SUSSEX COUNTY CONTRACT BRIDGE ASSOCIATION

Minutes of the meeting of the Management Committee of the SCCBA, held at the Avenue Bridge Club at 1030 hrs on Sunday 25th July 2004.

Present:

Mr M Pool Chairman

Mr E Williams Vice-Chairman

Mr P Kent Hon. Secretary

Mr T Bradley (President), Mr P Bates, Mrs S Bugden, Mr R Buddery, Mrs V Chandler, Mr B Gould, Mrs M Langmaid, Mr B Loasby, Mrs J Newton, Mr D Newton and Mrs C Watson.

Delegates: None

1. Apologies

Apologies were received from: Mrs K Batting, Mrs J Clinton, Mr D Galpin and Mr A Southwell.

2. Minutes of the Meeting of 18^th April 2004.

2.1 Accuracy; The minutes were approved subject to adding "by the Officers" to the end of Para 13 and were signed as being a true record of the meeting.

2.2 Matters Arising

1. 1. Non-EBU members in affiliated clubs,
   2. Persuade non affiliated clubs to become affiliated,
   3. People who play bridge at home,
   4. New players.

1. 1. Club Ambassadors to visit clubs and talk about the benefits of being a County/EBU member. [Need an updated Ambassadors list (Pat Kent) and a script of benefits (Sally Bugden)],
   2. Write to Club Secretaries/Delegates to ask them to obtain the views of club members on compulsory membership (Pat Kent),
   3. Other counties to be lobbied (Martin Pool),

1. 1. If we decide to pursue compulsory membership, obtain approval at the next AGM.

3. Chairman’s Report

3.1 The Chairman had received letters of thanks for the donations received from the SCCBA from two charities:

1. Sussex Emmaus Treatment Centre in Southwick,
2. Riding for Disabled Young People in Cuckfield.

3.2 The Chairman has been dealing with a complaint from a lady, who received an injury in the Sussex Pairs Semi-final; Andrew Southwell is dealing with this.

3.3 SCCBA had offered to provide a team for practice for the Young England Team but it was not possible to further this.

3.4 The Chairman reported that the EBU were looking for somebody to organise practice matches for the England team against some strong European teams in readiness for the forthcoming Bermuda Bowl and the Olympiad. The President promised to find out more about this before bringing it before the Management Committee.

3.5 The Chairman had received a letter from Tim Greenhill stating that the SCCBA Zero Policy was not being firmly applied. It was generally agreed that there was some substance in this observation and Martin Pool in his role as Tournament Manager promised to write to the Tournament Directors requesting them to pay more attention to deviation from the Zero Tolerance Policy. He also mentioned that the SCCBA have a third as many directors for their congresses compared to the EBU, which makes it difficult to see what is going on throughout the room(s). The Tournament Manager agreed to look into increasing the number of Tournament Directors for SCCBA events

4. Secretary’s Report

The Secretary reported that as our membership numbers are hovering around the 1500 mark, we may lose entitlement to one of our delegates and one of our voting shares, if we drop below 1500, which is the cut off point. This could bring our entitlement down from four to three delegates and shares.

5. Treasurer’s Report

The Treasurer was unable to attend.

6. Membership Secretary’s Report

There was no report due to the absence of the Membership Secretary.

7. Tournament Committee Report

The Tournament Committee had last met on the 22^nd April 2004 and the minutes were tabled for information. The main points arising were:

7.1 The two Joint Venture Green Pointed events held in 2004 were very successful. There will be only one Joint Venture per year for 2005 and 2006 and Ardingly has been provisionally booked for these events and this was agreed nem.con.

7.2 The Metropolitan Cup was deemed to be better organised since the SCCBA had taken over the organisation.

7.3 Hastings No Fears event, organised by Kathy Williams had made a profit for the first time.

7.4 There was some doubt as to whether we could have the Henfield Hall for the New Year Swiss teams on January 2^nd as booked by us, but this has now been resolved. Val Chandler suggested that we might change the venue for this event to Ardingly. The Chairman said that the Tournament Committee should discuss this.

8. Selectors Report

A report was provided to the Management Committee and the contents were noted.

9. Conduct Committee’s Report

There had been no formal requests to discuss conduct matters since the last AGM and consequently there had been no meetings.

