This is a wonderful time of the year with festive parties, gatherings of friends and family and get togethers in the winter cold made warm by all this cheer and spirit of the holy season. I want to wish all of you and your families a Warm and Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and all the blessings throughout the year.

This year has been an exciting year for MAC. Full of challenges and yet our MAC members have responded in full force. I can’t thank you enough for all of our members participation. We have faced changes in our judging guidance and “opening of the gates” for a new concept, the Open Class, which in my view has created a means for owners of later model Corvettes to show their pride and participate in new classes of judging and display. At our Lindsay judging event we had Open Class Judged Cars, many judges attended, and we worked our way through it successfully.

We also met the challenge of adjusting our bylaws to meet the corporate charter laws of West Virginia, where MAC was incorporated, led by Ed Szeliga and a seasoned team of MAC veterans including Jim Moxley, Don LaRue, and Don Hooper. The team undertook a year long process to update MAC Board of Director’s (BOD) responsibilities, match BOD processes with WV incorporated laws, and get our bylaws on consistent footing with other chapters and best practices. Not only did Ed and team make a thorough effort, but MAC members voted in unprecedented numbers to accept the bylaw revisions with a 120 “For” to 3 “Against”, and the changes were approved effective Nov 19th, 2025. What a tremendous response from the Bylaw Committee and our members.

We’ve faced other challenges including the aging-out of our veteran judging teams. Pat Callahan, our Judging Chair, and our first team of judging candidates answered the call. We now have our 1st graduates of an 8 module Judging Class that have gone thru extensive coursework in scoresheet evaluation, CDCIF, Standard Deductions and actual practice on the-job at Pop Up and Judging Meets. We have secured a toehold on a new class of judges, seasoned through academics and practice that should supply qualified judges for our meets for many years. Matter of fact, our new class for 2026 is almost filled up and ready to go.

Transitions for aging, changes in NCRS judging, and chapter member activity desires will be a continual challenge getting the right mix. We know about 1/3 of our members are active in Judging Meets, while others like get-togethers for cars and friends. We are always changing our Road Tours, and have found new, successful routes. We have invested in the MAC Tent at Carlisle, and a great number of guests enjoyed the upgrades in power, fans, and cold drinks. Our recruiting has also enjoyed success this year with 20 new members. We have drops in membership for members moving to a different location, folks selling their cars and passing of senior members, now we have more recruiting tools and venues to address these annual changes in membership

So, we’ll be taking a hard look at new social activities. More activities in population centers like Harrisburg, Fairfax, Maryland, Prince William, Richmond, Virginia Beach, and outer regions. We’ve created a new Senior Advisory Committee for our members, so they can plan meaningful social activities and present ideas to the BOD that capture our members experience and put it to good use for the chapter.

We also faced additional challenges and our veterans responded. We had a sudden change in the Vice Chair position, and a veteran stood up and volunteered. Our Website and Member Data Base fell into disrepair over six months, and veteran Jim Erickson responded to update it. Veteran Pete Rutledge volunteered to take those duties, and he will be working to provide more information on the website including member car information and more for event activities.

Another challenge was finding a suitable location for a planned MAC Regional event in Spring of 2028. We initially started with a look at Williamsburg, but difficulties with the township contract, 25 pages, and three rounds of negotiation proved too complicated. Considering our recruiting team building going on now, volunteers and cars projected for judging more than two years out, our BOD reached out to the Tri-State Chapter. I’m pleased to report we will collaborate with the Tri-State Chapter on Altoona, PA for our 2028 Regional Meet. We plan to support Tri-State in their 2026 Altoona Regional as a “sub”, and then “prime” the 2028 MAC event with Tri-State help and participation. This makes sense for so many reasons: Blair County Convention Center in Altoona is a mature, dependable site that has been successful every time, multi-chapter support for owners, cars, and people, a 1½ page contract proven reliable with decades of use, and time to address our volunteer support.

What does all this mean? That MAC will continue to be a viable organization for many, many years in the future, our financial books are secure, and a GIANT positive: that time and time again MAC members have shown they will always respond in a positive manner to change and support our chapter. I am very proud of our membership. Thanks to All!!