These are all very valid questions. I have a PayPal account set-up specifically using the yorketalkmeetup e-mail address, so that everything is separate from any of my personal finances. I do have a personal PayPal account too, but it's using a different address, and it's a different type of PayPal account. The yorkietalkmeetup PayPal account is then tied to a savings account that's only for YT meetup funds (a new savings account I opened up through Bank of America specifically for the meet-up, so there was never any confusion between YT funds and my personal funds), so it's again completely separate from any of my personal finances. I'm an auditor for the federal government, so believe me, I totally understand where you're coming from since I'm a skeptical person myself (hazard of the job, always having to audit everyone's activities :rolleyes:), but because of that being my nature, I've been very particular all along to make sure there is never a question as to the money, where it's going, etc. I even made sure I had witnesses at the meet-up when I bought my raffle tickets using my personal money, because I didn't want there to ever be a question of whether or not I paid for mine like everyone else did. They told me I was crazy to think like that, but my theory is better to be safe than sorry. In case it was brought up later, I wanted to make sure I had proof. Leave an audit trail...again...a hazard of the job. Because of my accounting background, I have spreadsheets that calculate everything from the cost of each individual plate of food (both with service fees and taxes and without) to the individual registration fees to the the overall expenses and whether we're in the red or black. I am way too organized for my own good, and believe me...my hubby wishes I wasn't :p.

As for keeping non-payers from voting - it's simple - your vote isn't counted until payment is received. When people needed to pay with check or money order for the 2008 registration, I gave them a deadline of when I needed to receive payment by, as there was a registration schedule, and I didn't want someone registering when it was one price and not sending payment for months later when it was a higher price. In this case, payment would need to be received by next Monday (as the deadline states in my original post). Most people use PayPal nowadays, so it's not really a problem, but we didn't want to exclude anyone. For anyone who sends payment and it doesn't arrive by the deadline, I would send their check back to them (unless they tell me to do otherwise). I hope that clears up your questions.

Thanks for the explaination...

Unfortunately, the only way to charge for a vote is to vote through PayPal. Otherwise, people could place their votes again here, and we would have no way of ensuring those people had sent money. We knew people would take issue with not being able to view the poll, which is why I said in my original post, "We will tally the votes, and we will post a count at the end of the poll regarding how many votes each location received and who voted for each location, so you can ensure your vote is properly counted." We thought this the best way to eliminate any suspicion. Since we will be posting a list of WHO voted for WHICH location, I don't see how this isn't fair, as you will be able to make sure YOUR name is under the correct city you voted for, and that nothing was "fishy".

The problem with having 2 meets is that it completely defeats the purpose of the meet-up. This "International YT Meet-up" began as a way for ALL of YT to get together and meet in person, and if we have 2 separate meet-ups, it would then be an "East Coast YT Meet-up" and "West Coast YT Meet-up" - not a meet-up for everyone as was the intended idea :(:(.

I just wanted to say I am sorry I do plan on trying to come but I will not be paying to vote. I just do not see what it matters.

Thank you for casting your vote! I look forward to meeting you, Ginger, and Bernie!

Yes, if the meet-up is cancelled, you will most DEFINITELY get your money back. Actually, Admin required I make a few various statements/points regarding the past meet-up, so I will make them again here, to abide by admin's rules and further eliminate any questions...

- As I've run everything past Admin to make sure we're not breaking any YT rules by requiring non-refundable registration fees and putting together a meet-up like this, they have requested I make a couple things clear, and I want to make sure I do that on their behalf. I want to make it VERY clear that this meet-up is the responsibility of the meet-up committee. We are handling all aspects and are fully responsible for it - NOT YORKIETALK. Therefore, please do not send your questions regarding the meet-up to Admin or any YT Moderators, as they are not on the meet-up committee and do not have any answers for you!

- In the event the meet-up is cancelled or does not occur for any reason (other than acts of God), your money WILL be refunded.


- Any and all extra monies gathered from this event will be donated at the conclusion of the event to a non-profit Yorkie related rescue (to be determined).

It seems that many who plan to attend do not plan to vote. I don't think your pay vote is going to be that reliable. Too bad......perhaps in the future (2009)the committee should just select a location.

I agree Judy. I would be happy with that. They did great the 1st time and I am sure will do great this time too .

IMO, it's easier to save up over almost a year a couple hundred bucks than it is to hand out $20 at the drop of a hat. Just saying.

