membership report is attached. Live Free! Robert Robert S. Kraus - Dir of Operations Operations(a)LP.org Libertarian National Committee, Inc. 1444 Duke Street Alexandria, VA 22314 Ph: 202.333.0008 x 231 Join today: https://www.lp.org/membership LP FB Page: https://www.facebook.com/libertarians

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Re: [Lnc-business] Email Ballot 2017-06: Move Archive Records to CO
by William Redpath 02 Apr '17

02 Apr '17

Yes. Bill Redpath -------------------------------------------- On Sat, 4/1/17, Arvin Vohra <votevohra(a)gmail.com> wrote: Subject: Re: [Lnc-business] Email Ballot 2017-06: Move Archive Records to CO To: lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org Date: Saturday, April 1, 2017, 6:50 PM Yes On Mar 29, 2017 8:34 PM, "Brett Bittner" <brett.bittner(a)lp.org> wrote: I vote Aye on email ballot 2017-06. Brett **This message sent from my phone. Please excuse any typos. On Mar 29, 2017 20:31, "Caryn Ann Harlos" <carynannharlos(a)gmail.com> wrote: To supplement the other update and relevant to this motion: I now have two volunteers willing to dedicate an entire week block of time if the records are in the Denver area to work on the project. This is with minimal word of mouth from person(s) who read the LNC list. I believe I would get several regular crews. LPCO already has a commitment to its history (unfortunately some records list due to past neglect prior to my time and were soiled by vermin). I am a prolific volunteer recruiter when I need them. -Caryn Ann On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 3:19 PM Caryn Ann Harlos <carynannharlos(a)gmail.com> wrote: Hi Joshua, any historical work with a budget is going to require prioritization which requires knowing what we have. If it were just the records in the basement, that would not be an issue (another volunteer I found just spent two more days there - total volunteer time on the project now totals likely over a 100 hours between inventory work and LPedia database fix issues - IOW significant volunteer has already been expended - we have been effective). It is the storage facility records that are the issue. If they remain there, one possible avenue to keep staff uninvolved as much as possible is to grant me the key to designate to a certain core group of volunteers in the area to be determined. I am confident that whatever is decided, we will make the most effective, cheapest, least intrusive means possible. As I said, I will have to spend vacation time in VA this summer if they are not moved. I do not require any staff oversight, but that money could go to the Party rather than Southwest and Marriot. And no, this year that expense will not grow (and next year is a different budget discussion). I am convinced it is too high by at least $1000 (unless salary is way more than I figure in my head - which of course would be a confidential discussion). And I want to remind everyone that I already raised nearly $1200 and promised an additional $1500 if the move was approved. So if I am right (and I am pretty convinced I am) that the $9000 figure is correct, taking away the pledge and the amount raised, we are at $6800. Which is only $1800 more than the LNC expected already to come out of the budget (and most certainly money will be raised toward that) in additional to the free professional labor. Putting aside that this is my project and I have a bias, we need to be supporting these volunteer initiative small projects. I could wax long about that, but I will save it to not bore everyone to death with this post. But you are right, we have spent more discussing a relatively trivial amount with a potential result of volunteered time, product, and good will way beyond the amount. For once, I am nearly talked out - miracle of miracle. I have never tried so hard to give away so many hours of my professional time over several years. I don't think there is much btw that falls in some third category. I do think that is somewhat of a false premise. I broadly went through records in the facility and it was not that category (membership slips should be scanned IMHO - whether they are published is a different decision). There are filing cabinets in the basement which do, but which have always been outside our scope. I find it interesting that it seems there is a critique that the original scanning budget has not been spent - it seems my prudence and caution is being used as a point of suspicion rather than good stewardship which rather reminds me of government budgeting. I could have spent it in a week. I am determined to squeeze it for every penny but it seems that this suggestion would have had a lot less discussion if I were irresponsible. I did get some advice to just spent it right away being cautioned about this very thing. I don't operate that way. I treat OPM (other people's money) as sacred. I have spent my own money on misc items rather than nickel or diming this. Volunteers have spent days from their vacation time - neither of them lived by HQ, one was further away in VA and the other was all the way from AZ. PS: I have a volunteer willing to commit a full week of time to assisting with these records,, if they are moved to CO. -Caryn Ann On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 12:48 PM, Joshua Katz <planning4liberty(a)gmail.com> wrote: Well, let me say this: the debate on this motion has entirely changed my view on the questions involved. One thing I am gleaning from the debate, though, is that different people are talking about