A rip in the AIDS quilt: ten chapters of the Names Project, which shepherds the AIDS Memorial Quilt, have closed this year in a power struggle between national staffers and local volunteers. Both sides say they're only acting to protect the quilt. (Activism).

For many San Franciscans who have supported the AIDS Memorial Quilt since its birth in 1986, the May 31 folding of the local chapter of the Names Project Foundation was the second half of a stinging double whammy. Last year the national headquarters of the Names Project, the quilt's nonprofit caretaker, pulled stakes from the Bay Area and relocated to Atlanta. But the decision to close the local operation--which included a visitors' center, gallery, and quilt-making facility in the city's Castro district--was particularly painful because it left the birthplace of the Names Project with no connection to the quilt it had created.

"There are a lot of hard feelings about all this for volunteers who've put in countless hours and dedication over the years," says Michael Weaver, board secretary of the shuttered Bay Area chapter.

What's happening in the Bay Area is not unique. Since the beginning of the year, 10 Names Project chapters (out of 33) around the country have disbanded, including one of the largest, in Washington, D.C. At the heart of the closures is a new contract governing the chapters that was drafted in late 2001 by the Atlanta headquarters--an agreement the national office says is necessary to the survival of the organization and the maintenance of the quilt but that many chapters say makes their local work financially and logistically impossible.

Reenergized by a new board, new staff members, and some success in whittling down a six-figure debt that had lingered since the mid 1990s, the national office last year turned its attention to revamping the chapter network. "One of the things we needed to do is all start working from the same page," explains Julie Rhoad, managing director of the Names Project. To the national office, this meant a ban on local direct-mail fund-raising, national-office approval for all promotional materials, and a nondisparagement clause requiring chapter volunteers to conduct themselves in a "professional manner." The new agreement also boosted shipping and quilt-handling fees paid by the chapters.

Some chapters, particularly smaller groups with limited budgets, found the new fee structure unworkable. Tom Prince, facilitator of the Central Ohio chapter, estimates that his group's annual costs to display quilt panels would have been boosted by about 400%. "We don't understand why this had to happen," he says. "No one has told me why costs had to go up." In January the chapter's board voted to reject the contract.

Perhaps the most common complaint among chapter officials is that they feel they had no voice in crafting the agreement. While Rhoad and quilt founder Cleve Jones insist that input was provided through six regional representatives elected by the chapter membership and by two chapter members on the board of directors--and that the agreement's framework was based on existing guidelines--volunteers from now-defunct chapters indignantly disagree.

Beth Milham, chair of the steering committee for the Rhode Island chapter, says her group's efforts to negotiate changes were ultimately met with an edict to "get on board or get out." "That's not even a sound business practice, much less a way to treat earnest volunteers," she says.

Discontent was so widespread that several chapters refused to sign the agreement, formally ending their affiliation with the Names Project. In addition to those in D.C., Central Ohio, and Rhode Island, chapters rejecting the contract included Syracuse, N.Y.; Southeastern Massachusetts; Fort Worth/tarrant County, Tex.; Susquehanna Valley, Pa.; and Long Beach, Calif., leaving no chapters in Southern California. A chapter in Houston also recently broke up, citing the contract as one of the reasons it closed.

The Bay Area chapter acknowledges that its dissolution was due only in part to the national office's demands. In fact, the chapter's board signed the contract in January, as did 23 others, including chapters in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, New York, and St. Louis. Most consented to the agreement happily, Rhoad says.

But Bay Area volunteers also say the only reason they signed on was that the national office--Rhoad in particular--had pledged financial assistance to keep open their visitors' center, gallery, and panel-making facility. "She said they wanted to help, but they couldn't help us until we signed," says chapter chair Dolores Thompson.

That help never came, laments Michael Henschel, the chapter's chair of development and fund-raising. Rhoad responds that the Bay Area chapter was never promised any money.

Not all local chapters are at war with headquarters. The Northeast Florida chapter welcomed the new contract, and its chair, Avery Garner, believes that much of the local-level dispute stems from reluctance by some groups to let go of the autonomy they enjoyed throughout the 1990s. "I think some people just got used to doing it their way," he says. "What they fail to remember is that this is a new leadership team, there are new staff, and they want to be more hands-on."

But even among chapters that opted to stay the course, skepticism remains. Jeff Bosacki of the New York City chapter says his board opted to sign the contract "with prejudice" and notes that it continues to work with the national office to address "issues that are directly affecting our work," namely the group's annual tours to South Africa and displays of the South African AIDS quilt in the United States.

Rhoad too admits there are still problems to resolve but says her office is committed to addressing every concern and to building a sense of community between the chapter volunteers and the quilt headquarters. "Some things we have to work through together over time--with a basic framework in place so we have a starting point," she says.

Calls for unity, however, have often been drowned out by heated, even malicious, accusations by local chapter officials--often in the form of caustic E-mails sent out to more than 100 recipients. Unsupported insinuations that Names Project board members were profiting from their work, among other charges, led founder Jones to tell the Atlanta-based gay newspaper Southern Voice that "people need to just put aside the petty bullshit."

Yet nowhere were the anger and bruised feelings more visible than in a particularly venomous exchange between Jones and Ron Koziol, finance coordinator for the Central Ohio chapter. Through E-mail and answering machine messages, the two lashed out with very personal attacks, shared via the Internet with activists and journalists nationwide. Jones remains unapologetic. "It is one thing to disagree; it is quite another to be dishonest and abusive," he explains.

Nevertheless, several of the disbanded chapters openly accuse the national office of dishonesty, claiming that Atlanta leaders are deliberately trying to rip apart the chapter network. "I'm convinced of that, and they've said as much," Rhode Island's Milham says. "They really don't think the chapter program is a great value and wouldn't be unhappy to see it go."

Rhoad maintains that there is no plan to do away with the local organizations, but Jones is less reassuring. "I think that it's possible that in a few years there won't be any chapters as we know them now, because we're in a process of restructuring and reorganizing," he says.

For AIDS quilt volunteers, that's a sobering prospect, one that could compromise the Names Project's mission to memorialize those lost to AIDS--what Rhoad calls the common thread connecting everyone involved with the project.

Mike Bento, a board member of the disbanded D.C. chapter, still supports that mission. "The quilt doesn't live on the shelf of a warehouse; it lives in the chapters and in the schools and churches and meeting rooms where we show it to people and let them understand the lives of the people behind it," he explains. "I don't know what's going to happen with the quilt, but I do know there are a tremendous number of us who still care deeply about it. That's why all of this is just tremendously sad."