Ranks of regional service groups decline

Some groups have managed to stabilize their declining numbers.

By TIM YOVICH

VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF

BARRY MAZARIK ISN’T A JOINER. But feeling the desire to help others, the 48-year-old Cortland resident joined the Lions Club in Cortland this March.

“What’s so hard about giving up a couple hours of your time so somebody can have eyeglasses?” said Mazarik.

The Lions are best known for helping those with sight problems. In 1925, Helen Keller challenged Lions to become “knights of the blind in the crusade against darkness.”

Mazarik lived in Warren and volunteered at his church festivals. When he moved his family to Cortland in 1993, he became interested in Lakeview Band Boosters because his daughters played in the band. He eventually became its president and learned about the community’s willingness to give.

Other than the boosters and joining a summer campground along Lake Erie, Mazarik hasn’t been a joiner.

Being forced to retire from Delphi Packard Electric after 291⁄2 years, Mazarik had more time on his hands and decided to join the Lions.

“It’s a pretty good group of guys,” Mazarik said.

Lions Club members must be asked to join.

Danny Pedigo, Cortland Lions president, said membership has remained stable over the 68-year history of the local group, which numbers 47.

“We’ve done fairly well over the years,” Pedigo said, noting that as older members die, younger men are asked to join. This leaves a pretty good mix of new and old ideas.

Trouble with membership

Mazarik is unusual because he has joined such a group. Today, veterans organizations and fraternal and social groups in the Mahoning and Shenango valleys are finding it difficult to attract new members.

Some, however, have been able to stabilize their membership decline.

Michael Psznick, director of the Trumbull County Veterans Service Commission, said membership is just being maintained in such groups as the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars and Disabled American Veterans.

He said younger people have too much going on in their lives to join veterans organizations.

“We should have a ton of guys coming in,” Psznick said of the large number of soldiers, sailors and Marines who have served in the Iraq war.

To recruit more members, posts are offering to forgo dues for the first year.

“I don’t think they understand what the posts do,” Psznick said, noting they aren’t aware of how the veterans groups “help champion their cause” and become involved in community programs.

Psznick points to his American Legion Post 540 in Cortland. From January through mid-May, its honor guard — comprising members from up to four other posts — participated in 88 funerals. In 2006, the guard honored 189 veterans at their graves.

“They are a dedicated group,” Psznick said, noting they are an older group themselves.

Roger Gardner, who has been Post 540 commander for 15 years, said post membership has dropped from 200 to 153 since he became commander.

“We’re getting new members,” Gardner said, noting Vietnam veterans are joining as they get older.

Barry Landgraver, Psznick’s counterpart in Mahoning County, agreed that membership in veterans groups “isn’t as good as some people would want.”

He called attention to those who have served in Vietnam and the Persian Gulf who aren’t joiners, as opposed to World War II and Korean War veterans who flooded the ranks of veterans groups.

“Maybe they’ll join when they get older and see the need,” Landgraver said.

Bouncing back

The Ohio State Moose Association has stabilized its membership, said Dwaine Brown, a Moose regional manager in Galion.

Official membership had declined by several thousand because the civic organization cleared its rolls of nonpaying members. Brown said that through recruitment and making improvements to its lodges, membership rose, with 90,000 men and 40,000 women in Ohio.

One of the tools used by the Moose Association to recruit is offering organization logo jackets to a member who brings in seven new members, he said.

All is to support its missions: Mooseheart, a facility to care for children outside of Chicago, and a facility for senior Moose members in Orange Park, Fla.

A study at Indiana University, released in 2005, shows that traditional membership organizations — such as fraternal societies, veterans and civic groups and fraternal organizations — have lost members.

Almost half, or 47 percent, of mutual benefit groups, including veteran and fraternal organizations, have decreased membership, as did a third of civic and recreational groups.

One reason for stagnation, the study says, may be related to how long a group has existed. Most mutual benefit and civic associations were established under community conditions that were radically different from what they are today.

In some respects, the study found, it’s easier to start a new organization than to change an existing one because the older groups have well-established traditions.

A big drop in membership

Elks Lodge 295 in Warren is a prime example.

Lodge 295 had a membership of 2,300 in the 1970s. It now stands at 225.

A lodge officer points to other activities by former members that took priority in their lives.

“We’re hoping to make the turn,” William Kush, lodge secretary, said of a handful of new members. They are letting potential members know of Lodge 295’s restaurant, bar and swimming pool.

He noted that the lodge swim team is its selling point.

Kush said he is also hoping to overcome negative publicity the lodge received April 1998, when a raid on the Youngstown Road building netted numerous gambling-related items, including video gambling machines, tip tickets, punch boards and accounting records showing gaming profits.

The lodge, Kush said, is slightly attracting members who want to help with lodge charities, such as helping hospitalized veterans and the Children’s Rehabilitation Center in Howland.

“We’re doing some good work out there,” he said.

Howard Glovier, secretary of the Valley of New Castle (Pa.), 32nd Degree Scottish Rite, has seen the Masonic organization plummet from 15,000 members to the current 5,000-plus membership.

“We’re losing at the rate of 3 [percent] to 4 percent annually,” Glovier, of New Castle, Pa., said.

Glovier attributes the dip in membership in not only Masonic lodges, but in veterans and civil groups, to the public’s reaction to Vietnam War veterans and to demanding corporations.

An Army veteran, Glovier said the drop began in the mid-1960s as veterans returned from Vietnam, and many were shunned, being called “baby killers.” The same holds true for veterans of the Iraq war, he said, who are being ordered to fight in an unpopular war.

The other factor, Glovier said, is the corporate culture: Corporations once encouraged their managers to get involved in community service, but they now require them to work longer hours.

The work of veterans, social and fraternal groups is now being carried out by fewer people.

Glovier recently saw a sign advertising a fund-raising event for a volunteer fire department. At the bottom of the sign, it called attention to the department’s need for members.

“People don’t even want to protect their own homes,” Glovier said.

Little Lions

The Lordstown Lions Club has only 23 members, a severe drop from the 116 it had in 1980, said Bill Krempasky of Howland, a Lordstown Lion member and former club secretary.

The 23 is actually an increase from the 16 members it had in 2004. Krempasky said the decline is because family activities take up so much of a man’s life.

“We’re small but we’re tough,” Krempasky said of the group, which holds fundraisers for charities.

One way of recruiting future members, Krempasky said, is through the creation of the Little Lions, a group of 7- to 11-year-olds — some children of members and others who just show up to help.

“It’s a good group of kids,” he said, noting it’s also a platform to get their fathers to join the Lions.

As the Lions hold events to raise money, the Little Lions sell hot dogs, soft drinks and baked goods alongside them.

Last year, the kids earned $150 and donated it to charities.

yovich@vindy.com