L.I.R.A. Meetings at Dowling

[acropora]

The topic of moving back to the dance studio has come up and I would like to address it here for new and old members who are not familiar with the location. I am a newly elected board member and although I have been a club member from the start, I was not fully aware of the situarion as well.
Les ,owner of Fishy Inc, a LFS had provided a dance studio , for our meetings. The studio was a good sized location and Les was a gracious host. At our meetings ,as we do now, members auction Frags, trade and sell frags , and sell Aquarium supplies as well. Some are personal and some are business sales offered at discounts to our members.
This course of action had become a highlight for all at our meetings . Our monthly meetings provided a meeting place where members from far reaches of Suffolk, Nassau and N.Y.C. could meet to make these exchanges. It also provided an important revenue for our club. Currently the club receives much needed funds from the frag auctions and Dry good auctions. The frags are provided free of charge by Atlantis, local vendors and other members. Dry goods are donated by Aquarium businesses for auction with revenue going completely to our club. It is no surprise that these events would hamper the sales of any LFS that supplied a hall for us.
As a result the we decided to move to a location that had no restrictions on the format of our meetings. We had been offered a very large and prestigious venue at Dowling College which we had moved to and hold our current meetings. However this large hall has become less and less available to us and we were relegated to the smaller Lion's Den hall. Although this location is rent free for the club, we would like to locate a large hall for our ever increasing membership. We are looking for a suitable sized and reasonably priced location that would be equitable for travel by all and it ideally be in Suffolk County, closer to the Nassau border line. We plan to be able to hold meetings on Saturdays and Fridays as well, to make it easier for all to attend.This new location will require rental fees, but it will allow us to exist independently.
If you have a location that fits the above criteria, please let me know via E mail. Currently we have a tentative agreement with Dowling until the end of 2007, and our meetings will be held there until further notice.