General Service Conference Charter – 2025 AA Service Workshop – Part 18 of 27 – Billy N.

good evening everyone i'm billy i'm an alcoholic welcome everyone and uh well if we could start out this is not a meeting or a group just the gathering but i will say the responsibility statement i am responsible when anyone anywhere reaches out for help i want the hand of always to be there and for that i am responsible and the theme you will notice over the next couple of weeks is always referring to the literature and not personal opinion so as a result of that i just want to throw out there that if there's anyone here tonight who does not know the story behind the responsibility statement because we hear all kinds of things of what it's about and what it's defined as. Please get a copy of As Bill Sees It, and as you know, it starts with stories, story number one, two, three, four, five, and quotes to sources. And the last story or so-called chapter in As Bill See's It is the responsibility statement, and you can see it right there. So welcome, everyone. Let's just get a couple of things out there in the open uh it's february it's actually februari 17th meaning that within a week or so don't hold your delegate hostage but they'll the background and the final conference agenda will be out meaning that if you are a new GSR or you're not even a GSR but your group has a GSAR or you don't know if your group as a GS are or anything like that it would be really good right now for you to know or find out who is your DCM or your district chair or maybe you call it a DCMC or maybe you even call it a zone leader. It doesn't matter what they call it. Just find someone who's currently in general service who can explain to you how your area reviews the conference agenda. Now, I don't know how many areas are represented here tonight, but I'm going guess at least like 30 and so that being the case i can't tell you how your area is going to review your agenda items and background now i can tell you have a few areas well based on how they always have but that doesn't matter find out how your área goes through the items find out how your group hopefully you have a gsr can be involved in the process some areas have one big meeting some areas have what we call uh mock conferences some areas pick like 10 items and get feedback on those and the rest of the delegate just gets as much feedback as they can from groups and individuals and um some areas are utilizing this platform um and i'm not here to say what is the best what i will tell you is if there are any people who've been involved in service for a while is most areas review background in the way that was handed down to them from the year before who was handed down to them from the year before it doesn't always have to be that way but that's not a conversation for now if you think that your area could improve in how you review background and agenda items then think about that for a future topic at one of your district meetings or your area meetings now is what i call the playoff season of alcoholics anonymous service now the agenda item and the background is coming out maybe you have let's face it half of february is gone some groups that have their business meeting the first and second whatever of the month have already had their februari business meeting but at the most there's three business meetings left before the conference February, March and April for most groups. So all I can stress is that you find out. So next on the list, where obviously we sent out a schedule, we'll do a concept and a tradition each week except for tonight we're doing the conference charter. There are a couple of pamphlets that we threw in there only because they really relate to the traditions and so we wanted to review those we have an extra week involved so we invited the chair of the general service board the current chair to come here and speak in like two or three weeks whatever night that is but whether we're doing pamphlets or whether it's the night that scott is here himself or whether we're just doing the concepts and and the traditions we are not going to entertain questions on conference items so i just want to make that clear so no one is disappointed this is not a place to ask questions about particular conference items those are best left in your group your district and your area what i will encourage is some of you may have a service sponsor. That's great. Some of you may not, and that's fine too. But I definitely will stress that each person embrace being an individual thinker. Meaning that you are entitled once you do the work as far as researching each issue, reading our history, reading our literature that you as an aa member are entitled to have their your own opinion on any item on the conference agenda or on any item in alcoholics anonymous and i hope i could stress that you don't have to take personal if somebody thinks different than you i hope that as we go through the traditions and the concepts you can embrace the principles you may be at your district or your group or your area could raise your hand to vote and once your hand comes down you have let go which i know is a difficult process for a lot of us in aa so just let go we are the people who would rather be dragged you know they say let go or be dragged where those few people who would choose be dragged right so something to try and work on is to not be dragged it's not personal in fact most people who've been active in service for a long time if you talk to them one-on-one they will finally admit to you that probably the best progress they've made in their life that's benefited them in their regular life from service is something not going their way yet working hard to carry it out just not taking your toys and going home and leaving the sandbox like embracing the group conscience a would probably be much better off embracing the group conscience and not getting all hell-bent and so and you know i tell delegates this when they go to the conference but i'll tell everyone here because most of the people here are going to districts or assemblies is it's the same advice we would give that any delegate gets don't leave your district meeting your assembly all bent out of shape because you didn't share if you're entitled to share and you feel strongly on one of these conference items and it's appropriate in the way that your area reviews background don't just go to the diner and complain don't like drive home furious like give your two cents based on your experience based on the literature and let it go there but so many people don't throw their two cents in and the group conscience