Money and Authority – 2025 AA Service Workshop – Part 16 of 27 – Billy N.

Good evening, everyone. I'm Billy. I am an alcoholic. Welcome Monday night after the General Service Conference. Hopefully all the delegates are getting some rest and had a good week. Few reminders, we'll go through Tradition 7 and Concept 7 tonight. When we get to questions, we're still going to stay away from any conference items. Now, unfortunately or fortunately, whatever, it's bad timing because we're going over Concept 7 tonight, which is the legal and the spiritual and where they meet. and apparently from two delegates that i talked to there was a floor action the center of the general service board that failed last week i do not know the details um so i will be talking about that topic in general not about what happened because i was not there so i can just talk about concept seven and you know the implications there um but again let's try to stay away from any conference topics um this is being recorded please keep your phone down away from the screen so it doesn't look like you're taking pictures of anyone in the meeting um a google drive will be posted in the chat that's an easy way to get the recordings they're also in the monday night service workshop private group if you email me and you want to get in that group or message me on facebook you can the recordings are usually posted by late monday night early thursday early tuesday at the latest so let's go to tradition seven the aa groups themselves ought to be fully self-supported by the voluntary contributions of their own members we think that each group should soon achieve this ideal that any publication any public solicitation of funds using the name of alcoholics anonymous is highly dangerous whether by groups hospitals clubs or other outside agencies that the acceptance of large gifts from any source or of contributions carrying any obligation whatever is unwise then too we view it much concern those aa treasuries which continue beyond prudent reserve to accumulate funds for no stated a purpose experience has often warned us that nothing can so surely destroy our spiritual heritage as futile disputes over money over property money and authority so we'll go through it slowly but from the start let's just say that alcoholics and alcoholics anonymous in general having no money is a problem and having too much money is a bigger problem so that makes us a weird organization uh right from the start um but it says right from the opening line the groups themselves ought to be fully self-supported by the voluntary contributions of their own members in there with a t-h-e-i-r not what a thr ere so does that mean that you can't take money from other aa members in your group of course not i'm not saying that at all what i am saying is any money from non-group members should be like gravy and i mean non-group aaa members we don't take outside contributions or donations i should call them from anybody and there is a big difference between contribution and donation the two words mean entirely different things when you make a donation you're giving it to some charity to do work that you don't do that you might not even be somehow attached to contribution you could contribute more than money you could you could contribute your time contribution has a much bigger definition the other thing is is that um i don't know about anyone else here but i had to file my taxes not too many weeks ago um on a year when it says that i owe i do not donate to the united states government to the internal revenue service they are not on my list of donors they're not a charity that i support i contribute because i'm a contributing member of society today i have a mortgage with a bank that bank is not on my list of charities either. I contribute because I pay my own way. Now, the animal shelter down the street, the homeless organization in my county, a couple of other things, those I donate to. I could even give you some AA examples. And the amount of money doesn't matter and so and just you all should know this but for a long time now even when i only gave like when electronic banking first started i think i first started with like maybe two dollars a paycheck or three dollars a month or whatever but i sent money to the new york in a group office i contribute i contribute to the chicago area service office every month i lived there for a long time and served as a delegate there um i contribute to the deaf intergroup in texas now i also every month have been sending money to dr bob's house and stepping stones but i donate to them i do not contribute to them they are not aa entities those are great purposes i believe great organizations with a great mission but they're not aa so i donate to them now i believe that this is one thing where the pandemic and electronic contributions have helped us it's kind of easy to just send once or twice a month with an electronic contribution to your home group um we of course have this challenge of a dollar in the basket has become like standard for many years and so people repeat what they see you know do you think i have never seen in any aa parking lot okay i'm just gonna tell you maybe there is one out there. And if there's one out there, I'd love someone to text me a picture. But I have never seen in even a clubhouse parking lot any sign that says you may use your car keys to save a seat once you're inside and then go outside and vape and smoke or BS, whatever you want to do. I've never seen that sign. But yet somehow everybody knows that keys are a magic sign to save someone's seat. Although I believe saving seats is killing people, but I'm okay, I guess it's saving your own seat, saving a whole row a little bit too much. But my example is newcomers learn by what they see and what they hear. So while there's