DECEMBER 2003

Down the Stretch

by Steven M. Goolsby

With this issue of The Delegates' Voice, it feels like our activities for this year are in the home stretch. This second issue of the HoD newsletter contains quite a bit of information, and is well worth the effort to read. For example, it contains information on the candidate nominations for next year's HoD officers. And in my mind, there is not very much that is more important than finding someone else to take over my chores next year.

My efforts to seek contributors to discuss important issues of the HoD in The Delegates' Voice have produced some good results. This month's Point-Counterpoint column contains two articles. The first is a counterpoint response from Robbie Gries to Clint Moore's letter that we published in the last issue. The second article is a thought-provoking proposal from Jim Tucker. Both of these articles are worthy of your consideration. Please keep in mind that we would appreciate hearing from you if you have an issue that you would like to have the HoD membership consider.

I had fewer responses to the second proposal I forwarded in the last issue of The Delegates' Voice. No one has stepped forward with any artwork or photographs to help brighten up the pages of this newsletter. Nor has anyone sent in any brief historical articles to replace the ones that Pat Gratton has traditionally published in past issues. If you have any of these materials that you think would be of interest to the HoD membership, please contact me. Better still, if you know of someone else you could volunteer for this duty please let me know. I'd be glad to talk to them about it.

Putting together The Delegates' Voice is a time-consuming process. It takes a couple of months to get all of the editing done, to publish the newsletter, and to mail it out to the membership. So if you have an issue or proposal that you would like to get in front of the HoD membership for consideration before the annual meeting in Dallas this coming year, now is the time to step forward with it. Write it up and send it along to me.

As a last note, I'd like to remind everyone about our 2003-2004 Membership Enhancement and Development contest. This is the on-going contest that AAPG is sponsoring to encourage those in our Association to recruit new members. The top individual award for the most recruitment is a trip to AAPG's international conference and exhibition in Cancun, Mexico, October 24-27, 2004. In addition, the top international regions and U.S. societies based on percentage of membership will receive cash prizes. So participation in this contest is well worth the effort. For recruitment kits and more information, call or email Donna Riggs at the AAPG office (1-800-364-2274 or ).