Priority One: Recruiting Members

The mission of the National District Attorneys Association is “to be the voice of America’s prosecutors and to support their efforts to protect the rights and safety of the people.” To effectively accomplish this mission, NDAA was founded as a membership organization in which the members effectively guide the work of the association. Therefore, it is, and always has been, crucial for NDAA to recruit members from throughout the nation so that those issues NDAA strives to address are the issues of concern to the nation’s prosecutors. The recruitment of members has been a priority for NDAA in the past and it is, again, at the forefront of NDAA’s goals for 2007. President Mat Heck has dedicated his term to increasing NDAA membership and the visibility of NDAA nationally.

I would like to acknowledge the work of NDAA’s membership committee chairs: Stan Levco of Indiana and Luis Valentin of New Jersey. With their guidance, the membership committee has been working to develop new recruitment initiatives and membership goals for NDAA. NDAA’s most immediate goal is to obtain 100 percent membership of elected prosecutors in each state. We will begin this mission by attempting to recruit all elected prosecutors in states in which 75 percent or more of the elected prosecutors are already NDAA members. I would like to point out that the majority of elected prosecutors in the U.S. are currently NDAA members.

NDAA is here to serve the needs of the nation’s prosecutors and it is therefore vital to have a membership that is representative of all prosecutors. Currently, NDAA membership is thriving in jurisdictions with large populations, however smaller, rural jurisdictions tend to have fewer members. NDAA is aware that small communities have very different needs than larger ones. Different populations have different issues to contend with, and therefore the resources provided by NDAA for larger jurisdictions may not be relevant to smaller localities. In order for NDAA to become aware of and address the needs of these smaller communities, it is vital for prosecutors in those areas to become active members of our organization to help guide the work of NDAA and help to create programs that will benefit their neighborhoods.

In an effort to establish a representative pool of members, NDAA also plans to work on recruiting more minorities. In recent months, the NDAA Board of Directors has begun to develop relationships with minority prosecutor organizations, such as the National Black Prosecutors Association and the National Hispanic Prosecutors Association. In collaboration with these organizations, NDAA will have an opportunity to reach a broader audience than in previous years. In addition, the recruitment of minorities will direct NDAA’s attention toward issues that affect minority populations which may have been previously overlooked because of a lack of representation.

Prosecutors will confirm that their pursuit of justice does not end in retirement. A prosecutor’s dedication to the safety of our nation’s communities lives on past their years in the courtroom. And those former prosecutors who committed their lives to this end are the most valuable resources to the nation’s current prosecutors. They have the ability to contribute insight into the world of the criminal justice system based on years of experience and first hand knowledge. Since 1950, NDAA has been committed to serving the needs of the nation’s state and local prosecutors. How better to improve those services than utilizing the “experts in prosecution,” the alumni?

It is the former members of NDAA who have made our organization the great resource that it is today. Our alumni created the foundation that supports our work, and our current members are creating the foundation for projects and initiatives that will support the work of future generations of NDAA members. To this end, NDAA is calling on former members to continue their efforts in improving the services of NDAA.

This is a crucial time to consider NDAA membership. In recent weeks, many jurisdictions have welcomed newly elected prosecutors into their offices. If you are receiving this publication because your predecessor was a member of our organization, I strongly encourage you to continue the tradition. NDAA has many exciting plans for 2007 including: state-of-the-art training programs, some of which will be accessible over the Web; family-oriented activities; the NDAA summer conference, which will be held in Portland, Oregon; more courses which will count toward CLE credits; and many other new initiatives.

Our efforts to increase membership will have limited results without the help of NDAA’s existing members. As current members, you have experienced first hand the benefits of membership in this organization. Therefore, I call on all of you to assist in our efforts. I challenge each current member to recruit one prosecutor to join NDAA in 2007. With your help, we have an opportunity to drastically increase the size of our organization, and the impact of such a drastic increase will, no doubt, have extraordinary effects on the impact NDAA has in Congress and in communities throughout the nation.