More than 330 Grangers Meet the National President at Regional Meetings

by Carl Meiss, P.R. Director

Averaging more than 40 members at each of the eight PA State Grange Regional Meetings held around the Commonwealth during the last week of March and the first week of April, more than 330 Grange members had the opportunity to personally meet the newly elected National Grange President Ed Luttrell.

National Grange President Ed Luttrell
discusses his "National Grange Priorities"

 

Since her election in October, 2002, PA State Grange President Betsy Huber has held regional meetings throughout the state in an effort to communicate on a personal basis with as many Grangers as possible. This year's meetings were held in Lackawanna, Elk, Tioga, Juniata, Chester, Blair, Washington and Erie Counties beginning on March 26 and ending on April 2 and had the best total attendance of the six years.

The keynote speaker at the meetings was Ed Luttrell, National Grange President. Ed was elected to his office in November, 2007 at the National Grange Convention in Nevada. Luttrell is a past State Grange President from Oregon and had been the National Membership/Leadership Director for the previous six years.

The National President had presented his "Five Priorities for the National Grange" to State Grange Presidents in February at a meeting in Dallas, Texas. Shortly thereafter, Huber invited him to attend the Pennsylvania regional meetings to personally present his priorities to Grangers from our state. (In researching these meetings, it appears that this may have been the first time that the National Grange President has ever attended all of the PA State Grange regional meetings.)

Betsy opened the meetings by welcoming everyone and then turned them over to the National President. Ed's program, titled "National Grange Priorities - The Clock is Ticking," explained his five priorities which include: Increase Active Membership and Participation at each Community Grange; Develop New Leaders and give them opportunities at each Community Grange; Revitalization of Community Granges as a State Priority; New Community Granges, and; Re-emphasize and strengthen the family structure through the Junior & Youth Programs.

He included "The Clock is Ticking" in his title because most Grange officers are elected to two-year terms, which doesn't give a lot of time to accomplish priorities. Ed said that one of his personal goals in his position is to visit all of the 36 states which have State Granges. (Pennsylvania was his fifth state to visit and he was going to West Virginia and Maryland before heading home from our trip.) At the end of the meetings, members had the opportunity to personally ask the National Grange President any question that they had. (Ed did qualify that, "If the question is too personal, I may not answer it," but that did not occur.)

Luttrell clarified his priorities, speaking about each one separately but emphasizing they were all equally important.

"Our number one priority must be to increase ACTIVE membership and participation throughout our local Granges," he said. He explained that our focus must not be on numbers and money, but rather on active participation of present and new members. "Active members are passionate members," Luttrell said, "and passionate members attract new members."

In explaining leadership development, he believes that every member, old or new, should try for the opportunity to serve as an officer when he or she is personally ready, and that they should realize that when they are no longer growing (personally) in that office that they should step aside for others to take over and develop in leadership positions.
In speaking about Revitalizing Community Granges as a State Priority, Luttrell pointed out that the National Grange Digest gives that responsibility and authority to the States and does not allow the National President to go into the individual states and work with Community Granges without an invitation from the State Grange President. As Ed put it ""Attitude starts at the top." He made a note of the many Granges that PA has worked to re-vitalize and re-organize recently.

That is why, on Saturday morning of March 26th, a meeting was held with the PA State Grange officers. The National President wanted to make sure that the State Officers understood his priorities and "bought into them," particularly having the positive attitude as the PA State Grange Leadership.

His fourth priority is one that our PA State Grange President has been emphasizing, "Opening New Community Granges." Luttrell acknowledged that, "We will lose some Granges...communities disappear or dwindle...and Granges go away with them." "But," he noted, "We have opened more than 40,000 Granges since 1967. It is something that we are good at." He praised Pennsylvania as one of only two states to have opened two new Granges in the past 5 years.

The final priority that Luttrell revealed was "Re-emphasize and strengthen the family structure through the Junior & Youth Programs." He said that "Family is the keystone of our organization." He made the special point that the Grange is about the only organization outside of the Church, that includes the entire family. "Family is relevant to communities," he said, "No matter what community or where it is located, the family is needed." Luttrell added the fact that, "Kids join gangs because they are looking for their 'family,' filling their need to belong." "Who better to fill that need of belonging and family than the Grange?"

In speaking about strengthening the family structure through the Youth & Junior Programs, he notified everyone of the newly appointed National Grange Youth Development Director, our own Charlene Espenshade, originally from Wyoming County and now living in Lancaster County. Ed explained that Charlene has been given the task of figuring out how to reach into the "virtual world" of today's youth to attract them to the Grange by using some of the many "social networking" sites on the internet.

After Luttrell's presentation, various committee members had the opportunity to remind Grangers of upcoming events and contests, including Family Festival, Youth and Junior Camps as well as the State Session in October to be held in Lancaster.

P.R./Membership Director Carl Meiss talked about the tools that State Grange has available to "Partner" with Community Granges in their efforts to attract new and active members, such as the seven different brochures and two volumes of National Grange's "Building the Grange Across America - Coast to Coast Real Success Stories," with more than 100 ideas for events and functions from Granges across the country.

Carl then opened the floor for questions for the National Master. Questions covered a wide range of topics from "What does the National Grange gain from owning its own Headquarters Building in D.C.?" to "Does the National Grange President plan to spend most of his time in the office in Washington or in the field going to various Granges?" For many Grangers, this was one of the few times that they ever had to speak with the National Grange President one-on-one.