entirely different issues and concerns, and several of those issues are not well-framed enough to be answered in a yes/no manner. For a while, I thought the debate was largely off-track because it was getting into the weeds, but now I realize that some of those weeds are LNC concerns, and others, despite ideally not being LNC concerns, have become such due to a lack of other governance mechanisms. I will attempt here to lay out what I see as the issues being discussed - largely independently - and suggest that the question be narrowed. The Stuff We have piles of stuff, is what I'm gathering. We passed a motion a while ago, creating the Historical Committee, which I think was implicitly premised on the idea that the stuff falls into two groups: garbage, and things we wish to preserve for historical value. At least, that was my implicit premise. Now we're finding, though, that there's a third group: things we wish to preserve for legal/business purposes. This suggests to me that our handling of the previous motion might not have been sufficient because of this faulty premise. So we're left with a broad question: how to handle all this stuff. I think a lot of us thought our previous motion would take care of that, but perhaps it will not if this third category exists. Financial Considerations This is what I originally thought this motion was all about - spending money. In particular, it seems to me that this motion is based on the idea that the money we previously allocated was not sufficient. This gives me independent concerns: if the expected cost of a project doubles in a matter of weeks, experience shows us that it is likely to continue rising. I also would like to know how we learned this - since none of the originally allocated money has been spent, and the proposed increase is exactly the amount allocated, why can't the allocated money be spent to do this? While much discussion has been about the proposed object, the motion seems to me only to authorize money, and to take for granted that the moving can be done by staff as long as the money is there. Now, assuming there's some other use for the original $5k, I don't think what Wes has told us suggests that we can do this project for either $5k or $10k. I think it suggests that the cost of the project is (at least) $10k, once staff time is included, as it should be. A functionally allocated budget would have made this clear, whereas with our current budgeting procedures it has to come out in discussion and remain a little fuzzy, but that's how I'm reading it. We can spend the additional $5k in cash, or we can spend it in lost staff time. That brings up a new question, then - since we approved the project at $5k, do we still think it is worth doing at $10k? I think that's perfectly well-framed to be answered with a yes/no decision. However, what is less clear is what happens if we say no. One option is that things would remain at status quo, and we'd continue paying for storage space. Another is to throw everything out. There are probably other options, too. The Value of Things in Storage Focusing for a moment on the items of business/legal significance, I think that, if a clean-up project does not proceed, they might as well be in the trash. It is extremely unlikely that things can be found when needed, and it would be healthier, when such a concern comes up, to be able to say cheerfully "yep, it's gone," than to have a vague notion that it may exist in a large pile of stuff, buried under furniture. Turning to the historical items, I confess to being less interested in these than others are, but I take the result of the vote to suggest that we find it important, and so we're unlikely to think they're worth preserving at $5k, but worth throwing out if it would cost $10k. In the grand scheme of things, $5k is not much money, and it's believed that there are donations available to support much of this. In my mind, though, such donations are currently speculative - and I can speculate that costs will continue rising. So let's ignore both speculations and assume we'll be spending the money out of what's currently in our budget - it's still rather small and not worth much of the time spent discussing it. Heck, it's the amount we let the chair spend freely - which raises one possible solution. More generally, it raises the idea that we should be freer with allocating budgets to projects without involving ourselves in the questions of how the money is spent. Personally, I find it baffling that we turn over the vast majority of our budget to staff, yet insist on weird control mechanisms for small portions - putting the most control on money to be spent by committees, largely populated by board members. I have no idea why we single out budget access, for instance, for EC control (why not, at least, control by the people directing ballot access?), but leave half the budget in Compensation. But then, I don't understand many things about the world. Budgetary Impact That said, and I don't want to spend a lot of time on this, when donations are available for a given project, it is not always clear if they will increase total revenue, or simply be taken out of other giving the same people might otherwise have planned. I suspect the answer is somewhere in the middle - a $10k project, fully funded by donations, will not cost us $10k, but also will not cost us $0, all things considered. Why is There a Pile of Stuff? I think Wes has well explained this one - people are afraid to throw things out. A few years ago, I was