The Tradition of Self-Support Between Intergroups and General Service – Curtis M.

Hi, everybody. My name is Curtis Monaghan. I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Curtis! And as you say out here, but for the grace of God, my sponsor and everybody in the world, I'm sober since January 20th, 1974. Before I share with you some of the experiences we had last week at the 38th General Service Conference, I like to thank District 20 for inviting me, and especially for Scott Grave as being a wonderful host. And it's always a pleasure for any of us from our General Service office to come to the areas and to meet our fellow AAs whom many times we've spoken with one another on the phones or naturally through the mail. And coming from New York AA, and AA does reflect the area, coming to the meeting last night, you scared the devil out of me. You're so friendly. New York AA, you know, you can walk in and walk out and you wonder if anybody recognized you, but you guys are really terrific. And it brought back memories when I was here in 81 for the Cornhusker Roundup. I remember arriving at the airport and getting a cab over to the Holiday Inn and being rushed through, getting dressed quickly and up the podium. And I was only at the office a few years and I came over the podium, I looked and oh my God, I said to myself, my self-centered pride and anxiety was hanging out and there you were. It looked like 2000, what do you call each other? A big red Nebraskan. I have to apologize for those people who are with the University of Nebraska. I'm a University of Miami graduate. Sorry. which simply means don't come down to our area to play us. You know what happens. Well, I could have been from Oklahoma. It's getting worse, right. I'm always grateful to come to the different areas because no matter where we are, where we come from or for that matter what school we're from, I know you and you know me if we're alcoholics. It's been my privilege to meet many people from not only North America but from the world who are in our wonderful fellowship which as you know is growing in leaps and bounds and the excitement this past week really hasn't left me. I'm still full of hungry, angry, lonely and tired because I'm exhausted And when the General Service Conference convened on Sunday, the 17th of April, 135 servicemen and women got together to state what is the state of the fellowship. And I'd like to share with you this evening some of the highlights of that conference. And the conference theme of the 38th was our singleness of purpose, key to unity. There is a concern in the fellowship that we are maybe losing what Alcoholics Anonymous is all about. And having this as a theme this year sort of brought us all back to what is our primary purpose? Why are we here and why do we carry the message? In the state of the fellowship, I'd like to share with you that we have a strong and we have a vital fellowship served by a strong and vital conference. However, some of the challenges of the day are new or of greater dimension than the past and sometimes we may be at a loss to respond to them. There has been a great deal of interest in our prudent reserve curiously not whether it is ample reserve as required by our warranties, but Bill W. introduced the phrase corporate poverty. He was enunciating an alternate to accepting outside contributions, 12 steps and 12 traditions on page 165. Thankfully, we are moving closer rather than farther from that status today. As far as self-support is concerned, in particular a move to a single pricing schedule for all our literature, although it may cause temporary pain to some, is a great step away from dependency on outside income. Actually, the amount of the prudent reserve today per registered member of our fellowship is about eight dollars. In the judgment of our finance committee, it is large enough to protect Alcoholics Anonymous in foreseeable emergencies. So we are trying to reach zero net income for GSO operations, and the AA groups in the service structure are making that possible through the response to the self-support initiative. Our self-upport initiative has been solidly supported, and we have been able to reduce literature prices in several steps, totaling about 25 percent. This is something the membership has done in response to our communicating the need. Our glorious past was necessarily full of catch-as-catch-can management, witnessed by the loss of our big book copyright in 1967. But that should not be a model for carelessness management today. It is our responsibility to have the fellowship on a sound footing as our resources and our growing membership can provide. Now, regional forums. We have another recent example of how the willingness to take responsibility has benefited the fellowship. The regional forums were initiated in 1977 to improve communications between the board, the office and the fellowship I have attended a couple of years of regional forums because I had that as an assignment before the last rotation in last September. And each regional forum, we are not only getting a lot more attendees, but more are coming to the forums for their first time. AA and Russia. We now have a new challenge, one of the largest of recent years, presented by the beginnings of AA in Eastern European countries. They have suffering alcoholics in numbers rivaling ours. How will we respond in the face of apparent conflicts between their society and our traditions? Are their conflicts any more serious than the differences between our society and our traditions?" Anonymity breaks. Conflicts in our society have been dramatized recently by anonymity breaks in the media and in published books. Our most cherished and fundamental tradition is perhaps in greater jeopardy than ever before. Can we revitalize this tradition, extend its understanding throughout the