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EXECUTIVE COMMENT
President, Garth Webber Atkins
One of the things that the Club Executive try to “right size” is Club communications. Our standard operating procedure has been to put notice of upcoming events in Porscher, which is published at the beginning of the month and for the President to send out an e-mail midmonth to all Club members. The underlying principle is to keep communications efficient and not clutter up your inbox. Mostly we manage to plan events so that notice of them occurs in at least one of these modes of transmission. We also post reminders on Facebook, but haven’t so far relied on this as sole means of apprising members of events. Occasionally we have time-sensitive information, usually about registering for an event and I will send an extra or singlepurpose e-mail. Late in March, Gary Glover, a Past President and active tour leader saw a nice day coming up and asked me to invite members to meet him for coffee in Bowser, a few days later. It wasn’t an event or communications scenario we have entertained in the four years I’ve been on the Executive and I was hesitant to contact 600 people when only a handful might be interested or available. However, we didn’t have much else on the calendar and I felt it was a worthwhile experiment. I have to stress that I could only entertain this because it was a stationary event and not a drive. We cannot conduct drives without having obtained the mandatory PCA insurance in advance, so impromptu drives set up through any VIR Club channel, by anyone, are not something we can enable and have to actively discourage. Club executives and members, probably throughout the country, would love to be able to do this, but we’ve heard clearly and repeatedly from PCA National, that it is the planning and risk management up front, as well as our good safety record, that keep our insurance rates the lowest of any car club and without affordable insurance, we won’t have a Club. Stationary events, however, do not need insurance, so impromptu meet-ups are doable. I know that at least 60 people read the email, because they either let me know they regretted not being able to make it, or asked what time to meet, as I most unhelpfully neglected to include the time. The turnout was good – 20 Porsches and about 30 people showed up, so it seems this is something that at least some members would like to know about and we could consider offering up similar opportunities in the future. The question is – what’s the best way to let people know? An all-member e-mail? Our Facebook Group page? Something else? Sometime over the next couple of months, I will send out a questionnaire to get your thoughts on what would and wouldn’t work for you. May is Black Rock month and I am looking forward to seeing many of you there. Just around the corner from that, we will have a busy June, with the Spring Rally on the 5th , the Shawnigan Lake Drive on the 11th and the VanIsle Adventure Tour on the 24th and 25th. Please register soon for any of these events that you are interested in. See “Around the Bend” for registration links.
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Garth
Membership Chair, Kathleen Short Membership Report for April 2022 Vancouver Island Region has 627 members. We have 383 primary members and 244 affiliate or family members. PCA National Club has a total of 146,564 comprised of 95,690 primary members, 50,853 affiliate members and 21 life members.
Welcome New Members
Member Evan Brown John MacDonald Co-Member
David Jubb Emily Jubb Kevin Root Location / From Vehicle Victoria 2004 911 Carrera
Victoria
Victoria 2008 911 Carrera S
Kevin Sokyrka
Parksville Dave Hinton Blake Hinton Mayne Island / Canada West
2001 911 Carrera 1997 911 Carrera
Uli Jaeckel North Saanich / Canada West 1993 911 Carrera RS3.8
If you do not have your partner/friend listed as an affiliate (18+ years old) on your membership, please contact PCA to add them, it’s free. You can do that via PCA admin at membership@pca.org or call them at 1-410-381-0911.
Anniversaries in April – Congratulations! 20 Years David and Sidney Manchip 5 years Richard Probst, Ross MacDonald 1 year Dabid Massel, John Biddle and Rosemary DiLabio, Donald Kelly
Other Membership Activity for this period:
Renewals: 25
Non-renewals: 3
Transfer in/out: 2/0
Juniors: 35 (Register your new PCA Junior here)
PCA – Membership Region Change During the new member sign up process, only the zip code or postal code is used for automated region placement, so new members will see their assigned region name. We have found most new members do not know what a PCA Region is and having an open region field to select a region is confusing at best. Each member remains in their assigned Region, even if the member moves or changes their address in PCA.org.
Note: Members can change their Region affiliation by emailing the PCA National Office at membership@pca.org or calling 1-410-381-0911.
PCA has some exciting news to share about a change to the Test Drive program. Test Drive has previously been a six-month subscription costing $40. The program is now a one-year subscription costing $46. PCA has automatically extended current Test Drive subscribers an additional six months, at no extra charge.
Also, if a Test Drive subscriber purchases a Porsche within the oneyear subscription period, they can call the PCA National office at 1-410-3810911 and the balance of their Test Drive term will be converted to full PCA Membership.
Test Drive subscribers were notified of this change this month. For more information about the PCA Test Drive program, click here.
The VIR thanks the Porsche Centre Victoria for new member referrals at the time of purchase.
Kathleen
PCA Test Drive Do you know someone with Porsche ownership intentions or aspirations?
Tell them about the PCA Test Drive program. For US $46 they get 1 year access to PANORAMA and defined access to browse the online PCA Mart to find their Porsche. Go to pca.org/pca-test-drive for details.
PCA Zone 6 Representative, John P Sommerwerck
Iam thinking the old saying goes something like: ‘March goes out like a lion…’ In our case, April came in like a lion. Since April 3rd, we received nearly two feet of snow at the house and the mountains have received about four feet. The mountain snow has been a blessing as we are in the middle of a drought. Even with the new snow, the mountain snowpack levels are below normal. However, the snow at the house is preventing us from getting our 911 out of storage. I had hoped to update you on the work that has been accomplished to develop a new and improved Zone 6 website. Unfortunately, I cannot. I can update you on what I am thinking and hopefully, in next month’s In The Zone, I will be able to unveil the new site design. My current thinking is the new site will have many of the old Zone 6 website features; description of Zone 6, its regions, contact information, etc. the changes I want to implement include: direct linkages to each region’s websites for events. This will eliminate the need for the regions to do double entry for tours/events. We will include pictures for Zone 6 Signature events and links to the regions picture pages. The current site requires a technologist to update. I am not a technologist, so I want the new site to be easily updateable. I welcome your thoughts on what would make the Zone 6 website (zone6.pca.org) more useable and/or functional. Next week, Nancy and I start our summer driving season, we are off to Colorado Springs for the Broadmoor Treffen. Two weeks later we head to Vancouver Island Region’s Black Rock Charity event. Hopefully, we will be able to drive the 911 to Black Rock. I grew up in the east and only moved to the west in my thirties, so we will be driving to the Poconos Parade. We are driving the Macan as Nancy does not want the luggage limitations of the 911. Stay healthy and we will see you in the Zone. John