elected Secretary of my fire department. I went through old minutes and found that all correspondence was there - i.e. Christmas cards, invitations to Climb for Life, for decades. This doesn't make it particularly easy to do the project I was engaged in - no one had kept records of standing rules, so I was attempting to reconstruct them from old minutes. (A fun story for anyone who says "I don't see what's wrong with including discussion in the minutes" or who fails to see why it is important to record the actual language of the motion.) Anyway, with a custom going back decades, it's hard to be the one who decides to break it. The solution is a document retention policy, which we should come up with. I will move in Pittsburgh that we appoint a committee to recommend one. How to Throw Things Out Although we have agreed that the LNC will make this decision, based on this discussion, I am questioning the wisdom of that move. I think if a committee is going through this material, and if we have adopted such a policy, that committee should be free to throw things out within that policy. Currently, as the Secretary notes, making these calls would take a good amount of expertise with the specifics of the materials. With a document retention plan in place, I don't think it will. I think it would be crazy for the LNC to make document by document decisions, personally. Let's set some rules about what sorts of things we want to keep, and then let volunteers have at it. Purpose of Historical Committee As the Secretary notes, we appointed a historical committee, not a clean-up committee. If it turns out that cleaning up is necessary before the historical work can be done, we need to decide if the historical committee is the right committee for that purpose, or if something else needs to be done first. Joshua A. Katz On Mon, Mar 27, 2017 at 10:36 PM, Caryn Ann Harlos <carynannharlos(a)gmail.com> wrote: Hi Alicia, My recommendations will be primarily about duplicates. I do believe I am experienced enough to determine a duplicate. I also undertook a similar (obviously smaller scale but in principle the same) project already in Colorado (http://www.lpcolorado.org/arc hives). The rest would be done via inventory and in consultation with more experienced Party members. I do not have experience in years, but I have experience in diving in more deeply than persons with twenty years of experience have done. Further CO has a wide breath of available persons to volunteer. Right now there is no danger of anyone's experience because it simply isn't being done, and unless another person with the passion I have for the topic appears, it likely will not in any forseeable future. It hasn't so far. I respectfully submit that making recommendations is not complicated and I believe I have proven my understanding on historical artifacts. -Caryn Ann On Mon, Mar 27, 2017 at 9:26 PM, Alicia Mattson <agmattson(a)gmail.com> wrote: Starchild, My concerns are not about the city in which the analysis is done, but about the depth of experience of the person analyzing the contents in order to characterize them for the decision maker(s). -Alicia On Sun, Mar 26, 2017 at 4:34 PM, Starchild <sfdreamer(a)earthlink.net> wrote: Alicia, If there were an amendment or second motion that none of the materials to be sent to Colorado be discarded without an elected or appointed member of the party leadership gives the okay, would that allay your concerns? Or perhaps a motion/amendment saying certain categories of things can't be discarded, period? Having seen the kind of stuff that's sometimes been left behind and thrown away after LP conventions – current outreach materials, unused office supplies, etc. – not to mention stuff being deleted from our website, old meeting minutes and other important records apparently having been thrown out by people at various times, etc., I share your concern that things might get thrown out which would better be saved. Where we may possibly see things differently is that I don't perceive there being a greater risk of this occurring in Colorado than in Alexandria. The discarding of minutes and other important past materials presumably took place in the D.C. area. More recently, Wes mentioned in a recent message that he discarded some stuff, and although I trust there were no minutes among those materials, there wasn't a lot of detail provided about precisely what they did include, and I can't help wondering whether anything was discarded that I personally might have kept. I might have the same concern upon hearing of stuff discarded in Colorado, of course, but I wouldn't be any more concerned. Love & Liberty, ((( starchild )))At-Large Representative, Libertarian National Committee (415) 625-FREE @StarchildSF On Mar 26, 2017, at 2:16 PM, Alicia Mattson wrote: The discussion on this thread paints the motion in a very different light for me. I want to take a step back and put this in context. The motion adopted by email ballot to create this committee included the following scope description: "The LNC establishes a Historic Preservation Committee to help preserve and publish historical documents of the party and to manage LPedia." The goal is to preserve and publish things of historical value. This motion suggests that the newly-requested funds will be used: "to budget an additional $5,000 (budget line 90) to relocate the historical records in the Duke Street basement and in the off-site storage facility to a location in Colorado..." That to me sounds like the materials in question