Vital Times 2022 - 11

specific mechanism in place to ensure this took place.
As a result of the unified dues billing relationship, CSA
" found " dozens of new members and didn't have to invest
administrative time, budget marketing, and processing
memberships. As a result of the unified dues billing, CSA
changed its fiscal year from July to June to January to
December to align with ASA's membership dues cycle.
2017
GASPAC Fix
One downside of the unified dues billing with ASA was
that the CSA could no longer solicit contributions to
GASPAC (CSA's political action committee supporting
state level candidates) through the membership invoice.
As a result, GASPAC's balance fell from an average of
$100,000 to less than $15,000 - a precipitously low
number. Always willing to make lemonade out of lemons,
Mark Zakowski, MD, FASA, CSA President and Jeff
Poage, MD, LPAD Chair, began a set of consultations
with a Sacramento based political law firm to develop a
sustainable funding strategy for GASPAC. As a result of
the legal advice they received, the CSA Board of Directors
proposed, and the House of delegates approved a $99
per year increase in individual membership fees and
a related $125 per member " dues assignment " to be
directed toward GASPAC. The goal of the " GASPAC Fix "
was to raise $200,000 per year to be used on individual
campaign contributions and $200,000 over five years
to build a $1 million " war chest " - which was actually
achieved in 3.5 years!!
Membership Research - State Advocacy, Practice
Environment
Also in 2017, CSA leaders authorized a contract to
Association Labs to conduct a research project to
identify what were the top priorities of individual CSA
members. After conducting three rounds of focus groups,
surveys with board members and key contacts, and an
extensive membership survey, the findings demonstrated
what CSA leadership anticipated, that state level
advocacy was the members' number one concern. But
members also were clear that wanted CSA to provide
them with greater assistance and resources in navigating
their practice environment, including assistance in
developing stronger relationships with their hospitals and
health systems. As a result of this research, CSA leaders
established a separate Practice Management Committee
within the Legislative and Practice Affairs Division,
initially chaired by Christopher Tirce, MD, FASA.
2018
Redistricting Proposal - Opportunity for
Organizational Restructuring
CSA President, Sam Wald, MD, MBA, FASA, and CSA
President Elect Christine Doyle, MD, FASA, took
the opportunity of the survey findings to propose a
redistricting of CSA's governance structure and House of
Delegates to more closely reflect the member priorities
identified in the research - State Advocacy and Practice
Management. Historically, CSA's Board of Directors
was comprised of 13 regional district directors who
were elected to serve on the board and in the House of
delegates representing a specific geographic region.
Dr. Wald suggested reducing the number of geographic
districts to eight, each representing a geographic
district aligned with five state senate districts, and
create six new practice forum directors each reflecting
key demographic subset of the CSA membership -
Academic, Large Group, Medium Group, Small Group/
Solo, Early Career and In Training. Now, each CSA
member would have two representatives on the board
and in the House - one Geographic District Director,
responsible for state advocacy, and one Practice
Forum Director, responsible for assisting with practice
management concerns.
CSA wins the Alabama Cup for the First Time
Now that GASPAC was fixed, CSA leaders, under the
direction of Paul Yost, MD, FAAP, FASA, CSA Past
President, and ASA Delegate, set their sights on raising
contributions from CSA members to the ASAPAC. CSA
organized and won the first ASAPAC Day of Contributing
Challenge and ended the year with the most dollars
contributed to ASAPAC during the fiscal year - a feat
thought of an unimaginable in previous years. Under Dr.
Yost's continued leadership, CSA has won the Alabama
Cup twice more - in 2019 and 2021.
2019
CSA Foundation
After several years of work, originally authorized under
Jim Moore's, MD, FASA, presidency in 2016, the CSA
Foundation for Education was established as a separate
501 c3 charitable organization with initial funding
coming from the Charles Guedel Foundation. The CSA
Foundation currently supports two initiatives- Project
Lead the Way Partnerships now in place at UCLA (2018),
Stanford (2019) and UC Davis (2022)., and cash awards
to residents participating in the History of Anesthesia
Annual Publication 2022 | 11
Vital Times 2022

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