fellowship, ensure that newcomers from treatment facilities understand it, reach every AA member with Bill's last message? We have to remember that the understanding and practice of anonymity is our responsibility. If we don't preserve and emphasize it, nobody will. group participation. This brings to mind the overall problem of participation in every aspect of our fellowship. Amid the success of the self-support effort in 1987, one sober note remains. Only 55% of AA groups registered in New York participate, and we know that about 20% of all groups in the U.S. and Canada are not even registered at GSO. I believe that a lack of interest is also manifested in groups in participation at the area level. How can we enhance knowledge, understanding, responsibility and participation in all aspects of our fellowship? Let's think particularly of an understanding of anonymity as a spiritual principle. Geographic representation at GSO. Related to this, it is an interesting experiment underway on our operating boards. To enhance communication, a director of the grapevine was proposed at this year's conference from the state of Washington. A consultant to AAWS board has been appointed from Georgia. Search for GSO staff members is always extended throughout the United States and Canada. We hope that these experiments will succeed and that we can expand the practice. Was the report at the conference on the consideration of relocating the general service office? Yes, there was a report but that the office if moved could be moved to only one other place. It seems because we are basically a publishing office, the report stated that we could move to the suburbs of New York only. On the other hand, regional forums can go everywhere and have done much to improve communications. Now we are emphasizing representation on our staff from everywhere, not exclusive of New York, of course. And we are experimenting with inviting committee members and board members from throughout the United States and Canada. This is going to be an expensive experiment, and those board and committee members are going to have an audience experience. But if it works, we will have taken another step toward making our boards and office more nearly representative of the whole fellowship, intergroup and central offices. We have assisted the intergroups and central offices in holding their second seminar. You will recall that the first seminar was initiated by GSO with the idea of discussing literature pricing and distribution, and the second was requested by the inter-groups and central officers. The second seminar resulted in more general sharing and a request that we help them with the third seminar. The third one, by the way, will be this November in Dallas, Texas. I know that there is an uneasy relationship in some areas between intergroup central offices and general service. One of the concerns of the intergroup seems to be that their interests are not represented by the general service conference. It is the hope that delegates will have some idea how the concerns for trusted servants responsible for intergroup and central offices can be considered at future conferences. One of their concerns has to do with funding their activities. Perhaps we can find a way of emphasizing to the fellowship that intergroup central offices have self-support problems similar to the general service office. The grapevine. As you know, the grapevine has been discussed, analyzed a great deal in the recent past. I believe the board's activity in this regard have paid off. Excellent work on the part of the grapevine Board and Grapevine staff have brought about a recovery in finance and in spirit that will be reported and was reported at this year's conference by the chairperson of the General Service Grapevine Board. The report of the AAWS kind of hits home in many areas, and I'd like to share that with you. AAWS is, in effect, the wholly owned subsidiary of the General Service Board with the delegated responsibility to maintain oversight of the General Service Office. They meet monthly, review budgets, expenditures and salary policy, establish prices for literature and other materials, approve or disapprove requests from outsiders and AA members to reprint our copyrighted literature, discuss matters of GSO administration and publishing operations, etc. There are nine AAWS directors. AAWS is Alcoholics Anonymous World Service. Four are trustees, including two regional trustees. One is the general manager and one is the staff coordinator. Also attending AAWS meetings but not voting are the other staff members of GSO, the director of finance, the controller, the services director, the secretary and the Recording Secretary. In addition, a Grapevine staff member is usually present. The operating departments, publishing, finance, support services report to the Director of Finance slash Business Administration, as does the Director for Human Resources. The AA staff's Center Graphic and Clerical Departments archives report to the Service Director. Reports covering the operations of the departments are given throughout the conference. This report that I'm going to share with you now are items from the monthly meetings of 1987 and over to 88. The AWS board met 12 times during 1987. The following significant items are noted. The board recommended the 1987 budget to the Trustees Finance Committee for approval. The board authorized AWS transfer $887,900 to the General Service Board to cover operating deficits for the year which ended December 31, 86. Surplus cash in excess of basic operating requirements amounting to $500,000 was transferred to the general service board reserve fund on March 23, 1987. AWS recommended to the trustees finance and budgetary committee the proposed budget revisions amounting to $277,500 additional income and $287,900 additional expenses. Major