News 2007 Annual General Meeting (ILCA-NA)

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The ILCA-North American Region Annual General Meeting will be held at Hyannis Yacht Club on June 15th after racing concludes for the day.

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Is there an agenda for the AGM?

Yes, but I don't see it posted yet...

Note for anyone not from North America: this is the ILCA-NA AGM and only covers status of ILCA-NA, not ILCA or other regions.

**subject to small changes before the meeting**
  1. Introduction/Welcome
  2. Office Report
    • Status of finances in great detail (eyes will be glazed at this point)
    • Status of membership (will also include a brief discussion of new online database)
    • The Laser Sailor
    • Website
    • odds and ends
  3. Regatta scheduling of ILCA-NA major events
    • Worlds qualification 2008 and beyond
    • Grand Prix 2008 and beyond
    • "Regatta Crystal Ball" - the plan for rotating major events about the region, input from those at the meeting and encouragement to get your favorite host in contact with ILCA-NA before the schedule is set in stone
  4. Update on Composite mast for Radial
  5. Open session and AOB
    - a good place to bring up your favorite topic.

There will be a serious attempt to fit all of the above into 1 hour.
Most importantly, do attend and ask questions, give feedback, etc.
 
In the financial status report:
What is the status of the merchandise I delivered to Annapolis in 2002? There were class shirts, sweatshirts, t shirts, books, posters, and about 10,000 bumper stickers delivered to Annapolis and no mention of their sale or disposal has ever been made in any class publication. The cost to the class for these articles exceeded $6000 and the class selling price would have brought the class a similar amount. ( Bumper stickers are always given away free) Certainly someone must know where these items went and where the money went. The number is a tad large to be simply blown off. At the very least the loss should be recognized and officially written off.
If the stuff was ruined when some pipes broke...Then say so...And collect real money from whoever was responsible for storage.

Office:
Some policy questions are in order.
1. Are we as as employers satisfied with the current regatta posting methods?
Thought: The objest is to post as many regatta notices on our website as possible so as many sailors acn get to as many events as possible.
The website regatta posting Tools are wonderful ADDITIONS to our set of tools for information gathering and dispersal. However, many of our event hosts are not posting on our website.
The fact that the hosts can POST THEIR OWN information may save time for the office staff. ( When folks like me screw up their attemtps to self post, the office staff has to spend significant effort correcting our screw ups. And I thank them for doing their jobs so well when I did screw up my posting))
If time is saved by the self posting tools, That time SHOULD BE USED TO SEEK OUT NEW HOSTS AND GATHER THEIR EVENT INFORMATION.
For some reason we have fewer events posted on our website this year than we had at the turn of the century.
I believe it is primarily because we are trusting the website tools to do the information gathering work for us.
We have to GO AFTER information. Failure to post information about events is lost opportuinty to meet wnd play with fellow Laser sailors.
I believe our office staff should be directed to make contact with every 2007 host and to find out who is hosting the 2008 event.AND PLACE THAT INFORMATION ON OUR WEBSITE!!!

Regatta Scheduling:
We should be scheduling our major events at least three years ahead of time. It is simple to get venues when you are the first to ask for those venues.
The very least worst possible level of scheduling must be
ANNOUNCE THE NEXT YEAR'S EVENT LOCATION AT THE TROPHY PRESENTATION!
The host for the 2008 North Americans should be present at the 2007 North Americans not only to learn what works and what fails but to INVITE te fleet to come back next year .
The tiny little J-22 association manages to accomplish this sort of scheduling. The 2006 hosts were at the 2005 event wearing t shirts publicizing the 2006 event. The 2007 hosts were at the 2006 event.
Why is the Laser Class Association the last major call to look for and secure sites for major events.
WE SHOULD BE AND MUST BE THE FIRST TO GRAB THE BEST VENUES!!!
Planning and scheduling for 2009 and 2010 should most certainly be added to the agenda for the meeting.
We should be paying someone to absolutely schedule our major events three years ahead. NO EXCUSES!!!
The target for advance shceduling ought to be five or even ten years.
Three is not a target. Three is an absolute minimum. Three is get the events scheduled three years ahead or we will find someone else to do the job.



I guess that is enough opinion for one post.

Wheeee
 
It is a beautiful sunny day here with the seabreeze filling and I'm running out the door to go sailing... so, I'll be brief.

In the financial status report:
What is the status of the merchandise I delivered to Annapolis in 2002? There were class shirts, sweatshirts, t shirts, books, posters, and about 10,000 bumper stickers delivered to Annapolis and no mention of their sale or disposal has ever been made in any class publication. The cost to the class for these articles exceeded $6000 and the class selling price would have brought the class a similar amount. ( Bumper stickers are always given away free) Certainly someone must know where these items went and where the money went. The number is a tad large to be simply blown off. At the very least the loss should be recognized and officially written off.
If the stuff was ruined when some pipes broke...Then say so...And collect real money from whoever was responsible for storage.

In 2 minutes or less I can't tell you where everything that was forwarded to the previous Executive Secretary, now some five years ago, went item by item. About all I can say quickly is that what could be sold was sold (and did appear in a line item in the financial reports), what could be given away as promotional (e.g. bumper stickers) was and I don't think much ended up in San Diego. Unfortunately, the revenue for the class was not what was hoped for... probably because, for example, when given a choice between a free t-shirt at a regatta or something that can be bought from the class most people appear to opt for the freebie. And who doesn't buy books on Amazon anymore?

