District 7 Meeting Minutes:

 Gatlinburg, TN April 17, 2004

 

President Barbara Heller called the meeting to order at 10:10 AM.

 

Introductions were done with the following in attendance: Sandy Barrow-Unit 114 President, Jay Bates-Unit 191 Rep, Judith Bloomer-Unit 119 rep and MABC Secretary, George Bloomer-Unit 119 rep, District Finance Chairman and MABC Governor, Nannell Burford-Unit 160, Eldon Clayman-Immediate Past President, Susie Clayman-Unit 244 rep and MABC Governor, Ray Coleman-Augusta Co-Chair and Unit 202 rep, Ann Hedden-Unit 114, Barbara Heller-President, Bob Heller-MABC Governor and Unit 114 rep, Nancy Hetsko-Secretary and MABC Governor, Wayne Hollingsworth-Vice President and NAP Coordinator, Pat Jankovic-Unit 165 President, Reba Jernigan-Unit 206 President, David Klein-Wilmington Chair, Unit 118 rep and MABC Governor, Mike Kovacich-1st Alternate to ACBL Board of Governors, Josie Mitchell-Unit 114 rep, Julie Murphy-Unit 171 rep, Walt Murphy-Unit 171 rep, Betty and Dick Myers-Unit 114 reps,  Joanne Newby-unit 165, George Nichols-Unit 160 rep and MABC Governor, Judy Nolan-Treasurer, MABC Governor and Gatlinburg Co-Chair, Bruce Reeve-District 7 Director and ACBL President, Larry Rich-Unit 114 Rep and MABC Governor, Veronica Ruggles-Unit 202 rep, Pat Seiler-Unit 160 rep and MABC Treasurer, Janet and Joe Sherwood-Unit 114 reps,  Liz Swanson-Unit 114 Rep and GNT Coordinator, Jerry Vaughan-Unit 165 rep, Marlene Wass-Gatlinburg Co-Chair, Emory Whitaker-Unit 114 rep, Bob White-Unit 119 rep and MABC Governor, Carol Winecoff-Unit 153 rep, and Harold Winecoff-ACBL Governor.  Also present as a guest was Leon Lyday-District 4 President.   

 

Minutes: Eldon Clayman moved that the minutes from the Hilton Head meeting be approved as submitted, Dick Myers seconded and the minutes were approved.  

 

Treasurer’s Report and Budget: Judy Nolan presented a report showing the account balances as of 4-10-04, a detailed listing of all calendar year-to-date transactions and the proposed 2004-2005 budget.  George Bloomer pointed out that because we are anticipating greater income we are budgeting $7200 to go into the reserve fund.  He also said that if the MABC goes to a calendar year budget the Finance Committee would have a special meeting to add 6 months to our budget. Joe Sherwood moved to accept the treasurer’s report as submitted, Pat Seiler seconded and the treasurer’s report was approved.  Nancy Hetsko moved to approve the proposed budget, Eldon Clayman seconded and the budget was approved. 

 

Website Committee: Wayne Hollingsworth reported that the District 7 website is now up and the address is district7bridge.org.  He requested that anyone with any suggestions for the web should email him.  Wayne negotiated a Webmaster fee of $100 per month with Guru Shyamsundar, and indicated that Guru had been paid $300 for the start-up work and would begin receiving the $100 per month April 1st.

 

Committees: Barbara Heller reported that Nan Burford is now on the Finance Committee.

 

Tournament Oversight/Publication Committee:  Joe Sherwood had no oversight items to report, but commented that the publication would probably be under budget.  Julie Murphy commented that the District publication is wonderful.

 

By-Laws Committee: No report.

 

Education Liaison: Sandy Barrow reported that Unit 114 is having the ACBL Unit Growth Seminar at the Macon Bridge club on June 6th and wanted everyone to know that this is something ACBL offers to all units free of charge.  Bruce Reeve stated that each unit should have an Education Liaison and let Memphis know who it is – ACBL will be sending out lots of helpful information.

