CBF BOARD OF DIRECTORS - CONFERENCE CALL MINUTES

October 9, 2003

PRESENT:         Jim Priebe, CBF President & Zone III Director

                            Claire Jones, CBF Vice President & Zone V Director

                            Mary Moulton, Zone I Director

                            George Retek, acting Zone II Director

                            Bill Treble, Zone IV Director

                            Doug Fraser, Zone VI Director

                            Janice Anderson, Executive Secretary/Treasurer

                            Jean Castonguay, Zone II Director elect

1. CALL TO ORDER

At 8:34pm EDT, President, Jim Priebe, thanked all directors for taking the time to join this meeting and called the meeting to order.

2.   RATIFICATION OF NEW ZONE II DIRECTOR

MOTION 03-10CC-01: The election, by acclamation, of Jean Castonguay is ratified and Jean will take over all responsibilities of the Zone II CBF Director at the conclusion of this conference call.

            MOVED by Mary Moulton.

            SECONDED by George Retek.

            CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.

President, Jim Priebe, welcomed Jean Castonguay on board and also thanked George Retek for stepping in and filling the spot while the election process was carried out.

3.   SYSTEM WORK FOR JUNIORS

MOTION 03-10CC-02: Eric Kokish be given an honorarium of $1000 for the work he did on system material that will be available to all Canadian Juniors.

            MOVED by George Retek.

            SECONDED by Claire Jones.

            CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.

4.   CBF PROCEDURES FOR HANDLING COMPLAINTS

      The board discussed the need for a set system for handling any complaints that come in.

Claire Jones offered to draft a policy for board discussion. This policy will contain specifics on how to handle complaints of abuse or misconduct.

5.   CHILD ABUSE CHECK

Claire Jones reported that in Saskatchewan a person can get a “Child Abuse Check” done through Social Services. Claire pointed out that he felt this is something we should get from all people involved with the CBF Junior Program. This would be in addition to the “Police Record Check” that all people are already asked to submit.

      Concern was raised over the availability of such a thing in all provinces. It was felt that  

before we can proceed with a formal motion in regards to this, we must look into what is available in all provinces.

ACTION: Claire Jones, Jim Priebe and Jean Castonguay will form a committee to look into what is available in all provinces and will then proceed with drafting a motion for our 2004 meeting.

6.   NPC POSITION DESCRIPTION

It was felt that we need to have something down on paper that describes what the duties and responsibilities of all NPCs are. We probably need two documents: one covering the Junior NPC and one covering the Open & Women’s NPC.

These documents should also contain information on what we are looking for in a post event report from the NPC.

      ACTION:

            Claire Jones will draft a JUNIOR NPC position description.

Doug Fraser will draft a position description for the NPC of the Open and Women’s teams.

      George Retek offered to assist in this project where he can.

Jim Priebe will provide Doug Fraser with contact information for others that might have helpful input into this project.

7.   SCREENS

      Problems with our present screens were discussed. Most feel that we need better screens.

      Considerations, though, still include cost and portability.

      It was decided that our current screens will be used in St. Catharines.

For our meeting in June 2004 we will work toward having a draft design and cost estimate on better screens.

Jim Priebe will write an article for the December 2003 Bridge Canada stating that the CBF is considering redesigning the screens and asking people to submit suggestions or plans to us.

8.   CBF REGIONAL

      The Montreal Bridge League is hosting the first CBF Regional - February 23 - 29. 2004.

      The site is rented. Programs are almost ready to go out.

Advertising: November Bulletin will have a box ad and the December Bulletin will have the full schedule.

                             December Bridge Canada will have the full schedule.

                             CBF Website will have the full schedule on it.

Mary Moulton asked that all clubs in her Zone be mailed programs. Janice will get mailing labels sent to Jean Castonguay and he will make sure the clubs are mailed programs.

      Directors have not been assigned yet.

FUTURE PLANNING: George Retek, Jim Priebe and Janice Anderson will put together a proposal for future Regionals.

We will continue to look at the late January to early March time frame.

Ideally we want it to be a split-site Regional. George Retek suggested that we put this to the ACBL Board of Directors for clarification at their 2004 Spring Meeting.

             2005 - would be a possibility in Penticton.

9.   RICHMOND TROPHY

MOTION 03-10CC-03: Any player being awarded the Richmond Trophy must be paid up member of the CBF for the complete year that the trophy is being awarded for.

            MOVED by Mary Moulton.

            SECONDED by George Retek.

            CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.

10. BB/VC REGULATIONS

It was felt that the draft letter still needs a little word smithing. Once the final letter is ready, it should be sent to Jose Damiani, President of the WBF. Copies will be sent to Al Levy, ACBL President, and Dan Morse. A copy will be given to Eric Murray. The letter is to be signed by the CBF President and sent out by the end of November.

11. JUNIOR PROGRAM

NPC reports from the 2003 World Junior Team Championship were received from Ed Antosz and Martin Hunter.

