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BOARD OF DIRECTORS’ MEETING AGENDA
Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2004
ClubSport Fremont
46650 Landing Parkway
Fremont, CA 94538
Directions: Driving South on 880, take the Mission Blvd/Warren Ave Exit.
Continue on W. Warren and turn right on Landing Pkwy.
Driving North on 880, take the Gateway Blvd Exit. Continue on Gateway Blvd
and turn right on Bayside Pkwy. Bayside turns into Landing Pkwy.
I. Food and Refreshments—6 PM
II. Call to Order—6:30 PM
III. Introductions
IV. Approval of Minutes
V. Executive Committee Activities
VI. President’s Report
VII. Executive Director’s Report
VIII. Treasurer’s Report
A. Variance Report (Green)
B. Monthly Grants (Red)
C. Budget Requests (Purple)
IX. Committee Decisions/Meeting Schedule (Yellow)
X. Action Items (Blue)
A. Inside Tennis-USTA NorCal Newsletter Agreement
B. Split Ratings in Combo and Mixed Leagues
C. TPI 1
D. TPI 2
E. TPI 3
F. TPI 4
G. TPI 5
H. TPI 6
XI. Old Business
XII. New Business
XIII. Adjournment of Meeting
Next Meeting: Wednesday, Feb. 18, 2004 at ClubSport Fremont.
Action Item
January 2004 A
Presenter(s): Bill Schoen, Chairman, Marketing and Communications Committee
Statement of Action Item: In exchange for the usage of the USTA NorCal (NorCal) mailing list by Inside Tennis (IT) and a certain sum of money to be paid by NorCal on a monthly basis to IT that is to be agreed upon, NorCal will receive 4 color pages in the center spread in each issue of IT. An average of one page in each issue can be used for advertising. The pages will be identified as NorCal pages and will be written, laid out, and printed at no additional cost to NorCal. Photography shall also be included. The agreement will be for 9 issues in 2004 and may be extended by the Board in the following years as long as both NorCal and IT are satisfied with the arrangement. Either party may cancel the agreement on 90 days notice. NorCal will provide a liaison person to work with IT. Reasonable deadlines will be negotiated and adhered to by both parties.
This resolution would rescind the July 17, 2002 resolution of the Marketing Committee that was approved by the Board that exchanged the NorCal mailing list for three pages in IT for advertising or sponsorship purposes.
Rationale for Action: The departure of the USTA NorCal Communications
staff member makes it the right time to consider other options to NorCal
publishing and printing its newsletter.
Fiscal Impact: That depends upon the sum of money in the agreement to be
discussed in Executive Session by the Board.
Staff Comments: The proposal allows for USTA NorCal to maintain its
identity and visibility within Inside Tennis and provides for a vehicle to
distribute news to USTA members in print form in a timely fashion.
January 2004 B
Presenter(s):
Philip Stromer, Jean Hassoun, Margie Peterman
Statement of Action Item:
To set aside a portion of the Adult League Committee decision dated 11/19/03, pertaining to the allowable ratings disparity of players in the mixed and combo leagues above the 9.0 level.
Rationale for Action:
The concept is excellent for lower levels, but an unwanted burden at the higher levels. Two of the three board members want the restriction to apply only to levels below 8.0, and hope for a board discussion on this issue.
Fiscal Impact: None
Staff Comments: None
January 2004 C
Presenter(s):
Philip Stromer, Jean Hassoun, Betty Cookson
Statement of Action Item:
To set aside the Adult League Committee decision dated 11/30/03, pertaining to the mandatory reporting of practice match scores.
Rationale for Action:
The reporting of practice match scores should be voluntary.
Fiscal Impact:
If the implementation process is changed now, the current technical support staff may withdraw from the project and pay the $30,000 committed to the project. This could require the hiring of additional staff, 1 – 2 full-time positions, to finish the project. The estimated cost would be $40 – 100,000.
Staff Comments: Voluntary reporting has not been successful using TPI in
the past. A change from mandatory reporting of match scores to voluntary
reporting would assuredly delay the project and likely cause TPI to
fail because of a lack of data input if match reporting was voluntary.
January 2004 D
Presenter(s):
Philip Stromer, Jean Hassoun, Betty Cookson
Statement of Action Item:
Change the current TPI mandatory requirement for player participating in TPI to record all their practice matches to be eligible to play in the NorCal Sectional Leagues, to the following:
It is strongly recommended to all players participating in the NorCal Sectional Leagues to record all or most of their non-USTA matches into TPI for optimizing the computation of their actual ratings.
