Betty Soennichsen

2007-2009

In CalRTA we’ve always talked of the need to increase membership.  In 2007 when Betty was president, she decided to really DO something about it.  That was our main emphasis during her two years as President.   Something new and different?  A least, the approach was different.  She had a BIG contest with lots of publicity and lots of participation–all divisions participated, as well as staff and our vendors.  And lots of prizes—all of then contributed by our vendors.  First prize was a cruise for two to Hawaii!

Betty had hoped to stop the membership decline and instead show an increase over the previous year. That didn’t happen, but we did have a much smaller decline, and we did have a 42% increase in the number of new members over the previous year.   In addition, she got all divisions talking about increases, and trying new things and getting more members involved in the actual work of recruiting.  Many of the good ideas that came out of the contest were around for years afterward, still motivating our members to add to our membership.

The following year she held two membership symposiums to focus on membership recruitment at the division level where the actual work and accomplishment occurs.  These generated greater motivation in the divisions.

Betty and CalRTA  got the governor to back down on his attempt to reduce the state’s contribution to the CalSTRS Supplemental Benefit Maintenance Account, and CalRTA got him to raise the purchasing power protection to 85%.

The lawsuit we had against the state was settled resulting in a $500 million payment to CalSTRS from the state to pay back that amount that they had withheld from CalSTRS SBMA.  CalRTA also received 10% interest.

CalRTA continued to work to repeal the Social Security penalties—the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset.  We got more cosponsors of the House bill, and had hearings in both houses.  We activated a federal coalition of the states most affected by the penalties, and will be working with them.

A new logo was adopted, at the same time changing CRTA to CalRTA.