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Date: 15 Jun 2008 06:25:11
From: samsloan
Subject: Pathetic Turnout at US Junior and Cadet Championships
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Pathetic Turnout at US Junior and Cadet Championships
Normally, the US Junior Championship and the US Cadet Championship are
two of the most prestigious tournaments held in the US, because that
is where we see our future grandmasters.
However, this year is different. Almost none of the top players are
playing. In order to fill up the list of players, even some players
not in the top-50 lists have been invited. Also, the two events are
held together on the same weekend. Normally, some players are
qualified to play in both events. Now, they must chose which event to
play in.
These events normally have ten players each, but the result of this is
that the US Cadet Championship has only five players and the US Junior
has only six players. They will play double round-robins to fill up
the time allotted for these events.
The U.S. Junior is a closed event, open by invitation only to the top
players under the age of 21. The U.S. Cadet is a closed event, open by
invitation only to those under the age of 16.
Although there are many US players under age 16 rated over 2200, none
of them are playing in the US Cadet this year. Most of the players in
the event are in the low-expert range, rated below 2100. Only one
player in the US Junior would make the normal list of invitees.
The reason is obvious: Unlike previous years, this year the players
are provided with no expense money and the cash prizes are minimal.
Thus, the players are playing mostly for the honor normally associated
with these events. Although the events have been scheduled since
January, invitations were not sent out until a few weeks ago, or not
at all. Also, the events are being held in the remote location of
Lindsborg Kansas, a small hamlet out in the Great Plains with a
population less than 3,000. One player complains, =93Flights are very
expensive now and from what I've heard, there are no taxis to the
event site from Wichita Airport=94.
Mike Aigner, who goes by the moniker of "fpawn", asks the question on
the USCF Forums, =93Whose Responsibility Is It?=94 The fingers are
pointing at Jerry Nash, the USCF Scholastic Director, and at Susan
Polgar, Executive Board Scholastics Liaison. Obviously, the higher-ups
need to be held accountable. Fpawn writes, =93The rest of this post is
not suitable for publication under the AUGs.=94 What he means by that is
that he is not allowed to post his true feelings on this subject,
because that would get him sanctioned and banned by the board
appointed USCF moderators.
Sam Sloan
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Date: 16 Jun 2008 04:52:40
From: samsloan
Subject: Re: Pathetic Turnout at US Junior and Cadet Championships
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[quote="Sevan Muradian"][quote="Brian Mottershead"]I'd like to know
what he does, too. And I don't see why it can't be posted in this
forum. There are a lot of people involved in scholastic chess
posting in this forum. If none of them knows what the Scholastic
Director does, that would be ... interesting.[/quote]
There is a better place for job profiles, role & responsibilities, etc
to be posted. In the internal controls documentation for the
organization. Oh wait - scratch that - we don't have any of those.
Sevan Muradian[/quote]
During my one year on the board, I was trying to cut costs and I
repeatedly asked for information on where all the money was going.
Remember that the USCF has $3.2 million in annual revenues, so it must
require a considerable effort to squander all that money in just one
year and come up with a loss.
In particular, in preparation for the May 19-20, 2007 meeting in
Stillwater, Oklahoma (which I and a majority of the board members had
wanted held in Crossville so that we could see the USCF operation
first hand but that had been vetoed by Bill Goichberg) I put the
following items on the advance agenda:
My email was sent on May 13, 2007, sufficiently in advance for the
board meeting to be held on May 19-20, 2007. In spite of having a full
week to prepare answers to my questions, Bill Hall came to the meeting
with answers to none of the questions.
Here is my email:
08:43 AM 5/13/2007 EDT, USCF EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETING Quality Inn,
Stillwater OK- May 19-20, 2007
Agenda items
I have several items I want added to the agenda of the meeting in
Stillwater. Here are five of them.
1. Performance of Executive Director. At the last meeting on February
3-4, 2007 in Monrovia CA, the Executive Director was directed to
perform certain specific tasks. As far as I am aware, none of those
tasks have been performed, or, if they have been performed, he has not
reported it back to us. I want him to bring a report on which tasks
have been performed and if not performed, then why not. Then, I want a
discussion of what to do about this situation.