doesn't go their way and then they they leave resentful i can tell you this from personal experience and from many other AA members sober a long time who have shared the same thing with me. How painful and horrible a place is it if the very place like Alcoholics Anonymous that is supposed to bring you joy does nothing but piss you off? It's a horrible place to be. And it's not what our principles try to lay out for us. We can agree to disagree. We can embrace the group conscience procedure. And we can know that we're self-correcting, that maybe next year we vote some way different. But this is the time of year when we do go through all these conference items, meaning in the areas, in the districts, not on this workshop. But I just want to stress that you should be able to enjoy a bad cup of coffee and an uncomfortable chair anywhere in the Alcoholics Anonymous world. Anywhere. you should walk into a district meeting an area meeting a convention a big book workshop your home group a meeting on vacation a meeting while traveling for work and you should feel at home in Alcoholics Anonymous like it should bring instant good feelings to your life not resentment and anger it's just not worth it life is too short so so those that are maybe new to service i know i put 123 if you have the current new service manual with the kind of aqua blue color if you still have the red one it's page 119. if you have an older service manual just use the current conference charter not the original I would tell you all, reading the original someday and comparing it to the current is good to know from a historical point of view. But for our business in AA today, it's best we not confuse everyone and stay with the current conference charter. So what is the conference charter? The traditions basically got published in 1946. We know that. we know that Bill was convinced that AA needed the traditions I read a letter from Bill W it's one of my favorite letters I do not have a copy of it because it's in the archives and we're not supposed to make copies but you're allowed to and I'll tell everyone else that if you go to GSO someday and you know three months ahead of time when you're going to go there if there's a particular part of AA history that you're interested in you can make a request to the archives for them to pull a file out to read all the correspondence for that time period so one of the best letters i ever read in the 40s about the traditions was bill w right into a person and he said that the reason he was convinced the traditions were needed was that alcoholics had a unique ability to destroy anything good in their life boy did that sentence really kick my ass like drunk or sober we have a unique ability to destroyed anything good in our life and bill w had noticed by the mid 40s that we were going to destroy the very thing that was barely 10 years old. The first thing on earth that really was working and sticking around. By 1950 and 49, Bill knew that Bob was going to pass away soon. And one of the things that's not talked about a lot, uh by the way there's a great new book out i don't have it in front of me i'll remember to bring it next week or the title but there'sa great newbookout about father ed dowling it is absolutely fantastic um there was already one book out but there is a new bookout that is so good um sometimes we hear that bill just you know he wanted to give aa to the groups but it's important to know that bill w was as human as all of us are not a deity not a god just a regular man and it was father dowling that convinced him that as long as he was the last word in aa he would never get the spiritual freedom that other AA members were getting that if he was always the end-all be-all in AA he would never get the freedom that was promised in the big book and when he knew Dr. Bob was not going to last another year or two he came up with this idea for the conference Now, the conference was no different than the traditions as far as old timers were not in favor of it. There's a great file at GSO in the archives of letters from old timERS who wrote Bill about the proposed conference and how many of them were opposed to it. Amazing. just like the traditions I mean I've said this many times think about 1945 1946 if you had six years that's like having 70 years tonight okay in modern day AA if you had six years in 1945 you were an old timer and AA wasn't like it is today if you had six years in 1946 you got to decide where you met what night you met what time you met you got to decide who got to come to your group what were the rules for sponsorship it was perfect for the alcoholic ego so could you imagine bill writes the traditions they're upset enough and now he comes up with a conference and that's what bill called the general service conference the permanent successors to the founders that's the conference is the conference was a test in 1951 52 53 and 54 and in 55 the conference comes alive that's why the book aa comes of age is called aa comes of age where did it come of age it came of age in the keel auditorium in st louis in 1955 when the resolution was passed to take bill and bob's job as an advisor to the board and pass it on to this thing called the general service conference and really the conference charter is like the declaration of independence for the groups but it's really important when we talk about the conference charter especially for people who are new to service we talk about what is the conference especially one might say in the last couple of years we've had some difficult issues that happens all the time it happens unfortunately sometimes it becomes personal and polarizing and that's unfortunate and what's really unfortunate is it comes out to us in them sometimes the board versus the delegates but it's super important to realize and embrace that the conference is all of those people that there's four groups of delegates at the conference the conference the bylaws of the trustees called the by laws of the general service board make clear that every voting member of the conference as a delegate meaning there's four types of delegates so if you're new to this just use the figure 135 sometimes it's one less or one more two more but 135 is a good number to use and inside that 135 there's no us in them it's all us and there's four types of delegates inside the us there's area delegates 93 of them there's trustee delegates 21 of them now director delegates six of them and staff delegates which is about 15 aa gso and a great fine staff know us and them the conference is all of those people and the conference is not a board meeting it's not a trustee