no sign in the parking lot, it doesn't take long in AA to realize, oh wow, all the people that are outside vaping, they all have their car keys on the chairs. You learn that once because you're outside doing whatever and you don't have a seat when you go in where you want to sit. And then you're like, wow, well, these other people had a seat. And what's it take? Maybe two or three weeks to catch on. And you're like oh I save seats at my keys same with a newcomer seeing what you put in the basket now I'm not saying anyone should judge what anyone puts in a basket but if all you see repetitively is people putting money in the basket it's gonna teach a lesson now I believe the tradition says we support our home groups more than we support other meetings we attend that's what it says to me that my first responsibility is my home group and it suggests that I have one home group so that's the one that I support do I put money in other baskets yes but that's kind of like being a good guest that's kind of like helping doing dishes it's kind of like my dad or my mom bringing a gift to the house we're going to visit like it's just being a decent person it's the home group members who are responsible and you know there's a couple of things i would suggest people do and that is number one if you haven't done it in a long time for a month track what a baskets whether virtual or in person you're putting money in for a month and track how much and what basket it's going in it doesn't matter the amount even if it's zero but at the end of the month add up how much money you put in aa baskets total and then add up how much went into your home group and how much Went to other meetings you happen to attend and take a look at that and see if it works out for you. It's not for me to tell you what it should look like, but I know when I first did it, it didn't work out for me. I know When I miss my home group now when I go back I throw extra money in because it's not based on how many times i attend my home group if i'm traveling on business or something it's based on that i'm a member and i should pay my fair share every month and every year um not taking outside money has kept aa out of so much trouble and there's a couple of the lines in here that are really important it says i love this uh then too we should view with much concern aa treasuries which continue beyond prudence or reserve to accumulate funds for no stated a purpose like is all the money that you have in your group's bank account for a stated a a purpose as your group figured out what your prudent reserves should be the general service board has nine to 12 months the general service board has a plan if the general service board we call it they call it the reserve fund it's a prudent reserve though if it goes over 12 months for longer than a year the finance committee has to come up with a plan to lower it that has happened in the past if you look specifically at years 2002 and 2003 for aa world services you will see that they lost money both those years and that was a plan to lose money because the reserve fund was over the reserve fun was so over in 2002 and 2003 that that's when the fourth edition big book came out and the fourth edition first printing was a dollar cheaper retail than the last printing of the third edition like that's how serious we take not being having too much money i posted in the monday night private facebook group a great article written by gary glenn i use his last name because he was a class a trustee he served as the treasurer of the general service board and then the chair of the General Service Board he gave a presentation in the mid-90s about spiritual poverty and it's one of the best that I've ever seen or ever heard so this whole money thing and you know recently I received the question and your group has to decide what expenses make you self-supporting. I would strongly suggest that funding your GSR to be a fully participating GSR is just as important as the rent, just as importan if you pay insurance, just as important of any other bill. That whoever serves as GSR it should not matter what their economic condition is it should just matter can they carry out the duties in my particular area it costs us about 1500 a month a year to have a gsr that's four quarterly weekends one or two nights in a hotel each weekend meals for the weekend and usually a couple hundred miles there and back of gas money um so it winds up costing us four or five hundred you know for each quarterly assembly um a trend has developed and anyone who knows me knows that i can't stand it but someone asked me a good question lately about why i can stand it or comparing it to the general service conference so the question was there are a lot of districts and groups that have started using group contributions to help groups who can't afford to have a gsr send their gsR to an assembly and i think that goes against the traditions obviously a group is not self-supporting now what has been brought up to me which is a valid point is that well the general service conference tells each area what the total cost is about nine grand give or take a couple hundred dollars per delegate her voting member they send a minimum out for each area many areas send the minimum out it's whatever two or three thousand dollars whatever it is now but any area that doesn't even send the minimum still gets to go and so aren't other areas funding that well maybe but their groups are giving money to the general service board that's number one but number two is this the general services conference at least has a check and balance on how out of hand it could get with delegates there's 93 delegates right now up until 1999 2000 they were 92. up until 1990 there was 91 we split washington into eastern washington and western washington And