X-Message-Number: 717
From: 
Subject: New Building
Date: Thu,  9 Apr 92 12:01:24 PDT

Hi, as one of the people who has actually visited Alcor's
proposed facility in Arizona, I would like to comment on the
debate about moving there.

I believe there are two big reasons why Alcor should move
into a decent looking building:

LOSING MEMBERS

We are losing potential members when they see the shack that
Alcor is currently in.  They assume that any organization that can't 
afford a better building can't be too stable and a cryonics 
organization needs to be able to survive for many decades if not 
centuries.  

LOSS OF DONATIONS

More importantly, our richer members don't donate much money because 
they believe that if Alcor is barely surviving, then giving it money 
could be pouring money down the drain.  Rich people want to donate 
money to a successful organization, not a shaky, barely surviving 
one.  I know for a fact that a rich family was so disgusted by the 
Alcor building that they almost bought Alcor a new building on the 
spot.  The probable reason that they didn't do this was that they 
would have felt foolish buying a nice, beautiful building for an 
organization that hasn't shown the ability to get a half decent 
building on its own.  It would be like giving $10,000 to a beggar on 
the street.  More money than the beggar can handle.  

LOSS OF DONATIONS II 

Let me repeat how important it is to look successful.  I have done a 
survey of known Alcor members and have found that Alcor's members are 
worth in excess of one quarter of a billion dollars.  Yet Alcor is 
always starving and begging for money.  I would be willing to bet 
anyone that Alcor's endowment fund will double within twelve months 
of a move into a decent looking building.  Research donations and 
other fund raising activities would also prove much more successful 
if Alcor looked like a stable organization.  

APPEARANCE AGAIN 

I want to repeat one more time about the importance of appearance.  
One likely reason that the California government keeps picking on us 
is that they took one look at our building and assumed that we 
wouldn't have enough money to sustain a legal battle.  They must 
figure that we are always on the edge of financial collapse.  The 
media would give us better press if we had a decent building.  Even 
scientists would be more willing to work with us if we looked a bit 
more successful.  (I've spoken to a scientist who is horrified at the 
prospect of showing his colleagues our current building.) 

-------------OTHER REASONS -------------

CALIFORNIA: THE EARTHQUAKE STATE 

I think it's ludicrous that Alcor is based in one of the most 
earthquake prone states in the U.S.  This is not the ideal place for 
patients to be stored for a century!  Quite a few members don't want 
to be stored there including the founders of Alcor, Fred and Linda 
Chamberlain.  

CALIFORNIA: LAND OF THE LOONIES 

It doesn't help in our media exposure when people hear that we are 
based in California.  When people think of California, they think of 
people like Governor Moonbeam.  I don't think any other state has 
such a loony reputation.  

CALIFORNIA: SOCIALIST PARADISE 

For the past decade, the California government has been getting more 
and more anti-business.  Not only are they driving Alcor out of the 
state but they have succeeded in driving hundreds of thousands of 
jobs out of the state over the past year.  Why should Alcor put up 
with this lousy anti-business climate?  We'd save thousands of 
dollars a year just on the reduced Workman's Comp Insurance if we 
left the state.  That'd pay for an air-conditioning bill or two.  

RIVERSIDE: THE HUMAN SARDINE EXPERIMENT 

Experiments have shown that if you pack living beings into too small 
of a space that they get on each other's nerves.  It's bad enough 
that we don't pay our employees a decent wage -- at least we could 
give them enough room to work in.  If I was working at Alcor, my 
nerves would be shot from the packed conditions.  I probably would 
have shot the Health Inspector like Arthur McCombs almost did.  Hey, 
I might have shot a few Alcor employees if I had to live like a human 
sardine.  

In addition, it is hard to do research or other activity at the 
current Riverside facility because you always have to waste time 
moving things out of the way.  

---------------REASONS TO STAY ---------------

There are two important reasons why Alcor shouldn't want to do this 
move: 

TOO EXPENSIVE 

Alcor shouldn't move if it can't afford to.  We don't want to 
bankrupt ourselves!  Considering that the new building will be paid 
for the same way that the old building was, by investors, the cost of 
the building is not a problem.  And, as with the current building, 
Alcor will pay a substandard rent until it can afford otherwise so 
the rent isn't a big problem.  While it's true that utility costs 
will be a bit higher, I believe that with Alcor's net worth of 1.5 
million dollars, we are unlikely to bankrupt Alcor from the utility 
costs.  And of course, I expect our legal bills to be much lower in a 
pro business state.  

WRONG BUILDING 

Alcor shouldn't move to the building in Arizona if there is a better 
one available.  Our board member in Florida was unable to find a 
better building and after speaking to two brokers in Arizona that 
Mike Paulle referred me to, I am convinced that Dave Pizer has found 
a very good deal in Arizona.  It is not surprising that Dave has 
found a good deal; he's made a fortune buying and selling real estate.  

NOT STRONG REASONS TO STAY IN RIVERSIDE 

I have heard that we should stay in Riverside because we have more 
members in Southern California then everywhere else.  First, they are 
ignoring the fact that Alcor will be able to give nearly the same 
level of service to the people in California from Arizona as from 
Riverside.  Those people who die slowly can go to Arizona in their 
final weeks and those people who die suddenly will be coroner cases 
which will give Alcor time to get a suspension team over there before 
the coroner gives the O.K. to begin the suspension.  And of course, 
the people in Southern California could train a few EMTs and develop 
the ability to stabilize patients.  Hey, even my little group of 
six people in southern Nevada expects to have three EMTs before the 
year ends.  Southern California has about ten times as many people!  
It is also possible that Mike Darwin's proposed company could do 
suspensions in California if there was sufficient demand for this.  

SUMMARY 

Alcor needs a bigger, more attractive building if it wants to expand 
and grow.  Just as we moved to a bigger, more attractive building 
last decade in our quest for growth, we should do the same this 
decade.  The longer we stay in our little shack, the more Alcor's 
growth will be impeded.  People should not be distracted by our 
sometimes confused Alcor politics and be sidetracked by conflicts 
between personalities.  It is in the patient's best interests if 
Alcor expands into a large, stable organization.  This is an 
impossibility if we stay in our current building.  

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