On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 1:14 PM, Dan Rosenthal swatjester@gmail.com wrote:
No, the US does not need one national chapter. This has been gone over time and again. Anthony's strategy provides for a guiding body to oversee the local chapters (something that takes too much time and effort for the foundation to do, and also something they must be separate from for liability reasons), but keeps the emphasis on the local chapters, to conduct local events and local outreach, something that they can do far better than any national chapter, while national stuff can be reserved for the WMF to handle. The national guiding body also simplifies the issue of the US local chapters candidates for the 2 board seats.
The existence of a "virtual" national chapter, a chapter that exists as a hollow shell of sorts, would enable state- and locally-based groups to qualify for 503(c) status under a group exemption. Putting this kind of parent/child structure in place now would be helpful if we decided to move towards a more nationally-organized structure in the future (which might not be entirely unlikely).
I'm not necessarily advocating this, just showing it as a way in which the existence of a US national chapter might be nice, even if it's not strictly necessary.
--Andrew Whitworth