I am going to lead with the personal this month. On December 22, 2014, my 58^th birthday, I got the best present ever! I adopted my foster son, Kortlan. He is now Kortlan Hopping-Heth, and he will be caddying at the GNT District Final and probably at the Champaign Regional, so you will have a chance to meet him. I may be going through a mid-life crisis (a little late) as I also changed jobs to a much more demanding one last year. No sports car, though, so I guess I am okay.

Grand National Teams: Another challenge has been finding a new site for the District finals of the Grand National Teams and North American Pairs. We are trying out a new site for the GNT this year. We will be at the UAW Hall in Bloomington where they hold their sectionals. The Eagles Club in Springfield raised the rent and would not allow us to bring in coffee or snacks anymore. Unfortunately, the new site is not as large so we will be instituting some changes. Last year the District Board voted to change Flight C to a one-day event, hoping to increase participation, and that event will be on Sunday only. Also this year the Open Flight will be one day only on Sunday. Flights A and B will start on Saturday as usual and continue onto Sunday as needed. Complete details are on the District 8 website and the Facebook page. It is time to be making your teams and sending me your reservations. I expect there will also be a separate article in this edition of the Advocate which gives all of the details. I hope to see many of you there.

ACBL Board actions: The Board meeting in New Orleans was very busy for me. Appeals and Charges was only given two hours on the agenda so we also met by phone on President’s Day to discuss the motions and ran the first two hearings on Sunday night before the meeting. After the meetings ended on Thursday, we attended the open forum with the Technology Committee put together to review our technology needs in light of the failure of ACBL Score+ software. A video of the entire forum is available on the ACBL website for you to see. If you are interested in this issue, I recommend watching it. The two outside specialists on the committee were very interesting and enlightening. They agreed with our decision to stop Score+, but also agreed we need to replace ACBLScore. For now, any new programming will be done in modules that can be added/used in whatever new system is decided on. One example of this is a module for starting Kos, which is scheduled to be up and running by the end of the year.

The ACBL also terminated its pension plan for employees last year. They were offered the option of a cash payout or an annuity. Low interest rates made this an almost $2 million expense, but this money was owed whether we terminated the plan or just maintained the liability. We have switched (as has most of the world) from a defined benefit plan to a defined contribution plan with an employer’s match. These last two items (the entire value of ACBLScore+ software was written off, although we hope we can use parts of it in the future) accounted for most of the decrease in assets you will see if you examine the ACBL financial statements.

One of the motions considered by A and C and adopted by the Board was about publishing discipline decisions. There will be a new section on the ACBL website which will list the name, ACBL player number, section of the CDR violated, and punishment imposed for all disciplines imposed by hearings run under the CDR and ethical violations in clubs reported to headquarters. Expulsions will also be reported in the ACBL Bulletin. Decisions of the Ethical Oversight Committee (our own Karen Walker is a member of this committee; Chris Benson was appointed to the Disciplinary Committee) will also be reported in the Daily Bulletins at NABCs. Reports will remain on the website as long as the discipline is in effect, and will not be posted until the decision is final, i.e. all appeals have been completed or not requested. Certain violations and disciplines require review by the Appeals and Charges committee, even if not requested by the parties.

Columbus Ohio was awarded the Spring 2020 NABC. Toronto was awarded the Summer 2024 NABC.

In Governance, a new way to request a new unit or changes to an existing unit was fleshed out. This used to be done by obtaining signatures on petitions. Now an electronic vote can be requested. While it is recognized that not all members have email accounts, the petition method only involved people present where the petition was circulated. Both methods disenfranchise some people. It was decided that the proportion of members with email addresses is now high enough to use this new method. A new Unit was created for the Atlanta metro area. Requirements for League Counsel were amended  to remove the word extensive from the knowledge of bridge and areas of practice requirements. All of the other governance motions were just rescinding motions that are no longer in use.

Transfer responses were added to the Competitive Bidding section of the General Chart, and some changes were made to Paragraph 8 of the General Chart.

A motion regarding spectators and security changes was defeated, but some parts of this almost two-page motion will be reintroduced as separate motions in future meetings.

The first reading of a motion regarding awards for 5- and 6-member teams in sectional and regional KOs passed. If passed again at the second reading in August, members of 5- and 6-man teams will lose 5% of the overall masterpoint awards for each segment (half of a match) that is won and where a member sat out. Masterpoints for Regional Non-Championship events (side games) were slightly increased.

There will be no entry fees for the first two days for Flights A, B and C of the Grand National Teams national finals. If you read the minutes closely, you will see I voted against this. Why would a GNT coordinator do this? I had several reasons. One, it did not include the Open flight. Two, I do not think it will increase attendance at the District Final and we had already had to cut several programs requested in order to balance the budget. And three, this is one of the things that could be covered by the District’s use of Grass Roots Fund money. The next motion passed took care of this third reason. Distribution of Grass Roots Fund Money was changed. The money to pay for the last motion will be taken from the Grass Roots Fund. Then only 80% of the money is returned to the district that raised the money. There is a formula in the motion on how the remaining 20% is distributed, but the result is that smaller districts with good participation in Grass Roots Fund games, like District 8, will receive more money than they raised. Some of our Districts are very large, yet they only have to fund four teams, the same as the smallest district. It was believed that this motion would help the smaller districts without hurting the large districts too much. Because of changes in the Grass Roots Fund month, funding this year dropped by about 75%, but next year will be at the regular rate and with the new formula. Also, awards for the NAP finals first-place and second-place qualifiers was increased by $100 per person.

A complete copy of the minutes is available on the ACBL website.

World Bridge Federation: In November, I was re-elected to represent the ACBL on the World Bridge Federation Executive Council. This was good, as in October I had been re-appointed by the WBF as Honorary Secretary and added to the Management Committee. This means I now attend all three WBF meetings per year: the Executive Council, the Officers Meeting and the Management Meeting. Fortunately, the Officers meeting is held immediately after the ACBL Board meeting at the Spring NABC, or I wouldn’t have enough vacation time to go around! 

Update on “The German Cheating Case”: After losing all of their WBF hearings and not appealing to the Sports Arbitration Committee, they lost the first case they filed in the German Courts. Now they have filed another case in the regular courts, alleging antitrust violations and impairment of earning potential. This case is still in the early stages.

I look forward to seeing you at the District 8 GNT District Final May 2 and 3, and at the regionals this summer. Remember the early date for the St. Louis Regional this summer, caused by the Chicago NABC in August.

Best wishes,
   Georgia