How LAMBO email works
The new lamboriders.org email, side by side with the old shared Gmail. Where a message goes, how to keep your inbox tidy with filters, how to answer as LAMBO, and what happens to the old address.
The short version
- Before: everything went into one shared Gmail inbox (lamboridersemail@gmail.com). Everyone signed into it with the same password, and everyone saw everything, including each other’s filters and clutter.
- Now: each person who answers LAMBO mail has their own inbox at lamboriders.org. LAMBO’s public addresses (
email@,treasurer@,president@,secretary@,board@) aren’t inboxes. They’re job addresses that pass each message on to whoever holds that job today. - The old Gmail still works. It passes everything on to
email@lamboriders.org, so nobody who has the old address gets lost. Nothing is deleted. - Your inbox is yours. Filters, labels and archiving in your own inbox affect only you. Tidy it however you like.
- When someone changes jobs, an admin moves the job address to the new person. Banks, vendors and members keep writing to the same address and never notice.
Then and now
The old Gmail forwards everything to email@, so it lands in the same place as everything else.
| The old Gmail | The new lamboriders.org email | |
|---|---|---|
| Where mail lands | One shared inbox | Each person’s own inbox |
| Signing in | One password everyone knew | Your own password and 2-step on your own phone |
| Who sees a message | Everyone with the password | Only the people the address delivers to |
| Filters and archiving | Changed it for everyone | Changes it for you only |
| Someone changes jobs | Hand over the password, hope it gets changed | An admin moves the job address to the new person; nothing for senders to update |
| Someone leaves | They still know the password | Their account is suspended; the mail stays with LAMBO |
| Replies come from | lamboridersemail@gmail.com | The job address, if you set up “Send mail as” (below) |
| Old messages | In the shared inbox | Copied into a LAMBO archive mailbox you can search (below) |
| Cost | Free, plus $1.99/month storage | Free (Google Workspace for Nonprofits) |
The three kinds of address
1. Your personal address, like yourfirstname@lamboriders.org. A real account with its own inbox and password. It’s yours as long as you volunteer, whatever job you hold. Anyone who answers LAMBO mail gets one, free. Board members who only need board mail don’t need one; they get board@ on their personal email.
2. Job addresses (email@, president@, treasurer@, secretary@, board@). These are Google groups: an address with no inbox and no password that hands each message to its members. Who’s in each one is the only thing that ever changes.
| Address | Use it for | Delivers to |
|---|---|---|
email@lamboriders.org |
LAMBO’s public contact address: on the website, the newsletter, sign-up forms, general vendors | The officers who answer LAMBO mail |
treasurer@ |
The bank, insurance, taxes, invoices, anything about money | Whoever is treasurer |
president@ |
Partners, landowners, the town and county | Whoever is president |
secretary@ |
Minutes, filings, records, account recovery | Whoever is Secretary |
board@ |
Writing to the whole board at once | Every board member, on whatever address they use |
3. The old Gmail (lamboridersemail@gmail.com). Still alive and still receiving, but nobody needs to read it any more. It forwards every message to email@. A lot of logins still use it (PayPal among them); those move over one at a time, and some may never move. That’s fine.
Who gets a lamboriders.org address
It depends on what you do for LAMBO, not on your title.
You get your own lamboriders.org address if you:
- answer mail as LAMBO (replying as
treasurer@ormembership@only works from a lamboriders.org address); - handle money or member details (payment notices, donor names, the money and membership folders);
- make files LAMBO keeps (forms, sheets, minutes, grant drafts). A file belongs to whoever made it, so if it’s made in a personal account, it leaves when that person does;
- sign into LAMBO’s tools (Slack, Google admin, Claude).