MOTION 03-10CC-04: The CBF acknowledges the receipt of and thanks both Ed Antosz and Martin Hunter for their NPC reports.

            MOVED by Claire Jones.

            SECONDED by Bill Treble.

            CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.

Janice will send a letter to each thanking them for all their work and for the detailed NPC report.

Claire raised an item that Ed has proposed. Ed would like to have a special section, in the December Bridge Canada, on the 2003 Junior team and their experiences at the 2003 WJTC. His idea is to sell separate advertising for this and all additional funds (over normal advertising costs) would go to the Junior Development Fund. The Board asked Claire to approach Ed and tell him that the Board is very interested in this idea but requires more details. This detailed plan would need to be received by beginning of November as the deadline for submitting material for the next Bridge Canada is November 15.

The Board confirmed that they see the roles of those involved with the Junior program as:

a) Junior Manager - oversees the whole program and deals with grassroots involvement and the Junior trials.

             b) Junior NPC - deals with the specifics of the WJ Team and WJTC.

             c) Fundraising can be a job worked on by both.

12. SENIOR TRIALS

The Board has received feedback on the proposed Canadian Senior Team Championship (CSTC). Much discussion took place on how we can make the event better and how we can accommodate players that are in the other National Championship Finals.

MOTION 03-10CC-05: The CBF change the CST into a tthree-dayevent to allow teams to drop in from the CNTC-A QF, CNTC-B SF and the CWTC QF/SF.

            MOVED by George Retek.

            SECONDED by Claire Jones.

            CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.

- individuals playing in other National Finals will need to preregister their intent to drop-in if they are eliminated from their event.

      - drop-in players may be added to teams but may not replace players on teams.

- the deadline for submitting drop-in entries will be one hour after the other events end on the night before the CSTC begins.

Janice will put together a set of Conditions of Contest for this and they will be published in Bridge Canada and on the web-page.

13. FUNDING FOR INTERNATIONAL TEAMS

Jim Priebe has notified the ACBL that the CBF will not be funding all International teams equally. Jim, in his letter, pointed out that at the present time we cannot adequately fund our Open and Women’s teams and thus cannot give equal funding to Senior teams.

MOTION 03-10CC-06: The CBF will not send a Senior Team to International Competition if they are required, by the WBF Zone II body, to fund them equally with the Open and Women’s teams.

            MOVED by Bill Treble.

            SECONDED by Claire Jones.

            Claire Jones took the chair for the vote.

            IN FAVOUR: George Retek, Bill Treble, Mary Moulton.

            OPPOSED: Doug Fraser, Jim Priebe

            CARRIED.

14. SUBSIDY MONEY FOR BB/VC TEAMS

Discussion took place on the current CBF policy of withholding $1000 of subsidy money until an appropriate NPC report has been received by the Board.

The Board reconfirmed the current policy. The withheld money will be released once the NPC report comes in.

15. 2003/2004 GOALS

President Jim Priebe highlighted what he felt should be our goals over the coming year and that we should review the progress each time the board meets.

      a) CWTC Format

- taking a good look at the CWTC format and finding out if changes should be made and if so, what changes.

We are currently working on this and Mary Moulton reported that the survey is on track and will be out by January 1, 2004. This survey is directed more toward finding out “why participation is down.” Mary and Marilyn felt we need to know this before we can proceed with getting opinions on possible format changes.

ACTION: Mary will have the survey out to the board by November and ready to go to players by January 1, 2004.

      b) Relations with Units

- we must make it a goal to have the CBF more known to Units in the Zones. This can be done by having more personal contact with the CBF director and the Units in his/her Zone.

             - Each Zone Director should have some kind of regular contact with Unit Boards.

- Mary Moulton offered to send the board a sample of what she prepares for her Unit boards.

             - this item will be on all agendas

- anytime a Zone Director sends something out to his/her Units, they should also share it with the other CBF Directors as it may be helpful for them in contacting their Units.

      c) Funding our International Teams

             - the ideal goal is to reach full subsidies for our Open and Women teams by 2006 or 2007.

             - the CBF Regional is the first step.

             - we need to do more - thus we need ideas on how to achieve this goal.

             - we have two questions: How much do we need? How do we get it?

             - sponsorship is a hard sell.

16. 2003/2004 TO DO LIST

      The Board ran through the To DO List to see how we are progressing with various tasks.

Bill Treble reported that he had sent out some email in regards to the Notable Canadians. Bill will have something ready for the Board early in November.

      Janice will run a thank you ad in Bridge Canada to people who help out.

17. OTHER BUSINESS

      a) CHARITY MONEY

Janice reminded the board that the deadline for submitting their regional charity fund requests is fast approaching.

      b) LEGAL MATTERS

             It was reported that we are hopefully getting nearer to an end to the current matter.

18. ADJOURNMENT

Jim thanked everyone for their time and officially declared the meeting adjourned at 10:40pm EDT.