we split Area 5 about 10 years later, which was one of the Los Angeles areas, into Area 5 and Area 93. But that had to happen with the approval of the General Service Conference. The General Service conference gets to decide if another area can be created. So they have at least a way to cap the expense. There is no check and balance on new groups, as we all know. In fact, the fact that we have no check and balance has kind of led us to this overpopulation of everyone starting groups and meetings. And the area has no control over that, nor does the district. The new delegate is alerted. I mean, the current delegate is asserted that a new group has started but they don't get aren't given any powers of investigation they can check when the group meets is the day right is the time right is it an a group but there's no meeting purification committee there's not meeting quota committee no dcm or district chair can come in and say you know what we already have six groups in in that zip code. We don't need a seventh, we don't have that control. So funding other groups who can't pay for their GSR, I would say this, what is the difference between that and your group paying another group's rent? What's the difference? There's really no difference. it's a valid cost that the group has to pay so we definitely see that out there um we don't we there's another line in the long form that i love and this sometimes hurts people's feelings so i'd apologize ahead of time if anyone here is in this position but it says um let's see that acceptance of large gifts from any source or of contributions carrying any obligation is unwise so i'll take the second part first obligations you can't send a check to the general service board and say i want this to be for corrections or i want this to be for treatment. We don't take earmarked funds. Now, a lot of areas or districts might have what we call some people call a pink can for corrections literature. But there's a high responsibility on nonprofits that take segregated money. Sometimes in AA, we think the rules don't apply to us, but they do. If somebody gives you money to do a certain task and you accept it, you've made a promise to them. Now, if you're a group and not a legal entity, not a big deal, but if you are a 501c3, it is a big thing. It's a big deal. Many universities have been given money by families and forgot to use the money for what it was given for and have had to return the money like a family gave the money to build a science building and instead the university built a music building and six years later the family figured it out no that money has to come back that's why the general service board does not take earmarked funds just all goes in the general fund and no obligations that's Why We Don't Take A Lot of money 7500s the max we take right now i don't know what the conference decided last week but going into last week's conference it was 7500 a year any individual can send that so that when you get off the elevator at the general service office which i know a bunch of you have been to and anyone who hasn't i hope that you get there but what you do see when you go to the elevator get off the elevator, is the serenity prayer in a lot of different languages on the wall. That's what you see, thank God. What you don't see is what you see in a ton of non-profit buildings. Someone's name, like that they're a platinum or gold donor and they gave this much money. We don't do any of that nonsense. we do not give credit to individuals and we never want to be dependent on only the rich it makes a very different and when i say a other 12-step fellowships have followed us but we were the first so it makes us very different than other people or other organizations the other thing it says and this is the one where i don't want to hurt anyone's feelings but i'm just going to tell you what it says um uh large gifts from any source this is covered in the a group pamphlet in the section on the treasurer so what does this mean this means if you own a pizza parlor you don't get to give 20 pies for the group anniversary night unless you're getting paid that's it this means if you own a deli or a bakery we don't need any newcomer thinking that you have some special status because you give a lot and it comes right out of the tradition that's what it says the other thing i want to talk about the seventh tradition especially because a a lot of people in service, is let's just say you're the corrections chair. The corrections chair needs a budget, whether you're at a district or an area. The way that most area or district treasurers figure out the budget for next year is they look at what we spent this year and the year before. And they come up with an average, and maybe they add to a 3% for inflation, whatever they do. And they say, this is the budget for next year. But let's say you happen to be a corrections chair who took over for a corrections share who might be wealthy. And they didn't hand in any receipts for anything. And they don't hand it any mileage reimbursement. so what does that do to the treasurer it messes up their numbers planning for the next year it is as much a violation of the seventh tradition to not help the area or district be fully self-supporting as it is to put no money in the basket if you are one of those people who are lucky enough to be in that situation And there are people that feel it. You know what? AA's giving me this life. I don't need a hand in a receipt for $4. But here's the deal. That's kind of an arrogant way to look at it. Because the person next year, $4 might be $4 million to them. That might be the difference between them being able to do service and not do service. So if you're one of the lucky people in that situation. And in your receipts, get paid, cash the check and throw it in an