Executive Committee

This page contains minutes of Executive Committee meetings, Objectives of the Executive Committee, and Standing Orders of the Executive Committee.

Minutes – 2009–10

Minutes of Executive Committee Meeting held 29 April 2010 at 2 Park Terrace

Present: M. Barnes (MB), N. Graham (NG), D. Levens (DL), R. Richmond (RR), A. Walker (ANW)

Apologies: D. Sudar (DS)

1. Matters arising

1a On-line form for recording who had used NCA equipment to be implemented after CC 1/4-finals. MB reported there were 43 working clocks.

1b Best Game Prize - Entries by 8/6/2010 to ANW, to cover the last two years. 1 or 2 prizes, depending on entries. ANW to circulate website and with RRM agenda. DS to circulate team captains.

3b Clock trophies - RR reported 16 clocks had been purchased.

5. Blitz - DS and MB to make further enquiries about using Gambit as a venue.

2. County Championship quarter-finals

The U160's had beaten Lancashire in the preliminary round, so all 4 teams had reached the quarter-finals on May 22nd. Arrangements were well in hand. U180's vs Bedfordshire and U140's vs Surrey at Milton Keynes, U160's vs Suffolk at Huntingdon, U120's vs Yorks.

3. Congress

RR had circulated a report by e-mail. Changes and dates for next year were discussed.

  1. Upper limit for the Major to be increased from U160 to U165
  2. Entry Fees to be increased by £2, largely to go in increased prizes in the MAJOR, INTERMEDIATE & MINOR
  3. Dates for next season:
    County Championship - Nov 20/21 or Nov 27/28
    Rapidplay - Sunday January 23rd 2011
    Congress - April 2/3, 2011 (Easter is very late - April 23/24 - so it must be before Easter)

4. Junior

DL reported the Girls had come 4th and the U9's 5th in the national championships. U11 Final still to take place, but expected to be a tight contest between Notts & Kent. Mark Kenyon, Isaac Stables and Michael Fletcher had qualified for the England squad. U18/U13Jamboree would be in Surrey and unlikely that Notts would enter.

5. 4NCL

Six Boards had been unavoidably defaulted in Round 6, due to unexpected snowfall making the roads in the north of the County impassable that Sunday morning. 4NCL were seeking £120 in penalties (£20 per Board). The feeling in the EC was that the fine should not be paid, subject to consulting the rest of the team. DL to write to 4NCL.

6. Nottingham 1936 75th Anniversary Celebrations

RR outlined some proposals, following the discussion at the previous meeting.

  1. 75 Board friendly match vs Leics, Derbys & Lincs followed by dinner in late September 2011. Possible dinner guests C.J. de Mooi (ECF President) and the Mayor.
  2. RR to write booklet celebrating the event, to be free to members of the association and with a further number for the use of Junior organisers as prizes. Possibly recover printing costs from sales outside the County.
  3. An appeal to be launched over the year of celebrations to possibly set up a Notts Junior Chess Trust and also the John Robinson Trust (National Junoir chess charity). RR to contact John Crawley about NJCT.
  4. Additional Tournament over the August Bank Holiday, 2011, of 7 or 9 Rounds. Probably just two sections, with generous prize money.
RR to write 1 page summary, for consideration by the RRM (8th June). RRM to be asked to approve the ideas and whether there should be a cap on total expenditure.

Robert Richmond

Minutes of Executive Committee Meeting held 6 August 2010 at 6 Coppice Drive Eastwood

Present: R. Richmond (RR), S Burke (SB), N. Graham (NG), M. Hill (MH), D. Levens (DL), A. Walker (ANW)

SB was welcomed and MH welcomed back to the EC

1. EC Matters

RR outlined his approach to the Presidency and running to EC:

RR to be the permanent minute taker, following ECF practice, with the aim of getting the full minutes on the website within 2 weeks of the meeting. (The previous practice of a rotating minute taker was the root cause of why this had not happened under the previous Presidencies).

Brief bullet point highlights of the meeting to be e-mailed in a day or two of the meeting to the following - EC, Other Officers of the association, LMC, congress team, Club secretaries plus anyone else interested team.

A planned schedule of EC meeting dates to be agreed, once various fixture dates were known. Action RR

NCA calendar to be added to the website, to include the dates of County matches, other NCA events, Junior events, EC meetings etc. Action RR

EC Standing orders to be reviewed at next meeting. ANW to dig out. Action ANW

Current website hosting arrangements were still organised through Ian Kingston. ANW to discuss with Ian whether alternative arrangements could be made and updating and expanding to team captains and other officers the [Officer]@NottsChess.org system. Action: ANW

RR confirmed that David Coates was willing to continue as webmaster. ANW to notify the changes of officers from the AGM and this meeting to webmaster. Action: ANW. ANW had sent the exact working of the League Rule changes agreed at the last RRM to Drag Sudar, for the League Handbook and website. (It was noted that the consitution was up to date on the website).

2. Minutes Previous Meeting

Agreed with one of minor amendments

3. Matters arising

1b - Best Game Prize - 10 entries had been received, the winners being Pablo Padilla and Richard Myers.