I was one of the people who was supporting a Pay to Vote, but I think $20 is just really quite insane. I thought we had agreed on $5 or $10.

And I understand the explanation for doing a revote thing, but I don't like it. I thought we agreed that this poll was it because it's the majority. Just because people are new doesn't mean they're not serious members. This meetup is for the members of YorkieTalk, not for the members with the most posts, and I feel that voting should also reflect that.

Basically, I love how Janie worded her post, so I'll just 2nd her.

This is like a popularity contest to me. We all thought it was going to be on the West Coast, and since it was voted that it's on the East Coast, we're doing a revote to just make SURE it's not wanted on the West Coast? Sorry, it doesn't make sense to me.

Yes, it does seem that way :(:(. Unfortunately, had we just selected a location, we would be taking heat for that as well :thumbdown. We are a forum of 34,000+ members, and we cannot make everyone happy. We are trying to do it the most fair for everyone. Some wanted an additional vote, some did not. Some wanted East coast, some wanted West, some wanted Midwest again. All the committee wanted was another happy meet-up for everyone in 2009, and it's very disheartening that we have to go through all this in order to begin planning. Believe me, it would've been much easier for us to just say, "this is the 2009 location - PERIOD", but we thought this was most fair to everyone, as without each and every YTer, the meet-up will never be a success. I remind myself that we will upset people no matter what we do, and we rehashed everyone's responses from the thread last night before we ultimately voted to do a 2nd poll and the pros, cons, and logistics of doing that. I haven't seen one argument this morning that we didn't expect, but we discussed all the responses we knew we'd get on the thread, and this was what we came up with as the most fair path to take for everyone. That's all we can do. I'm sad others don't see that we're trying to do this for them, as it would be much easier for us to just pick a location, as you suggested :(.

I agree with you 100%. This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever experienced here on YT. The "committee" asked the YT community to vote, members voted, a decision was made. Did this decision not agree with the "committee" and thus, the rules were changed?

Instead of giving $20 to vote I'll donate to a charity myself and start planning a 2009 meetup on the east coast for anyone (regardless of posts or amount of time here) to attend.

I really don't see why there cannot be 2 this year :)

I voted for California. If California won, I would go, If it didn't win, I wouldn't. Does that mean I shouldn't have voted? Paying $20.00 would not change my decision not to fly across the country. I think the original poll should be used by a comittee as a "tool" to help decide the location. The poll, along with many other factors should be considered. Honestly, I think people who might have attended are probably being scared off. Sounds like a "gang-up" not a "meet-up."

In theory, I think we all agree that one International YT meet-up would be terrific!
I think this poll is the reality or we wouldn't be having a re-vote!
I would like to throw out there, that just because two meet-ups would be planned, doesn't prevent someone from attending both, if they are able and want to do that.
In all likelihood, mostly west coasters will attend the meet on their side and same for the other coast anyway. The reality is alot of people for a number of reasons can't attend " no matter " where it is! If money and time were no object, I would LOVE to be able to do that!

Thank you for your post. Please count me in for a planning committee on the East Coast. My involvement might be a bit limited - I am facing additional surgery/recovery, but I will help in what ever way I can.

"The Committee" put a vote before the YT general population. It was voted upon and Alexanderia won fair and square according to ALL of "The Committee's" voting requirements - which was to be a YT MEMBER. Not honoring this vote questions the integrity of "The Committee". Since they did not honor the first vote, what obligation are they under to honor any subsequent votes.

If this is a YT event or an event using the YT name as an incentive to attend, especially since $$ is being requested for a vote, then most certainly the Administration and/or Moderators should be the ones to house the $$ and oversee the voting.

That was my understanding. By voting...you were saying you would attend regardless of where the meet up was held.

I don't agree with having 2 meet-ups because I plan on attending regardless of which coast it ends up on. But I definitely wouldn't be able to attend 2 meet-ups in the same year. I'm sorry but I don't know if anyone's budget would allow that. And I would love to meet people from both coast. I will pay my $20 to vote, yes I did vote for the west coast. But as I said I plan on attending regardless.

If the numbers are correct, there were 107 people who voted for the east coast and 60 who voted for the west coast. If all those that voted for the east coast are really serious about attending, if they vote again then that coast will win, so they will have $20 of their registration fee paid a year in advance. :thumbup: If they don't attend, the $20 will go to a great cause, win, win in my books. :thumbup:

I really think the committee is trying to do the best they can to make this fair, but yes there is no way to ever make everyone happy. That's just life, in any situation. I applaud the committee for all their hard work and the commitment they have to making this an enjoyable event. :D

Talk about be careful for what you ask for :eek::eek:

I'm the one who first asked about a run-off vote. I did this because I was concerned about the disparity between the number of votes going between the 2 coasts. I was concerned about a low participation rate again - as I knew Lisa spent way too many hours trying to make everything work out with the number who attended in KC.

