Attendees: NC Sheldon Ohren, PNC Monte Mayer, PNC Ed Goldwasser, PNC Mike Berman, PNC Warren Dolny, Maxwell Colon, Joe Kraut, Elliott Donn, Jerry Farris, Mike London, George Weinstein, Paul Osslander, Jesse Gerstein, Mrs. Bailor, Rich Morris, Harvey Chowder, Ben Podgor, Jerry Blum
Staff: NED Herb Rosenbleeth; DOO Larry Richardson; Nikki Salzman
Subject:Veterans Day Activities and Planning for New Members
- Veterans Day Activities – Posts doing a variety of activities including:
- Distributing poppies to active duty visitors and retirees at Camp Pendleton
- Synagogue service honoring veterans for Veterans Day
- Veterans Day Parade
- Program where three synagogues join forces to honor members. Will also feature participation from the religious schools
- Poppy sales
- Participate in local Stand Down program
- Going to a senior citizen development for a veteran’s day service
- Go to a football stadium prior to a football game around veterans day and sell poppies: there’s a lot of potential to raise money in that forum
- Planning for New members:
- Commanders need to lead by example:
- Dress appropriately
- Clear communications/materials
- JWV procedures should be followed at all times
- Staff Officers should have JWV hats on (especially when they give their reports)
- Commanders should constantly ask members to bring relatives, neighbors, and friends to events. Membership must be our number one priority
- RAM (recruit a member) should be our new code word for the year
- Ask everyone to be a member. The more you ask, the more likely you are to get a new member
- Encourage area synagogues to ask new members if they’re vets and then have them refer people to us
- At each meeting, make sure each person has five applications for membership and info on where to send it once it’s filled out
- It’s no good to just ask if people want to be members – need to give them a way to act by having applications handy at all times
- Members at Large
- Get the list of Members at Large from National
- Sign them up as part of your Post : they’re the best people to sign up, since they’ve already made the step of joining the organization
- Work with the younger vets without excluding the older vets
- How do you welcome a new member to ensure that they participate?
- It’s really easy to make a potential member go away – if you don’t make them feel worthwhile, they will go away
- You should appoint one or two regular members to buddy up with any new members – make them feel appreciated and interested in any upcoming events that you have
