The coming 2009–2010 season looks to be one that reflects the ancient Chinese curse: “May you live in interesting times!” There are rumblings and changes afoot at STC, changes that will affect this chapter and all its members.

Before I get into the future of the chapter, I’d like to express my personal thanks and extend a huge vote of confidence to Poppy Quintal for steering STC-Montreal through the last year. Poppy did a great job as President in 2008–2009 and I want to congratulate her for two accomplishments in particular:

• First, Poppy went above and beyond her usual presidential duties and helped member Ahmed Ibrahim run a highly successful publications competition, one that resulted in three of our local entries earning awards of excellence and four earning awards of merit.
• Second, Poppy did not sign an international affiliation agreement between the Montreal chapter and the Society. STC-Montreal has been registered as a non-profit organization in Quebec for nearly 25 years, and has a strong sense of autonomy and independence. I’ll expand below on why I think maintaining our group’s independence will be a good thing. Many thanks for your tireless efforts, Poppy!

Earlier this year, informal reports began to circulate throughout the STC forums about the “State of the STC” message that was delivered during Leadership Day activities at the Atlanta convention. Society Board Chairperson Cindy Currie and Executive Director/CEO Susan Burton reported massive financial losses of up to $1.2 million USD for the current year.

Subsequent communications from the Society confirmed the scale of the financial crisis. Society activists, staff, chapter/SIG leaders and Board members are working hard to come up with both tactical and strategic planning to handle the shortfall. Few decisions have been made at this point, but from the direction of the discussion, we expect to see a large increase in member fees, and a corresponding series of cuts to some services that STC provides at the Society level.

In addition, all chapters were asked to use a common budgeting approach for the next 18 months of chapter activities. If any chapter has a budget surplus, the Society requests that the chapter remit those surplus funds to the Society in order to pay immediate bills.

STC member Bill Swallow took the initiative to open an “STC Ideas” discussion forum on the web using Ning. It can be found at stcideas.ning.com and I urge every Montreal member to check it out, sign up, and contribute positive ideas for STC change. The STC Board and office are following the Ning postings, and it has become the de facto common discussion tool as the fiscal crisis progresses.

Canadian chapter leaders have conferred, and together have questioned the propriety and legality of remitting chapter funds to the Society. The Canadian chapters have begun discussing ways to collaborate more closely at a national level. The facts that 1) STC-Montreal is registered independently as a non-profit in Quebec, and 2) has not signed STC’s affiliation agreement both serve to give our group real flexibility to negotiate new relationships with our sister Canadian chapters and with the Society. These discussions are continuing, and there is a strong consensus across Canada that Canadian STC chapters need to redefine how they interact with the Society. STC-Montreal will keep our members informed of developments as they occur, so stay tuned.

Despite the budgetary pressures, STC-Montreal still plans to offer a full year of events. We have another inter-association event coming up in October — this time sponsored by PWAC — that should provide some great learning and networking opportunities across many Montreal writer’s groups. We will still have social events, evening speaker meetings, and a series of day-long workshops. Watch the chapter web site for announcements, or subscribe to our email announcements or RSS feed.

The rate of change in STC has accelerated hugely, and 2009-2010 will be a year of transitions, guaranteed. I hope you join me in hanging on as we zoom through the whitewater.

Everett Larsen — President, STC Montreal
29 July 2009