meeting it's an area delegate meeting it's the general service conference of alcoholics anonymous and the confidence charter is what governs the general service conference i'm going to go through the articles of the conference charter and just highlight some of the important things article one is the purpose of the charter the general services conference of alcoholics anonymous is the guardian of world services and of the 12 steps 12 traditions and 12 concepts of alcoholix anonymous The conference shall be a service body only, never a government for Alcoholics Anonymous. Boy, do some of us want a government. We want rules and regulations and everything else. But right there in the first article, it tells us no go. The conference's job is to be a Service Body. And then Article 2 is the composition of the conference. now a couple of things just get out of the way sometimes we make the mistake of calling ourselves the north american general service conference we are not the north American general service conference mexico is part of north america that's number one but mexico has their own general service conference. They actually have two, which is a story for another day or another concept, another week. We are the general service structure of the United States and Canada. That's the structure we are. It's important to remember when the first charter was written, we were the only structure and we were at the headquarters. We're not the headquarters anymore. There are 63 other autonomous general service structures around the world. So it says, the conference, U.S. and Canada, shall be composed of area delegates, the trustees of the General Service Board, directors of AA World Services, and the AA Grapevine, and staff members of the Grapevine and the General Services Office. Remember those four categories if you've not been through the concepts before for when we get to concept four because that will be important and then it tells us what's happened since the start of the general service conference other countries have created autonomous general service conferences of their own which rely on the steps and traditions that are protected by the united states canada conference in addition these other conferences often turn to the actions of the united States and Canada Conference for Guidance. And then it says consultation between conferences is encouraged, and a World Service meeting of delegates from the various conferences is held every two years. The United States-Canada delegates to the World Service Meeting are chosen from the General Service Board. Now, two things about this. The World Service meeting is held every two years but if you take a note that means every four years it's in the US in New York in October usually right before our board weekend it just happened a couple of you know a couple months ago so 2024 in New york 2026 somewhere else in the world 2028 back in new york 2030 somewhere else in the world that's the way it goes um it says the united states canada delegates to the world service meeting are chosen from the general service board so usually if everything is going right our delegates to the world service meeting are the trustee at large canada and the trusty at large united states is that written in stone no that's our plan that's their duties has someone gotten sick has someone passed away and we've had to send another trustee yes of course but the other thing to notice is not all air not all uh structures send trustees in some structures it's a separate position to just be a delegate to the world service meeting so they're not actually a trustee on their board in ours yes but we've changed the definition of trustees so many times what we call a trustee at large today was not a trusty at large back in the late 60s a truste at large back then it was more like a general service trustee today but if you are in the us and canada general service structure we currently have two trustees at large, one in Canada, one in the United States. We will get to how we elect them later on in the concepts. This year the United State's trustee at large is finishing their fourth term. That is Marita from Nevada. This year at the conference we will elect a new U.S. trustee at large it's a complicated process but it's conference year and everyone should know what happens back in the fall each area was allowed in the United States was allowed to send in one candidate at the conference there's a thing called the regional lunch and at that regional lunch each region there's eight regions if you don't know that there are two in canada and six in the united states but the six regions in the united states at lunch will have a third legacy vote to decide who is their one candidate from the region so whoever was nominated by their area in the region their name is put on the board in that regional lunch the delegate from that area will present that candidate given two minutes to present that candidates and then they will vote once each region has come up with one name we will have six names and they will go to the floor of the General Service Conference that afternoon And then all the US delegates, the trustees nominating committee and the conference committee on trustees will vote for the next US trustee at launch. That'll be this year. In countries where a general service structure exists, that's an important statement. The United States-Canada Conference will delegate sole, that is such an important word, right to publish our conference approved literature to the General Service Board of that structure. So sole means sole, one. That's why it's problematic when countries split and have two service structures or more. because according to our charter we can't give each structure a license that has become problematic at times in our history it became problematic when mexico split it became problematic when russia split In fact, the current general service GSO general manager, Bob W., and myself, when I was chair of AA World Services, had a fly to Russia to try to negotiate if we could get everybody on the same page, which we couldn't. Because if you have the sole right to literature publish, you havethe sole rightto make money on literature, which becomes a big complication. But right now, the conference structure will only let us give that license. And the license is a big deal and it comes with a lot of responsibility. We've had issues where we've had to maybe threaten in a nice way, in an AA way, to pull a license because if you get a license, you have to sell the literature to anyone who wants it. You don't get to pick and choose which AA people you like, or if there's a