expensive items are $97,000 for a computer study, $26,000 für a relocation study, and $62,400 correction on the original construction budget. That is construction of the office. Due to the dedication and hard work of the DCMs and others, contributions have increased more than 37% over the previous year, and the percentage of groups registered with us that have contributed increased about 55% at year end. As a result, the following actions were taken during the year. We approved a 4% discount on literature sales to all purchases effective April 1st, 1987 on orders of $25 or more. We approve an additional 8% reduction on all prices of all literature we sell effective August 1st, 1987. These actions did not apply to Spanish, French, and foreign literature. We budgeted an additional price decrease of about 12 percent effective March 1st 1988. We budged a reduction of non-AA prices to the revised AA price. This last action results in a single schedule of prices to all purchases. Other items such as Spanish and French language literature will reflect similar price reductions. The budgetary impact of the changes in 1988 will be a reduction of net income by $815,000 made possible by projected group contributions 15% higher than 1987. A meeting was held in Washington, D.C. between persons active in the alcoholism field in the United States and three leaders of the Temperance Promotion Society of the Soviet Union. John Bragg, who is the general manager of GSO, attended and described Alcoholics Anonymous. The Soviets toured various facilities in the U.S. As a result of this meeting, AA was invited to participate in an upcoming exchange in Russia, which was accepted subject to observance of our traditions. John Bragg attended with other Americans representing various segments of the alcoholism field. John represented this office with the purpose of providing information on AA to government and professional Soviets. We granted the request from Denmark Literature Committee for financial assistance in the amount of $6,000 to reprint the 12 Steps and 12 Traditions. This help is given under the usual terms, which are the inventory is to remain the property of A.A.W.S. Inc. until such time as the total amount has been repaid. We granted or had no objection to 98 requests to reprint from A.I. literature, 6 requests to tape. We denied or objected to 12 requests to print and 2 requests to take. We established a policy that requests within AA for permission to reproduce audiovisuals not be granted. We authorized John Bragg, as president of AAWS Inc., to execute a new pension fund agreement between AAWS and the Bank of New York. We welcomed Ruth Jagadensky, who is the trustee of the Pacific area, directed to replace Jack Ford, who rotated off, and he was the truste from Western Canada. We hired a new staff member, John Grant, to replace Maureen Costello. Helen Turnquist was a member of the General Service staff, attended the fourth European service meeting held in Frankfurt, West Germany, March 6th to 8th, 87, where she delivered the keynote address. The second central office interview seminar in Los Angeles, September 18th and 20th, 87, had 137 in attendance and proved to be very successful. The stock market crash last October had no serious impact on GSO. The reserve fund is entirely in government securities, and the retirement trust fund is slightly more than half in fixed income, slightly less than half an equity. The fund has benefited from a good deal of appreciation, overall effect of about 12% reduction. in the principle was simple to retrace some of the appreciation realized early in 87. A letter from our copyright attorneys was sent to the publisher and Nan Robinson, the author regarding her book AA inside Alcoholics Anonymous, which contains excerpts from AA literature, the use of AA trademark and a violation of the 12th tradition. Due to lack of cooperation on the part of the author and the publisher, we were advised by legal counsel to expeditiously take all appropriate action with respect to trademark violations, including litigation if necessary regarding the book, which gave the impression it is allied with AA and also threatens to be harmful to AA interests. As a result, but not all objectionable features have been removed. The study of our new computer system reached the solicitation of proposals from vendors and a group sent out an evaluation in March by Pete Marwick, GSO employees, and our external committee. We agreed to renegotiate renewal rights as Bill sees it once these rights mature and to discontinue negotiations with Lois Wilson's attorney. And then there's a list of approved prices for the many new books in Spanish, Chinese, and Russian-Polish revise of Too Young and financial guidelines which were new this year and the first 10 are free. Ruth Jagodinsky, trustee from again Pacific area, Don Prince, U.S. trustee at large, Sarah Price, general service staff on overseas met with members of Creating a Sober World in San Francisco on January 12th, 1988 to discuss their request to translate the big book into Russian. Creating a Sober World has decided not to translate the bigbook, but it will be done by individual AA members who do not plan to publish it, although they will be taking the manuscript into the Soviet Union on future visits. Their target date is this month, 88, and they will send us a copy of the translation when it is completed. We referred to the report and charter committee, which deals with the service manual, the request from the trustees conference committee that we send the complimentary copies of the final conference report to GSRs, if desirable, to do so through direct mailing or through the service structure. That request has been approved at the 38th General Service Conference. Some of the highlights and the recommended from the conference advisory