AA basket if you don't need it. It's very simple. That way the books stay good. Thatway you feel in your own mind like you're not taking money from AA because you've been taken care of by AA and your life is good that that keeps everything level because it is super important that aa membership and doing service never depend on money or conformity as the first tradition state it's super important that everybody gets an equal chance to serve and to do service. The other thing I want to say about the seventh tradition, groups have a lot of leeway here. I just want to grab my book. Hold on. I'm not here to be the arbiter about what your group does with this money. A lot of times we only talk about putting money in the basket for the seventh tradition we forget to talk about the real responsibility of taking money out of the basket and spending it there is definitely a spiritual agreement when you are spending aa money now i believe in truth in advertising if a basket goes around i believe the money i'm putting in a basket is for an aa purpose if a group has a group anniversary or something else maybe they should pass a separate basket for that and let people know that that money is not going to help carry the message it's going to have a big picnic or if you do just put it all in one basket announce that as part of your tradition. Baskets are going around. We pay all our group expenses, and we also pay for our group anniversary out of that basket. But let people know. How you spend your group money is really your group's business. I will say this. Whenever there's a place where money and affiliation kind of cross with each other and i'll give you an example where you meet could be a community center could be a temple could be church they come to you and say you know what we could really use you having a cleanup day of our parking lot once a month or how about you paint our fence or how about you clean out our gutters I would tell you that's a slippery slope to go down the best response for that is how about we just pay a fair rent and you pay somebody to do that that's the much better response I also want to say that when i say that i want to clarify something because god knows i say anything and it gets taken out of context and by the time it gets back to me i'm like i need to listen to that recording either i said that coming out of a bar like 40 years ago or i don't remember saying that like let's talk about a person who might be the janitor at the church or might be the caretaker of the property where you meet if that person gets paid by the church or whoever is also very good to your group and your group decides to give them an extra 20 or 40 bucks around holiday time that is none of my business that's your business um and if your group thinks that's the right thing to do i i can't find anything in the literature that would say don't do that um i think in relation to its own affairs as tradition four says your own affairs are where you meet but when it comes to painting and putting roofs on and all this other stuff it's much better to just pay a fair rent now some people say we meet in a building and they don't want to charge us any rent and some people, say oh that's not self-supporting. Not necessarily. The question you need to ask then is what do they charge other groups? If they let other community groups meet there for free then aa is not getting anything for free that anyone else doesn't get for free if they offer you a discount you need to make sure that everyone gets the discount not just aa there's a real place here to be common sense and practical and not like drawer rigid lines um but if they let the american red cross and the local first aid company and the Girl Scouts meet there for free and they don't want to take your money, well then I don't see anything wrong with it. However, if you're getting something just because you're Alcoholics Anonymous, that's a problem. And that's what the General Service Board uses. I'm sure there's a lot of people here who have been to a lot AA conventions. There's probably some people here who've been on the committee of AA conventions The going rate in America is basically for every 50 or 40 rooms you rent, you get one comp night. Not because you're AA, because every organization does that. It's simple business. We don't just give them money away because we're AA. We have to cut the best deal for Alcoholics Anonymous and our members. We just don't take special deals because we are AA. um let me just see if there are any questions so far when others especially newcomers don't see you putting money in the basket because you used an electronic method to make your contribution how do we let them know that we are doing and then who wrote the spiritual poverty piece gary glenn wrote the spirituality piece so that's a great question and i've thought about this a lot of groups that send around baskets now will have inside the basket a laminated piece of paper with a qr code on it so that people even right there could go to their phone and send venmo or cash app or paypal or whatever you use i would also suggest that when you pass the basket you make an announcement. A lot of group members give to the group via electronic method so that people know that. That's what I would say. What drives me crazy is another GSO produced film of a meeting that shows someone putting a dollar in a basket, right? I mean, that drives me crazy it drove me crazy when i was a trustee like and they key in the camera right on the basket when the person putting a dollar in um i'll say this too and i'll just throw this out there for most people when they come into alcoholics anonymous they're not coming on a winning streak in a lot of parts of their life. Emotional, financial, mental, family, domestic, marriage, God knows. All of them, a