2. Awarding of Life Memberships. It seems that the Executive Director
has awarded a life membership in the USCF. This exceeds the Executive
Director's authority. Thus, the life membership he awarded is invalid.
Also, it was originally intended to be a motion by Don Schultz to
award the life membership. After I voted in favor, the president
squelched the vote by directing the executive director to award the
life membership. I object because Don Schultz and myself are
candidates for election and I believe that the president, who opposes
my candidacy, told the executive director to award this life
membership in violation of the by-laws in order to undermine my
candidacy.
3. Bounced Check and Pension and Profit Sharing Plan: Former USCF
President Steve Doyle and former USCF President Tim Redman have each
sent a long list of questions to the Executive Director asking him
about the pension / profit sharing plan. Thus far, the Executive
Director has failed to answer any of those questions. Each of the
former presidents asked about ten questions and the questions were
different, so there were about twenty questions in all. I expect the
Executive Director to bring WRITTEN answers to those twenty questions
to the meeting so that we can discuss these items.
4. Expenditure $76,738.48 in USCF Dues Money for World Youth
Championships: At the meeting in Monrovia, we asked the Executive
Director to explain why we spent $38,000 on the World Youth
Championships in Batumi Georgia. He never answered the question, but
Donna Alarie has been able to find out that we actually spent
$76,738.48, although about half of that was reimbursed. I want a full
report on why the Executive Director did not tell us about this
earlier and what it to be done about the forthcoming World Youth
Championships in Turkey.
5. Employee staffing: I want a list of everybody on the payroll at the
USCF and what they do. It seems obvious that we are way overstaffed,
so I want an explanation of why we need all these people and which
ones are the personal friends of the ED.
Sam Sloan
In response to the last item above, not only did Bill Hall fail to
provide a list of everybody on the USCF Payroll or a job description
of what they do, but he has still more than one year later failed to
answer any of these questions. Moreover, his response to Item 5 above
was nasty and sarcastic. You can play the tape which is on the
uschess.org website (his response comes near the start of the meeting)
to see how inappropriate his response was to this reasonable request.
Sam Sloan
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Date: 15 Jun 2008 14:43:45
From: Brian Lafferty
Subject: Re: Pathetic Turnout at US Junior and Cadet Championships
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samsloan wrote:
> Mike Aigner, who goes by the moniker of "fpawn", asks the question on
> the USCF Forums, �Whose Responsibility Is It?� The fingers are
> pointing at Jerry Nash, the USCF Scholastic Director, and at Susan
> Polgar, Executive Board Scholastics Liaison. Obviously, the higher-ups
> need to be held accountable. Fpawn writes, �The rest of this post is
> not suitable for publication under the AUGs.� What he means by that is
> that he is not allowed to post his true feelings on this subject,
> because that would get him sanctioned and banned by the board
> appointed USCF moderators.
>
> Sam Sloan
Now Sam, don't go around looking for Susie Chesspiece to take any
responsibility for this fiasco. Susie has more important things to do.
As she writes on her blog this weekend,"My involvement with the USCF
board is to help this federation. If they do not want my help then I
will continue doing other things for SPICE and the SPF. Chess will
continue to grow with or without the USCF."
But, it would be interesting to read some comment from Susie regarding
what she views as her EB Scholastics Liaison responsibilities.
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Date: 15 Jun 2008 06:48:11
From: samsloan
Subject: Re: Pathetic Turnout at US Junior and Cadet Championships
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On Jun 15, 8:32 am, "[email protected]" <[email protected] > wrote:
> Sam, get your accusatory facts straight. Moderators are not
> board-appointed. The Executive Director appoints them. Jeezh, the rest of
> your material is a fine analysis, why do you have to weaken your appearance
> with down right falsehoods when everyone knows you know better?
Because the Executive Director is appointed by the board and works
under the direction of the board, and thus the board cannot avoid
ultimate responsibility for the actions of the moderators, which often
include censoring negative opinions expressed about the board.
Sam Sloan
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