actions from this year's conference were following a draft of a pamphlet for the gay lesbian alcoholic be prepared and reviewed by the 1989 conference proposal from Northern Minnesota area about the use of surveys to determine the need for conference approved literature be referred to the appropriate committee for consideration at the 1989 General Service Conference. Under agenda, we had the theme of the 39th General Service conference be anonymity our past, present and future or anonymity living our traditions. The following presentations for the 89 conference will be self-support, GSO finances, anonymity, how it developed, is it necessary today, principles before personalities, back to basics, the group in the structure, sponsorship and recovery and service, AA literature tool or mandate. Under cooperation with the professional community, the following sentence, duly or multiple addicted persons are asked to seek AA membership only, one of their addictions is to alcohol, be deleted in the pamphlet if you are a professional under the section problems other than alcohol at the next printing. After discussion in depth, the conference decided the need to carry the AA message to the black community. The committee decided that the scope of the initiative be broadened to include all minorities with emphasis on the black communities and and recommended that CPC Secretary and the Public Information Secretary consider the suggestions listed in the PI-CPC Bulletin Fall 81, and use them as guidelines for carrying the message to all minorities. A letter will be sent to all area PI- CPC Chairpersons with these revision suggestions for carrying a message to minority group members. In order to follow progress of this initiative to minorities, the Committee requested that the Secretary of CPC send the committee members a full report of whatever action takes place at the Trustee, CPC and PI Committee meetings at the July Board meeting and that discussion of the initiative be an item on the agenda of the 1989 Conference CPC Committee. Under correctional facilities it was recommended by this year's conference that the pamphlet AA in prisons be replaced with two separate revisions of the material. One, an easy-to-read pamphlet for inmates and outside AAs interested in starting AA groups and correctional facilities which will explain how inside groups are formed and how they function. Two, a brief pamphet or leaflet to provide information about AA to administrators of correctional faculties. The phrase AA contact, in quotes, unquote, be used in place of pre-release sponsorship, in quotes, in AA literature and communications about inmates who will soon be released in order to encourage more participation on the part of outside AAs. Literature. And if you have, if you're ever on the, and I had this privilege once to be the secretary to Literature Committee. You meet about a dozen times before you can get any of the advisory actions to the floor. Under literature, this year's conference recommended the following. Work continue on the AA history book and that this be subject to further editing through coordinating efforts of each regional trustee with each delegate for further updating corrections and additional information. The AA historybook basically is taking AA comes of age from about 1965 to 1985, which the ghostwriter was Bob Pearson, who I believe is speaking in this area sometime next month. He used to be the general manager at GSO. The revision of the manuscript AA and Armed Services be accepted with the following changes. The Marine story from the current pamphlet AA and Arm Services be included in the revised pamphelet. The manuscript be returned for editing of Charles' story to include consideration of references to drug addictions. The copy on the AA group's structure be approved with following additions. A, that cooperating with professional community slash public information representatives be added to the diagram entitled Service Structure Inside AA Group. B, that the term institutions representative be changed to treatment facilities slash correctional facilities representative. C. That the following be added to the second paragraph of the copy, in quotes, parentheses, condensed from the six-point definition of an AA group found on page 32 of the AA group pamphlet, close parentheses, close quote. Also recommended a copy of the structure of the AAA group be added into the chapter in the service manual depending on approval of the conference report and charter committee. Copy of the structure of AA Group B, A, produced as a flyer suitable for insertion in the AA group pamphlet and also as a continuing piece of literature. And B, include in the AAA group pamhlet at the next revision. The copy of quote, the home group close quote be accepted for inclusion in theAA group pamflet with the following stipulations, one, with the third paragraph page two be underlined Obviously, and this will be underlined, quote, obviously, as with all group conscience matters, each AA member has one vote, and this ideally will be through their home group, unquote. That on page three, paragraph three, line two, and greeting newcomers at door be added. That three where repetition of information occurs in the AA group pamphlet, that it be deleted. the committee the conference also recommended specialized gatherings on page 33 of the AA group pamphlet be changed to specialized meetings and at an article in the April-May issue of box 459 entitled service sponsorship a vital stepping stone to service and sobriety be prepared as a service piece with Kiwanis club types on page 4 paragraph 2 line 3 change to quote, club types, unquote. The manuscript for the Native North American not be approved as presented but that this manuscript be returned for editing to include consideration of the references to drug addiction, chemical