are of historical value, and it thus warrants the expenditure to preserve them. What we're learning, though, is that possibly the vast majority of this material is trash, and we're paying thousands of dollars to ship trash to Colorado to be thrown away there. This is really more of a document destruction project than a historical preservation project, though along the way it will likely find a few historical documents worth preserving. We created a Historic Perservation Committee, rather than a Basement Cleanout Committee, and they're very different tasks. I would be comfortable with volunteers in Colorado taking things deemed to have historic value and scanning them for preservation, or making them available for silent auction fundraising, etc. I am not comfortable with volunteers in Colorado who have no experience in operations of our headquarters essentially making decisions about what documents get thrown away. The reason I spent a day in the Watergate dungeon (I think it was in the fall of 2011) digging through that material is because I was looking for some records that should have been preserved in perpetuity, but someone who didn't understand their importance apparently threw them out. They actually had very high value for legal reasons. As pretty as it sounds to have a team of volunteers in the birthplace of the LP building historical archives, a person's Colorado residence doesn't grant them magical knowledge of what business records ought to be kept and which ones ought to be thrown away. I realize that you say that the LNC will ultimately decide which things get tossed, but the quality of the LNC's decision depends heavily on the description of the records we are given. If a volunteer describes to us that a box contains miscellaneous receipts, it's one thing if it's 15-year-old receipts for office supplies that have long since been used up, but it's another if the receipts are for equipment still in use today and maybe still under warranty. If a volunteer describes to us that a box contains old email correspondence with a state chair, it's one thing if the conversation was, "I look forward to seeing you at the convention", but it's another thing if the conversation was relaying facts about a situation that is the subject of a lawsuit. If the person looking at the records doesn't really understand the context of the records, how can they give us the key information we need to make an informed decision about which ones to throw away? This is not a project that should be undertaken by people with no understanding of our party operations. There may also be old employment records with sensitive personnel information, social security numbers, etc., and those shouldn't just be passed around among random volunteers. I have no objection to paying for the committee chair to make a trip to the storage facility, spend a few days sorting through it to find items of historical value, and then shipping those 10 boxes to Colorado for further processing. That is within the function of a Historic Preservation Committee. I do have objection to shipping our trash-mixed-with-important-rec ords across the country for people who don't understand what is valuable and what isn't to give us vague descriptions which will be the basis of uninformed decisions for destroying our records. This document destruction task is not what I had in mind when the Historic Preservation Committee was created. For several years our outside auditors have been urging us to adopt document retention policies (and also whistleblower policies, but that's another subject). I think it was two terms ago near the end of that term that the Audit Committee proposed some starter language to try to get the ball rolling, but the LNC has not yet implemented anything. At minimum we need to establish how long certain records are to be kept such as employment records, financial records, membership certifications, and other categories. These can be important to keep for legal reasons, for FEC compliance, etc. Even after we make those policy decisions, I think the document maintenance has to be done by knowledgeable insiders rather than miscellaneous volunteers. -Alicia ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listi nfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listi nfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listi nfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org -- In Liberty,Caryn Ann HarlosRegion 1 Representative, Libertarian National Committee (Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, Washington) - Caryn.Ann. Harlos(a)LP.orgCommunications Director, Libertarian Party of ColoradoColorado State Coordinator, Libertarian Party Radical Caucus Chair, LP Historical Preservation Committee A haiku to the Statement of Principles:We defend your rightsAnd oppose the use of forceTaxation is theft ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listi nfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listi nfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org -- In Liberty,Caryn Ann HarlosRegion 1 Representative, Libertarian National Committee (Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, Washington) - Caryn.Ann. Harlos(a)LP.orgCommunications Director, Libertarian Party of ColoradoColorado State Coordinator, Libertarian Party Radical Caucus Chair, LP Historical Preservation Committee A haiku to the Statement of Principles:We defend your rightsAnd oppose the use of forceTaxation is theft ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listi nfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org ______________________________ _________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/ listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp. org -----Inline Attachment Follows----- _______________________________________________ Lnc-business mailing list Lnc-business(a)hq.lp.org http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org

