(The next Board meeting will be the Annual Retreat, August 10-12, 2001 at a site to be announced.)

In Attendance: Emi Vishoot, Terry Miller, Bob Dickenson, Glenn Purdy, Rick Laskey, Al Herbert, Keith Burke, Steve Donahue, Ron Wyzynski, Nick Nystrom, Michelle Fox, Patty Salvatore, Bob Price, Hank Trimble and Troy Dixon
 
Guest: Tom Silbernagel
 
Absent with notice were: Jeff Belmonte, John Buck, Tom Kohl, and Bill Zehler

Meeting was called to order at 9:10 am. Al Herbert passed out an agenda and the previous meeting's minutes. A question was raised about the distribution of Bid Tournament Sites. Bob P. will talk with John and Bill about the process. Emi moved to approve the 10/15/00 meeting minutes. Glenn seconded. Motion passed unanimously.

Bob Price - Commissioner's Report

Officials for the Regional events in Columbus will be staying at the Hawthorn Suites. Staff may stay on site at the Hampton Inn. The Crowne Plaza is already booking teams for the second Juniors weekend. The Region is not interested in trying to become the middle person between hotels in Columbus and teams. We prefer to allow the teams to deal directly with the hotels themselves.

Directions to the various sites for the first weekend of Junior Regionals will be checked for correctness and clarity. There may be some construction detours about which we will need to notify the teams.

There are 40 courts being reserved at sites for the first weekend of Junior Regionals and 32 courts at the Convention Center for the second weekend. Has met with Columbus Parks and Recreation Department but their security requirements are too expensive.

The Region has about 100 Spalding and 250 Baden volleyballs left for sale out of 800. Check the Region's web page for more information: http://www.ovr.org/

Nick is working on the Region's Handbook. Will be distributing sections for review shortly. The current edition of the Newsletter is a higher priority now.

All Team Registration Packets next year will include information about locating Region materials on our web site. The Region is trying to cut down on Postal Mail.

Emi Vishoot, Liaison to OHSCA

Because we had a guest (Tom Silbernagel) we moved to a discussion of Boys Volleyball in the Region. There is a new organization (Ohio High School Boys Volleyball Coaches Association) being formed. This organization is intended to promote Boys volleyball in the schools. Tom has developed a video to help promote this issue. He asked if the Region would be interested in sponsoring the production costs of more copies. After some discussion about changes in the video, Keith moved that the Region fund up to $1,500 to develop and produce a tape and information package to promote Boys volleyball in Ohio and the Region. Emi will review and approve the final tape before funding. Terry seconded. Motion passed unanimously.

Ron Wyzynski - CEO Report

Thanked everyone who worked at the Region's sponsored tournaments over the past two weekends at the Kent State University Annex. This included clinicians, raters, officials, and tournament director (Micki Fox).

He is meeting with the Region's lawyer to clarify need for 1099's and W2 forms within the Region's business. He feels that the Region will be required to start issuing 1099 for more staff members.

38 teams took advantage of the Region's offer to buy insurance for their tryouts at $1 per attendee.

Over 4,800 people are now registered in the Region. This is just to this date. Expects well above 10,000 total by the middle of February.

The Region is sponsoring adult and junior tournaments at the KSU Annex. Ron plans to attend each event to make sure the facility is cleaned when we are finished. We don't want to lose this site. If you are playing in one of these events (or really any event) please pick up your trash before you leave. Don Dickey is helping with the setup and take down of the nets.

Saturday, Feb. 3rd, there will be a meeting for all Club Directors in Westerville, OH at Westerville High School South in the Media Room (Library) starting at noon. Region policy regarding recruiting of athletes and tryout procedures will be developed at this meeting. All club Directors are strongly encouraged to attend or send a representative.

The region office has announced that Kaepa USA will be the "Official Volleyball Outfitter" of the Ohio Valley Region-Kaepa USA Junior Championships. This should generate about $10,000 additional income for the Region.

Is working with Molton to obtain 200 volleyballs for the Region's Bid and Regional Tournaments for both adults and juniors. Molton will be used at National Events.

The Region is looking for a possible site in the Columbus area to put our own facility. It would be used for tournaments and practices. Is looking for a space for about 6 courts.

There will be 16 courts for Adult Regionals.

Bob will check with John B. to make sure all Bid Sites have sufficient clearance around and above the courts.

John Buck, Bid Tournament Coordinator

No report.

Rick Laskey, Referee Chair

Hosted Professional Official Clinics in three cities in December. There are now about 60 new First Year Provisional Officials. The plan for next year is to offer fewer make-up clinics for professional officials but more player clinics. This is to train the players to do a more consistent job during pool play at adult tournaments. Prospective professional officials will need to attend one of the December clinics because of the amount of information distributed and demonstrated. The make-up clinics do not contain enough information to train these new officials.

Terry Miller, Scorekeeper Chair

Scorekeeping ratings have gone well at the tournaments so far. There are some clarifications needed on how to record exceptional substitutions involving the Libero player.

Michelle Fox, Women's Tournament Director

Women's' Teams Tournaments are going well.

