State of the Association Address from the President

Dear Fellow Association Members,

It is my honor to address all of you as your elected President of the Southern Association of Forensic Scientists.  The past year under Tammy Jergovich has seen wonderful improvements to the Association website and newsletter.  I want to be the first to congratulate her on her efforts and service to the Association.  However, as chair of the Consultant Committee I trust her efforts are not entirely over.

To continue this work I will continue the appointment of Jesse Brown as the Communications Committee Chair with Keith McMahan as Newsletter Editor.  I have also chosen individuals for the Communications Committee based on their own individual commitment and potential for SAFS.  Already the Communications Committee has received $4000 in corporate donations toward the second phase of the website that involves a database for drugs and related compounds (please see the website for additional details).  I foresee that trend expanding in the direction of databases for other forensic disciplines in trace evidence if the drug expansion is popular.  I know the Communications Committee will continue to serve us well as we further develop the website to serve the Association and forensic scientists everywhere.

There are a few issues facing our Association that need attention in the upcoming year.

Most significant is the status of our Association as a non-profit entity.  I have contacted the Internal Revenue Service and re-activated our non-profit status, but more is needed.  There are new rules and filings for non-profits that we must abide by to avoid federal and state tax implications.  Also, we need to locate all of the records for our Association for compliance.  I will be in contact with the Consultant Committee and the Secretary to address these issues, but if you have any information please contact myself, or any member of the Consultant Committee.

Our website gives us the ability to communicate and conduct our business in a fashion not dreamed of when the By-laws were written.  Additionally, our Association membership has proposed several revisions to our By-laws over the last few meetings.  Because our By-laws require physical presence to call a vote we have been unable to make any significant changes.  To remedy both of these issues I have formed a Constitutional Committee with Lynn Henson as chair.  This committee will work closely with the Consultant Committee to re-write our Association By-laws to reflect the use of the website as a communications hub, and to allow for such conveniences as electronic voting and conferencing.  This will greatly expedite our ability to do our business even if you cannot make a meeting.

Our membership is waning.  At the last meeting we actually had more people scheduled to be dropped from membership than we had applicants.  We need to reverse this trend.  I believe the best way to accomplish this is to make the Association useful to the membership by providing the training and services that are so needed across our lab systems.  To help in this function I have created a Training Committee to be lead by our current Vice-President, Larry Peterson, and staffed by four previous Special Program Chairs of our Annual Meetings.  The goal of this committee will be to generate consistent training opportunities for our membership, and to assist the Social and Program chairs for each of our annual meetings.  I also charge the Membership Committee to come up with ways to market our association and website to the laboratory systems in our region.  Only through active participation will our Association become an active player in the advancement of forensic science.

Because our Association is in a state of drastic change I have staffed many of the other Committees required by our current By-laws with the Consultant Committee members.  This action was not done to limit the input of the membership, but only to streamline our efforts to get our communication on the web.  I know that our Association leadership is heavy on the Georgia side right now, but I don't want that to hold you back from participating.  We need active, enthusiastic members from all over the region now more than ever.  If you have skills to offer please volunteer to assist any of the committees that are working for positive change in our Association.  Please make the website a favorite and frequent stop as we transition our business there.  I encourage you to contact me and give me feedback on these changes.

Robert J. Ollis Jr.
SAFS President