March 2009 Board Meeting Minutes

OREGON SWIMMING, INC. BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Regular Meeting
Multnomah Athletic Club, Portland, OR
March 4, 2009

The meeting was called to order at 7:05 p.m. by Mark Rieniets, General Chair. In attendance were: Jacki Allender, Stan Benson, Joe Dahl, Jeff Gudman, Tim Hamlet, Judy L’Roy, Marilyn Loitz, Bruce Ludwig, Bob McMillan, Gene Mielke, Skip Runkle, Coby van Andel, Robbert van Andel

Minutes The minutes from the January 7, 2009 meeting were approved as submitted.

Treasurer (Gene Mielke)

M/S/P Motion to accept the Treasurer’s written Income and Expense Report for January 1, 2009—March 3, 2009. Gene also presented a 2009 Projected Cash Flow report based on years 2003 through 2008.

REPORTS

Age Group (Tim Hamlet) Tim said that he met with at least one coach from each team that was at the 11-14 Championship to see if there were any issues/comments/questions to be passed along. Responses included a) having a B/C Championship meet; b) reviewing the time standards for the 11-14 meet; c) concerns about the 10 & Under Championship; d) complaints about the protest procedure; e) questions about the Zone meet; f) smaller teams sometimes feel that they don’t have a voice. They were reminded that Tim’s e-mal address is on the OSI website. The spontaneous National Anthem during Saturday’s finals was one of the neatest things he’d ever seen at a meet.

Senior Report (Skip Runkle) The Oregon Senior Championship is this weekend and looks to be about the same size as last year. Two senior camps will be held in April; one at Linfield College and the Altitude Camp in Colorado Springs. For the camp at Linfield, the top twenty boys and the top 20 girls from the Senior Championship this weekend will be invited. The Altitude Camp athletes will be selected off of best times from September through the upcoming Sectional Meet. Power points from the top four events of swimmers will be used. Applications will be distributed online in the next week or so. Bert Stratton will be the head coach for the Altitude Camp and two more will be selected depending on the makeup of the team.

Coaches Report (Kyle Kimball) No report. (Coby is sending out a “blurb” from Kyle to all coaches.)

Athletes Representatives (Sloan Storie, Tori Simenec) No report

Scheduling/Championship Site Selection (Mark Maxwell) Per Mark Rieniets, Mark Maxwell is working on the championship meets and trying to come up with a method for the funding of championship meets without killing championship bids. Coby is putting a spread sheet together on the OSI income and expenses of the championship meets over the past six years.

Time Standards (Alex Nikitin) No report

Technical Planning (Jim Bowe) No report

Website (Robbert van Andel) No report

Safety Chair ( Jeanine Serrano) No report

Camp Coordinator (Scott Kerr/Mark Maxwell) No report

Officials Committee (Bob McMillan) All high school district meets were refereed by OSI officials. They all went well, however, one meet had issues because the meet was not observed. I investigated and believe the referee made every reasonable attempt to solicit officials to observe the meet, but was not able to secure the requisite number of officials in advance of the meet. All three high school state meets went very well and were very well staffed.

10&U Championship. The Board was copied on e-mail communication to Mark Rienets regarding an alleged altercation between parents at the meet. A statement by the meet director pointed out that this took place well before the meet, well prior to warm-ups, and this is corroborated by the referee’s meet report. I've responded by sending an e-mail to all referees pointing out the need for the meet referee to ask the meet director for immediate report of issues at a meet.
11-14 Championship. The meet was well staffed and ran very smoothly.
Backstroke. The requested change to verbiage regarding the backstroke turn is being disseminated throughout the LSC through stroke briefings.
N3 evaluators. I've been in contact with USA-S regarding the process for identifying potential N3 evaluators, and they have advised they should have a process published within the "next several weeks". I would like to see a published process so OSI can work toward generating more evaluators; I believe this will benefit OSI by offering more evaluations at a lower travel cost, as well as by elevating our status as an LSC that can help other LSCs.
Meets & OTC. I've begun discussions with AOCs regarding USA-S OTC surrounding having the AOC set up meets in the OTC and then having the meet referee enter all officials in attendance.

The handling of meet evaluations was discussed. The evaluation form was revised a while back with the idea of putting the results on a spreadsheet. This wasn’t carried through. A new idea is to target a specific number of individuals to do evaluations. Mark R. will take on this task.

Disability (Gene Mielke) No report

Office Manager/Registration (Coby van Andel) The membership figures for 2009 to date are: Athletes--4753 regular and 183 outreach for a total of 4,936; Non-athletes—712; Clubs—64; Organizations—2.

JD Pence has been bought by Curtis Taylor and in speaking with him she learned that Speedo is looking at revising its policy for sponsorships and may not provide much toward our awards in the future. They will provide the high point trophy for this year’s 11-14 S.C. Championship.

Sanctions Chair (Terry Johnson) No report

Awards Ceremony (Cheslah Barkdoll) No report

NTV Chair (Jacki Allender We were reminded that high school times only go into the SWIMS database and do not go into the OSI database.

Records (Robbert van Andel) At the 11-14 Championship, MAC set a new relay. There have been several other new records this season.

All-Star Team (Shelly Rawding/Heather Thomas Per Coby: Plans for the Zone meet are being finalized and the applications will be available soon. Kudos were given to Shelly for her handling of the last minute changing of travel plans for the All-Star trip to Federal Way. Both Shelly and Heather did an overall awesome job on the trip.

OLD BUSINESS

Travel Reimbursement Committee (Mark Bernett, Chr.) This coaches’ committee is charged with looking at funding and its progression as a total pictures. The Board was given a preliminary report. Mark R. raised the idea of inviting athletes to be on the Zone Team as opposed to our current practice of athletes’ applying.

NEW BUSINESS

OSI Officials on Website Discussion was held on listing all officials and their areas of certification on the OSI website. M/S/P Motion to add the names and e-mail addresses of starters, stroke and turn, and electronic timers to the Officials section of the OSI website with an opt-out option. Officials will be notified via e-mail that they will be listed unless they opt-out within 14 days of being notified. Robbert will work on a request to make it possible to contact officials via e-mail right from the website.

Trainee Officials on Deck USA Swimming says that trainees can now be on deck without being registered, but cannot act in any official capacity. The consensus from the area officials chairs and the training committee is “yes” they would like to adopt this in our LSC. Bob McMillan will develop guidelines to bring to the board for adoption.

Newsletter Discussion was held on reinstating the OSI newsletter as people really miss it, they don’t know where to find information and the blogs aren’t working. A Newsletter Committee of Jacki Allender, Gene Mielke, and Jeff Gudman was appointed to come up with a recommendation and report back to the Board at the May meeting. They were also asked to look at linking to other LSCs for noteworthy items in their newsletters.

M/S/P Motion to adjourn at 8:27 p.m.

The next Conference call will be April 1, 2009 at 7:30 p.m.

The next Board Meeting will be May 6, 2009 at 7:00 p.m. the Hilton Hotel in Eugene.

Respectfully submitted,
Marilyn Loitz, Recording Secretary