New players (without a computer rating) entering the leagues shall be required to record 10 practice matches before being qualified to participate in the leagues. Players with a current computer rating are exempt from that requirement and will enter the new system with their rating.
Rationale for Action:
This change has three main justifications:
1) It would support a softer player-friendly NorCal policy in its TPI introduction and get acceptance on the product values, and not from a mandatory rule which is already alienating many in NorCal and could cause an important drop out from participation in the NorCal Sectional Leagues, and potentially in all leagues if TPI is used for all leagues in ’05. That risk could cause catastrophically damaging financial consequences in NorCal by minimizing league revenues.
2) It has not be proven that TPI would not work if non-USTA matches were not recorded.
There hasn’t been, perhaps except at LVTC, any piloting of DCTR in any way which could provide data for what could work for NorCal.
Some claims were made of documents “proving” that only a mandatory recording would work, but not only no one was allowed to verify those claims, but just the concept that a local club environment (for which that program was designed) could be expanded to cover a while USTA section makes no sense.
If TPI cannot function just as well as DNTRP, and better for new players (self-rated, with a requirement of entering 10 matches before qualifying for the leagues), that project should be stopped now as poorly designed.
NorCal should not define a policy to satisfy a poorly designed program, but should have a program designed to satisfy a market need.
It should be assumed that voluntary practice match recording will improve the quality of the computed ratings.
3) As there is no safeguard to control the reality of those practice matches, it’s an easy avenue for cheaters to enter dummy matches to protect low ratings.
Until such safeguards are defined and implemented, NorCal is imposing a burden on the players (for some unacceptable) without providing any protection against those cheaters.
TPI, as it stands, provides a much easier environment for cheaters to manage their ratings and to avoid being caught. While some could point out weaknesses in DNTRP (i.e. handling of mixed leagues), its process of hiding the actual dynamic rating allows the 3-strikes system to handle people going out of levels.
The TPI value of providing a better way to handle new players (self rated in DNTRP) is very secondary to its terrible weakness of being cheater friendly.
Fiscal Impact:
Not supporting the motion could have very damaging financial problems in NorCal if league revenues are lower than in current years. (Presenters)
If the implementation process is changed now, the current technical support staff may withdraw from the project and pay the $30,000 committed to the project. This could require the hiring of additional staff, 1 – 2 full-time positions, to finish the project. The estimated cost would be $40 – 100,000.
Staff Comments: Voluntary reporting of match scores may cause the project
to fail.
January 2004 E
Presenter(s):
Jean Hassoun, Philip Stromer, Betty Cookson
Statement of Action Item:
To set aside the Adult League Committee decision dated 11/30/03 and the Board resolution of Oct. 15, 2003, pertaining to the mandatory registration of all the tennis members of the member organizations, as a requirement for their participation in the NorCal sectional leagues.
Rationale for Action:
That requirement violates both the organizations’ rights for a selective participation of their members and forces them to potentially violate their members’ rights for privacy, with possible legal ramifications.
Recommendation: Modify that requirement to include all tennis players who did not instruct their organizations to not provide their contact information to NorCal.
Existing USTA members will be registered in the TPI database, and the organizations can elect not to provide phone numbers and email addresses for those of their members requesting this. Non-USTA members can be excluded from TPI if they so desire.
Fiscal Impact: If the implementation process is changed now, the current technical support staff may withdraw from the project and pay the $30,000 committed to the project. This could require the hiring of additional staff, 1 – 2 full-time positions, to finish the project. The estimated cost would be $40 – 100,000.
Staff Comments: Voluntary participation may cause the project to fail.
January 2004 F
Presenter(s):
Jean Hassoun, Philip Stromer, Betty Cookson
Statement of Action Item:
Change: the current TPI mandatory requirement for member organizations to record at least 90% of all its tennis members as a condition for their participation in the NorCal sectional leagues, to the following:
Proposed requirement:: Member organizations will be required to register in TPI all of their tennis members, except those members who instruct the organizations to not provide their contact information outside the organization database and files, or specifically not to USTA NorCal.
Rationale for Action:
That requirement violates both the organizations’ rights for a selective participation of their members and forces them to potentially violate their members’ rights for privacy, with possible legal ramifications for the organizations, and potentially indirectly for USTA NorCal.
This could in fact prevent many organizations to join in piloting TPI and limit their participation in the USTA NorCal sectional leagues, and even to the National Leagues if NorCal obtains a waiver for ’05.
Many clubs have only a limited portion of their membership who are USTA members and even a more limited portion participate in USTA leagues.
We estimate that participation to widely range from 20% to 90%.