few of them. Very few people here come here on awinning streak. So there's a good chance that when you came here, putting a quarter in might have been a lot some days putting a dollar in might have been a lot and i hate that saying we need you more than your money no no we need both that's how we observe the seventh tradition we just don't need your money if you don't have any but if you have money we need it and i would say this if you've been lucky enough to stay sober a couple of years five years 10 years 20 years you might want to compare what you're putting in the basket now to what you put in a basket when you first came in your first year or two you might wanna take a hard look at what your income was when you first got here compared to now and does your seventh tradition contribution to your home group really equal that so i know that doesn't sound great for most people but we all come to that reckoning someday what are your thoughts on 50 50 raffles and intergroups holding raffles at Alcathons or soliciting prizes for their golf tournaments. God. All right, let's go down the list here as best I can. Number one, if all you're doing is raffling off AA literature, good for you. Have at it. If all you'RE doing is rattling off grapevine subscriptions, that's awesome. i even love i've seen some conventions and conferences now that are going away from speaker gifts and instead giving a subscription of the grapevine which i think is awesome um now if you're funding your aa event with a 50 50 raffle if you read the aa guidelines on conventions and conferences it really doesn't go together with the seventh tradition like if someone like me can buy like twenty dollars worth of raffles you could have made my registration to a three dollars more like that's how we remain self-supporting now two other things about raffles that cause trouble in aa number one let's go back to where not above the law. In most states, counties and cities, you need a permit or a license to hold a cash raffle. That's just the law in a lot of places, depending upon the amount of money that's going to be in that 50-50. The other thing is these kind of silent auction type raffles. um first of all even if they're coming from an aa member that seems like a large gift to me talked about in the long form and in the a group pamphlet like if someone owns a tv store they don't get to give a tv to say raffle this off that's a large contribution we'll it's so funny we will do anything except put money in a basket or pay an adequate registration price we'll buy the 50 50 we'll by the silent auction for the 70 inch flat screen we'll do all of that stuff but we won't put money in the basket it's it's really absolutely incredible um um because it's the easier way and I would say that the traditions are not there to be easy they're there to make it more difficult and they're there to Make It More Difficult because we are difficult people because money property ego will all will run wild with it now I saw a question that comes in a lot um which is what about somebody who might have a problem with gambling well i would tell you that's an outside issue and i'm not being harsh on the compulsive gamblers but that would be like us going to an event and somebody couldn't serve alcohol like i'm aware of what it says in the gambler's anonymous literature okay um are we gonna stop serving sugar in our cake for out of respect to people from oa or food anonymous or that i mean i could go down the line um what we could best do is get rid of raffles and and just you know be self-supporting um but sometimes that sounds harsh and people don't want to it's just easier um let's see what is your opinion on district sponsoring gsr to go to the general service assembly i already answered this earlier um it's not self-supporting at all that group is not self supporting is your group is your district going to start paying the rent groups i don't think so in a local obituary the in the words in lieu of flowers donations can be sent to the local intergroup office who now claims contributions are up due to this setting aside donations versus contributions would this be valid as the intergroup would not be necessarily nope it is totally not valid totally goes against every tradition especially the seventh If AA members want to send a contribution in memory of a member who passed away, great. But an inner group or a district taking money from outside people? Not okay. I've seen this too. It's just a lack of understanding of the traditions. You know what it should say? Find a local clubhouse. In lieu of flowers, send a donation to the local club house. they're not aa they help aa aa meets there but intergroups and this other thing about would not necessarily be an aa group we got to get rid of this attachment to the words alcoholics anonymous that there's some official brand um i hate to tell you this there's no such thing as an official aa group there'sno good housekeeping seal of approval there's that number you get from gso the only thing it means is you say you're an aa group and because you say we want to communicate with you it does not mean you have our official blessing let's see a group in my district has been carrying the message into a seven-day detox they have been giving 300 a month in big books now they're asking the district for money does it go against the seventh tradition to slide supply big books to a treatment facility no but you have to be wise and practical and you got to make sure you're spending aa money wisely number one how do you decide which facility you're giving books to are you fair and equitable if you're giving books to a facility that gets paid 30 grand for each person there uh you're really going down the wrong road and wasting aa's money you know what's really much better creating a