I asked about a run-off because anyone could see that the East Coast was getting more votes in total as the votes were really getting split between the 4 East Coast choices, while San Diego took the clear majority of West Coast votes. So I wondered in actuality the number of people being willing to attend the meetup.

I will most likely have to fly if I go no matter where it is - so I wasn't concerned on a personal level - more on an entire group level. But in hindsight, I see that it doesn't matter where it is - because it would be on the opposite coast the following year.

Also, in hindsight, I think it would have been best for there to have first been a poll about will you go if it's only on the east, west or you will try to be there regardless. So the committee could see what the numbers might look like.

When Alexandria won and it was clear that the majority of votes were cast for the East Coast, then I think it should have just been settled that it would be on the East Coast - I don't think we need another vote

But now we have a $20 vote - I think it's steep - I would probably have voted for $10, but for $20 - it's just too much when I still have to pay my credit card bill for KC and I was wanting to buy YT Raffle tickets - to immediately support a shelter and I was considering participating in the GE; plus I'm preparing to take a vacation and have a daughter in college -- so $20 more right now for something a year away is just out of my range. And I'll try to be there regardless of where it is.

On top of this, this morning I saw on TV that every airline is now charging $100 each way to fly with a pet; and United is increasing the fee to $125 at the end of August - and we know that means that every airline will follow suit. So flying with my yorkies could potentially cost as much as my ticket. :(

As stated in Lisa's post: http://www.yorkietalk.com/forums/2098304-post335.html YT Admin did not want to be responsible for any aspect of the meet-up. They left that up to the meet-up committee.

In all reality "fair" would be having the meet up where the MAJORITY of our YT members voted for.... Alexandria....

If the committee was trying to do what was best for the entire YT voting population, they would accept the original Poll/Vote. What guarantees do we have that a second vote will be honored, or a third vote, or any vote that does not reflect the location desired by the committee.

The money is also an issue. A list of organizations should have been provided and each voter should have the option to select the chairty that their particular donation would be donated to.

This thread is currently closed, pending further discussion...

Sukoshi's Mom organized a great YT meetup this year and we appreciate that. YorkieTalk did specifically ask that the below be included in the YorkieTalk 2008 Meetup thread:

- As I've run everything past Admin to make sure we're not breaking any YT rules by requiring non-refundable registration fees and putting together a meet-up like this, they have requested I make a couple things clear, and I want to make sure I do that on their behalf. I want to make it VERY clear that this meet-up is the responsibility of the meet-up committee. We are handling all aspects and are fully responsible for it - NOT YORKIETALK. Therefore, please do not send your questions regarding the meet-up to Admin or any YT Moderators, as they are not on the meet-up committee and do not have any answers for you!

- In the event the meet-up is cancelled or does not occur for any reason (other than acts of God), your money WILL be refunded.

However, that was for last year, and no one from the current meetup committee asked for YorkieTalk's input at all for any future meetups, nor did anyone from the committe ask for permission to have a vote in which votes would need to be paid for. As per YorkieTalk rules, anytime there is something posted that involves money, we have to use our utmost caution.

We hope to have this resolved soon. Thank you.

YorkieTalk has always supported the Meetup, even though it was conceived and brought about without YorkieTalk being involved. We do not at all take credit for Sukoshi's Mom and the rest of the committee's accomplishment of the 2008 Meetup, nor will we. We have allowed multiple meetup threads, some as stickies, many reminder threads, and allowed the meetup group to solicit YT storeowners and members for raffle items. These threads were done for our community for a YT meetup, and if it wasn't for a YT meetup, we wouldn't allow our storeowners and members to be solicited. The 2008 meetup certainly did not benefit YorkieTalk financially, nor would we see future meetups as being moneymakers for YT. This issue isn't about money, control, nor taking credit. We are simply wanting to be fair to the general YorkieTalk population.

We only asked that YT was not involved in the financial aspects, and we tried to let the committee do as it thought best for the meetup and we didn't try to interfere. The 2008 Meetup Committee made a hugely successful event for the 2008 meetup, but we did not wish to take over the meetup duties, as we know that it is indeed a lot of work, and finding another committee is more unnecessary work as well.