 

Appeals: No report

 

Easybridge: No report

 

Entitlement:  Wayne Hollingsworth reported that the Entitlement Committee had received a request for assistance with the entry fee for the Women’s International Team Trials (to be held during the Raleigh Regional) from a District 7 team (Barbara Heller, Sue Cooper, Annalee Gault and Nancy Hetsko).  The entry fee is $170 per day for the event.  Nan Burford moved that District 7 pay the entry fees for the team as long as they remained in the event.  Eldon Clayman seconded.  Bob White proposed an amendment that only ˝ the entry fees be paid by the District.  Pat Seiler seconded the amendment.  The amendment failed and the original motion passed.

 

Tournament Coordinator:  Bob Heller handed out the updated tournament schedule and reported that attendance has been very good. Reba Jernigan stated that Huntsville, Alabama is having a sectional the same weekend, as Chattanooga, and this will hurt attendance at Chattanooga.  Bob said he would talk to Charlie MacCracken about this.

 

Regional Site Selection Committee: Bob Heller commented that we are locked in through 2008 assuming District 7 approves Chattanooga for December 1 through 7, 2008 (tournament would start the day after the Boston National ends).  Wayne Hollingsworth stated that Chattanooga was popular 2 times ago.  Mike Kovacich said that there was a November date available, but the November date had lots of problems as it was probably the same week as Daytona, would start right after VA Beach ends, would end right before Boston started, and the rooms would be $10 more in November.  Julie Murphy moved that we approve Chattanooga for the December dates.  Wayne seconded and the motion was approved.  Mike K. said that Bob should report this to the MABC.

 

GNT Report: Liz Swanson reported that we are down about $800 on the area semifinals and up about $30 from club qualifiers.  She also reported that she discovered that the Duplicate Bridge Association of Atlanta has not sent anything in this year or last year on club qualifiers that they ran.  Also, Priscilla Smith hasn’t sent anything in on the one qualifier she ran last year or the one she ran this year.  Liz then brought up the format for the District finals.  Wayne Hollingsworth stated that there were 2 issues.  The first involved the seeding for the Championship flight (over 5000) and flight A (2000-5000).  Last year there were 6 teams in the Championship flight and they were seeded with 1,3 and 5 in one round robin and 2,4 and 6 in the other round robin.  This seeding made the first round robin considerably tougher than the second.  Wayne suggested that the committee should review and “tweak” the seeding this year.  The second issue involved Flights B and C.  We used to run a Swiss on Saturday to qualify 4 teams for the finals on Sunday.  Last year we tried a Swiss on Saturday to qualify 8-10 teams to play in another Swiss on Sunday for the finals, but we did not give them any carryover from Saturday.  Wayne would like to use the National carryover formula.  Liz said that she wants to know what the maximum carryover would be before she could decide.  Mike K. said that the board needs to make the decision so Liz won’t have to take any grief from the players.  Mike made the following 2 motions:

1.     That Wayne and the GNT committee “tweak” the seeding for Flight A and the Championship flight.  Bruce Reeve seconded this motion and stated that we should trust the committee to do a fair matching.  He also suggested that the seeding should be posted on the District 7 web page 1 week prior to the event.  The motion was approved.

2.     That Flights B and C receive a victory point carryover from Saturday using the ACBL formula but not to exceed 20 victory points.  Julie Murphy seconded the motion.  Wayne pointed out that there would probably only be 6 matches on Sunday, and Mike amended his motion to reflect a maximum of 15 victory points.  The motion was approved.

Liz said she thought Wayne had wanted to change the Flight A and championship flights to Swiss on Saturday, but Wayne said that was not what he wanted.  Liz said she would poll the players during the event.

 

NAP Report:  Wayne Hollingsworth reported that club level qualifying starts June 1st and goes through August 31st.  The ACBL has made a few changes: clubs can run twice as many qualifiers and the sanction fee is reduced from $1.70 to $1.00 per player.  Participation at the club level determines whether the District gets extra trips.  Wayne said they were still working on finding an acceptable site for the finals.  Knoxville and Charlotte have indicated that they have possible sites.  There will be a full write-up in the July publication.