bunch of intergroups in that country, which offices you like or don't like. Believe it or not, we've been down this road. But there is an official license agreement for publishing conference-approved literature. And then the last line of Article 2, only matters seriously affecting AA worldwide needs shall be the subject of joint consideration. That means we'll get to it later in this document. But the World Service meeting does not deal with business. Business. It deals with sharing experience, strength, and hope. Business is not conducted at the World Service meeting. However, we can get a sense of how people feel about certain things. Article 3, the conference relation to AA. The conference will act for AA in perpetuation and guidance of its world services, and it will also be the vehicle by which the AA movement can express its view upon all matters of vital AA policy and all hazardous deviations from AA tradition. Delegates should be free to vote as their conscience dictates. They should also be free, free to decide what questions should be taken to the group level, whether for information discussion or for their own direct instruction this is a line that is so important but often sometimes missed i don't know how many items are on the conference agenda this year but i'm going to guess it's like 80 or 70. the job of a great delegate is to do exactly what it says here what questions do i need answered by the group and what questions do i not there's no way you're going to be able to get feedback on 80 agenda items but really deciding which ones are the important ones that you know the group wants to really the groups want to give feedback on is super important And then we get to Article 3, last paragraph, which has become more and more important in the last couple of years. But no change in Article 12 of the Charter, this document, or in the 12 Traditions of AA or in The Twelve Steps of AA may be made without less than the written consent of three-quarters of the AA groups as described in the resolution adopted by the 1955 conference and convention. And then it says footnote two, which if you go to the end and it says this applies to the original English version only. Here's the problem with this little article. if you go to the resolution which is right after the charter in your book resolution authorizing the general service conference the problem with that resolution i'm not going to try to read the whole page but if you're following me there's a couple of bold it says as and it is understood okay hopefully everyone sees that and it is understood and it says that neither the 12 traditions of alcoholics anonymous nor the warranties of article 12 of the conference charter shall ever be changed or amended by the general service conference except by first asking the consent of the registered aa groups of the world not of the u.s and canada of the world and then it says this would include all a groups known to the general service offices around the world not general service office i only point that out because there is currently no process to implement article 3 there is we have a process for everything at gso i don't know if you're new to service and you don't this let me let you know this every committee has procedures nominating procedure number 14 nominating procedural number 12 we if there's one thing we're good at is procedures and guidelines And one thing we don't have a procedure for is what about if Article 3 was put into effect? The closest we've come is the suggested change to the 11th tradition about 12 years ago. That did not leave committee at our conference. But imagine it had left committee. Imagine the conference PI committee said, you know what? Let's change Tradition 11. We like that idea. And imagine the conference decided, let's change Conference 11. Where would we go from there? We don't keep track of all the groups in all the countries. would we have to let every board in every country get in touch with their groups or would we restrict it to just u.s and canada even though the resolution says around the world i'm so bothered by this and you know another a former or a past trustee at large u.S. had helped me with this i voted against i'm just being honest i was not for changing the tradition only because this trustee at lodge had passed trustee lodged and convinced me that it would be a disaster without a process in place to actually do it and so i'm hopeful someday that maybe this is something we're going to have to tackle article four conference relation to the general service board and its corporate services the conference will replace the founders of Alcoholics Anonymous who formerly functioned as guides and advisors to the General Service Board and its related service corporations the conference is supposed to be diverse and wide opinion it's not supposed to all think the same way um a quorum shall exist of three two-thirds of all conference members registered so 93 delegates 135. two- thirds of 135 or we can't do business here's where we talked about advised reactions article four it will be understood that as a matter of tradition that a two-thirds vote of the conference members voting shall be considered binding upon the general service board and its related service corporations provided the total vote constitutes at least a quorum so at the general service conference when two-thirds of the body approve a recommendation either from a committee or a floor action it is binding on the trustees they have to carry it out but then there's a little safety measure here but no such vote ought to impair the legal rights of the general services board and the service corporations, and here's where it's so important to understand. What is the conference not allowed to do? It's not allowed to impair the legal rights of the General Service Board to conduct routine business and make ordinary contracts. That's the job of the trustees. Routine business and ordinary business and ordinary contracts. But the General Service Conference, and we'll get into it in some of the concepts, can give advisory actions even on legal issues if they're not routine business and contracts. The General Service conference is supreme. It then goes on further to give some more safety it is further understood that regardless of the legal prerogatives of the general service board as a matter of tradition that a three-quarters vote of all conference members participating in the vote may bring about a reorganization of the general service board and the directors and staff members of its corporate services if or when such reorganization is deemed essential so the conference