Quit counting on “Somebody Else” If you’re waiting to be asked, I’m asking

April 18th, 2022 – the deadline for your income taxes, right?  Yes, but the date has another significance in your life. It’s the deadline for Candidacy Papers for the ABATE of Wisconsin District Director Position.  You know, that election that you’re pretty much ignoring because “someone else will do it or no one asked me!”

If you’re thinking, “I’m not qualified because I don’t know all the rules and all the history and policies of ABATE of Wisconsin…”  Well, forget that! No one knows everything they need to know before they’re elected. But once you’re in the job you’ll quickly learn on-the-job. Rest assured that there will be other officers and board members that have been around a while that can show you where to find the answers and help you through the rough spots. ABATE of Wisconsin also has the documents you’ll need in print (the By-laws and our Officers Manual) so you aren’t going to have to re-create the wheel.

The District Directors are the seats on the board of directors that represent the members from their district: i.e. the District 1 Director represents the members of ABATE of Wisconsin’s District 1. The District Director is also the first level of contact for the Regional Officers of their district if a question arises. Does this mean that you have to attend all the regional events in meetings in your district. No, it does not. What it means is simply that you need to be reachable and if you can attend meetings or events your presence would surely be appreciated.

What is most important is how you can answer the following questions:

• Are your goals the same as those of this organization and its board?
• Can you contribute skills, experience, or expertise that will increase the impact of the organization and help it advance its mission?
• Are you prepared to commit the time required to fulfill responsibilities?

Who are you going to offend? No one. Even if the current District Director is running, there is absolutely nothing wrong with a contested race (unless it’s a board member?

But what if I like my current District Director? Well, in this election cycle – for most people that really doesn’t matter. Why? Because as of this writing, with less than one month to go to the deadline for candidates only one seated District Director has filed for candidacy in this election cycle.

As a very long term member of ABATE of Wisconsin, I personally know that we have more than one good District Director candidate in every district. Jump on in the race and let the members decide. If your current District Director decides to run again then the members can show them that they are doing a good job by re-electing them. So that means that you’d lose, right? No shame in that. No shame at all: because you rose up and put your name out as someone who was willing to give it a try because you value ABATE of Wisconsin and want to help. One day the right election or appointment will come around at the right time: it’s not a secret (because we tell this story all the time and he knows it) but the first time Hardtail ran for our board of directors he lost by one-stinking-vote. But he tried again and won and went on to not only do good things for ABATE of Wisconsin but he also rose up to become the President of the Motorcycle Riders Foundation.

If this makes you think about running at all: do it now. Don’t put yourself in the situation where guilt makes you take the difficult route of a write-in candidate in May when you pick up the newsletter and see that no one is running in your district because they were all counting on “someone else to do it.”

If you’re still using the excuse that you’re not running because no one asked you – toss that out the window…  didn’t you read this? I’M ASKING YOU!  The candidacy paper is on page 4 of this issue.

“Cuz”