of directors on April ord. this:
■' T1 G Association c t the present
tire, judged by all reasonable
coot crat5vc standards, is an or
ganization In na: c only, O’.mlng
no facilities, having no author
ity, and with no future except
the honest losiro of those people
who wore and are responsible ft r
its cxiatanco. The actual organ
ization is c aitrary to all coop
er.-:tivo principles in that, it is
organized fror. the top down in
stead of fr :>r the botton up, ho
one car a; orient is provided for the
mo: bors to become working partners
With the inter..st of the organiza
tion at heart.11’
I 1'urt1 or pointed cut that,'*1 In
anv program fer the successful
develop nent of this or any other
cocp "a ^ w c , thes con li t i 'ns
must be corrected. This is net -
pccvli .r to this cooperative but
is r. fundamental law of all co
operatives that met be adhered to
or invite disaster."
I base1 that report u on the fact
that"although the tracing post,
garage, and warehouse w. s being
operating under the none of the
cooper: tivo and paid dividends to
the. members and returned to the
organisation a reserve fund yet
the board of directors who are
your duly elected r rosentives
could not hire or fire one cler^:
they could not buy a can of beans
and ha'3 n thing to say about the
bookkeeping or a'Trdnistrntion in
any way. The mothc. of doing
business is net cooperative.
The reason for this condition is
that all authority has been trans
ferred by 'virtue of the agency
agreement, instead of working to
ward building a cooperative you
have let the tail wag the dog.
When I was hired it was my under
standing then that the intentions
were to make this a complete co
operative sot up. for t he first
two months during the absence of
Mr.Sheely I strongly doughted if
this idea was shared by anyone -
except the members themselves.
Hot only did 1 dought that this
idea existed witn otners out
my impression was that there
might be deliberate opposition
and rid.icr.lo upon the part of
some, j spent quite a little time
visiting among you and I critized
quite soverly so I could get your
reactions and the only reason I
sent for* my family and decided to
stay was because 1 failed to find
one single case where a member
did not want a cooperative setup.
To rac Cooperation is more than
just a business activity it is a
religion and it must originate
from tho bottom up. You cannot
learn to operate a cooperative by
letting some one else do the work
for you any more than you can
learn to swim, by sitting on a
river bank, I am not making these
statements with the intentions
of criticising anyone, It is
my o-k-rs tending that the nctho.d
ohkgjir.itin Washington and the
direction for the operation largely
ear,lc from thero. pfaybe the method
they used was justified in tho
beginning, however what 1 wish to
point out is this that there never
has boon and novc-r will be a co
operative that could operate from
tho top down successfully.
When I arrived here I found that
there has been some discussion re
garding the taking over of the
trading post, I know that some of
you may of thought that to advo
cate the taking over of these pro
ducer and manufacturing units,
which'were loosing money was
wrong, that it was bettor to take
over the ones that were making
money. That may be right but i
still believe that- the creamery,
produce, meat, and egg departments
mean more to you as farmers than
tho retail units. The store and
garage could burn down tonight
and you could still get along
but the units that handle your
crops are a necessity.
Tho deal that had its beginning
with tho administration of the
producers units and has just re
cently been further strenght.oriod
with the complete turn over of
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