really does have a lot of authority there now when we get to concept four we're also going to talk about there is some guidance in concept 4 about when trustees and directors should not vote at the conference and we'll get into that when we talk about conference four uh concept four but here it is just saying that a three-quarters vote of the conference members regardless of the legal rights the trustees have is binding this is why russia split into two by the way a little real life history lesson um the legal rights of the trustees like the legal rites of our trustees the trustees are the ones who legally elect each other or their people who follow in their footsteps spiritually the conference this year will elect the new trustee at large right spiritually but legally the board has to do it after the conference at the board meeting because the conference is not a legal body this is saying regardless of the legal power of the board the conference should be able to remove or reorganize people In Russia, a few trustees decided not to rotate when it was their time to rotate. And legally, they did not follow the conference's wishes. They took a legal vote and they voted themselves as trustees again. This is why they split. And this is actually why the U.S. AWS board gave the license to the new general service structure, because those old trustees did not follow the spiritual vote of their conference. They used their legal authority to keep themselves in place. When we get to concept seven and eight, we'll try to take the proper time to talk about all of that stuff. um article 5 talks about area assemblies assemblies designated as area assembles that composed are composed of the area elected general service representatives of all a groups desiring to participate district committee members and area committee members in each of the delegate areas in the united states someone just called me the other day can you be a registered group without a GSR? Of course you can. Would I suggest it? No. But is there a rule you have to have a GSAR to be official? Absolutely not. It says it right here, all AA groups desiring to participate. It say generally speaking each delegate area will be entitled to one assembly but areas of large AA populations or whose geography presents communication problems will be entitled to additional assemblies as provided by the service manual or by any further amendment there too um so we still have a lot of one state one delegate states in canada we have two regions east and west anyone seen the size of ontario lately it starts above new york and you can drive out minneapolis into ontario okay uh we have some two state delegates three state delegates we have a four we have one five it's usually dependent upon aa population or serious geographic concerns like area 92 is eastern washington We're now going back to the 80s before Zoom, before fax machines or right around the invention of fax machines. They could not hold assemblies in the winter because there was only one way to get through the mountains. So depending on what part of the state it was on, half of the state couldn't go. That's Area 92 now. Area 93 was split from Area 5. That was Los Angeles. Actually, the U.S. trustee at large currently, Marina, made the floor action because it didn't come out of committee. But that was because there were so many thousands of groups in that section of los angeles it was impossible for one person to be the delegate and to serve all those groups and a little trivia one of the biggest concerns of areas believe it or not back in the day yes i know there's people who are like in my age group here and some older and some a little younger but But if you grew up when I grew up, your mother did not like long distance phone calls. OK, like you do not make long distance foam calls from this phone. And in my house, they didn't even like if you called like three prefixes over like in the county, like it wasn't even a long distance call is called like a unit call. um a lot of the original service map was created by the old area codes in the united states and canada so that areas wouldn't have hard really high expenses having to make long distance calls inside their area if you look at some old areas before we messed with them recently in the last 30 years, you look at like, you look at Northern Jersey, you look at Philadelphia, you look at some other parts of the country and you can see the old original area codes and those were the same as our area maps. Article six says the purpose of an assembly is to convene every year for the two years of the election of area committee members from which are elected delegates to the General Service Conference. Such area assemblies are concerned only with World Service Affairs of Alcoholics Anonymous, so let's talk about that a little bit, because many areas now have six assemblies a year, four assemblies per year. The assembly they're talking about here is the election assembly, and it's concerned with the World Service Affairs of Alcoholic Anonymous. There are many general service areas that don't have intergroups in their area, in their geography they provide the local services or a district does they don't have an answering service at a group they don t have a literature bookstore so what we're talking about here is the area assemblies to elect the delegate article 7 says whenever practical committee members are elected by written ballot without personal nomination so everybody always asks me that because i talk about it all the time nominations are not good in alcoholics anonymous and this is where it comes from without personal nomination because we ask who's willing and available and qualified to stand we don't want it looking like billy edin supports this person or somebody else i won't pick on any names in the of who i know that's on tonight but we don'T HAVE TO HAVE LIKE PERSONAL WE DON'T HAVE POLITICAL ENDORSEMENTS YOU STAND ON YOUR OWN QUALIFICATIONS AND THAT'S WHERE IT COMES FROM ARTICLE 7 article 8 talks about terms for general service representatives unless otherwise directed by the conference these terms of office shall all be concurrent and of the two years duration each in approximately half the areas assembly elections will behave be held in the even years the remaining assemblies will behave held in the odd years that's recreating rotating panels of the conference so if you're new to aa service let's talk about this complicated language number one we have decided that we are going to be the kings and queens of uh well listen we love abbreviations we love acronyms oh my god are we like in love with acronyms. We throw