As an aside... one can say "well, why don't you partner with Amazon for sales of sailing books?" To answer that question I will direct people to the "LASER eMall" link on the class website...


Office:
Some policy questions are in order.
1. Are we as as employers satisfied with the current regatta posting methods?
Thought: The objest is to post as many regatta notices on our website as possible so as many sailors acn get to as many events as possible.
The website regatta posting Tools are wonderful ADDITIONS to our set of tools for information gathering and dispersal. However, many of our event hosts are not posting on our website.
The fact that the hosts can POST THEIR OWN information may save time for the office staff. ( When folks like me screw up their attemtps to self post, the office staff has to spend significant effort correcting our screw ups. And I thank them for doing their jobs so well when I did screw up my posting))
If time is saved by the self posting tools, That time SHOULD BE USED TO SEEK OUT NEW HOSTS AND GATHER THEIR EVENT INFORMATION.
For some reason we have fewer events posted on our website this year than we had at the turn of the century.
I believe it is primarily because we are trusting the website tools to do the information gathering work for us.
We have to GO AFTER information. Failure to post information about events is lost opportuinty to meet wnd play with fellow Laser sailors.
I believe our office staff should be directed to make contact with every 2007 host and to find out who is hosting the 2008 event.AND PLACE THAT INFORMATION ON OUR WEBSITE!!!

I'm not going to disagree that we don't have absolutely every Laser/Radial/4.7 event in the ILCA-NA calendar. I'd say that everything the class office knows about is in the ILCA-NA calendar... and, well... actually... Sherri personally entered something like 2/3 to 3/4 of the something like 450 events in the 2007 calendar (and there are still some 277 events between today and the end of the year displayed). The vast bulk of these events are local and her primary source of event information, as it should be, is from the District Secretaries. The second source is from people telling her where to find information on events or sending it to her as well as from Sherri surfing the internet (or calling people on the phone) herself. After this she approves all entries that people enter themselves on the website, in most cases verifying with the affected District Secretary first. It is more work that it seems.

You also need to remember that not everyone works out their season calendars the Summer before a given year. Some do (my club does), but a good fraction of sailing areas use the winter to organize themselves. In some cases we don't get information until April or even May. We try to publish the events calendar in TLS in Winter and Spring and if you compare the two you can see how the schedules evolve.

Personally, what I would really like to see is for us to arrive at a centralized calendar that everyone referenced. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a good solution for this out there yet.

The bottom line: you want to see more events in the calendar? Help Sherri by sending her your event schedule. She will be more than happy to enter it for you.

Regatta Scheduling:
We should be scheduling our major events at least three years ahead of time. It is simple to get venues when you are the first to ask for those venues.
The very least worst possible level of scheduling must be
ANNOUNCE THE NEXT YEAR'S EVENT LOCATION AT THE TROPHY PRESENTATION!
The host for the 2008 North Americans should be present at the 2007 North Americans not only to learn what works and what fails but to INVITE te fleet to come back next year .
The tiny little J-22 association manages to accomplish this sort of scheduling. The 2006 hosts were at the 2005 event wearing t shirts publicizing the 2006 event. The 2007 hosts were at the 2006 event.
Why is the Laser Class Association the last major call to look for and secure sites for major events.
WE SHOULD BE AND MUST BE THE FIRST TO GRAB THE BEST VENUES!!!
Planning and scheduling for 2009 and 2010 should most certainly be added to the agenda for the meeting.
We should be paying someone to absolutely schedule our major events three years ahead. NO EXCUSES!!!
The target for advance shceduling ought to be five or even ten years.
Three is not a target. Three is an absolute minimum. Three is get the events scheduled three years ahead or we will find someone else to do the job.



I guess that is enough opinion for one post.

Wheeee

Scheduling the major events is a constant process. We do have a rotation schedule and we really don't have problems getting venues we want, potential host venues are always putting in requests to the ILCA-NA office, etc. But, taking on a major event is, well, a major undertaking and it takes some time for some hosts to go through the whole process within their organizations to get approval. Right now there are potential hosts for the really big events in 2008 either onboard already or waiting for their respective boards to approve them. Except for MWE (always that same weekend in February) dates for these events will get selected on a combination of what is the best time for sailing at these locations AND avoiding conflicts with things like Continental and World Youth events, World Championships, etc. Many of those dates are not yet fixed and the day that ISAF and even ILCA are willing to worry about avoid conflict with a North American event will be the day that California falls into the ocean. And don't get me started with US Sailing!

Anyway, gotta run before it gets too windy!

Tracy
 
Cool!!
It looks like I am worried about stuff that is well under control.
Sherri keeps surprising me by digging out from the mess she inherited sooner than I notice the accomplishment.
Again...Thanks are due to Sherri for doing a really great job.

With respect to advance scheduling, I believe three years solid WE KNOW time and places for Mids, Can and US nationals and NA Champs is a minimum. I also believe each of those hosts should "as a policy" be asked to host a lesser event as a warm up. That lesser event could be a "coasts" event or districts held in the year before the major event. The warm up event allows both the hosts and the sailors to do a better job at the major that follows.

The rest of this post was deleted by its author
 

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