The Alumni Advisory Group has worked closely with the chapter to help them over the near-term membership challenge and allow them to re-establish themselves as a strong fraternity. We will need help from as many alumni as possible to be fully successful. We have identified four immediate issues that cannot be overcome without an alumni financial investment.
- The chapter’s size does not enable it to fill the house and generate enough income to meet operating expenses. Contributions are necessary to help meet chapter house annual expenses for the 2021-22 school year, specifically taxes and property insurance.
- The property has developed a substantial maintenance backlog that needs immediate attention. Select repairs will be contracted out, such as replacement of gutters and electrical repairs. Additionally a team of alumni and students will be working together over the summer to thoroughly clean the house and make many cosmetic repairs, including refinishing floors, minor carpentry, and interior and exterior painting. We are minimizing the number of people living in the house over the summer to make this easier to do.
- To make the public areas of the house more compelling for recruiting and more usable to the members, we strongly believe that an investment in some furniture for the public areas of the chapter house is necessary. We will be looking for some rugged furniture to enhance to the public areas and show the chapter as an up and coming organization.
- To prepare for the future, we plan to build a modest reserve to support developing a long-term renovation and capital campaign plan. Critical is funding an annual communication plan through the UVA Alumni Association to build alumni engagement with the Chapter.
We have evaluated these issues and established an annual campaign goal for the 2021- 2022 school year of $60,000. The objective of the annual campaign is to sustain the chapter through a very challenging time and allow the brothers to grow the chapter back to a sustainable size. We will begin laying the groundwork for a capital campaign to renovate the chapter house and support the chapter over the long term.