them out of our language and no one knows, no new people know what we're talking about. Some areas actually publish an unofficial list called alphabet soup of all of our acronymes but all of us could do better and honor the new people in service if we maybe stayed away from acronyps. it would be better one of the reasons that i bring this up is because panel numbers oh my god another confusing thing in our language so i was a delegate in 1999 and 2000. that makes me a panel 49 delegate so when you think about that going back to the first conference in 1951 what does that mean only half of the delegates were there. That is true. Only panel one delegates attended the first conference. The second general service conference in 1952 was made up of panel one delegate and panel two delegates. So if you're new to service when it comes to area delegates they're split in half about 45 each first year delegates and second year delegates now let me get rid of another urban myth if your area was a panel one area you are not special i'm sorry to give you those news i'm sorry to break that to anybody um it was done in alphabetical order by state no special thing there it's just that only panel one could go to the first conference because panel two started at the second conference that's all that means area numbers didn't appear until the 80s there were no numbers in the beginning It was just an alphabetical list. I would suggest, based on what I just read, that GSRs start at the same time as your delegate. That's the best practice. Does that mean that's a rule? No. But that is the best practise. One of the reasons it's good... Let's say you're a new GSR. and you started this january and let's say your delegate started this january that means you're going to elect the next delegate that means that you're not going to be elected that means you have two years to interact with all the district chairs the alternate delegate all the area officers and become informed in how you should vote in two years on who should be the next delegate and who should be the next alternate delegate. That's why having the panel start at the same time is super important inside the areas. Okay, Article 9, the General Service Conference meetings. The conference will meet yearly in the City of New York unless otherwise agreed upon. Special meetings may be called should there be a grave emergency. The Conference may also render advisory opinions at anytime by mail or telephone poll in aid of the general service board or its related services obviously we know that this will be updated when the new conference whatever the conference charter is updated again because you would think we would add the internet in there but um it does say the conference is in New York City every year not the state of New York not the New York City area not driving distance to New York but it says the city of New York unless otherwise agreed upon it has been otherwise agreed upon to be held in other places a couple of times most often that is meant Westchester either the Marriott and Tarrytown or the Hilton right outside trying to think, I'm forgetting the name the city that that but it has been but only when the conference agrees that it can be held outside the city of new york article 10 the general service board composition jurisdiction and responsibilities the general services board of alcoholics anonymous shall be an incorporated trusteeship composed of alcoholic non-alcoholics who elect their own successors these choices being subject however to the approval of the conference or a committee thereof candidates for alcoholic regional trustee or however first selected by the areas in that region then at the general service conference voters consisting so i'm going to get really into that when we get into a later concept but this is talking about the makeup of the general service board it goes on to say the general service board is the chief service arm of the conference and is existentially custodial in its character circle that word custodian because we're going to come back to it big time in concept eight and big time and concept six and then it gives a little warning in the next paragraph accepting for decisions upon matters of policy finance or a tradition liable seriously affect aa as a whole so i want to say that again accepting decisions upon matters of policy finance a tradition with the capital t meaning the 12 traditions liable to seriously affect aa's a whole the general service board has entire freedom of action in the routine conduct of the policy and business affairs of AA service corporations and may name suitable committees and directors to its subsidiary corporate service entities. We will really go into that in concepts six and eight. Show me an argument in Alcoholics Anonymous service, show me an us and them and I'll show you a little battle between concepts six and eight like what is the responsibility of the conference and what's the responsibility of the board and it's like a pendulum in AA sometimes the pendulum swings all the way this way and the conference is micromanaging the board and the board pushes back sometimes the pendulum goes all the way this way and the board starts doing things they're not supposed to be doing making decisions on policy finance and a tradition and then conference gets really upset it's really this kind of tug-of-war pendulum that keeps us safe it's what keeps us safe um it goes on to say uh well i already read it but i'm going to read it again the general service board has entire freedom of action in the routine conduct of the policy and business affairs the general surface conference does not decide what new furniture we need it does not decide what medical insurance our employees need it does not sign our tax returns it does not decide what time our employees start work and end work those are all routine business items next it says the general service board is primarily responsible for the financial and policy integrity of its subsidiary services, AA World Services and AA Grapevine. If you're new to service as we go through the concepts and the traditions, but especially the concepts, you're going to hear over and over again, AA World Service, AA World services and AA grapevine. That's where 90% of the business gets transacted. AA World Serivices and AA Grapeline. They are affiliate corporations of the trustees. The General Service Board does not own those corporations. They're independent corporations with common ownership. So legally, and if you want to write this down, write it down, and we'll get to it in Concept 7. We have three companies. the general service board of