by The next two resolutions to be considered included one that I authored on the condition of the NRA Headquarters Building and another that called for email notification of members when a meeting was canceled.
I had conversations with numerous people who told me about the poor condition of the NRA Headquarters Building. Doug Wicklund, former senior curator of the NRA Firearms Museum, sent me the picture below.
He noted that there were numerous patches for water damage in the driveway overhang as well as staining from rust on the window frames of the building. Another person who had been on the 6th Floor said there was lots of water damage from the leaking roof. In era in which real estate tax valuations rarely go down, Fairfax County lowered the tax valuation of the building by over $1 million from 2020 to 2021.
It is an embarrassment that the public face of the NRA is in such poor condition. After my resolution was introduced, I spoke in favor of it as did a gentleman from southwest Louisiana who said you don’t play around with leaking roofs. Speaking against my resolution was NRA Board Member Ron Schmeits of Raton, NM. He said the board was working on it, that there was no need to “waste money” on an independent inspection, and well, you know getting parts these days is hard. Frankly, I put in the part about an independent, third party inspection because I don’t trust the board to do more than pay lip service.
Of the few people remaining at the meeting, the majority agreed with Schmeits and voted it down.
RichardsonBuildingResolution2022I unfortunately do not have a copy of the next resolution nor the name of the person who introduced it. Basically, it noted that the last minute cancelation of the 2021 NRA Annual Meeting in Houston caused members to lose money on reservations and airfare. The resolution called a better notification of members when a meeting was going to be canceled. It asked that all members be notified by email in case of a cancelation and not just by a note on the webpage. After minimal discussion, it was voted down.
While I would be hesitant to endorse any resolution I can’t read in its entirety, I can understand the frustration of communication on cancelled events. It wasn’t just the previous Annual Meeting that was a boondoggle, but also this year’s concert.
Honestly, while I don’t think they needed to go full Columbine response, they did need to cut the public parties that were nothing but parties. And the first act cancellation (which likely happened privately well in advance of public news) should have been the first clue. From everything I read, NRA hid the fact that all acts had pulled out for quite a while. It was a tweet from the last artist that gave the first clue that the whole thing was off, not any statement to ticket holders.
You combine that with they way they tried to hide news of the last Charlotte meeting and the date/city switch out of Louisville on a non-holiday weekend to Houston on a holiday weekend, and yeah, they have a problem with communication.