Before I get into that though, I need to touch on a few items.  First, I want to honor Paul Hove's memory by recalling the several decades of his dedication to this chapter, almost continuously as a board member, and for four years as our President. He was generous with his time and energy to the chapter and will be greatly missed. Like most, I was shocked at how quickly we lost such a robust and optimistic presence at the airport. The memorial that Jeff Hove organized at Wulff was a thoughtful tribute to who he was and it was great to see so many from Chapter 54 there to celebrate his life. Thank you to Bob Collins for the website tribute page he put together for Paul and the members who shared photos and testimony about Paul's influence on them.

 

And just a couple of other items I'll mention quickly because you'll likely read about them elsewhere:

• Congratulations to Anna Chase for passing her Private Pilot checkride!  She became our second Ray Scholar to achieve that milestone and her achievement will put our chapter in a strong position to be selected for the honor of distributing another Ray Scholarship in 2025 (we'll find out in March).
• The Nov.25 Lake Elmo Airport Advisory Committee program included a spotlight on the city of Lake Elmo and reviewed the results of the mid-August aircraft noise study.
•  MAC has succeeded in getting the 21D CTAF frequency moved to the less congested frequency of 123.075.  This will be effective starting Thursday Feb.20.

 

 

Our VP, Jay Schrankler has plans for speakers at our 2025 member meeting presentations well in hand. What a gift it is to have such a well-connected member in our chapter lining up great speakers.  Our entertaining and educational programs are possibly the leading draw the chapter has for folks to join the chapter and to stay with us.  We'll also have another chapter presence at AirVenture in 2025 thanks to our Events Coordinator Bill Schanks, and hope to host another successful Flying Start event, as well as field another good season of Young Eagles rallies.

 

We resurrected the Fly In fundraiser last year and took away a lot of lessons that will put us in a stronger position to field an even more successful one this year.  We'll focus on getting the word out in new ways to hopefully increase the attendance.  While the borrowed grill worked OK for us, we'd like to get our own grill equipment in place, probably just several garden variety Blackstone type griddle top grills, and that will let us entertain deploying them for other events that could bring in more revenue.  Why more revenue?  Well, we found greater demand last year for Air Academy scholarships than we had raised funds for during the year. Our young eagles are learning about how the Air Academy can open doors to their interest in aviation so more are applying, and I can think of nothing more rewarding for us as a chapter than to enable that avenue for more young people inspired and motivated by the idea of flight.

 

Another opportunity for increasing revenue for our scholarships became obvious over the year:  we had quite a few unsolicited donations to the chapter by people who have an employer charitable benefit that could be steered into charitable organizations of their choosing and they apparently liked the idea of helping young people explore aviation as a career path or avocation because they chose us.  It might very well be worth spending some effort getting the word out to EAA members in the area and to employees of high-profile local corporations with charitable benefits that we are here to help channel their charitable benefits to this purpose.  If you have skills or interest in this area, please talk to me about joining our board as a Development coordinator, a new position that we could create.  

 

With more applicants for Air Academy, it's also clear we need to come up with a defined process for evaluating and selecting recipients, and setting expectations among potential applicants about the selection process and prospects for support. A new volunteer to help with this effort is sought; please let me know if you are interested...another way to get involved and contribute to the chapter.

 

Ever wondered what goes on at a chapter board meeting?  Going forward, I'll make the link to the virtual meeting available to all members so you can find out.  Non-board members won't be able to vote but you'll be welcome to provide input.  Maybe you'll find that you'd like to become a board member.

 

All of our officers and board members, other than our three Class 2 directors (Bill Schanks, Evangelos Savaas, Bruce Olson), per our bylaws have terms expiring in November and will be up for re-election if they choose to continue to serve.  This includes me in the role of President. I am willing to serve in this capacity for another term but I'm also perfectly happy to let someone else take the helm if they feel inspired to lead the chapter with their own particular vision (and I'm happy to provide a supporting role). Feel free to reach out to me if you'd like to explore taking a role on the board, including mine. We welcome any who would like to become more active in chapter leadership.

 

Thanks for your time and your continued participation in Chapter 54!

 

Marlon