| Bruce 2005-08-19, 12:31 am |
| My personal opinion was that the demise started with the ill fated
decision to raise adult dues in 1995 to $40.00. At $30.00 per year
growth had been steady and in fact the peak of adult membership was mid
1995.
Prior to this dues hike the past trend had always been a flood of
renewals at the old rate, followed by a temporary fall off before
membership slowly started rising again. It didn't happen however in
1995. Instead the decline was continuous and lasted for over 8 years,
not a single one of which after 1996 did the USCF realize an
operational profit.
It also did not appear to be blamable on any particular political
group, Board or ED. All of them were failures until the USCF finally
axed their B&E staff and outsourced it.
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