Meeting of Many Members
Wednesday September 22

In the dense crowd people mingled freely, many with their fingertips around drinks.  Were it not for the balmy evening air, the occasion might have been mistaken for the club Christmas party.  More than half the membership was in the process of casting their votes for the Board of Directors, and now upwards of 150 people gathered along the long porch and on the grass down below.  The bar and the club’s little restaurant kept a brisk pace as they fought to keep up with orders.  In record-breaking form, charge tabs were dealt out like playing cards in overlapping rows on the counter of the bar.

The night was alive with talk and charged with anticipation as members waited for their ballots to be counted (although most of the conversation was about anything but politics.)   Those who hadn’t seen each other in months, or even years, got a chance to catch up as they stood by with an eager patience awaiting the return of election officials.

This was the first official Meeting of Members that had taken place in more than a decade, and now rows of empty white seats beckoned in the adjacent meeting hall – but still, the wait went on, as elsewhere, three election inspectors struggled to crawl out from beneath a pile of ballots and proxy forms that would select five candidates from a field of nine.  Almost half of the club’s eleven member Board would be new in 2011!

At last everyone was summoned inside – the empty white seats filled quickly and the room began to silence.  There was a brief statement from the President of the Board, and an equally brief statement from the Treasurer and the Club Manager.  Given the late start and the imminent arrival of election results, all speeches were cut short, as was a ceremony honoring the five outgoing Board Members.

Despite recent controversies, the previous year had gone smoothly – the club was reported to be in excellent shape both physically and financially, and the new capital improvements had been a big hit.  In the large meeting room, the crowd was content, eager for election results but otherwise composed …… until …… and then it happened – a comment came from the back of the room – it was a statement, or rather, a question dealing with the club’s finances and its non-profit status.

A prolonged, somewhat deflated groan came from the crowd as they tried to make sense of what they had heard.  Or thought that they heard in the now confused room.  A great murmuring and grumbling spread throughout.  And then remarkably, everything normalized as the President stood before the membership and announced that the three election officials had returned with the results. 

One by one, as the five new Directors were proclaimed, their names repeated in a hush throughout the room.  And now the long evening had come to an end, though for some perhaps the party was just beginning.  In pockets throughout the dissipating crowd it became obvious that the election had been a success and that everyone was ready to put aside controversies of recent months and welcome in the new Board.  It was a Meeting of Members that would not soon be forgotten.   

figcmg@tennisfresno.com