In fact, we did not interject nor did we try to interrupt the 2009 vote poll that the committee made, if we wanted to take over this meetup issue, we certainly could have closed or deleted the 2009 poll and stopped everything then and took over meetup duties. If we wanted, we could have just ordered a 2009 meetup in Canada if we wanted. But we did not get in the way and we didn't want to take over the meetup at all. We see no benefit of YT trying to take over something that already is working well and accomplishing a lot. It makes no sense.

We believe it is simply unfair to change the rules after the poll was over and after the committee made the rules. Most people would agree it is unfair to change the rules when there is a clear winner. There was no indication that this poll was a preliminary poll, nor were there any posts stating that there would be a another poll if the votes were close. Again, we are being as fair as we can about this, seeing as it doesn't matter to YorkieTalk at all what coast it may be.

We are sorry to hear Sukoshi's Mom and the committee no longer want to be part of the meetup committee. We appreciate their time, effort, and expertise in planning the 2008 event and thank you. We wished you could have continued with future meetups as we did specifically state we would appreciate if you and your committee to continue with the 2009 meetup efforts. We are sorry to hear you no longer want to be involved with the 2009 meetup.

Changing the vote or changing the voting system gives all Americans a bad taste, as we have seen in the past two Presidential elections.

If there was a runoff vote (without any required deposits or payments) between San Diego and Alexandria, with the large amount of east coast votes, it would seem Alexandria would win again. A vote which requires money would be a toss-up. Since the committee posted the poll and implied to all those that voted that the winner would be the actual chosen city, we believe the 2009 meetup should be held in Alexandria, VA. There were no qualifications as to the poll being a "preliminary poll" nor was there any indications that only people with a certain number of posts could vote. It was simply available for all of YorkieTalk to vote on. Changing the rules after the vote has ended makes YorkieTalk look bad and makes YT look unfair.

We also calculated the number of YT Donating Members who voted, and we believe we counted 42 for Alexandria and 33 for San Diego. We think that's also another fair way to count "legitimate" votes, although this is the Internet, and that there will be some people that say they will attend and end up not going at all. That is the nature of the Internet, and in life in general, as we have tried to organize things in the past before. Not everyone that says they will attend will attend, and sometimes emergencies or other family issues may come up between when a person posts their intent on going and when the actual event takes place.

That said, to be fair to the YorkieTalk community, the 2009 YorkieTalk Meetup will be held in.... Alexandria, VA!!!

The 2010 YorkieTalk Meetup will thus be planned for the West Coast...

If you are interested in being on a meetup committee for the 2009 Meetup, please PM us. We will try to get a group together in the next few weeks. Thank you.

We are sorry if anyone's feeling were hurt in this ordeal. That is never the intent of YorkieTalk, nor it's admins or moderators. When there is an issue that is very dear to the heart, such as this one, people can get emotional and be hurt by words and actions. We do not believe any members were intentionally trying to hurt any other member's feelings, as many have said before, sometimes the tone of the poster does not "go through" in the posts, and one can misinterpret what is said. YorkieTalk members are also very passionate, caring, and have strong feelings when there are Yorkie issues or YorkieTalk issues at hand. This is definitely one of those issues where there is strong passion.

We hope everyone can forgive what is said and done, as YorkieTalk will try to as well, since YT admins have been bashed as well, from both sides of the argument. We are sad about the entire situation as well. We would have preferred to not have had this conflict at all, as we prefer a peaceful community. Thus, we tried to make as fair a decision as WE COULD, but we know that any decision would make one side upset. We tried to see it from both perspectives and we made arguments for both sides and then we made a final decision. We are sorry if you are upset with our decision, but any more lingering or arguing or voting would cause even more pain and hurt. Thus we made a decision on the location for the 2009 YorkieTalk Meetup, which will be held in Alexandria, VA and we are sticking with our decision.

We again would like to thank the 2008 Meetup Committee for their dedication, hard work, countless hours, and effort they put into making the meetup a success. Without them, there certainly would not have been a meetup at all, and even members seeing pictures and video of the event can tell, it was a wildly successful, fun, and exciting event. It has showed a lot of members how great a large YT meetup is. YorkieTalk will not hold anything against any members who have said negative things about YT from this situation. We hope we can all move along, and enjoy YorkieTalk as we have had in the past.

We hope everyone can attend the 2009 YorkieTalk Meetup and have a great time!