alcoholics anonymous inc the aa grapevine inc aa world services inc those three corporations companies have the same owners the 21 trustees they're membership corporations so when you say who owns a world services it's not the general service board that's the spiritual owner the legal owner is the 21 members those individual trustees same with the general service board same with aa grapevine now how does the general service board then keep control of these other companies well at least four of the board members for aa world services and aa grapevine have to be trustees can be more than four but it can't be under four it's usually two regional trustees and two general service trustees on the AA World Services Board. On the Grapevine board, it's usually two regional trustees, two general services trustees, and a Class A. But then the general service board, the trustees get to elect the directors. Who are the non-trustee directors? Well, they're elected. I was a non-trustee director before I was a trustee. I was on the AA World Services Board for four years. I was not a trusty. I Was not a member of the General Service Board. I wasn't an owner of the three corporations. I was a director put on the AWS board to carry out the management and oversight responsibilities of that board of directors. It gets very complicated, the spiritual versus the legal. There's some people here who are brand to service and some people here who know more than i know so i'll try to stay in the middle um but when we get to concept 678 we're going to talk a lot about it um it makes it very clear here the charters and bylaws of the general service board so remember that the bylaws with the general services board Any amendments thereto should always be subject to the approval of the General Service Conference by a two-thirds vote, so the General Services Board cannot change its own bylaws without the conference approving it. approving it. It then goes on to say, except in great emergency, neither the General Service Board nor any of its related services ought to take any action liable to greatly affect AA as a whole without first consulting the conference. It is nevertheless understood that the board shall at all times reserve the right to decide which of its actions or decisions may require the approval of the conference. And that's where we get into some debates. Article 11, the General Service Conference, its general procedures. The conference will hear the financial and policy reports of the General Services Board and its related corporate services. The conferences will advise with the trustees, directors, and staff members upon all matters presented as affecting AA as a whole, engage in debate, appoint necessary committees, and pass suitable resolutions for the advice and direction of the General Service Board and its related services. The conference may also discuss and recommend appropriate action respecting serious deviations from AA tradition or harmful misuse of the name Alcoholics Anonymous. this is not just like old stuff from 50 years ago some of you might know from a couple years ago that it was coming up at the conference from both delegates and trustees who were very bothered that someone else owned the website alcoholicsanonymous.com and you probably know in the last year that we now own that website address thank god if you go to alcoholics anonymous.com it takes you to aa.org A year ago, or last July, it took you to a treatment center platform to refer you to a treatment centre. A lot of delegates thought that was a serious deviation for the Alcoholics Anonymous name. It says the conference at the close of each yearly session will draft a full report of its proceeding to be supplied to all delegates. your area delegate will get a bunch of hard copies they get to order as many as they want and want to pay for in french and spanish but it's 2025. we also now have an anonymous digital version that goes up and gets distributed which is amazing now we've had that now for almost 10 years um article 12. i am not going to read why because it's the same as concept 12 and we might actually need an extra week for that but know this article 12 is the same is concept 12. and is so important that from the start the only two things that needed approval of 75% of the AA groups were the traditions and Article 12. Not even the steps. In the beginning, the steps could have been changed by the General Service Conference. That has since been amended and the steps are protected as I read tonight. But in the beginning it was the traditions and Article12. Article12 for anyone new to service you might hear another word we love to throw out, the warranties. Right? The warranties, the six warranties of the General Service Conference are contained in Article 12 of the conference charter, which is obviously the same as Concept 12. And we will go through them each individually. I'll throw out a little suggestion here for people just so you have it um if you're doing a concepts workshop this is one of those things that doesn't make sense a lot of times when we do concept workshops let's say we have four speakers right If we give them each three concepts. If we have three speakers, we give them four concepts. Do not do that. I've had to learn the hard way. Concept 12 is equal to three or four concepts, like break concepts 1 through 11 up between three people and give one person Concept 12. The six warranties are that important, and you cannot give them justice if you're also doing Concepts 10 and 11. It's almost impossible. I don't care how good you are at the concepts. That's how critical Article 12 of the Conference Charter is, Concept 12. So let me just read a couple of things. The new book on Father Ed Dowling is called Father Ed, the Story of Bill W.'s Spiritual Sponsor. This is not an AA group or an AA meeting. This ist just a workshop, a gathering. It's by Dawn Eden. It''s an awesome, awesome book i'm just telling you uh if you want to know why bill w realized that he needed to get rid of him being the final answer in aa so much great history is in that book about alcoholics anonymous so with that if anybody wants to leave they can leave next week we will do tradition one and concept one but i am going to oh thanks somebody who told me uh rye is the other city that the General Service Conference has been in. The Hilton in Rye. And if you want to know a great funny story about the Hilton and Rye, some of you who maybe grew up in New York, Connecticut, Long Island, will know that there is a concert venue right in RYE. I'm forgetting its name now. But we've all been to disastrous concerts there