An important look at how the 04/05 season played out
BY ED YOUNGLOVE PSIA-NW PRESIDENT

Whew, am I glad last season is behind us. With rather few exceptions, the weather devastated most of last season for northwest resorts and snowsports schools. What did it mean for us, PSIA-NW, a dues based membership organization?

Our organization has two principal income sources, membership dues and event fees. Our major expenses are administrative costs (e.g. staff salaries, rent, etc) and event costs (e.g. clinic leader compensation). Because we held fewer events, event fees were down, but so were event costs. The overall effect of the reduced volume, however, was a substantially reduced amount of net event income. The other major factor was our fixed expenses like our monthly office rent and administrative staff salaries. Last season we told you how PSIA-NW has the lowest membership dues of any division in the nation. A consequence of this is that our dues income is insufficient to cover our major fixed expenses. That’s a problem when we don’t have event income to supplement the dues income.

Your Board of Directors and Officers worked together to go lean, without trying to get mean to get us through the season. We had to make some tough choices. We tried through email and other media to keep you informed, but the situation was so fluid it seemed to change from day to day. We just didn’t have the means to keep you abreast of everything as it happened. We tried to keep you up to date with the website and we hope to improve our membership email list for future use. Now that the dust has settled (it certainly wasn’t snow) we can see more clearly what transpired.

We hung on as long as feasible before substantially cutting down on events and training. The toughest decisions were about laying off staff. Most of you already know this story from earlier communications, but starting in January we laid off one of our fulltime staff in the office and reduced another’s hours by one half. At the same time we reduced our new Education Program Director position from full time to half time. At the end of February we further reduced the Ed Program Director to one-quarter time and we eventually had to lay her off the end of March. We considered but decided against further staff cut backs. We felt it was important that members have the ability to get whatever information and assistance we could give through the office and we particularly wanted to be able to continue to provide services regarding the events we were able to hold (or hoped to hold) and also to service those areas in the division which were not as affected by the weather. Membership services never suffered in my opinion. All the staff were incredibly understanding regarding these decisions. They deserve our appreciation for their loyalty. If you have any contact with Cheryl, Becky or Amy, the staff affected by the layoffs, please tell them how much we value their loyalty and hard work. The net effect of all this was that we still had to expend a substantial amount of our reserve funds, but I guess that is what they were for.

Some members have expressed the feeling that we shouldn’t have to pay dues for this upcoming season because of the limited opportunity to ski/ride or to work last season. Part of the problem is that, as pointed out earlier, many of our expenses go on regardless of the amount of snow. Last season we had a lease obligation to pay rent on our office space and we had employment compensation obligations to employees and without them no one would have been in the office to answer your questions or to do the work of the division, including holding events where there was snow, etc. Even more to the point, for this upcoming season (which is what these dues are for) we need the dues income this summer to pay for the expenses of the upcoming season. There is no reason to believe that we won’t have a normal season during which we will provide the “normal” high quality services you expect and are entitled to.

Some members apparently feel that we should have waived the educational delinquency (waiver) fee because of the more limited opportunity to attend events. In truth, I think we offered ample opportunity for people to maintain their educational credits, including some new creative events such as the Spring Fling. Most people who needed to get credits, were able to. If we were to waive this fee, we would have to make up this loss of revenue (the educational event fee or alternative delinquency fee) somewhere else. Should the rest of the membership who were able to keep their credits current pay for those who didn’t? Should we dig deeper into our already depleted reserves, jeopardizing the quality of future services and our fiscal health? The board considered this issue and decided against amnesty and its fiscal consequences. I believe this to have been a tough but reasonable and fiscally responsible decision. Just one of many last season.

While we offered many program events, they were a moving target all year. We moved Divisional Academy to Canada in a last ditch effort to save the event. I believe those who attended had a great time at Sun Peaks and were glad we did. For awhile, we had considered moving Symposium out of division. We eventually decided to hold it at Mt. Bachelor. It was fairly well attended and the skiing was awesome. Because we couldn’t hold some of our on snow events, we created the Spring Fling indoor training. It was such a success, members indicated they hoped we will consider holding it as a regular event. (What’s that about necessity being the mother of invention?) We managed to hold DCL and TD training, mostly early season. We were able to hold the Mt. Bachelor exam for those hardy soles who worked hard to prepare for exams despite the limited preparation opportunities.

Amy Zahm will not be will not be back next season as our Education Program Coordinator. When we were forced to lay Amy off she had to concentrate on her massage therapy business. While I am sorry we will be losing Amy’s services, we are all happy to see her business do so well. Despite the lack of events, Amy was able to leave us with a well organized blueprint for the position and for division events. We all agree this will prove invaluable in the future. On behalf of the division, I would like to thank Amy for all her hard work and for her perseverance in the face of the adverse year. She served us well as our first ever staff Education Program Director.

As I write this, we are in the process of screening and interviewing candidates for the position. Once again, we were blessed with a pool of well qualified applicants. I am excited that we will be able to maintain the excellent quality of personnel in this position. We hope to hire a new Education Program Director this summer so he/she can start before fall when so much of the season planning takes place. Check the website for current information. Check out the next newsletter for a profile of the new Director. I continue to believe that this position will allow us to take the quality of our already great events to a new level and to hopefully increase both our membership base and our current member participation.

I hope you all have a great summer and that we are skiing early and long next season.