O
n Monday, February 22, which was the first monthly meeting after the adoption of our new bylaws, the Board of Directors unanimously approved a change in the makeup and structure of our committees. It seemed logical that several prior committees overlapped other committees. This produced a level of duplicated work and some confusion as to which committee held sway on a particular topic.With that in mind, the old committee structure was reworked by President Jonathan Dixon as follows.
The old Operations and Museum committees are now combined into and enhanced by the addition of other responsibilities as the “Archives and Ops Committee.” This is one of the biggest changes. The new committee will be responsible for operations, including office/business administration, business IT systems, and clerical support to committees. Additional responsibilities include our Photo Archives and Cataloging Project (PACP), oral history projects, museum exhibits, and archive management, (including object resources and paper resources [library]). Finally will be research services.
The former Publications committee has been restructured as the new “Communications Committee.” This formalizes what this group has been doing throughout the past year, but wasn’t formally assigned. The Communications Committee now encompasses the publication of our Historian newsletter, publication of any new books (as well as the sales of the present offerings), publication of our revived e-newsletter (renamed the Bulletin), and the creation and maintenance of our website (http://www.rpwrhs.org). Finally, there is our Yahoo.com discussion group (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rpwrhs) within which visitors/members are encouraged to ask history-based questions and post historical remembrances.
The previous Diversity Development and Events Committees have been grouped into the new “Education and Outreach Committee.” The responsibilities of the new group include planning and execution of events, programs, and interfacing with school, church, and social agencies.
Finally, comes the new “Resource Development Committee” which is a combination of the old Resource Development, Membership, and Volunteer Committees.
The Executive and Finance Committees were not restructured.
Because your Society is only able to function through the support and help of its membership, the chairpersons of each of the above committees would appreciate discussing ways in which you could volunteer your time and talents.
