September 2006 President's Message
Patricia Moran
 Dear Colleagues,
I hope you enjoyed your summer vacation and enjoyed a brief but relaxing Labor Day weekend before the start of another very active fall season of fundraising. While you are scheduling special appointments on your calendar, please take a few minutes to review the AFP fall calendar of events and plan to attend one or more AFP activities. I hope to see you at the Chamberlain Luncheon on Monday,October 16th—this is the annual meeting for the Greater New York Chapter. At the Chamberlain Luncheon we honor our volunteers—those members who provide educational and mentoring programs to all fundraisers in the Greater New York Area. We also honor those volunteers who handle the Chapter’s finances, carry out fundraising efforts, coordinate communication efforts and direct Fund Raising Day in New York—the largest one day conference in fundraising in the United States. Programs and services provided by the chapter’s volunteers are available to both AFP members and nonmembers in an effort to carry out our Chapter’s mission to advance philanthropy by enabling people and organizations to practice ethical and effective fundraising.
Our chapter has approximately 1,000 members, yet, we provide services each month to hundreds of fundraisers who are not AFP members. Each year, about half of the attendees at Fund Raising Day in New York are not AFP members. The Greater New York Chapter Board of Directors and volunteers believe that our organization must reach out to all fundraisers to help them improve their personal skills and to share new and innovative fundraising concepts. Although we believe that joining AFP is an important commitment to the development profession—we also know that our profession will expand and excel if we are all willing to share our experiences and expertise with others.
I continue to be surprised by the lack of commitment on the part of some fundraisers to join AFP. I have seen the survey responses and have heard many reasons why people don’t join. “Dues are too expensive,” “my employer won’t pay for my membership,” “not sure if I will be in this position next year,” “I belong to CASE”....and the list goes on.
I, however, believe that AFP is the professional organization for fundraisers. Fundraising is viewed as a credible and respected profession for civic improvement through the United States and the world. In order to expand our profession, fundraisers need an organization that provides ethical training and research in our field. This support is available today because of the commitment of 27,000 fundraisers throughout the U.S., Canada and Mexico who are AFP members. Other AFP chapters are growing in other parts of the world as well. If you are a member, thank you for your commitment to our profession and our organization.
If you are not a member, please join today! I wish you well as you begin your fall and winter fundraising activities.
Patricia A. Moran, CFRE
Fordham University
This message is part of this month’s newsletter, which is available online. Please click here to read Fundraising News.
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