While it is the stated goal to include many players not currently USTA members in TPI, the current mandate will prevent the member organizations to be compliant.
Current Requirement is not Enforceable:
Member organizations could elect the following process as a solution between that excessive requirement and they wish to allow some of their players to participate in the NorCal leagues.
The member organization can create a new CTA ($25/year), register (free of charge) in that CTA those of its members interested in sectional league play, and commit that CTA to TPI. In fact, that process allows a member organization to be ‘compliant’ with the TPI requirement, but likely will register only a small portion of its members.
Allowing the members of an organization to exclude themselves if they wish to not be included removes much of the member organization’s motivation to use that alternative process, and will bring to TPI many more players.
TPI Player Registration Needs to be Urgently Improved:
The current player registration process is manual (3 to 5 minutes per player).
This is not only very error prone for most clubs, but also labor intensive and very difficult for organizations without available staff.
A file based registration process would allow an easy initial registration, but also would allow the incremental changes (new and obsolete members, modified contact information, and making use of the TPI features of hiding selected information).
Also, the management of this requirement would be much facilitated if USTA NorCal provides a process for member organizations for checking which of its members are also USTA members. A specification for such a process was sent to the Executive Director as a feature request and is available for review to anyone.
Fiscal Impact: Unsure at this time. If the implementation process is changed now, the current technical support staff may withdraw from the project and pay the $30,000 committed to the project. This could require the hiring of additional staff, 1 – 2 full-time positions, to finish the project. The estimated cost would be $40 – 100,000.
Staff Comments: Voluntary participation may cause the project to fail.
January 2004 G
Presenter(s): Paul Kepler
Statement of Action Item: To construct a possible compromise that may create the best chance for the TPI Pilot to be successful.
1. Assuming USTA NorCal (NorCal) is granted its waiver request by the National USA League Tennis Committee, all National and Sectional league participants (beginning with the Fifty Mixed Season) will be required to register in the TPI Pilot and all new participants will be required to enter 10 match results (including one-set matches) into TPI prior to self-rating. If the waiver is not granted, then registration will be required for Sectional league participants only.
2. Registrants will be required to enter all their matches into TPI except traditional one-set matches; i.e. entry of traditional one-set matches will be voluntary. (Note - if one player enters a traditional one-set match, it becomes official for all participants in the match.)
3. Registration of non-league tennis player participants will be voluntary by each Member Organization. However, if a Member Organization elects to register its non-league tennis player participants, it must register them all (unless a non-league tennis player participant expressly requests, in writing, to be excluded from the TPI Pilot).
A. USTA membership will not be required to access TPI information in 2004.
B. As an incentive to Member Organizations to join the TPI Pilot, NorCal Staff will register all participants through June 30, 2004.
Rationale for Action: In the event the previous action items do not pass, this
provides an alternative course of action if the Board is not satisfied with previously passed resolutions.
Fiscal Impact: If the TPI Technical Support Team withdraws from the project
or the NorCal staff is directed to register participants, additional staff could need to be hired to register participants and the costs could be $40 – 100,000.
Staff Comments: Voluntary input of matches may cause the Pilot to fail.
Mandatory inclusion of all tennis players of a Member Organization may
cause some Member Organizations to decide not to participate in the Pilot.
January 2004 H
Presenter(s): Bruce A. Hunt
Statement of Action Item: Agreement with TPI Support Group. Estimated cost to implement and develop TPI for the next 9 months is $75,000 to $100,000 to the TPI Support Group. Current agreement, regarding the budget and implementation plan, with the Support Group is that the support group will provide the service for $30,000. If NorCal changes the implementation plan in the future without the agreement of the Support Group, then the Support Group would have the right to withdraw from the project and be reimbursed for all costs including time and expenses up to $80,000.
Rationale for Action: The TPI Support Group agreed to implement the project for less than market rates as a donation for the project provided it was implemented in a certain way. If those conditions were to change then the support group would not want to donate their services for the project. Therefore the Support Group would want to be reimbursed for all costs if NorCal did not follow through with implementation as agreed. The TPI Support Group should not have to donate time and expenses for a project that NorCal decides to change and that the Support Group did not agree to implement.
Fiscal Impact: Possibly $50,000 over the budget if NorCal changes the implementation plan without approval.
Staff Comments: The cost to continue the TPI project on a voluntary match score reporting basis could be $40 – 100,000 for 1 – 2 new full-time staff positions. These staff positions would be contacting organizations that wanted to enroll in TPI, assisting the organizational administrator with their membership lists, working with Mike Friedman regarding the program, and the other tasks currently being done by the TPI Technical Support Team.
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