ANGUSATAT: "The majority of the staff are just volunteers who help run the place in their spare time." The top level of ECF's staff/ownership should take the laboring oar on responsible site standards. If not them, who else? Noone? VOCALEK: Substantial donations to CASAA, if that is your "chosen" lobbying arm, are primarily the responsibility of those with a direct business interest in the industry. CASAA's site would be improved (one hopes) if there were some meaningful blurbs describing the officers' backgrounds. No one really wants to surrender money, much less to folks for whom they are offered no meaningful information. Also, don't lump officers and directors together on the website. Their functions are entirely different. The latter select the former, but the former are responsible for day-to-day operations. That is why there are typically background descriptions for officers, but not for directors on websites of this nature.
There have been some good points made about what ECF is and is not. CASAA is a separate orgnization. ECF does no lobbying. CASAA asks for the participation of ECF members when we need to get the word out.
You seem to believe that there is a huge reservoir of money somewhere that CASAA can tap at will to hire the same kind of attorneys, lobbyiests, PR firms, and ad agencies that the Alphabet Soup Gang and big pharma can afford to hire. That's why I challenged you to put your money where your mouth is, if you care deeply about keeping the products available.
Somehow, I don't think that this huge tub of donations is going to come rolling in from you, the industry, or consumers. If you really want to help, then dream up ways that we can accomplish what we need to get done as consumers without having much in the way of money to work with.
The e-cigarette industry suffers from being made up mostly of hundreds of small vendors, which is very unlike the profile of the pharmaceutical industry. The bulk of manufacturing takes place in China, and none of those companies comes close to being a Johnson & Johnson, or Pfizer. Ruyan is so broke that they are sending attorneys around to sue other companies for patent infringements.
While we do not turn down any donations from industry (or anyone else), we don't directly ask e-cigarette vendors or manufacturers for money. We need to rely primarily on consumer donations, else we face the accusations of being a tool of the industry.
And I am sorry to disappoint you, but CASAA has no paid staff whatsoever. All eight of us volunteer directors are involved in the day-to-day operations. I'm the only one of the officers who does not also have a full-time job. I'm retired and living on SS and a small pension.
You are very much a latecomer to this forum. CASAA was formed by the membership of ECF in late 2009 for the purpose of keeping e-cigarettes available and affordable. We were nominated by other members, posted our backgrounds on ECF, and then a general election was held. The history is all here in this forum if you care to track it down and see how we hammered out goals, mission statement, etc., and created an organization that supports the concept of tobacco harm reduction regardless of method used.
As for my profile: My last 9 years of employment were spent as a technical writer for both an IT group and a public health research and evaluation group within the same organization. I also have 25 years experience in instructional design and development of computer-based education and web-based training. I taught high school English for 4 years, worked in a bank for a year, and spent 4 years doing publicity for non profits.
I'm a mother of 2, and a grandmother of 7 (8 in July).
OK, so how about you. Are you a practicing attorney? In what specialty? If not, what is your professional experience?
How long did you smoke? What has your experience been in using smoke-free alternatives? Have you uses an e-cig? Snus? NRT? Do you still smoke? If so, have you cut down on how much you smoke?
What do you know about the history of government misdirection about the relative safety of tobacco products? If you were to volunteer your time to CASAA, what skills and abilities would you bring to the table?
is. And remember, we are all only that, human. 
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