USITT Fellow, Life Member, and former Board Member Jean A. Montgomery has compiled a short history of USITT Regional Sections as an important piece of institutional history which helps frame the upcoming changes to Sections. Executive Director Laura Lee Everett concludes with an outline of the new Regional Section model.

A History Brief on Regional Sections of USITT from Jean A. Montgomery

A little history: The Certificate of Incorporation for USITT was signed into being October 19, 1960, in the state of New York.  The first conference was held at the Julliard School of Music, February 4-5, 1961, in very hostile weather, with 150 attendees.

Standing committees (now Commissions) held monthly meetings exploring and exchanging ideas and interests that were reported to the membership through the Newsletter. Chapters started to form in 1962-63 from regional Institute meetings held in Chicago, Boston, and Toronto and in 1964 we moved to office space in the ANTA building in New York City and finally hired a full-time secretary.

In 1971, the Institute began a change in its development and sought increased growth – trying to move away from the perception of a “New Yorkese”-based organization. The Bylaws were revised to reduce the size of the Board and give more responsibilities to officers and standing committees. In hoping to stimulate the growth of regional groups, the Bylaws included a revised portion on Regional Sections and Student Chapters. By 1986, there were 18 Regional Sections across the U.S. and Canada.

Each Section was chartered under USITT Bylaws and most formed their own Bylaws, elected or appointed their own governance structure, and operated as their own “non-profit” businesses, holding events and meetings within their regions.  Sections often had their own EINs (Employer Identification Number), bank accounts, and were only accountable to USITT for use of the national logo and reporting financial accounting. 

Occasionally Sections would receive support from the national organization for an activity, but they were not covered by insurance or liability unless taken out on their own. When the USITT Annual Conference & Stage Expo landed in its region, the Section handled registration, operations, coordination with Commissions, and programming. This began to change in the 1980s when the Institute hired the first company to manage the Expo and we entered the age of computer use for conference registration in 1987. 

USITT had also grown in membership and aspects of the liability to the Institute began to become apparent. The increasing public exposure was becoming more apparent as we moved into the 2000s. Professional staff increased in the National Office to cover aspects of the operation that in the past had been done by volunteers and in 2010, we hired our first Executive Director and entered into a long change-over in operations and redefining the responsibilities of the Board of Directors. We also entered a world that was more litigious, more precise in IRS documentation, more immediate (cell phone-dominated), etc... .  

In 2017, we hit a barrier to continuing as a large non-profit organization with an IRS 501(c)(3) tax exempt status that had several “sub-organizations” with separate 501(c)(3) statuses.  In attempting to resolve this issue, the then-Executive Director had Sections sign "affiliate agreements" that would, in theory, resolve the problem. 

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Change Continues from Executive Director Laura Lee Everett

When I took my role as Executive Director two years ago, one of the charges I was given was to vet USITT’s contracts, partnerships, and agreements. Being a new set of eyes, this is a great opportunity to ask “why” do we do what we do the way we do it regarding our practices. It is also part of doing our due diligence as a business.

In November 2023, I was able to dig into the Regional Section affiliate agreements and learn about the adoption of these agreements in 2017. In reviewing the agreements with our consulting attorney firm Barclay Damon LLC, along with our audit firm Fust Charles, LLP, they believe that the agreements do not meet current standards for coverage of either party and leave both USITT and its Regional Sections jeopardizing their Federal non-profit tax status, as well as with leaving both liable for proper insurance coverages and governance of membership. These agreements are also silent on the collection and sharing of personal information of the membership. Because of significant privacy legislation that has passed in the intervening years in various states and countries, which we must to adhere to, this is now a required piece of association policy. It became apparent a new construct would be necessary for us. 

I opened discussions with the current Section leaders on a monthly basis in 2024 and began a series of discussions with each Section to learn about their needs, challenges, and activities to facilitate the members. The biggest challenges the Section leaders reported:

• running and maintaining leadership of an independent nonprofit organization within a national nonprofit with volunteers who also have full time jobs and often other volunteer commitments;
• managing large regional constituencies that are not easily convened;
• producing events without operational support;
• managing independent finances and communications.

Additionally, several Section leaders noted a regrettable lack of engagement from organizational members in their region, particularly those with local hiring needs. The leaders believe this to be due to the lack of structure at the Section level along with limited recruitment resources.

Such limitations may be solvable under the recent revisions now in place under the National Office structure. These are operational components that the USITT staff already manages for the membership, of which Sections are an important part.

Following the model set by the Board of Directors in changing the structure of USITT to a forward facing governance organization, I am recommending changes to the Regional Section structure which would entail moving all operational components to the National Office for support, thus allowing the Section volunteers to envision and create services and programming for the members in their part of the country. There will be no difference to the programming and services for members offered by Sections under the new plan. These changes will have their operational activities managed by the National Office staff in support of the volunteer leadership in the Regional Sections.

Section leaders have been working with me and the membership staff to develop how this new model operates. The Bylaws committee has been reviewing and updating the organizational policies to align with the Bylaws of the Corporation and creating a structure for the Sections that supports continued services and opportunities to the entire membership at their regional level.

Several Sections that had gone dormant during the pandemic have reformed using this new structure, serving as our “beta testers” for the change. The Board, which has been involved in this process from the start, will review all of the finalized steps of the framework in May for implementation and Bylaws adjustments. The goal is to have all parts of the new structure in place by July 1, 2025.

This change will unify all USITT members into one national organization, supporting the members and all activities at the local, regional, and national level.

 

 

02/27/25