Please note that Post 921 has permanently changed their meeting date from the third Saturday of the month to the second Saturday of the month. The time remains the same with the meeting commencing at 1:00PM.

Your Post election reports are due at Department and National (not just postmarked) by June 1st. I know that several Posts have submitted them already. If yours hasn’t, please see that it gets dropped in the mail or completed on-line.

Even if no one from your Post intends on making the National Convention this year, you still must pay a $25 registration fee to National. Your Quartermaster should have received a registration form which needs to be completed and mailed to National.

Prior to installation, please insure that all officers have DD-214’s on file indicating eligibility for VFW. Every now and then we have individuals up to Post Commanders who are not eligible. Longevity in VFW doesn’t necessarily prove eligibility. Unfortunately, some individuals abuse the system.

I am hoping we have a good turnout for the District Convention on May 18th as we have several im-portant items on the agenda.

As most of you know who attended the Memorial Service meeting, I handed out proposed District 1 by-law changes to all the Post Commanders or their representatives and these revised by-laws will need to be approved before they can be submitted to Department. Most of the changes are to bring the District by-laws into compliance with National. I also proposed that per-capital dues be increased in the by-laws from $.50 to $1.00. Currently, we charge $.20 and I am recommending that this be increased to $.50 allowed under the current by-laws. I handed out a budget supporting this increase and we will dis-cuss and vote on it at the Convention. The proposal to increase the per-capital dues in the by-laws is simply to allow a future increase without requiring another amendment which we all know is a bit of a pain to do for one item. An increase in the actual amount being assessed requires the approval of the Posts and would be voted on at a District meeting with prior notice being given.

Of course the other major item at the District Convention will be the nominations and election of District officers. I plan on running for District Commander for one additional term. Following the elections we are planning on a joint installation.

The Posts did a great job in having Loyalty Day proclamations read into the various city councils minutes and published in the local newspapers. I want to thank everyone for getting the word out in your lo-cal community. Fred Apgar wrote a great article on the meaning of Loyalty Day which was published in several local newspapers. I sent it to all the Posts so if you didn’t have time to get it published this year, keep it so you can submit it to your local newspaper next year.

I know several Posts are “educating” local city councils on what VFW does in the community. Post 1561 is a good example of this. Post 8870 is also making an effort to educate eligible veterans of VFW by running a press release in the newspapers in their service area. I’m including the article that Fred Apgar drafted. Your Post can alter it as it sees fit.

VFW Provides Vets A Special Way to
Serve Country and Community

Serving our country during times of conflict often creates friendships that last forever and a unique sense of duty to serve others. The men and women who have worn the uniform of the United States military in foreign wars know this well. Since its inception in 1899, the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) has been the nation’s leading veterans’ service organization in the fight to better the lives of veterans and members of their families.

Local Veterans of Foreign Wars Post # 8870 of Edmonds offers veterans an opportunity to continue serving at both the local and national level. Through its Poppy distribution efforts, Post #8870 raises more than $25,000 every year to support programs like the Veterans Homes in Orting and Retsil, Fisher House, the Fallen Heroes Project, VFW National Home, Wounded Warrior Project, and many other community and youth programs.

If you are a U.S. citizen who has honorably served in an overseas conflict and received a campaign medal for that service, you may be interested in continuing to help others in new and fulfilling ways. We invite eligible veterans to consider becoming a member of VFW. To learn more, please visit our web site www.vfw8870.org. Or, contact us at 206-940-7502.

My previous newsletters detailed our VFW day at the park so I suspect everyone is familiar with what is going on. Please send me an email with the number of tickets your Post would like. I have to place an order with the AquaSox fairly soon in order to get all the seats in one area. I will need a check ($10/ticket) for the amount of tickets when I deliver them in June.

If you have or haven’t completed your reservation forms for the banquet at Friday night or the luncheon on Thursday, let me know if you are planning on at-tending. I will then try to consolidate the reservations and secure a District 1 table.

Danny Houghton has an inventory of recruiting sup-plies. With Memorial Day approaching, anyone handing out Buddy Poppies should have a good supply of recruiting brochures, membership applications, etc. There is also a replacement brochure for the “She Serves” that were discontinued. During the past couple of years, I know that I have signed up at least one member during the two days that I volunteer for Buddy Poppy’s in May. I know that a number of other Posts also use Memorial Day Poppy drive for recruiting as well as raising money for their relief fund. Send Danny an email or call as he is heading off for a cruise.

Date: Thursday, May 2nd, 2013
Time: 9 AM
Place: Department Headquarters
5213 Pacific Hwy E
Fife, WA 98424
**Contact Headquarters to attend**
253-922-2114
Instructor: Court Fraley
Class topics—Basic PSO training

Date: Saturday, May 11th, 2013
Time: 9 AM – 2 PM
Place: Post 239
190 S. Dora Ave.
Bremerton, WA 98312
**contact Post 239 to attend**
360-377-6739 after noon
Instructor: Ross Walker
Class topics
Basic PSO training
Eligibility for VA benefits
Overview of VA forms
Aid and Attendance

I need to remind all Auxiliary Presidents that I am to receive a copy of your year end reports. If you have not mailed me a copy please do so now. I am getting calls from the State Program Chairman to finish up their reports and if I have a copy I can make a phone report to correct any missing reports. They all want to be 100% reported so let’s do our part in getting our reports mailed in.

Installation time is upon is upon us. Get in your cars and attend some of them. We can all learn stuff by visiting other Post’s activities. Hope to see a lot of you as I travel the District in May. Good luck and best wishes to all new Officers and thank you all for your help this past year.

This is a bit of brief newsletter as I am still in post tax season decompression. We won’t achieve 100% membership this year but it wasn’t from the lack of trying. I know a couple of Posts are down quite a bit but they made every effort to reach out to non-paying continuous members. It’s too bad that some folks chose not to continue as members particularly when veterans’ benefits face sequestration and access to the VA is so difficult for some of our members. However, it is important to keep those folks on your mailing list and continue to reach out to them with newsletters, announcements, etc. Some will return if they feel they are a part of the VFW family.

I want to say that this has been a particularly satisfying year to me. I’ve met a lot of folks at different Posts that I wouldn’t otherwise have met. Also, with Post 1561 changing its meeting place for the first six months of the year, I know Arlington better than I ever thought I would.

There are some items I really wanted to accomplish but didn’t get done. However, I did get to reduce the list by a number of items. Hopefully, I can complete the punch-list this next year.

You will note that I am excluding the Tally Report on this newsletter since everyone is now receiving (or should be receiving) it from Department on a weekly basis. If you aren’t, let Robin at Department know and she will add you to the list. However, everyone has now filed everything that is necessary with a very few exceptions. Now that everyone is caught up, it should be an easy task to remain current with your reports. I want to thank all of you with reporting responsibilities for helping out. Here are the membership stats. Congrats to 1561, 7511, and 9417 for exceeding 100%.

Same time and place unless indicated below. See the listing from the links on left sidebar.

Gay Jones Post #921
Meeting Date: 2nd Saturday – 1:00 P.M. (changed from 3rd Saturday)

Edmonds Post #8870
Meeting Date: 2nd Friday-12:30 pm, Lunch at 11:45 am (changed from 11:30 am)

If you change the date or time of your meeting, please let both District and Department know of the change.