The American Endurance Ride Conference represents endurance riders from the United States and Canada. We have approximately 165 members residing in Canada. AERC riders from Canada are located in the Northwest, Mountain, Midwest and Northeast regions. It is very difficult for the Canadians to place in their regional standings without significant travel to the United States.

I would like our board of directors and membership to consider making Canada a region of their own. Some people get confused, thinking this will cause the Canadians to travel to rides all across the entire country of Canada in order to place in their region, but that is not how it works. Nothing would change on which rides count for points in their regional standings as all AERC-sanctioned rides count from any region.

AERC has been looking for ways to increase our membership. Canada has a vast resource of endurance riders who do not join AERC. Since many of the endurance rides that are held in Canada are not AERC-sanctioned riders do not have much incentive to do so. This would be very discouraging when only a portion of the rides add up for rider/horse mileage and regional points in the AERC standings.

By adding the Canadian Region, it would be my hope that we would gain more members in Canada and in return more AERC-sanctioned rides as riders would have more of a chance to be in their regional standings without having to cross the border for so many of their rides.

I would hope that Canadian rides would be sanctioned with both Equine Canada and AERC just as rides in different regions are sanctioned with their regional organizations or sanctioned with AHA or FEI.

The Canadians have a limited ride season due to longer winter months, making it hard for them to compete with other members in their region (as it stands now) that have a longer riding season. The smaller regions offer just three placings in each weight division, plus regional LD mileage, which would give the Canadians a goal to aim towards.

I believe this could be a win-win situation for both the AERC and the Canadian riders but would initially come with some expense to AERC. It takes a vote to amend our bylaws in order to change the number of directors and regions as listed below in bylaw 7.02.

In order to keep the number of directors at the same amount that we have now, we could vote at the same time to decrease the number of directors-at-large by two, taking that down to six.

I would advise this be a five-year trial and would like the vote on the amendment to state that if, at the end of five years (listing a date), the Canadian Region has fewer than 340 members, the bylaws would revert to what it reads now and the Canadian Region would be divided in the same manner as it is now. (Our smallest region at this time is the Southwest Region with 340 members, thus the reason for using the 340 minimum as the set number).

I would like to hear your comments in the next couple of months on this subject as our mid-year meeting is going to be held this August in Denver and we would like to have a in-depth discussion on this after receiving your input.

Excerpts from AERC bylaws:

4.03. The geographic subdivisions of the United States of America and adjacent areas of Canada as defined by the Board shall be known as Regions. No Region may consist solely of one state or a portion thereof. The boundaries between Regions may be adjusted by the Board, but the addition or elimination of Regions and subsequent change in number of Regional Directors shall require the approval of the Membership.

5.02. The Conference shall have three classes of Members: Regular Members, Affiliate Members, and Special Members. The Board shall determine the classification and privileges, other than voting rights, of these memberships.

(a) Regular Member. A Member who is a citizen or resident alien of the United States of America or Canada, and who holds no other membership in the Conference shall be a Regular Member.

7.02. The authorized number of Directors of this Conference shall be 26 until changed by a duly adopted amendment to this Bylaw. These Directors will be proportioned as follows:

(a) Regional Directors shall be elected by the Voting Members in their respective Regions, with two Directors from each of the nine Regions.

(b) Directors-at-Large shall be elected by all the Voting Members in the Conference, and shall number eight Directors.