VSA Brd Mtg Minutes, Aug. 10
VSA Board Meeting
8/9/2010
Officers in attendance: Scott Thoden, Bill Strachan, Shannon Howard, Paul Frascione, Kevin Driscoll, Mir Rezadoost, Dave Fitz, Lynn Martin, and DeAnna Lindonnguyen
Others in attendance: Kathleen White – Club Administrator, John Wagoner – Fundraising, Gus Donolo – Technical Director, Paul Bradley, Jeff Kerxton, Kim Cologne, Sara Noel, Dan Noel, Sharon Witmer, JD Daunt, Maria Rafferty, and Dave Spofford
Meeting was called to order at 7:08 pm.
The Board meeting minutes from 6/6/2010 were approved in an out-of-cycle vote on 7/27/10.
New Business:
- In an out-of-cycle vote on 7/28/10, the golf tournament was approved by the board pending the removal of the travel team fines and the three bullet points relating to these fines.
Club Administrator:
- Coaches meeting is scheduled for August 26 and we are looking into holding it in the Battlefield HS gym.
- There are 1976 children registered for the fall season.
- We have 39 kids in the cross-over league, 11 in TOPS soccer, 54 waitlisted, and 1852 children have been placed onto 181 teams.
- The recreational teams still need 12 head coaches. Preseason email will be going out tonight with information about the fall season and letting parents know that VSA is looking for volunteers for these coaching positions. Most of the needed coaches are for U8 boys.
- Recreational schedules are pretty much complete and Kathleen is still working on the travel practice schedules.
- Turf fields 6 & 7 will have lights for the fall. These lights are about $400 per unit per month. Lynn will look to see if fuel is included in this price.
- Allison has assured Kathleen that she is on track with where she should be.
Director of Equipment:
- Alice has ordered a case of size 3, 4, and probably 5 balls.
- Recreational uniforms will be in stock at the Running Store on Monday.
Director of Fields:
- Shannon is asking the Park Authority contact for the fields to be lined after Labor Day and they will be done before September 11. We do not need to line the fields at Valley View.
- Grass fields 1A, 1B, 2A, and 2B will be played on every Saturday during the season and they will need more bike flags.
- Shannon will look into weights for the goals.
Director of Referees:
- Kevin has dates and rooms for recertification classes for December, January, and February.
- The VSA referee sections on the website have all been updated and all forms are due on September 1.
Director of Coaches:
- VSA E licensing class is set for September 10, 11 & 12 and is on the website. This class will be run by Chip Rohr.
- Recreational coaching, development, and goalkeeper clinics have been scheduled. The coaching clinics are scheduled for September 11 from 10-11:30am for U5-U8 and September 18 from 6-7:30pm for U10 and older. The development clinics are scheduled for September 11 from 1-2:30pm for the U8-U12 age group and U14 and older age group. The goalkeeper clinics are scheduled for September 18, 25, and October 2 for the U10-U12 group and the U14 and up group. Subject to number of participants.
Vice President:
- The website is coming along but Mir is still working on it. If anyone notices a problem, please let Mir know.
- The sign for the U12 Boys Regional Champions has been put up at the turf field #7.
- The U15 Girls were US Soccer Cup National Finalist. A sign will be made up to recognize them for their accomplishment as well.
Travel Commissioner:
- The game schedules from the leagues will be coming out soon. When they do, we will need to double check the fields.
- The new WAGS competitive league for older girls will not come out with field schedules because they are self scheduled.
- Pre-season schedules only had a few problems.
- Dave has learned some good lessons from this preseason and maybe next time will need to adjust the timing.
- For next year, we will need to think about the timing of the payments for the academy teams.
- Dave has received most of the checks for the non-participation fine for the Bull Run Tournament.
Secretary:
- There were three travel teams that had uniform problems because of the shortage with the Brasillia jersey.
- These problems have been worked through with Ewing and the teams. East to West has also been kept informed of any rush orders that these teams may have needed.
- This process seems to be working well with one point of contact for the travel teams and Ewing to work through.
- The board meeting minutes will now be sent out to the board for an approval vote about a week after the meeting. This will allow the members of VSA to be more up to date with board discussions and decisions.
SFL Commissioner:
- For the fall season there are 17 SFL teams with almost 300 kids.
Treasurer:
- The financial information for July will go out to the new accounting firm.
- Not all of the Papa John checks have been picked up. Lynn informed the board of which teams she still had checks for. Board members that knew these teams/individuals agreed to deliver them.
- Lynn has received invoices from East to West that have additional charges on them. It was determined that the teams were responsible for theses charges.
- A question was asked as to when VSA would be receiving the check from Ewing for the lettering and numbering. John said that he would call and see.
Technical Director:
- Gus said that some of the academy teams will start practice on Monday, August 16 but this would be up to the individual team coaches. Monday, August 23 is the official start date of the academy practices.
- The academy coaches will let the parents know the date when practices will start. Coaches will have the option to deviate from the schedule posted on the website.
- The website will reflect the official start date and the coaches will be responsible for keeping track of the 22 contracted sessions.
- Coaches are trying to hold a pre-season meeting with the team parents.
Fundraising Director:
U10 Girls Academy issue:
- Dave Fitz gave background information about how the U10 Girls White team formed.
- An email was sent out to the parents of children that did not make the A or B team to see if there was enough interest to make up a third team. These parents were then asked if they wanted a professional or parent coach. This girl’s team chose to have a parent coach. Several emails went back and forth with the team manager to make sure they wanted a specific parent coach. After it was determined that they wanted this coach, an email was sent with rules and stipulations requiring coach sign off and agreement to form the team.
- Several parents from the U10 Academy Blue and Gold teams came to the meeting to express their concerns over the white team being allowed to have a parent coach.
- The parents were very concerned that many rules and policies were not followed when approving this team. They also felt that this may be detrimental to the academy system. Many parents in the academy system were under the impression that all new teams with birth year 2000 or later would only be academy teams and professionally trained and coached.
- Dave F expressed that the structure for a third team in the academy system is not clear and this caused a misunderstanding with the parents.
- From this meeting, the parents would like to see an action plan from the board.
- The board understands the parents’ frustrations and concerns about this issue. It now needs to decide how to handle it this fall season and in the future.
- The board thanked the parents for their comments and concerns.
Executive session:
- Due to shortness of preparation time, the Board decided to delay the Golf Tournament until Spring 2011.
- Also during executive session, the Board decided that a change in our approach to fundraising was in order and resolved to allow current director of fundraising to expire without renewal in January 2011. The board will begin deliberations on a new way forward in September.
Meeting was adjourned at 10:05 pm.