10. Management of Surplus Capital

The Chairman introduced this topic by referring to the discussion paper on financial objectives that had been distributed before the meeting and saying that 5 years ago Sussex’s finances were breaking even. Since then the finances have improved by careful tournament organisation and the removal of all but one of the honoraria. In the last five years the reserves had risen from £17,000 to £25,000 and if we exclude the sponsorship of £3,500 (which is unlikely to continue) we have made a surplus of £1,000 per annum in this period.

The following expenditure is envisaged:

1. We need a new Duplimate machine, costing £2,500 as our present one is unreliable. The new machine uses different bar coded cards to the present one.
2. Therefore we need 3,000 sets of cards, costing £3,000. The present cards are getting old and therefore we could buy a second set, costing £3,000 and a chip for the old machine to read them.
3. Our arrangement with the EBU for supplying tables for our congresses could run out and we would need to purchase 60 tables, costing £3,000
4. If we were to apply the 20% of the receipts to prize money [5.3.7 of 18^th April 2004] this would cost an extra £1,200 per annum, which would use up our entire surplus.
5. If we were to increase the ratio of Tournament Directors to players [see 3.5 above], this would cost an additional £500 per annum.

The following decisions were made with regard to managing the surplus:

10.1 Taking into consideration that honoraria are subject to tax, it was proposed by Peter Bates and seconded by Brian Loasby that the decision to award an honorarium of £30 to competition organisers [5.3.3 of 18^th April 2004] be rescinded. The votes were 12 for and zero against and the proposal was therefore carried.

10.2 Taking into consideration the costs of increasing the prize money to 20% [5.3.7 of 18^th April 2004] a proposal was made by Peter Bates, seconded by Carol Watson to aim for 15% as a guideline, excluding catering and variable costs. The votes were 12 for and zero against and the proposal was therefore carried.

10.3 With regard to the purchase of a new Duplimate machine and bar coded cards, Jill Newton proposed that we should purchase a new Duplimate machine and two sets of cards, this was seconded by Val Chandler and there were 12 votes for and zero against and the proposal was therefore carried.

11. Pre-Assignments of Players for Sussex Pairs

The Chairman referred to the discussion paper on allocation of seating positions for the Sussex Pairs Final and possibly the Chairman’s Cup that had been distributed before the meeting. There was a lively discussion as to whether there should be any pre-assignments for any competition. Sally Bugden proposed that seating should be randomly selected whatever the movement, this was seconded by Jill Newton eight voted for and two against [two members had left the meeting prior to the vote] and the proposal was therefore carried.

The Chairman asked whether we might like to extend this decision to all events. Seven voted for and one against [a further member had left the meeting prior to the vote].

12. Qualification for Pachabo Cup (Winners of Champ Teams or Sussex League)

The present situation is that the winners of the Championship Teams of Four Knock Out competition or runners up if they are unavailable will represent the SCCBA in the Pachabo Cup [page 7 of the SCCBA County Calendar]. It was agreed nem.con. that this should be changed to the winners of Division 1 of the Sussex League. This would then allow the winners of the Teams of Four (or runners up if unavailable) to represent the SCCBA in the Daily Telegraph Cup.

13. EBU Council Report

Pat Kent presented this to the Management Committee:

13.1 Single entity is going forward and the Articles of Association and the Bye Laws of the EBU Ltd were agreed after accepting amendments provided by the Council and the final documents will be sent to Council members and adoption sought at the AGM of 6^th October 2004.

13.2 The annual County Secretary’s meeting and the annual County Membership Secretary’s meeting have been cancelled by the EBU for 2004 and a new format is being sought.

13.3 Interest has been received by the EBU from potential funders for a National Bridge Centre to be located in the middle of England.

13.4 English Bridge Magazine was the topic of discussion and Pat Kent advised that the best method to affect changes would be for individual members to write to the Editor stating what they did not like and what they would like to have included.

13.5 Camrose events could in the future be seen on the web.

13.6 Bridge Mate terminals are progressing.

13.6 CASS 3.0, the EBU computer administration and scoring programme is available by downloading from the web site. A later version, 4.0 will be available in August 2004.

14. Date of Next Meeting

The next meeting will be held on Sunday 3^rd October 2004 at 10-30 am at the Eastbourne Bridge Club.

Jill Newton reported on the difficulty she has been having in obtaining address labels from the EBU so that she can distribute the County Newsletter. She also said that some of the address labels were out of date. The President advised her to report chapter and verse to the General Manager, Terry Collier to try and obtain some improvement in the service.