Portland Velo Club News

First of all, I would like to wish everyone a Happy New Year and extend my best wishes for the coming season of cycling!

In a few days it will be official - we will be registered in the State of Oregon as a non-profit corporation. We have submitted our paperwork and Articles of Incorporation and have received our registry number. The only thing left to do is to ratify our bylaws, which we will do in our first board of directors meeting (January 15, 2008). Once that is done, we will be a full-fledged non-profit corporation. I would like to thank all our Portland Velo officers as well as Portland Velo member Scott Strahm, for the work they have put into making this happen. Our next step is to find some affordable liability insurance for our board of directors and officers. If anyone of you are insurance agents or know someone that handles corporate liability insurance, please contact me at carlo@portlandvelo.net.

A few folks have asked me where we're at concerning 501(c)3 tax-exempt status. Before the holidays, the officers and I agreed that at this time it is not in the club's best interests to pursue 501(c)3 status. There are a number of reasons for this decision, Including the following:

• Only 1/3 of our funding can come from membership dues. That means we need to spend a lot of time and effort making up the other 2/3 by grants, fundraising, contributions, etc. This would mean spinning up a huge effort to locate and secure these funds and could very well detract from the purpose of our club, which is "It's All About The Ride".

• We would need to implement extremely stringent tracking processes and procedures and document every penny we collect and spend. We already do a fairly good job at tracking dues and expenses, but 501(c)3 requires an entirely different level of tracking for which we have neither the manpower nor the funds to hire out for. Again, it is a huge effort, and we would rather put that energy into improving our ride, events and race program.

• At this stage in our organization's life, we really are not a charitable organization, which is what 501(c)3 is designated for. Does this mean we will never do charitable work? Absolutely not! However the volunteer work we have chosen so far (LiveStrong Challenge, Harvest Century, etc.) is more in line with what Portland Velo is all about. The work we do with course marshalling, rest stops, and logistics relates more directly to "It's All About The Ride". We have never been about raising large amounts of money and distributing that money to worthy causes - there are other organizations that do that a whole lot better than us (think BTA, Community Cycling Center, etc.), and we encourage our members to donate money to these local charitable organizations.

Given the above situation, we are in a bit of a quandary - although we have raised dues to $25, we need to start thinking of ways to put more money in the bank as we provide more value to our members (and those things can be expensive). For example, it would be nice to have enough money in the bank to purchase some inventory of club and racing kits so new members can get these right away. Events like the Winter Party are becoming more expensive due to the fact that our membership numbers have greatly increased. Insurance only gets more expensive every year.

We are looking to put together a solid fundraising program in 2008, and to that end I have asked our officers to put together budgets for their sections so we have a target number to shoot for. We'll share that information with you as it shapes up; the big ticket items are the Winter Party, the Club Century, impromptu club get-togethers, web operations, various race team events, first aid and CPR classes, and the ride leader incentive program. Added up, even these few things can quickly exceed our dues run-rate. Be looking for more information on fundraising activities and how you can get involved soon.

More than anything, I am constantly impressed with the level of participation we receive from our members. I feel particularly fortunate for the community we continue to build and the great ideas people bring to the table. I encourage all Portland Velo members to continue to be enagaged with the club, by even coming to a ride and having a great time. 2008 promises to be a huge year for Portland Velo and we already have a lot of great things planned, like our First Saturday Ride series, the LiveStrong Challenge (June 28-29), and the Winter Party (January 26). I look forward to seeing you all on the road in the coming year!

As always, have fun and be safe!