text: In reply to message1844: As a State leader, I indeed know what it means to make hard decisions. I also hail from a walk of life so few would understand or fathom if given explanation, but here's the kicker.... 'No one cares' because NONE of this is about 'me'. It's about my state, what we're going through. What we can do as a team, and yes that does sound like thing's National wants to here but here's another kicker.... unlike National, our state leadership has SHOWN up. Has been PRESENT, and/or made a solid effort to somehow SUPPORT every zone's individual effort in activities. This is the part where I say, 'no offense' because I get it. It's hard to be everywhere at once and there's no harm no foul largely. We've almost always subscribed to the "help is not coming' moniker and knew we were responsible for our own. So we've built, we've pushed, we've pressed. We've set the bar and either reached or over shot it out of our own abilities and expectations. (And most times we've exceeded those expectations.) Sure, we're not perfect and will never claim to be, but we look around and considering our of deficiencies, we still seem well ahead of many curves. (This is the part where I again say no offense, we're not better than anyone, just doing our own thing. We have our own pros/cons and we're working on them.) The point is, every step of the way transparency has be paramount in what I'd personally consider a success of this state's role. One person didn't build Colorado, WE built it. And WE will continue to build it even if we roll on without some national brand name in our title. WE are Colorado. Not 'me'. Not him/her. WE. If I'm talking about 'me' right now I'll simply offer an opinion from my own witnessing right in this chat. And that is, that I suspect much of the reason these other states have left is because a rift of National vs. states, (i.e. "us vs them") has been created. "National is there to make the hard decisions". Your own words. Well, Colorado makes some pretty hard decisions, but we damn sure value every zone and every members input on those decisions and take them into consideration. We don't run a dictatorship here. We're not democrats making a mob rule decision. Everything is factored, and no decision is easy, but the leadership certainly doesn't put ego above newbie concern. It's take us a while to get where we're at and it's taken a great deal of ousting dictatorial douche bags to do so. But here we are. In our own eyes fumbling along and yet somehow killing it with every voice heard and every vote counting.