library for these places making up a stamp that says like provided by whatever in a group or district whatever and giving a place like that 30 big books so that they're there for the people to use. If somebody happens to take one, so be it. But you have to be very careful about how you're allotting that money. Now, if you're telling me there's a place where people go who have no money, who have nothing, and that place operates with hardly any funds, sure. but it should be a group conscience decision as to how you send books and where you send books it should not be any individual's decision um so let's see any other questions on the seventh tradition oh what are your thoughts when other people come from other groups saying they need support for their group both physically and financially um i say we have too many groups i say that if your group you know there's a reason people aren't going to your group you know listen i could speak for hours on the traditions but at the end of the day let's admit it the ultimate vote on the tradition is with your feet that's the ultimate vote are you going there or are you not going there and if people aren't going there why aren't they going there now if you're saying make an announcement that a group just started there's nothing wrong with that but if you'RE announcing you need other groups to support you I'm not so sure about that especially financially morally why wouldn't we want to support every AA group out there. But financially, it just makes no sense. Let's see. What about clubs having a membership fee? That's great. It's awesome. You know why? Because they're not AA. If they have a monthly fee or an annual fee, whatever, it's none of our business. I'm a member at the clubhouse that my home group meets at i've decided to be a member that has nothing to do with me putting money in the a group that i go to that meets there i've just decided to financially support that building because it supplies a place for a lot of groups to meet um but that has nothing to do i will tell you a couple of things that go wrong with clubs um when people make club announcements for membership inside an aa meeting is an aa related announcement that's not an aa related announcement or if the club is putting too many things financially related in the meeting area putting pressure on people to become group members that's probably not okay either but again we try to be practical um i want to go to this concept seven because i know we're behind a little um i'm gonna read it the conference rec uh first of all we start off with like a urban myth but the conference recognizes that the charter with a capital c and the bylaws of the general service board are legal instruments that the trustees are hereby fully empowered to manage and conduct all the world service affairs of alcoholics anonymous it is further understood that the conference charter itself is not a legal document that it relies instead upon the force of tradition and the power of the aa purse for its final effectiveness so let's get the confusing thing out of the way the charter word in the first sentence it says the conference recognizes that the charter and the bylaws of the general service board are legal instruments then it says later the conference charter itself is not a legal document so we're talking about two different charters the conference Charter is a spiritual document a spiritual handshake between the groups and the General Service Board of Trustees up here the conference recognizes that the charter and the bylaws the by-laws are actually in the service manual the by laws of the general service board the charter of the General Service Board is an old word which now we would call certificate of incorporation that's what the charter is that they're talking about there the certificate of incorporation to register the business with the state of New York to do business what does it do I will put the current certificate of incorporation into the private group this week. The last one was filed in like 2004 or 2005, but you can read our certificate of incorporation tells it what we do. It says in the first paragraph, on one hand, we see a board of trustees which is invested with complete legal power over AA funds and services while on the other hand we find that aaa's general service conference is clothed with such great traditional influence and financial power that if necessary it could overcome the legal right of the board of trustees it can therefore give the trustees directives and secure compliance with them practically speaking the legal side of our operation was created so that we could do business in the outside world that's why we have three corporations three non-profit corporations each corporation has couple of bank accounts. That's why we have an employee identification number so that we can pay our employees and open up bank accounts, that's why we have workers' compensation insurance because it's required by law. There are certain things we have to do to operate in the outside world. And this is where I may come in opposition to some current thinking, and if that is the case, so be it. I've already pled guilty. I was raised by the Jim Estelles and the Gary Glens and the Elaine McDowell's and the Art knights and the michael um alexander's michael alexandre was um uh bernard smith's law clerk that's his connection to aa he later became a chair of the general service board But I was raised to believe that the legal side of the AA structure was made to operate in the outside world, never to use it against the groups, never to use it against the conference it says here if someday the chips were really down there would be little chance of the stalemate the conference would find itself in complete control of the situation as the conscience of aa the delegates