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Dear List Members, PLEASE PARDON THE DELAY OF THIS RESPONSE, I'VE BEEN HAVING DIFFICULTIES WITH MY EMAIL... I=92d like to take this opportunity to respond to Jeanette Fuhr's recent pos= t on the Listserv regarding membership in the National Parkinson Foundation (NPF). Annually, we send out an appeal to recruit individuals to join as members. Basically, being a "member" means that these individuals are committed to contributing to NPF on a yearly basis. The concept of creating a "membership" base for the Foundation was established 42 years ago by our Founder, Jeanne Levey. Mrs. Levey felt that developing a membership base of individuals dedicated to donating to NPF on a yearly basis would not only help the Foundation in planning its yearly budgets, but create a sense of cohesion and make those individuals feel a part of the NPF team. Membership is absolutely voluntary and not necessary to benefit from the services offered by NPF. Anyone who calls NPF and asks to be put on our mailing list receives our quarterly Parkinson Report, as well as all our other literature free of charge. This is the same for anyone who makes a one time contribution=85 Once someone expresses an interest in the Foundation, we automatically, unless told otherwise, put them on our mailing list to receive everything we offer. In addition, our mailing lists are combined with the local lists gathered by our Centers of Excellence around the country. Thus, if an individual happens to live in an area where we have a Center, they will receive educational material from that Center as well. In most cases, NPF funds and prints the literature/newsletters distributed locally by those Centers. This year, our annual membership appeal letter stated that we had a lot to accomplish during the second quarter of =9198 and requested that contributions be sent in as early as possible. I=92d like to take this opportunity to explain this=85 NPF has an annual budget which funds our 52 Centers of Excellence, Parkinson=92s researchers around the world, educational programs, literature distribution, lobbying for the Udall Bill, patient services, etc. This year, we committed ourselves to a huge project that was not included in our annual budget. In April, NPF executives decided that in addition to funding established Parkinson=92s disease researchers, we would start funding a larg= e group of researchers studying disorders related to Parkinson=92s disease at the same time actively recruit and fund young promising researchers to focus their efforts on Parkinson=92s disease. And, in turn once we fund the new researchers, they can be submitted to NIH for potential future funding of $300,000 to 1,000,000.=20 As a result of this new initiative, we have committed an extra $750,000 to new researchers. These additional funds must be allocated in September of this year. As of July 1, we have only received one generous gift of $100,000 towards the new project. Hence, we decided that our annual membership appeal was the perfect time to try to solicit extra funds for the project.=20 I regret that our appeal letter did not go into greater detail, however I am happy to report that the overall response has been positive. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain. Please let me know if I can provide you with additional information. Best Regards, Melinda Brown Public Relations Director, NPF (305) 243-2235