This question in
this installment concerns the Presidency of the Association.
I recently
learned that the President serves a one-year term. Would continuity be improved
if the term were two or three years? It is almost impossible to implement ideas
in one year.
J.J. Trapani
East Islip New York
Actually, a President serves four years in four separate
capacities. First, he or she is elected to the office of Vice President. The
subsequent election to the office of President Elect affirms the fact that the
membership wishes that person to serve as President of the Association, which
is the following year. After serving one year as President then the following
year as Immediate Past President, this provides a lot of time to implement
ideas. This is what I have called the “Order of Ascension,” which is a simple
way to identify how a person passes through each rank of the Presidency, each
level having not so much more power as it does responsibility.
For as long as I have been a member of the AFA, the bylaws have
stated that the board calls the shots and it is the President’s job to make
sure what the board said to do actually gets done. Past President McClendon encapsulated
this quite beautifully during the 2012 midyear board meeting:
“If the board wants me to drive a truck load of duck feathers off
a cliff, that is what I am supposed to do. At that point (the Board) has made
the decision, it is (the Executive Committee’s) job to acquire the truck and
the feathers and eventually up to me to get the truck off the cliff. I am not
permitted by the bylaws of this association to question your logic as to the
order; it is to see it through to fruition.”
All of that said, it is true that everyone still looks to the AFA
President for leadership and ideas even though that power is actually at the
regional level and empowers the membership more than the President.
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