would find themselves in ultimate authority over our general service board and also its corporate arms of active world service meaning aaws and the grapevine now let me be very clear here there would be very little reason ever for the conference to use its ultimate authority to give directives to the board so forever whoever i'll joke around whatever trustee was assigned to listen to my recording this week to report back to the rest of the trustees what i said on monday night I just want you to hear that loud and clear. There would be very little need ever for the conference to ever give directives to the Board of Trustees. The Board of trustees needs great freedom to carry out their legal responsibilities. I've been a member of that board for four years. I've Been a member Of the AWS board for eight years i've been chair of the aws board twice and treasurer of the AWS board once we need to give our trusted servants the freedom to do their jobs so I am not here advocating complete anarchy or any kind of hostile takeovers at all but I am saying that the concepts are very clear that the conference is the spiritual boss that's our structure our legal structure is to do business in the world outside aa um that's why when i hear people say that if the conference ever wanted to censure the board it would be punitive no it wouldn't be first of all it's it's a spiritual censure how much power does that have right it's the conference as a body saying hey we don't like what you did there's nothing personally punitive about it we're not advertising it we're nicht hanging it on posters um but it does say at the end of concept seven and probably the one thing that i don't want to say is that i don' t like in the service in the concept i wish could be written better is it kind of compares the board of trustees veto over a conference action to a presidential veto the reason i don't like that example is because there's no such thing as an individual veto in alcoholics anonymous the chair of the general service board does not have veto authority scott spoke here a few weeks ago he does not have veto authority the whole board has veto authority if the general service board voted two-thirds or more to not listen to the conference that's kind of a group veto very different than a presidential veto but it talks about when should the board not listen to the conference. It says right at the end, three reasons. In a time of haste or heavy stress, the conference should take an action or issue a directive to the trustees in clear violation of its own charter or that of the General Service Board, or if the conference would have passed any measures so ill-considered or so reckless as to seriously injure in the judgment of the trustees aaa's public relations or aa as a whole then the trustees can say no we're not doing this it says although traditionally the trustees should never substantially exceed a conference approved budget without consulting the conference they should free feel entirely free to reduce the conference budget figure during any fiscal year even though such an action might curtail cancel special plans or projects initiated by the conference and number three if by reason of unforeseen conditions any particular planned project the directive of the conference should become impractical or unworkable during a fiscal year the trustees should without prejudice be able to use their right of veto and cancellation now what's the real history 75th general service conference just ended for 75 years the trustees have listened to the conference now the last one gives the trustees a lot of wiggle room and i don't mean that in a bad way it says if unforeseen conditions but what they do is don't usually they don't veto it if the conference tells the trustees to do something if during the year in july and october at the board weekends the trustees committee that's working on it realizes wait a minute this might not work there's some unintended consequences they bring a report back to the conference committee next year and they give an update and say this is where we are we haven't gone any further because we need your input um and i just want to stress a line going back to the spiritual versus the legal it's on the bottom of page 22 and it says this just as the conference should avoid the overuse of its traditional authority which i've already talked about so should the trustees avoid overuse of their legal rights if we get in a situation with the conference and the delegates and the board where the board is constantly talking about their legal to rights delegates there's probably something going on that's not right there's an imbalance i hate to use star wars analogies but there's an imbalance in the force how much better could i say it right there's something going on the same way if the delegates are micromanaging the trustees there's some kind of imbalance there that needs to be worked out um as i've said before there's a pendulum that swings back and forth listen i was a delegate i went there two years as a delegate You go for a week and you go home. And then you get to go home and say all the great work we did as delegates. And then I get to criticize the trustees for a year until the next conference because I don't like the way they're carrying out everything, right? But then I became a director and a trustee. And then i didn't get to come back. I didn't have to go back to the conference and go home and criticize. I got to, after the conference, come back to board weekends and AWS meetings and get heavily criticized, which can get old and tiresome. But I believe what Concept9 says. I warn everybody here. I warning every AA leader. Everyone knows that I say it all the time. you want to be a trustee what quality do you need what did i say i always say it if your daily peace