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LIBERTARIAN PARTY POST-LIFE MEMBERSHIPS
by Wes Benedict 01 Apr '17

01 Apr '17

*EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:*/When the Libertarian Party raised the price of Life Memberships from $1,000 to $1,500 in 2014, there was a one-time spike in the purchase of Life Memberships to beat the deadline, which resulted in a revenue windfall of tens of thousands of dollars.That bump suggested that other extended-period memberships might be equally profitable.Accordingly, the Re-Membership Committee was formed to consider out-of-the-box options to the existing Libertarian Party dues structure.Our committee was tasked with presenting its recommendations in time for the 2016 national convention to consider them.This is our committee’s report./ ** The Libertarian Party’s membership structure currently consists of non-dues-paying members who have signed the non-initiation-of-force pledge; sustaining members who have paid at least $25 per year; and life members who have paid $1,500 (or more in some cases, for higher honorary levels).But each life membership ends by definition with that person’s death.What happens afterwards?In rare cases supporters have left bequests for the LP in their wills, but that is an unpredictable and undependable source of revenue.Furthermore, it provides little direct benefit to the donor after his or her death, and only hypothetical benefit for the furtherance of libertarian values which the donor will never actually see. We propose to solve this problem by offering Post-Life Memberships in the Libertarian Party, which will be pre-paid but take effect only after a person’s death, thus filling a currently under-served donor niche.Establishing a much freer society for our nation and indeed the entire world is a life-and-death matter and should be treated that way.By purchasing a Post-Life Membership, a person’s association with the LP will transcend that artificial boundary, and will represent an enduring legacy. Suggested Post-Life Membership levels would be as follows: ·*Libertarian Party Angel -- $3,000*.This would be a limited-period post-life membership which would only extend until the year 3,000. ·*Libertarian Party Archangel -- $33,400.*This is an unlimited post-life membership, with the amount indexed to the FEC’s maximum annual contribution limit. ·*Libertarian Party Heavenly Inhabitor -- $100,200.*This is a specialized post-life membership aimed at Libertarians who are focused on where they will dwell in the after-life.It represents the maximum annual amount which the FEC says can be contributed to the LP Building Fund, and will also be indexed to that contribution limit. ·*Libertarian Party Lucifer -- $1,000,000 and up.*This is an unrestricted post-life membership for Libertarians who refuse to be bound in either life or death by arbitrary rules and standards, and are willing to brave the consequences (whatever they may be) in the cause of freedom. All Post-Life Members will be sent electronic copies of the /LP News/ to their last known email addresses, and their estates will continue to receive the same email fundraising pitches as all other LP members.Their names will be placed on plaques in the LP office and memorialized at the next national convention, and they will continue to pad the Libertarian Party’s membership rolls just as Life Members do. (As a side note, we believe that libertarians who have been placed in cryogenic storage should still be able to qualify for Post-Life Memberships.When they are successfully revived, they would then be categorized as “un-dead” and their Post-Life Memberships would be suspended until such time as they later re-died.) The Re-Membership Committee is optimistic that a test mailing targeted to older sustaining members and especially to current Life Members could produce exceptionally lucrative results.We urge that this be done as rapidly as possible, since time is of the essence before more of this demographic passes away. This report is hereby submitted on behalf of the Re-Membership Committee this day of April 1, 2017 by Daniel Wiener, Chair, who wishes to express his appreciation to the rest of the Committee, especially Aaron Starr, Alicia Mattson, and David Nolan (deceased). Daniel Wiener, Re-Membership Chair P.S.While we had originally intended to include Pre-Life LP memberships with the Post-Life proposals, our committee has been unable to complete that portion by the April 1^st target date.Several complex issues remain to be resolved, such as whether the Pre-Life memberships would apply prior to conception between the sperm and the egg, or prior to actual birth?Also, in the case of a miscarriage, would the parents be entitled to a full refund or a pro-rata refund based on the fraction of nine months?And how would unexpected multiple births be handled?For example, are twins each entitled to half of a Pre-Life membership, or must parents buy an extra one?These represent difficult philosophical questions upon which libertarians can reasonably disagree.

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