PROGRESS, NOT PERFECTION

District 6 was in trouble--triple trouble with a capital T. Six district committee members in a row had either quit or not served full terms. The district had voted by a narrow margin to move its monthly general service representative (GSR) meeting out of a church basement and into a government building with a room rent of one dollar per month, a real bargain that entirely ignored our Seventh Tradition. A literature committee had "borrowed" over $800 from the district's phone answering service fund to buy AA literature and resell it to the groups, and no money had been paid back. A copier machine had been purchased for $1,000 without approval by the district; then it wasn't returned when the district ordered that; and now it sat in the wings, smoldering like a time bomb. Participation at the monthly GSR meetings was down to less than fifty percent of the groups. Newcomers to the district meetings said it was their first and last district meeting because they didn't like the politics, fighting, and disunity they saw. The Traditions were read at most group meetings but rarely at the district meeting, and hardly ever mentioned in district discussions and debates. Vacancies in service committees were common. Some individuals ignored the spirit of rotation, thus undermining the leadership of the district committee members (DCMs). A workshop on the Traditions was never finished because the battle over the copier machine took away the time budgeted for it. The government agency the district was renting from used the AA name publicly several times, but perhaps worst of all, AA members were mad as hell at other AA members and resentments were spreading like wildfire.