NAIFA Reschedules Key Bylaws Vote For May

The National Association for Insurance and Financial Advisors rescheduled a key vote on streamlining organization bylaws for May.

The vote was to take place Sunday at the conclusion of NAIFA's annual meeting in Orlando, Fla., but the entire conference was canceled due to Hurricane Irma. Proposed changes are significant, but necessary to revitalize NAIFA, officials say.

NAIFA once boasted about 140,000 members, but is down to about 30,000 today, outgoing president Paul Dougherty said recently.

The board’s proposal of a new set of NAIFA Bylaws includes three main goals:

1. Creates a NAIFA federation structure with chapter relationships between national, state and local affiliates.
2. Establishes standards for successful NAIFA associations that all are accountable for at the national, state, and local level.
3. Move to one consistent dues amount nationwide.

The NAIFA Board of Trustees voted Wednesday to convene a business meeting on May 22 in Washington, D.C. Members are expected to gather that day for the association's Congressional Conference, said Sheila Owens, vice president of communications and marketing.

Also Wednesday, the board named Keith M. Gillies, chief executive officer of United Wealth Advisors Group in LaPlace, La., as its new president.

“This is an important and exciting year for NAIFA, as we focus on continuing to implement our NAIFA 20/20 strategic plan and look forward to gaining approval to launch its second phase, the NAIFA Quality Member Experience,” Gillies said in a statement. “I am honored to serve NAIFA at such a meaningful time in our association’s history."

Big Changes Needed

Circumstances are requiring that NAIFA change, Dougherty said in an August interview with InsuranceNewsNet.

“The question is whether or not NAIFA looks different in the future based on our recommendations to take positive steps or if we simply let it change due to atrophy,” he said. “We’ve lost over 20 percent of our local organizations since 2010. It was simply due to the lack of resources at the local level, in both volunteer strength, as well as the financial resources to be able to keep those organizations going.”

Under the new federation structure, each state NAIFA chapter would manage the administrative functions for all NAIFA affiliates in that state.

That means doing and filing tax returns and purchasing directors and officers insurance, Dougherty said. As it stands, NAIFA has 517 different entities performing separate administrative functions.

“This would give us a chance to pool the administrative resources from a financial level moving forward,” Dougherty said. “There was often a great deal of duplication.”

The dues change is also a big issue. Present membership costs can be a detriment to prospective members who may pay local, state and national dues, Dougherty said.

If the changes are adopted, “the dues will be set by the NAIFA national board and there will be one dues rate for the entire organization,” he said.

NAIFA similarly tried to reform the bylaws in 2012. That effort was met with pushback from the local affiliates.

If adopted, the new NAIFA bylaws will be effective Jan. 1, 2019, and the federation will work together towards implementation between now and 2019.

Also Wednesday, the board voted to extend the scope of the NAIFA Hurricane Relief Fund to provide assistance to insurance and financial advisors impacted by hurricanes in 2017.

InsuranceNewsNet Senior Editor John Hilton has covered business and other beats in more than 20 years of daily journalism. John may be reached at john.hilton@innfeedback.com.

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