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Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Notary Promoter

When Milton Valera joined the National Notary Association in 1969, it had a handful of people on payroll. Valera fondly remembered the very first conference the association hosted, where three people, including himself, serviced some 400 notaries. “It was absolutely crazy,” he said. Today, the association boasts 200 employees who will be celebrating NNA’s 60th anniversary this year. The organization is larger than ever, serving 4.6 million notaries in the U.S. with almost half a million paying members. Valera feels that despite the progress, notaries’ roles are still undervalued. “One of the big challenges for notaries is getting respect for what they do,” he said. Valera, who became the chief executive of NNA in 1982, has cultivated a sense of professionalism in the industry through an emphasis on continuing education, and development of regulations that set legal guidelines for notaries. Five years ago, Valera became the organization’s chairman when the organization named Thomas Heymann as its new chief executive. Under Heymann’s leadership, the organization saw a 20 percent increase in profits this year. An avid traveler, Valera said one of his favorite pastimes is to travel and knock on doors of other notaries around the country. “I’m not trying to be dramatic,” he said, “but if notaries stopped notarizing, the whole country would come to a stop.” The Business Journal spoke with Valera at his office in Chatsworth. Question: What does the NNA do? Answer: We provide everything there is to serve notaries. We educate them, supply them, insure them and provide various kinds of services. We have magazines and newsletters. We help notaries do their job. Notaries are government regulated by each of the states, meaning they’re all under different regulations. Some states are better at what they do in terms of educating and servicing them. Our part is to assist the states in this service. What is NNA’s main source of revenue? It’s broken down into four primary areas: membership, insurance, notary supplies and education. Membership fees can vary depending on the number of years, but one year of membership is $69. How did you grow sales 20 percent this year? A lot of that has to be attributed to our CEO Tom Heymann, and the great management team he has put together. Tom has been with us five years now as the CEO, and he has made us an important organization by virtue of his experience. He worked for Disney at one time and he worked with Michael Milken. He was involved in different kinds of startups. Tom and I had known each other for 25 years. I have to say that he’s been a major part of growing the organization. What is your management style? My philosophy was always to do the best job you can. Part of that is not worrying about money. The National Notary Association is a mutually beneficial nonprofit organization. We have an insurance agency, for example, and an organization that provides supplies and educational benefits. While we do keep an eye on the money, it’s not always just about making money. I suppose we could turn things around and increase that 20 percent to 30 percent, but then we wouldn’t be servicing notaries like we should, and wouldn’t be serving the public like we should. Age: 75 Education: Bachelor’s degree in journalism from California State University – Northridge Hometown: Island of Kauai, Hawaii Personal: Married, four children, seven grandchildren and one great grand child Hobbies: Reading, traveling Interesting Fact: Samuel Clemens (a.k.a. Mark Twain) became a notary public in Nevada in 1864. Calvin Coolidge, the 30th president of United States, was the only president to be sworn in to office by a notary, John Coolidge, who was also his father. How do you market NNA? Lot of times people get referred to us. And then of course technology has helped us a lot. We have a website and organic search is working very well for us. And all of the states know what we do. Who are your competitors? There are lots of so-called “competition.” When I say “competition,” I mean there are insurance agents who sell insurance and bonds. There are organizations that sell stamps. And then there are a couple others who have ventured into the membership business and produce a newsletter once a year or something like that. But no one really has what we have and that is a full-service organization. There isn’t anything a notary needs that we can’t provide. Why are notaries needed? The most important thing is to prevent fraud. The notary is an important third person in a contract or a transaction. One of the simplest example is when you sell your house. In the early days, when a husband and wife were not necessarily getting along, one may want to sell the house. And we’ve had cases where the wife would go to work, come home and the house is sold to somebody else because the husband brought in one of his girlfriends to serve as his wife. Unless you have a third party – a notary, an official witness for the state – then all kinds of crazy things can happen. If one day all notaries stopped notarizing, the country would come to a stop. We are becoming more important. Once upon a time notaries were primarily involved in only real estate documents. Today we’re involved everything. Health care is a big one and other really big one is immigration. How is the profession changing? We have 4.4 million notaries in the country. I think that’s about the highest it’s been for a long time. I think the highest we got was 4.8 million right before the crash in 2008. One of the big things that’s going on is the digital way of providing notarization. We’re constantly battling and trying to make the industry understand that physical presence is key. If there is no physical presence, then you can’t