At the beginning of the summer, the membership of the Poker Players Alliance sat at half a million. Not bad for the organization which, a year before, only numbered a tenth of that. Congress was winding down for the session and four bills dealing with internet gambling were introduced. Now the summer has come to a close. The kids are back in school and your elected officials are back in the nation’s capital to get down to business. Across town at the PPA’s headquarters, the database of members just passed the 700,000 mark. PocketFives.com sat down with new Poker Players Alliance Executive Director John Pappas to discuss the latest milestone.

“The growth of the PPA is stellar and it’s a testament to the success we’ve shown so far. People really care about this issue and want to become involved in our organization. Michael Bolcerek set a goal of one million members and we’ll keep going until we hit that. Our growth has to do with the PPA becoming well-known through forums like PocketFives as well as word of mouth. People are drawn to our success in terms of getting legislation introduced, recent media successes, and the changing tide of American opinions. It’s kind of like jumping on a bandwagon.”

The stated goal of one million members has been the dream ever since I remember first talking with Bolcerek and Pappas last year and the organization is becoming increasingly creative in order to continue expanding: “It’d be great if we could get to one million by the end of the year. We’re on track to do it. We have three months to reach 300,000 more people. We are working with the leading poker sites. Our Board of Directors is making recommendations about other online and offline communities that we can tap into such as the Ladies Poker Association. I’m also looking to reach out to top poker players themselves. Wouldn’t it be great if the websites of top players had a link to the PPA so people can learn about what we’re doing? There are also dozens of poker clubs, taverns, and places where people meet and play poker. While they might not play online, they realize that any threat to the game is a threat to poker.”

With Congress back in session, the PPA is also following up with members of Congress on interactions its members have had with the country’s leaders. Several new initiatives in Washington are also on the table: “One idea we’ve been thinking about is doing something similar to what we did in April 2006 when we brought in leading poker pros to Washington. It was a very successful event. We brought out our board members - Chris Ferguson, Greg Raymer, and Howard Lederer. This time, we want to have a fly in where it’s not just the pros; it’s Average Joe poker players meeting their members of Congress. In that sense, it’s an advocacy week. We’re trying to figure out how we can logistically be able to do it right now. We’ve also sent out a survey to 10,000 of our members asking them what their interest would be in participating.”

The response from members of Congress to the PPA’s growth has been beneficial to online poker as well. Upon hearing that the PPA now has 700,000 members, “It’s jaw dropping for a lot of members of Congress. It’s even jaw dropping when I say how many are in their districts. I also give them a stack of letters from our members to their staffs. The top issues we’re hearing include online poker.”

I’ve been catching up on the World Series of Poker on my Comcast DVR recently and noticed poker pro Michael Binger sporting PPA gear. Pappas was quite elated: “Michael Binger was wearing his PPA shirt. I’m actually in the process of thanking him for wearing it and seeing if there’s anything he needs. That was neat to see and when I was out at the WSOP, I was stunned by the amount of people I saw wearing our hats, shirts, and more. It was very cool to see someone of Michael Binger’s status wearing our logo.”

Time will only tell how long the PPA will need to cross the one million member mark and potentially muscle one of the four online gambling bills through Congress. Until then, we’ll have to wait and see. Not a member of the PPA? You should be. Sign up for free at the Poker Players Alliance website today.