unfortunately, no, NJ is not a part of NEPOC.
NEPOC is the New England protege owner's club and not the northeast protege owners club. And new england as I am sure you all know consists of Connecticut, Massachusettes, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.
Not trying to be "took cool for NJ" or anything like that, but the reason we wanted it to be New England and not just the northeast is because of the large number of protege owners in the NY/NJ/PA area. If we were to have one northeast club, then a majority of the meets, to be centralized, would probably be in the NY/NJ area, and meets from the northeast group would most likely merge with some of the Promazda meets even further south.
This may not seem like a big deal, but when it goes from everyone in new england driving 2 hours or less to a meet in a central location, to CT owners driving 2 hours and all other states drivnig 4+, it becomes decidedly less convenient and we want to be sure not to deter any enthusiasts from northern New England from coming to our events.
That having been said, there is a protege meet being planned for April in NJ which a bunch of NEPOC members will be attending, and it is possible that NEPOC will caravan in a group down to the Carlisle show or something along those lines.
Additonaly, you do not have to live in New England to be a member of NEPOC.
The only restrictive aspect NEPOC not including new jersey or other states is - dont expect meets or events in your area. As i said we might come down for one here or there, but its entirely possible that all of our meets and events will be within New England. So if you like seeing the sights of New England, and dont mind a 6 hour car ride or so, then by all means join up and you are more than welcome to participate. One of our meet locations is in Kent, CT which is actually pretty close in CT to you jersey folks.