Keith Burke, Men's Tournament Director

Some Men's teams may need to be re-aligned into a different category after looking at the results at the KSU Annex tournaments.

Has been approached to sanction co-ed tournaments. This should be able to be done as long as all players are Ohio Valley Members.

Troy wondered if there is some way to encourage teams to move from A to AA. He also felt that there should be a larger minimum number of tournaments played within Region to count for seeding points. Now a team only has to play in two events to be seeded.

Bill Zehler, Juniors Program Director

Bill submitted a report. 30 club directors attended the ASEP Sports Club Director Course. All club directors must attend this clinic within the first two years of forming a club. Non-compliance may result in a $300 - $500 fine. There will be a Club Directors meeting 3/3 in Westerville.

Cap I and II clinics were hosted at Miami University in early January. Impact clinics are now are now posted on the web: http://www.ovr.org/juniors/coaching/impact.html

Feb. 1st will be the first day for Junior Regional Tournament Registration. There will not be any refund for withdrawing from the event. There may be a need to limit the number of teams in some categories depending upon the quantity that register for the event.

The Region needs to continue to sponsor a High Performance Team. Al made a motion that Ron oversee and fund the Team again this year. Glenn seconded the motion. Motion passed unanimously.

Bill recommended that the Board approve a $2,500 bonus for Ron for landing the Kaepa contract.

Ron indicated that he would rather not receive a bonus. He instead recommended a committee be formed to evaluate the Region's compensation program for all officers. Al, Hank and Patty volunteered to form this committee and report back at or before the next meeting.

Steve moved that Ron be awarded a $2,500 bonus. There was no second. Motion died for lack of a second.

Tom Kohl, Juniors Tournament Director

No Report.

Al Herbert, Junior Official Development Director

Reported that approximately 2,700 Scorekeeper Certification Cards were mailed to players, coaches, and parents who attended scorekeeping clinics last year. These cards are good until 10/31/01. Also about 60 Second Referee Certification Cards were distributed to those who completed the evaluation process last year. If you hosted a scorekeeping clinic and did not receive your certification cards, please contact Al.

Clubs are currently requesting clinics for this year. We recommend that they schedule a clinic through Al Herbert or if they have a particular clinician that they prefer, they could schedule directly with them.

Certifications this year will take place during matches at tournaments. It is the Club Director's responsibility to email the names of certified players to Al Herbert. If the club is to go to a National Event, then the Region needs to be able to authenticate that they have a certified Scorekeeper and Second Official.

Jeff Belmonte, High Performance Team

No report.

Nick Nystrom, Region Webmaster

The Region has received 35,000 hits (accesses) to its' web page so far this month. Expects about 100,000 for the month of January. (We had 100,000 all of last year.) Everyone is receiving positive comments on how informative and clear the web page is. Nick has incorporated tournament directors being able to post the team pools themselves as well as post officials working the event. Will be adding more searching functions to assist tournament directors with locating officials for their events. As well as helping teams look for tournaments to play in.

The next newsletter will be published on the web about Jan. 19th. Plans to print about 100 paper copies. 75 will be mailed to USA Volleyball. Bob P. will check on price quote for the printing from the Westerville High School printing office.

Will publish election information on the web. An attempt will be made to incorporate mail voting this year. In the past all voting took place in person at the Adult and Junior Regionals. A change to our bylaws will be distributed to the Board members for them to review for 12 days. Then the Board will vote on the proposed changes.

New Business

Hank asked about the cost of a laser printer for the second weekend of Junior Regionals. Does the Region have one already available? He needs to print pools and playoff brackets quickly and clearly. Ron will check on costs of multi-function machines that can copy, print, and scan documents.

Bob asked to implement a Sportsmanship Form. Anytime someone is issued a red card for conduct, that information would be submitted to the Region Office. If an individual accumulated three red cards during the season, they would be sanctioned from attending Region events for some period of time. The idea is to control improper behavior at Region events. It was felt that any behavior (even a single occurrence) that is bad enough to require sanctioning can already be submitted to the Region Office.

Clubbing Guidelines: The Board feels that allowing two members of a higher category to play 'down' one level is too much of an advantage for the clubbing team.

For the 2002 season, the Board is considering the following limits: A team may include no more than two players from other teams within the club. Only one of those two players may belong to a team registered in a higher division, and that division may be no more than one higher than the team for which the player will be playing.

For example, suppose club Crusher consists of teams Crusher AA, Crusher A, Crusher BB, and Crusher B, registered as AA, A, BB, and B, respectively. Then on a given day, the roster of Crusher BB could include any of the following combinations:

  • 6 or more players registered to Crusher BB
  • 5 or more players registered to Crusher BB and 1 player registered to Crusher B, Crusher BB, or Crusher A.
  • 4 or more players registered to Crusher BB, 1 player registered to Crusher B, Crusher BB, or Crusher A, and 1 player registered to Crusher B or Crusher BB.
The following would not be allowed: any players from Crusher AA; 2 players from Crusher A and/or Crusher AA. [reworded/clarified -Ed.]

Terry moved to adjourn. Glenn seconded. Vote: unanimous in favor.

Meeting adjourned at 4:45 pm.

Future Meetings:

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