 

At this point, Barbara Heller interrupted to recognize Judy Nolan and Marlene Wass for putting on a great tournament.

 

Wayne next brought up the issue of unit finals for the NAP.  Historically, we’ve had 2-session finals in each flight, allowing people to cross over flights.  The ACBL requirements used to be that in order to have a 2-session district final you had to have unit finals.  The ACBL no longer requires the unit finals in order to have the 2-session district finals.  The question is: should we continue to have unit finals?  They are difficult to schedule, and the District does not benefit financially from the unit finals.  Wayne went on to say that the District loses about $2000 per year on the pairs.  Bruce Reeves commented that he used to be in favor of unit finals, but not anymore.  We want to encourage club level participation, and not having a unit final should increase district level participation.  Dick Myers made a motion that we make no changes this year.  Liz Swanson seconded and pointed out that Unit 114 is already set up for their unit final.  Sandy Barrows added that the unit 114 board had no overwhelming consensus to retain the unit final, but she had received an email from Ken Parker urging us to keep the unit final because losing it will hurt his tournament (Peachtree City).  Janet Sherwood commented that some units felt that the NAP unit final was a big fundraiser for their unit.  David Klein agreed and said that his is a small unit, but the NAP unit final is an important event on their calendar.  Wayne Hollingsworth proposed an amendment to Dick’s motion such that it would not affect whether or not we ask for money from the units.  Dick accepted the amendment, and the motion passed 20 to 5.  Wayne commented that the units must go through him to schedule their unit finals.  Bob Heller made a motion that the district receive $8 per table from the unit finals; Liz Swanson seconded.  Bruce Reeve suggested amending the motion to adding $1 per table per session to the unit and district finals.  The motion passed.  Bob White moved to eliminate unit finals after this year, Eldon seconded.  Ray Coleman inquired why we would want to eliminate the unit finals if the district can make money from them.  Eldon responded that there are scheduling problems and Mike K. added that eliminating the unit finals would enable us to hold the district final earlier.  Julie Murphy made a motion to table the current motion, which was seconded by Nan Burford.  The motion to table was defeated 9 to 14.  Bob White’s original motion to eliminate unit finals after this year was approved.

 

Old Business: None 

 

New Business:

1.     Barbara Heller reported that she had been approached about Bridge Camp – there are about 6 kids from the district who could go this year.  Bruce Reeve made a motion that the district pay $100 per person attending up to $1000.  Mike K. seconded and the motion passes.

2.     Eldon Clayman asked whether we should plan to offer the Director Refresher Course next year in Gatlinburg.  Marlene needs to know for next year’s schedule.  She would like to do the Director’s course the weekend prior to the tournament and offer the refresher course on Monday.  Bruce Reeve moved that we schedule the Director’s course and the Director’s Refresher course as Marlene wanted.  Larry Rich seconded and the motion was approved.  It was pointed out that this is actually a Mid-Atlantic issue.

3.     Should we have a board meeting during the Raleigh Regional?  Bob Heller stated that we do have a STaC issue which needs to be addressed; Barbara Heller said that it could be done online.  Mike K. moved that we not have a meeting during Raleigh; Bob White seconded and the motion passed.  Liz Swanson asked whether that would have been the meeting where we decide the amount of money to give to the winning teams for the GNT.  Barbara Heller stated that the Executive Committee could handle it.

4.     Seminar for Tournament Chairs:  Bob Heller said that in the past, we had done a seminar for tournament chairs.  Bob felt that since we are not having a board meeting during Raleigh, it would be a good time to offer the tournament chair seminar again, perhaps on Friday or Saturday morning.  The consensus of the board was that Saturday morning would be best.

5.     Bruce Reeve indicated that the insurance for units would be changing effective May 1st.

 

There was a rising motion to adjourn.

 

Respectfully submitted,

Nancy Hetsko, Secretary

 

Note: Subsequent to this meeting, Liz Swanson resigned as GNT Coordinator.  President Heller and the entire board wish to thank Liz for all her years of hard work as GNT Coordinator.