of mind and serenity are dependent on you getting your own way do not become a trusty do not became a director you're setting yourself up for lots of pain the other thing it says in concept nine just for those of you who are on your way down the triangle here's the good news if no one gave it to you before i know we're in concept seven but here's a good news in concept nine if you're going to be an aa leader here's what it tells you you have to look forward to who wouldn't want to do this you will often be faced called upon to face heavy and sometimes long continued criticism there are our constructive critics our friends indeed we ought never get fail to give them a careful hearing how about this then there are destructive critics they power drive they politic they make accusations maybe they're violent malicious they pitch gobs of rumor gossip, and gentle scuttlebutt. Welcome to AA Service, everyone. This is the prize. This is The Prize You Didn't Know You Get. But there's a big warning there. The warning is this. We're telling you this is going to happen. are you able to take the high road even though some people are going to act like this that's the real challenge to be an aa leader knowing that these people gossip about you knowing they start rumors about you knowing they act badly all this stuff but if you want the fancy title you take the high road and that's not always easy the balance of the legal and the spiritual is one of the most important things to understand regarding the concepts and that is why i believe concept seven is between concept six and eight not the numbers. Obviously, seven comes between six and eight, but the individual subjects. Concept six says the conference should make all the big decisions of large policy and finance. Concept eight says the trustees should administer and manage, but not make the final decisions. concept seven is all about what decisions should be made by the conference and what decisions shouldbe made bythe board. And sometimes there's errors made on either side, but it's still the best structure I've seen out there. i believe that it works um you know what's you know i i love that saying um hold on so i don't mess it up because it's really a good one um it is you know sometimes you hear that saying history does not repeat itself or does repeat itself here's the truth history doesn't repeat itself aaa members do okay that's who repeats itself the human element of alcoholics anonymous the structure and the organization is perfect as is designed the people who make it up basically the most imperfect people the world has to offer all gathered in one place in one organization which makes things very challenging so let me see the questions here is a censure necessary in AA? Well, here's my feeling. Nothing to do with whatever happened at last week's conference. Bill W. wrote the concepts with Bernard Smith. In 1961, the Literature Committee recommended that the conference approve the 12 concepts and the narratives, and they approved them. And then the conference approved it. So I believe there's only two ways to tell the board we don't like what they're doing officially. Censure, which is kind of like a warning, or withhold money which is drastic and that should really be done last possible thing for any group or person to do to withhold money from the general service board but i think i would be pretty arrogant if i said censure was not necessary if it's in our structure and the group conscience from when aa was started that would be like me coming on here tonight and saying i know we're supposed to discuss tradition seven but i don't think it's necessary i mean i know i'm arrogant but i am not that arrogant okay like i am self-aware of how arrogant i can be but i'm not going to come here and tell you we don't need the second step the fourth step the 11th step or traditions four or a like that's just sounds crazy same what if i said there's no reason for censure it's in our literature it's inner concepts if the general service conference voted to say we're not going to have center anymore then i would accept that group conscience i've heard and agree with you oh thank you that embracing the traditions rather than enforcement works is there a value in considering the words force of tradition in the seventh concept albeit if that force may be in the nature of my dialogue and vocabulary maybe i mean we do have to pick our words carefully sometimes um you know when it says tradition with a lower t that means not one of the 12 but rather what we've always done so you have to separate that when you read aa literature if it has a capital t it's referring to one of our 12 traditions if it as a lower tea it's talking about um something we've done over time but not necessarily one of our traditions um someone asked me about getting in the um private facebook group i'm gonna put email and number here you can email whatsapp whatever text um to get in any other questions about concept seven uh one uh funny two al-anon related things here lois w said traditions call for the obedience to the unenforceable true someone also wrote me a question about tradition seven um because al-anan decided to buy property they asked how come we don't own a building each 12-step fellowship including our sister fellowship al-anon gets to interpret the traditions as they see fit al-lanon does own property and they do accept donations in memory of people from outside al-anan one time only after death of a friend or a family member we don't own property and we don t accept in memorandum gifts from non-members but they have their own group conscience they have their own structure we just don't do that it's not for me to say what they do is wrong i just hope aa never does it so with that i am going to close with the responsibility statement.