Your personal email is fine if you only receive. A board member who reads board@ and votes, or a trail volunteer who only wants work-day notices, can stay on the address they already use.
| Your own lamboriders.org address | Your personal email in a group | |
|---|---|---|
| Good | You can reply as the job address. You can open the money and membership folders. When you step down, your mail and files stay with LAMBO for the next person. | Nothing to set up. Mail arrives where you already look. |
| Not so good | One more inbox and password. | Replies come from your own address. LAMBO mail stays in your inbox for good. No access to the money and membership folders. |
One more inbox is easier than it sounds. Add your lamboriders.org address to the Gmail app or iPhone Mail you already use (Gmail: your picture → Add another account → Google), and it sits next to your personal mail. That’s better than forwarding LAMBO mail to your personal inbox, which puts LAMBO’s mail back in a place LAMBO can’t reach.
Your personal email doesn’t have to be Gmail. Group mail reaches any address: Yahoo, Hotmail, work. To open shared Google Drive files you need a Google account, but not a Gmail address: at accounts.google.com, choose Create account → For my personal use → Use my current email address instead, and your existing address becomes a Google login. The same login lets you read a group’s past messages at groups.google.com.
Where a message goes: three examples
A rider writes to email@lamboriders.org asking about trail conditions. Every officer on email@ gets their own copy. One of you answers (see “Answering as LAMBO” below). Archiving or labeling your copy doesn’t touch anyone else’s.
The bank writes to treasurer@lamboriders.org. Only the treasurer gets it. If the treasurer sets up a filter to file bank mail under a “Bank” label, that’s their business. Nobody else’s inbox fills up with statements.
PayPal emails lamboridersemail@gmail.com about a new membership. The old Gmail keeps a copy and forwards it to email@, so every officer on email@ gets it too. Anyone who still checks the old Gmail for membership payments can keep doing that for now.
Your inbox is yours: filters
In the old shared Gmail, a filter changed the inbox for everyone, so people were careful. Now every officer has their own copy, so set up whatever filters you want.
One catch. The old Gmail forwards everything, including mail its old filters used to tuck away (PayPal sign-in alerts, newsletters, receipts). Those old filters still sort the old inbox, but they don’t stop the forwarding. So the clutter they used to hide now arrives in your new inbox, and you’ll want to recreate the useful filters there.
Make a filter (Gmail on a computer)
- In the search bar at the top of Gmail, type what you want to catch (examples below), then press Enter to check that it finds the right messages.
- Click the sliders icon at the right end of the search bar, then Create filter.
- Choose what happens. Usually: Skip the Inbox (Archive it) and Apply the label → New label… (for example “PayPal” or “Bank”).
- Tick Also apply filter to matching conversations to tidy up what’s already there, then Create filter.
Archived mail isn’t gone. It’s under the label in the left-hand menu and turns up in search.
Search words that work well
| To catch | Type this |
|---|---|
Everything that came through email@ |
list:email@lamboriders.org |
| Everything to the treasurer address | list:treasurer@lamboriders.org |
| Everything forwarded from the old Gmail | to:lamboridersemail@gmail.com |
| All PayPal mail | from:paypal.com |
| PayPal sign-in alerts only | from:paypal.com subject:(login OR "logged in" OR "new device") |
| The bank | from: followed by the bank’s address, copied from one of its emails |
Use list: rather than to: for the job addresses. It still matches when the sender put the address in Cc or Bcc. For subject lines, copy the wording from a real message, since companies change it.
Suggestions:
- Label security alerts; don’t delete them. “Someone signed in to PayPal from a new browser” is how you’d find out if someone got in. File them under a label you glance at now and then.
- Don’t filter
email@out of your inbox completely. It’s where riders and sponsors write. Filter the noise inside it (receipts, newsletters), not the whole address. - Check your Spam folder once in a while in the first few weeks, until Gmail learns what LAMBO mail looks like.
Answering as LAMBO
Reply from the job address. Without this, a reply to treasurer@ comes from your personal address, and the next message goes to you instead of the job. To set it up: Gmail → Settings (gear) → See all settings → Accounts → Send mail as → Add another email address → enter the job address (e.g. treasurer@lamboriders.org), leave Treat as an alias ticked, and click through. Google sends a confirmation to that address, and it arrives in your own inbox. After that, pick the address in the From line when you reply. You can add email@ the same way.