2. County Championship - U180's were losing finalists, U140's had drawn the final, losing on Board Count. The U160's and U120's had lost in the quarter-finals.

4. Junior - Noted that Saaras Mehan had also been added to the England U11 squad.

4. Bank Signatories

EC approved SB becoming a signatory on the Bank and Building Society Accounts, replacing Tony Wright on the Bank Account. This would bring the Building Society signatories back to four (currently down to three following the death of Jenny Waddingham). The signatories would therefore be:

Yorkshire Bank - SB, RR, ANW & Drag Sudar
Nottingham Building Society - SB, RR, Mike Barnes, Tony Wright

The constitutional issue of whether the EC had the power to approve the addition of SB as signatory was considered. The proposal from the EC do delete 9(e) of the constitution in April 2009, reserving all power to change the mandate to a General Meeting, had been rejected in April 2009. However calling a SGM just to nod through this change would be silly. Under 11(b)(i) the duties of the treasurer are managing the day to day financial affairs of the association, which obviously include signing cheques, and therefore in the specific and limited case of the election of a new treasurer it is arguable there was implicit authority from a General Meeting. On the last occassion in 2005 when signatories had been changed this had been approved by the Finance Committee (the equivalent of the EC today) and the opinion of Mike Barnes (President in 2005) was that it was constitutional.

EC was unsure of its position, but felt it was acting sensibly and in good faith in approving the change of signatory. RR to report the action of the EC to the next General Meeting and seek clarification on procedure. Action: RR

RR to have a Paying-in-Book for Congress, Rapidplay and County Championship Entires.

5. Congress and Rapidplay Entry Forms

RR had circulated the draft Entry Forms for comment and there were several suggested improvements:

  1. NG to be advertised as Chief Arbiter for the congress (in line with the RP entry form)
  2. British Championship place to be advertised on the first page on the congress
  3. British Championship tie splitting rules to be added to the additional information provided on the website
  4. Default time for RP to be specified
  5. Travel Directions to be checked from the Nottingham High School website and greatly simplified. Car Park entrance from Forest Road East to be clearer
  6. "No smoking is permitted in the playing areas" to be amended to "Smoking is not permitted on the school premises"
Action: RR

6. 4NCL and County Teams

  1. 4NCL - EC confirmed previous position of refusing to pay the default fines for Rd 6, when half the team were snowed in and unable to travel. 4NCL had refused to waive the fine, and therefore Notts would not be entering a team for the coming season. RR to prepare a brief public statement, for consideration by EC, for the NCA website and 4NCL section of the forum. Action: RR
  2. U100 - A team would be entered, largely of junior players with the expectation there would only be one match vs Warwickshire before the national stages. DL to be the nominated captain, but the work would likely be split across the junior team.
  3. U120 - Ric Dawson's grade had increased to 121, and accordingly there was now a vacancy for captain. Possible replacements were considered.
  4. U180 and OPEN - With no team to be entered in 4NCL it was agreed to enter an OPEN team. By 3 votes to 1 with 2 abstentions (possibly the first recorded vote in EC history) the OPEN section (Warks, Staffs, Derbys, Manchester) was preferred to the MINOR section (Leics, Lincs, Shrops, Worcs). DL to captain, unless an alternative volunteer could be found. The U180 team would continue, in the expectation that it would be difficult for the OPEN team to qualify for the national stages. It would be impossible to run both teams on the same day in the national stages.
  5. Correspondence - Some new players had been found, and Keith Walters would carry on for one more year.

Action: ANW to notify MCCU of (b) - (d)

7. Vacancies

  1. EC Co-option - Alan Kenyon to be approached. [Invitation accepted]
  2. Grader - Brian Hayward had given a years notice of his intention to retire at the AGM. RR would be happy to offload Congress & Rapidplay grading. Possible names were suggested. Otherwise advertise. Action: RR
  3. Other possible or looming vacancies (U120, Correspondence) to be advertised if no person could be found.

8. Junior Trust

DL had met with the other members of the junior team the day before, and outlined ideas

  1. Training program or coaches (top priority)
  2. Bursaries for juniors, where parents had limited means, either in representing England or for tuition
  3. Extension of current coaching
  4. Pump priming costs to set up a Secondary Association

RR to work this up into a detailed proposal (with the advice of DL) and seek to learn from the experience of other counties with a Junior Trust, such as Kent and Northumberland. Action: RR

9. Other: 75th Anniversary

(i) RR to write to University Vice Chancellor about possible tournament venue. Action: RR

10. AOB

  1. DL and one other likely to be doing the arbiters course on 9th / 10th October in Bucks.
  2. DL reported the Nottingham Evening Post very interested in running a regular chess column, probably on a Saturday. DL to be columist. Action: DL
  3. NG outlined a couple of rule changes he would like to see for the County Championship, to be possibly taken to the ECF AGM in October:
    1. Documentation on the strength of ungraded players to be provided prior to the match (this follows problems with the U140 match vs Yorkshire)
    2. Qualification for the national stages to be pro rata to competing teams. (For example the U140's had to play 5 qualifying matches, but in some other unions there were none). The EC saw problems with this, but thought it would be worthwhile to initiate a debate on the ECF Forum that the "County Championship should be organised on a national basis".

Robert Richmond