LOUISIANA DIABETES FOUNDATION - Our History After many years of experience in volunteer and staff positions serving the diabetes community, a number of individuals were distressed to see the national diabetes organizations shifting, or centralizing, authority away from local diabetes volunteer leadership to a central power. Unfortunately this seems to be a trend in our times. In contrast to the central and autocratic view of management in non-profit organizations, there are those who believe in the concept of subsidiarity; or, that actions are best served when they are performed at the lower most level of society that is possible. One Jeffersonian proposition is that the "people" should be educated and trusted because society is best safeguarded that way. The present formula of containing diabetes until a cure is found has been to likewise educate and trust the diabetic person. So, in our case, we think it best to continue and trust the independent, sovereign, local diabetes agency. During this period of change within the diabetes community, many other states also decided to form independent state diabetes entities and they allied themselves with other independent associations. The alliance type relationship permits the independent diabetes organization to join forces in specific joint ventures without giving up the independent diabetes organization's sovereignty to remain itself. Not a bold theory, because our nation was founded on this principle; simply a bold organizational step! As a result of this learning experience, in the summer of 1999, the non-profit corporation known as Louisiana Diabetes Foundation, Inc. (incorporated in Louisiana) was formed.