Who answers email@? Several of you get each message, so agree on who answers what (the treasurer takes money questions, the president takes partners, and so on). When you answer, Cc email@lamboriders.org, so the others see it’s been handled and the reply is on record.
Writing to the whole board: send to board@lamboriders.org. Reply-all reaches everyone.
Old mail
Years of the old Gmail’s messages were copied into a LAMBO archive mailbox. Officers can open it from their own account, no extra password: in Gmail, click your profile picture (top right) and choose the LAMBO Archive account marked delegated. Use it to look things up. New mail doesn’t go there, and you don’t need to answer anything in it.
What happens to the old Gmail
Never delete it. A deleted Gmail address can never be recovered, and some login somewhere may still depend on it.
| When | What happens |
|---|---|
| Now | It forwards everything to email@ and keeps a copy in its own inbox, so nothing is lost while everyone settles in |
| Over the coming months | Logins and contact emails move off it, one service at a time (see below) |
| About three months after the switch, when it’s quiet | It still forwards everything but stops keeping a copy in its inbox. Anyone who still reads the old Gmail for something (like membership payments) needs a new home for that mail first. |
| For as long as Gmail exists | It stays alive as a forwarding address, checked once a year |
Changing a service’s contact email
Each service is different. Some let you change the email freely, some make the email the login, some allow several users. Nothing has to move all at once, and anything that never moves keeps working through the forward.
Before changing one, ask two questions:
- Is the email also the login? If so, changing it changes how everyone signs in. Make sure whoever uses it knows the new login before you change it.
- Who needs to read its mail? Point it at the job address for that work, not at a person, so it follows the job when people change.
| Kind of service | Point it at | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Bank, insurance, taxes, invoices | treasurer@ |
Follows the treasurer when the job changes |
| Filings, the state, records | secretary@ |
|
| Partners, landowners, the town | president@ |
|
| Vendors, event sites, anything general | email@ |
|
| PayPal | Leave it on the old Gmail for now | Membership payments are read from its emails, and lots of members pay through it. Moving it is a separate decision for the treasurer, made when there’s a new home for those notices |
| Something only you use for LAMBO | Your own address | Where the service allows several users, add each person on their own address instead of sharing one login |
If a service’s email can’t be changed, or you’re not sure, leave it. It keeps arriving through the old Gmail’s forward.
When someone changes jobs
A Google Workspace admin opens the job address’s group, removes the old member and adds the new one. Takes a minute. The bank, vendors and members don’t need to be told. The new person sets up Send mail as for the job address, and the old person removes it.
If someone leaves LAMBO, an admin suspends their account rather than deleting it, so LAMBO keeps their mail and files.
Signing in safely
- Your account is yours. Don’t share its password; nobody else needs it.
- 2-step verification is required from November 9, 2026. Set it up on your own phone (Google Account → Security → 2-Step Verification). A passkey makes signing in a tap or a face scan, with no codes.
- Lost your phone or locked out? Any of the Workspace admins can get you back in. Ask a board member.
Questions that come up
Will people who only know the old Gmail still reach us? Yes. It forwards everything to email@, indefinitely.
Two of us answered the same email. It happens. Cc email@ when you answer so the others see it’s handled.
I set up a filter and now I can’t find a message. Look under the label in Gmail’s left-hand menu, or search for it. Filters archive, they don’t delete (unless you ticked “Delete it”).
Do I need a lamboriders.org account? Only if you answer LAMBO mail or sign into LAMBO’s tools. Otherwise you’ll get board mail on your personal address through board@.
I’m getting mail meant for a job I don’t hold. Tell a board member. An admin fixes who’s in the group.
Tick boxes as you go. Your ticks are saved in this browser on this device only; boxes already ticked were marked done in the handbook itself.
Updated October 29, 2026. Source: docs/email.md in the site repository. All handbook pages.