Hello,

If you have been a member of Prairie Fire for very long, you know I don't send emails to the entire group often, so that indicates how important I believe this information is!  To begin, thank you for your membership.  Our group is a great way to meet friends, whether you are new in town, or have lived here for a long time.  But there are a few simple ways we can all make it a better experience for ourselves and other members:

1. Please attend events!  Believe it or not, of the 524 members we have today, over 400 of us have never attended a single event.  If you're one of those 400, why haven't we met you yet?  If you don't see something on our calendar, it's incredibly easy to add an event yourself.  If you have trouble setting up your event, email me (Scott) and I would be happy to help.  All we ask is that you be available to reply to questions as the host, and actually attend the event.  Just imagine how many great things would fill our calendar if everybody posted an event!

2.  We collect dues for one purpose:  to pay meetup.com for this website (which is based on the number of members, currently just under $200 per year).  Dues used to be $5 per year, but we have a enough leftover that I reduced them to $4 per year (plus 87 cents which is kept by WePay as a processing fee if you pay online with a credit card).  If you don't pay dues, you can remain a member, but meetup will not allow you to RSVP for an event until you are paid up.  Also, we would rather have your event ideas than the $4, so you get six months of free membership if you host an event.  The six months must be entered manually, and I easily forget, so please email me if I don't add the appropriate time to your membership.

3.  Super Important:  If you do RSVP for an event, please attend or change your RSVP!  For some events, a group is waiting for you at a trailhead to start a hike when you don't show up.  Worse yet, some events have limited attendance, so your RSVP prevents others from going.  Because somebody forgot to tell us they couldn't come to the latest wine pairing dinner, we had an empty seat that could have been taken by one of the people on the waiting list.  We also had several interested in attending the Locked Manhattan escape room, but they were told the event was full because a spot was taken by a "no-show" member.

4.  To keep the group running, we do need a few people willing to help manage the group.  We need somebody willing to type a short personal greeting when new members join.  We need somebody else to designate the "event host" when a member adds an event, so others know who to ask if they have questions.  If you are willing to help, please let me know.

5.  This should be obvious, but we are not here to share our political or religious views, or to try to sell something to other members.  Doing things together means we will patronize restaurants and other local businesses.  But hosting a meetup event such as a Tupperware party would be inappropriate.  If you have a conversation at an event that happens to lead to your small business, that's fine.  But if your primary purpose for hosting or attending an event is to announce your business or organization, you're in the wrong place.

6.  Last, please know that you can change your email settings from meetup.  Near the upper right corner of every page is a drop-down menu with "Settings."  I am often asked why somebody did not receive an email, or why they receive more email than they want.  I cannot change your settings for you, only you have access to that information.

Thanks!

Scott