Simon Winter posted:It's a no brainer. Allow the public into the dealer halls for whatever fee the Eastern Division sets. If they want to go into the member halls, charge them a fee ABOVE what the member cost for the meet is, and give them the option of joining the TCA. If they join the TCA, they (the Eastern Divivsion) could` allow an appropriate part of that extra fee charged for access to the member halls to go toward their TCA membership. I don't know the breakdown of expenses for the Eastern Division of the TCA, but a buck is a buck. It will help defray Eastern Division expenses, and maybe get you some new members.
If they get to see what is going on in the member halls, it might persuade them to join.
Simon
1) It's NOT a no-brainer. Allowing the public into the member halls by just paying a large fee eliminates the "member to member" nature of the transactions for tax purposes. It's got nothing to do with how much money you charge to let public into the member halls, it's that they need to be members to maintain that situation for the tax man to be happy without forcing every member to obtain a tax number for PA and file for each meet. Member does not equal dealer or business in most cases.
2) The public can participate as a GUEST one time to obtain access to the member halls to see what is there. That hasn't changed (also OK with the tax man per long ago agreement we all take for granted).