call it a notarization. What’s NNA largest department? It’s customer relations or what we call customer care. Notaries call in from all over the country with questions. We also have a hotline that is open six days a week. What’s the number one question? I think it’s “How do I become a notary?” Invariably, people from certain states will call and say, “I’m a notary now. What am I supposed to do?” How has the education of notaries changed over the years? As you go up the chain, there are more sophisticated frauds and ID theft going on. In this day and age, it’s so easy to prepare documents that are fraudulent. Notaries, at least the members of our association, know how to screen a party to the transaction. That’s important because in the old days you would just look at the driver’s license. Well, driver’s licenses can be forged. So we have little techniques that we show our people on how to identify individuals. Is this an example of the supplemental education you provide? You’re right, it is supplemental. But this should be a basic part of the education. Many states don’t have enough money for that. States are really understaffed. If all the states were able to provide the education that they should, you wouldn’t need a National Notary Association. But that’s not the case. As a result, our communications group is constantly researching how to change laws. What’s the biggest challenges notaries face? Notaries can get sued for a lot of money, even if they’re not guilty of anything. The whole idea of having to defend themselves in court before an accuser becomes pretty tough for notaries. What other challenges? Getting respect for what they do. And by way of extension, getting paid properly. Now fees are regulated but again through the states. I think we’re all up to a at least $1 for notarization, but up to a few years ago it was 50 cents in Nebraska. How can notaries make more money? California has the highest fees. Florida matches us at $15 per signature. During the period when refinancing was big, things were happening so fast that notaries came to you. Since then, title companies, escrow companies and a lot of other organizations are more willing to pay for notaries to travel. What do you think is a common misconception about notaries? That they’re not very smart (laughs). It’s a major misconception. We have an annual conference. And next year is our fortieth. All you got to do is walk around and talk to these people, and you’ll realize they are very smart. And unlike a lot of other conferences that people attend where the company will pay for them, most notaries pay their own way. We do quite well. We’ve had as many as 2,200 people. Did you always want to become a notary? I’m originally from Hawaii. I grew up on a small island called Kauai. I never dreamed that I’d do this. When I was growing up, 7 o’clock was a very important time in my life. 7:00 p.m. was when the last plane left the island, and 7:00 a.m. was the first plane into the island. And I remember as a child I just felt so closed in. I just couldn’t wait to go away. I was supposed to attend the University of Hawaii, and then two weeks before school started, I changed my mind and said I got to go to the mainland. My mother cried for a month. I was accepted at the University of Oregon to study journalism, but it was too late. So I just kind of hung around Los Angeles and then community colleges are always open so I went to Los Angeles City College and spent a few semesters there. And I matriculated to CSUN to study journalism. I’m still very involved with CSUN. How did you become a notary? I became a notary in 1969 when I joined the organization. I didn’t know a whole lot about notaries. It was just really interesting. Rothman was an insurance agent and he liked to do different kinds of things. He needed some help with his newsletter, so I came on board and did his newsletter. At that time, I had a marketing and PR agency so I made an offer to come and do the newsletter, and that was the beginning. Over the years I had lots of experiences that I wouldn’t trade for anything. I spent a lot of time in Sacramento assisting legislators. And I helped grow the organization. How did you grow the organization at first? When I took over in 1982 I think we had something like 14 or 15 people. We had 27,000 members. The number is now close to 500,000. When we started out, my predecessor was not a big advocate of doing what we rely on a lot today – educational seminars. I felt that we had to do more of that. We had to get before people. I remember we would have seminars with five people, but today we sell out. Now we do about several hundred seminars a year and there are roughly 40 to 50 people at each one. We do this in about 30 states. What kind guidelines are there for notaries to follow? When I started there were really no standards. There was a history, but in 50 states. One of the things that I did was to try to establish the standard law. We called it the Uniform Notary Act. This was in 1973. When I took over in 1982, I changed the name because it implied that it was the only way to go. Realizing each of the states have different rules and regulations and customs and practices, I didn’t feel it was right so we changed it to the Model Notary Act. And we’ve had three since then. We have been working for about four years on the Model Electronic Notarization Act. Is your organization political? We don’t take an active role in lobbying. We work with legislators and local officials. We try to produce the least legislation for a particular state, and a particular locale. For example, in a lot of the northern states like Pennsylvania, hunting is very big. Certain licenses and certain kinds of applications have to be notarized. So, notaries need to have a little bit of a special expertise.

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