dependency, junkie, and clean and is then approved for publication. A more simplified draft of an easy-to-read illustrated pamphlet of Is AA For You? Be prepared for the 1989 conference. This is AA 44 questions as illustrated flyers not be published at this time. A simplified easy to read 44 questions as illustrated flier not to be published. I must have repeated myself. A simplified easier to read illustrated 12 steps pamphlet be prepared for the 89 conference and then work will continue on the daily reflections book that a request be made for additional manuscripts be submitted from the fellowship on any step tradition by Bill W., coordinated through each delegate, with a progress report to be presented to the 89 conference. The primary purpose cards to continue as a service piece. And then there was a task force from 1980 recommended a conference action to be affirmed, and what this year's conference simply added, any other changes made of substance of the conference approved literature shall be through the conference process and the revised pamphlet of young people in AA be approved for publication with the following revision that all personal references be removed from certain page from page 51 in line 3 and a self-support flyer quote your DCM close quote be conference approved. Public information had a variety of recommendations and again become quite, there's some details, but basically there are new radio spots to be developed to reach specific audiences currently being targeted by radio stations and brought back to the 89 Conference of Public Information for approval. And in 1971, a General Service Conference action reaffirmed that AA members generally think it is unwise to break anonymity of a member even after his death, but in each situation the final decision must be rested with the family. Further, the AA archives continue to protect the anonymity of deceased AA members as well as other members. And then they ask that the AA fact file be updated and corrected. Under report and charter, there was a discussion the recommendation of certain footnotes under a concept 11, which talks about current practices at the General Service Board and AA World Services that needed footnoting. Basically, they're talking about that today at the general service office we're paid on merit pay, and then another footnote has to be corrected where GSO staff members have a voting representation on the trustee committees. additionally the staff members serving as staff coordinator has a vote as the director of aws and that reflects back where bill in one area says we do not as a staff have a vote on anything and another area bill mentioned that we do have a we have uh we have a boat on committees so basically we're at as a member of gso uh staff you we can vote at a trustees meeting but not at the conference meeting we vote as conference members on the floor, but we have no vote as secretaries to the conference committees. And finally, and I mentioned this earlier, there was the final conference report will be sent to all GSRs with the distribution method and quantity determined by your delegate. I'd like to know, just by a show of hands, how many GSRs are present at this meeting? How many DCMs? Okay, thank you. How many people from PICPC meeting? Correctional? Okay, thanks. Thank you. I had the opportunity to coordinate the election. You have a new trustee to replace Dan Byrne. was Donald J. Bruner, and Don won going away. And Western Canada, replacing Jack Ford, has a new trustee, Phil J. Sells. And they were the new trustees that come on board. The new member of the directors of the Grapevine Board, which I mentioned earlier from the state of Washington, his name is Fran Pollock. And also a new in-house trustee, that's the New York trustee Has come on the board And that is Desmond Towie Gordon Patrick, who served for about 13 years As a Class A trustee Retired as chairperson of the General Service Board and he's been replaced by chairperson Michael Alexander, who was a Class A trustee, rotated off the board, and he has now come on for the first time as chairperson. He is associated with AA History. He was a young attorney. Bill had his buddy, as I stand here, who's good at AA History here? the early legal brains that helped Bill out. I can't think of the... No, no, I can'T think ofthe... Anyway, if there's an archivist in the house, help me out. I can'T think of his name, but he was one of the early trustees back in the early 40s. Anyway, his name escapes me. I, this was my ninth general service conference, and each one of them has proven to me, and I shared it with some people this past weekend, that the delegates that are coming to New York are really no longer quote-unquote the good old boys. They're articulate, they're knowledgeable, and they certainly represent the areas that send them to New Yorke, And they also vote their conscience, which is interesting. They don't just, as Bill would say in the service manual, they're not just messenger boys and girls. And the point is that the conferences are quite interesting, a lot of heated debate, and I have to believe that as of today, thanks to the 38th conference, Alcoholics Anonymous World Service and the Grapevine and the General Service Board and the fellowship as a whole, I believe, are in good hands. And it really comes from the fact that we have good GSRs, we have Good DCMs, and out of the service areas you are sending the best that AA has to offer in service. And I'd like to thank you for listening to this report, but this really brings you up to date, And I'd be very happy to share any questions you have, any concerns you have about our office in New York, and anything you want to know, any doubts you have or any rumors you may have heard. Please give me the opportunity to clear anything up. And thank you very much. Thank you.