[Ansteorra] Pay-2-play ---Clarification--- (My 2 cents)

[Gustav Minnesinger]

Just my two cents.

Correct me if I am wrong, but the goal of this line of questioning:
•	How to enfranchise those that have historically foregone paying for active membership due to economic reasons or the number of events that they participate in, ect.
•	Is it feasible to create a set of tiered memberships based on the level of participation, and then enforcing it after a period of time.
•	How to keep the paperwork down to a reasonable level and financially solvent in enforcing any new changes, if they are made (a matter of logistics).

Reasoning:  Historically there has always been a large number of ‘fringe’ members in the SCA who do not pay for full membership, but participate at sponsored events.  The exact numbers of ‘Fringe’ members can be estimated, but never truly documented for use in censuses and for who the populace actually is.  Legally, the ‘fringe’ members have been covered by the insurance provided by the ‘Paying’ members.  How will We (The Society), account for all the members to whom our decisions will effect?  And do this is a manor that will fulfill the obligations to Mundane Law, the Laws of the Society, and the customs of the local groups?

Example (Pure Fiction):  A Collage is trying to fulfill all the Kingdom Laws for officers and sustaining membership to keep the group open, active and to hold events.  The number of participating members are 50-75, but the number of ‘Paying Members’ is only 5-10.  Due to various problems, the group has had problems in maintaining officers and submitting the required forms.  The decision as for keeping the group open from a Kingdom standpoint obligates them to look at how many documented members that their decision will effect (Paying Members).  Under today’s standards of membership, they would see that there is only 5-10 people, and the group maybe temporally closed.  If we had a tiered system of membership or some other way to document the total amount of participating membership (50-75), then the decision may be very different.

The BoD is looking for ways to include everyone who want to ‘Play the Game’ into the Society in a way that will satisfy all the need of the people, the needs of the Kingdoms, and the Legal obligations.  One of the proposed methods for doing this would be a tiered system of membership by level of participation, various levels of cost, with some sort of incentive to families.  One such example would be as below:

Minor Waver Cards  ---  Cost included with the family benefits
Basic Participants Card  ---  50% of full cost, allows member to be on site and to participate in basic activities
Participants Card  ---  75% of full cost, allows member to compete in artisan and martial competitions
Officer’s Participants Card  ---  100% of full cost, allows member to hold office, autocrat events and fight in Crown Tournaments

(This is an example completely made up and holds nothing dear to my heart.  Think about it, play with it and make your own suggestions to Armand dragonetti at generich.com or the BoD)

In this way, everyone is included who wants to be included, costs are spread out amongst all, and decisions made by our officers and Crown will be better informed as to who it will effect.

The down side is that after a set time the new guidelines would then have to be enforced and either no one gets on site that does not carry a card, or the costs for a ‘Guest’ pass will have to increase quite a bit.

The use of having even the Basic Participants Card could also be used / thought of in many other ways.  Like paying off all your surcharges for the year.


Gustav Minnesinger

"There are people who say I have never really done anything wrong in my life; of course, they only say it behind my back." ---Oscar Wilde