probably back in the day. well what was always funny is whenever we would be in rye it was always timed at the same time as like the grateful dead or phil lesh or somebody else and that whole hotel would be like one big weed party and we wouldbe there for the weekend it was just incredibly funny um all the trust fund deadheads would be at the hilton and rye along with the trustees but yes that is the other place rye so if anybody has any well first of all i'll say this if you have like a critical individual question that is really complicated i'm gonna put my email out there so you have it now if you have a question you want to ask tonight send it in by chat and we'll take a couple of minutes and answer and and i'll all you have to do is send it in by as you can tell we've become very good at this we don't have zoom bombers we don we just have become uh very good so let me see article 9 says conference may also render advisory opinions what exactly is an advisory opinion and how are they handled that's a really good question really old language but it could be like an additional consideration i would suggest the person who asked you probably have heard about the manuscript litigation of 2017. if you go back to the 2018 conference report the conference committee on trustees gave an additional consideration that is basically like an advisory opinion it's basically telling them hey if this happens again in the future you might want to do this without making an advisory action and there are certain additional considerations you can read that are very much like that how many groups is too many groups for an area that may constitute splitting and adding a new area well i'm definitely not the arbiter of this but i'll throw out a couple of things i think you should consider do i think that we have enough areas i'm not that arrogant to say that i've not lived in all 93 areas i mean maybe there is an area that needs to be split but remember like a group you'll have half the money double the delegates double the alternate delegates double the area chairs two new places to meet instead of one so i'm just throwing it out there that you know can you be financially self-supporting um billy did you say the conference is held in new york than somewhere else in the world service i said the world's service meeting not the general service conference the general service conference has always held the new yorg city unless agreed to by the conference the world service meeting is held every two years and every four years it's in new york the other two years it rotates to another place around the world it's been in poland it's been in ireland it's has been in south africa it's been in peru um so the world service meeting has every two years and every other world service meeting is in new york the general service conference is in the city of new yark unless agreed by the conference to be someplace else that someplace else has always been new yorg state that goes back to old rules because we always have a board meeting after the conference and our annual board meeting needs to be in the state of new York because we're a New York corporation now those rules have obviously change with the pandemic and everything else and things have become easier to do but a lot of those rules were created um around where we were incorporated let's see has anyone made a motion to create an online area for all online groups in the usa al-anon has successfully created an online area they have some areas have created online districts some other structures like australia have created an online area our structure the united states and canada does not have an online area it has been discussion the last couple of years the trustees had a ad hoc committee looking at it it is not currently anywhere on the conference agenda unless it comes out in the next week that it appears again but for the person who asked that question it's the kind of thing that should go from a group to your district to the area and to get it in before september 15th because that's the deadline for next year's 2026 conference um it doesn't matter what i think about an online area or not an online arena but if you think it's a good idea you should take advantage of the conference charter and submit an agenda item let's see author of the book about father ed sorry i missed it that is perfectly okay it's dawn eden e-d-e-n i am not affiliated with dawn i am NOT endorsing dawn i am just saying that i happen to enjoy reading the book i would ask that everyone read tradition one and concept one before next week if you haven't um Um, be prepared to ask a lot of questions. If you want to bring the traditions checklist, bring it. Um, everyone knows I'm not the biggest fan of that checklist because some of the questions don't seem to line up with the traditions, but whatever. Um, I would also suggest that you be familiar with the long form of the tradition, not only the short form, but read the narrative if you can. And I'm also going to go on off the deep end for those that are like an AA service geek to the 110th power. Let me just talk to you right now. There is a section in AA Comes of Age that goes through all the traditions. I love that section of AA Comes Of Age. The original tradition essays are on the AA Grapevine digital archive they're also in language of the heart they're not exactly what's in um the 12 and 12. they're a little bit more direct but so the traditions illustrated aa comes of age not the whole book but the section on the traditions the AA group pamphlet is great and the essays I would just highly suggest all of that because I'm going to refer to all of those next week and that's it, I'm sorry we went over tonight but we had the conference charter, we knew that it would be difficult again if you need something please send an email, but I'm going to give myself the same freedom I gave your delegate, which is don't expect me to write you back tonight. It's probably not going to happen and I'm traveling on business tomorrow, but it will go in a folder where you will be in order and yours will get answered in order if you have something that's just driving you crazy um but also don't be disappointed that i'm not a big fan of giving answers to emails it's kind of like leading the horse to water i would much rather tell you where to go find that answer in what literature it's it's a lot more productive uh later on so thanks everyone i will uh close with the serenity prayer god grant me the serendipity to accept the things i cannot change the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference. Have a good night, everybody. Take care.