A Message From Your FCSLA Board of Directors

Challenging Times Call for Careful Management of FCSLA Assets

People are often surprised to learn that the First Catholic Slovak Ladies Association has assets over a half-billion dollars. That's the amount of funds we manage on behalf of our members, who have invested with us through the purchase of annuities and insurance certificates. All told, we have 85,000 members—individuals who trust us to safeguard their investments in FCSLA and make sure those funds are available to help support them in their old age, or when a death occurs in their family.

That's an enormous responsibility, and one that we take extremely seriously. Currently, we're fortunate to have a highly skilled and deeply experienced management team in place to make sure your money is invested wisely and watched carefully—something that's even more challenging in today's volatile economy. But with our current method of electing our top officers, there is no guarantee that individuals with comparable skills will manage our organization in the future. That puts your investment—and our entire organization's operation at high risk in the coming years.

Your Board is recommending that we adopt a more reliable method of selecting the managing officers. That process would place the responsibility of choosing the president with the Board of Directors. The president would hire the secretary, treasurer and editor with the approval of the Board. The Board will oversee the goals and direction of the association. Clearly, the most important positions are those of the members of the Board—those persons elected by our delegates.

Currently, the possibility exists that someone with limited experience or qualifications could be elected to our most important management positions. As a result, on both of their last two regularly scheduled examinations, the Ohio Department of Insurance recommended that we reduce the risk to our society by revising our governance structure.

The delegates to our special convention this October will be asked to approve this important change. When it passes we will be joining other successful fraternal benefit organizations that have moved in this direction. The move will put us among leaders in our field who are wisely changing their governance structure to meet the challenges of our times.

If you have questions about the bylaw change, you are welcome to contact President Mary Ann Johanek directly at (216) 468-1011, or by email at maryann@fcsla.com. We ask you to watch our new video, which explains the need for the governance change and how the proposed change will identify duties and responsibilities of board members. For more information about FCSLA's financial stability, please view our current Annual Report of Financial Highlights that is available on our Web site. Please continue to check back to our Web site for more information about the governance bylaw change.