COMMANDER'S CORNER March 2026

Hello, Post 108 Family,

Welcome to March. We are almost to Spring, and, it is time for our annual American Legion birthday (107 years) potluck before our meetings. As usual, bring your favorite side dish or dessert. We will be setting up starting at 1600 and serving at 1630. I am expecting some special guests at our joint meeting, so please come out and see who they are.

Peggy still has several items that we were going to use at the cancelled horseshoe tournament. We are going to do an auction or raffle at the potluck for some of these items so bring some cash with you. You might just go home with something. Below is an example of what we will be auctioning off at the meeting and a photo of them.

1. Target Gift Certificate. Valued at $50.

2. Red-X Armory Gift Certificate. Valued at $50

We are doing extremely well with 2026 membership renewals. Our 2026 goal for the post is 98 members. As of today, we are at 113.3% of our goal with 111 members renewed or joined thus far and one PUFL who transferred in recently to put us at 112 members. The Post’s annual dues are still only

$45.00, of which we get to retain only $11.00. The balance goes to National and Department. We still have just a small handful of members who have not renewed yet for 2026. If you are one of the handful of members who have not yet renewed for 2026 and have signed up for the Legion Insurance program, you will need to re-enroll for that after you pay your 2026 dues.

To renew on-line, go to www.legion.org, then click on the red renew button on the top right of the screen. Besides annual dues, there is also the 3-year option, or PUFL (Paid Up for Live) option, if interested. Select the option you want and follow the prompts to pay. You can also send a check to our Post Office Box (PV Post 108, POB 26239, Prescott Valley, AZ 86312) or save that expensive postage stamp and bring it to our next meeting. We would love to see you at a meeting!

Don’t forget, the Post has adopted the American Legion Park on Bob Drive. Members are at the park on the 2nd and 4th Thursdays each month at around 1130 to tidy things up. Please head over and give them a hand. Thanks to those who are helping keep the American Legion Park looking nice.

With help of Nick Purdin, Roger Rodriques, and Elton Anderson, we interviewed 9 students from Bradshaw Mountain High School for Boys State on 12 February and selected 4 candidates out of the group. We will be sponsoring 3 of them and the 4th will be sponsored by District 8.

Roger and I also met with COL Dahl and MSG Smith with the BMHS JROTC Program on 23 February. Roger has agreed to our liaison for the BMHS JROTC program, and we will be interfacing more with them in the future.

Tim “Digger” Roader has stepped down as our Post Chaplin. Thanks Digger for all you have done for us. I have appointed Debra Nowakowski as our new Chaplin.

We had a great turnout for President’s Day flags. Thanks to all who helped. We have flags coming up on Vietnam War Veterans Day, Sunday, 29 March. I will send that announcement closer to the actual date. After that, our next flag days will be Friday, 1 May for Loyalty Day; Saturday, 9 May for PV Days; Saturday, 16 May for Armed Forces Day; and Monday, 25 May for Memorial Day. May is always a heavy month for flags.

And speaking of PV Days, I have submitted our entry for this year’s parade. Please plan to come out and help with our entry. It will start at 0900 and we are generally done by 1000. We need people, vehicles, bikes, trikes, etc.

We had 2 fundraisers since the last meeting and did very well at both of the, We were at Arby’s on 20 FEB and at Culver’s on 3 MAR. At Culver’s, we had 10 members helping with delivering meals. Thanks to all who helped or got a meal. The ALA will be at Panera bread for a fundraiser on 13 March. I will attach that flyer with this Commander’s Corner. These restaurant fundraisers have proven to be very beneficial for us, require little to no effort from us and we get pretty good results. And everybody has to eat.

On 28 February, the Legion’s Oratorical contest for our District was held at Post 25 in Cottonwood. Our entry, Benna S., came in 1st place of the 3 students who were speaking. Next, she will be participating in the Area C Competition on 14 March at the Camp Verde Library. If you haven’t been to a Legion Oratorical Competition before, it would be well worth a drive to Camp Verde or to Peoria for the Department-wide competition on 28 March.

Don’t forget to record your Post and Community/Veterans hours for the month. And, the riders are now being asked for their mileage as well. (You can put them in the logbook at each meeting or email them to Ron at: ronarrigoni@gmail.com. Attached to this newsletter will be the latest finance report, the minutes of the February meeting, and.

I hope to see you at our potluck and/or meeting on 10th. Until then, stay healthy and be safe!

Gary Taylor, Your Humbled Post Commander