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Minutes: 2009 BAOC Annual General Meeting

Sunday, April 19, 2009
Sunol Regional Wilderness, Sunol, California


The meeting was called to order by President Nick Corsano at 1:34 PM.

Present were Jeff Lanam, Marsha Jacobs, Rosemary Johnson, Manfred Kopisch, Luc Poppe, Toby Ferguson, Jim Fish, Mark Blair, George Minarik, Esther Heller, Nick Corsano, Peter Graube, Bob Cooley, Bill Straka, Bob Strauss, Gary Kraght, Gavin Wyatt-Mair, Leslie Minarik, Tapio Karras, Mari Karras, Johanna Karras, Kelly Wells, Theo Verhoeven, Greg Ehrensing, Steph Maclean, Steve Haas, Steve Gregg, Trinka Gillis, Andy Belk, Alex Finch, Jerry Gleason, and Michelle Daher.

1. Approval of 2008 AGM Minutes

The present club members approved the 2008 Annual General Meeting minutes without changes.
The present club members approved the proposal by Nick Corsano to delegate review of the 2009 AGM minutes to Steve Haas and Bob Strauss.

2. President's Report

BAOC held six days of A-meets in 2008, and 38 days of non A-meets.
COOL held their second season, with nine events, including a Ski-O. Several BAOC youth are competing this weekend at the Junior Interscholastic Championships at West Point. Daniel and Philipp Kopisch received junior training grants this year.
The club has new uniforms.
For BAOC's 30th anniversary last year, we held a special anniversary event at Joaquin Miller Park in Oakland.
The EPunch team is working on a more efficient way to run EPunch. It is still a work in progress, but much credit goes to Mark Blair and Toby Ferguson for developing it.
The sprint and ski-orienteering series continue to be active.
Club income and expenses were nearly even in 2008, in the $60,000–$62,000 range. Our expenses were below budget. Our balance is approximately $40,000.
USOF has hired a full-time professional Executive Director, Glen Schorr, who started last week.
USOF is raising fees to cover the cost of the new Executive Director. Assuming the same number of A-meet participants and non-A-meet starts (3500), our fees will rise from $1800 this year, to $3100 next year and $4500 the following year. The BAOC Board of Directors will have to decide if we need to raise event fees.
The club will be conducting an online participant survey, on why people orienteer, volunteer, and why they don't do more. The survey results will be used to guide the Board in decision making.

3. Election of Officers

The board has recommended four candidates for the club officer positions, all incumbents:
  • Nick Corsano – President
  • Alex Finch – Event Coordinator
  • Steve Beuerman – Treasurer
  • Trinka Gillis – Secretary
No nominations were proposed from the floor.
The club membership approved the proposed slate of candidates.

4. Possible bid to host the 2013 Junior World Orienteering Championships (JWOC)

Gavin Wyatt-Mair described the JWOC and its requirements. The JWOC is five days of orienteering, spread over one week, for junior orienteers under 21 years old. The events include a sprint, preliminary classic distance, classic distance final, long distance final, a fun day, and a 3-leg relay.
Each country can send a maximum of six men and six women on their junior team. Usually 30–35 countries participate, with about 360 juniors total. The event is usually held during the first two weeks of July.
In addition to the JWOC event, there is a one-week training camp immediately preceding the JWOC, and an additional training event one year earlier, in 2012.
The cost needs to be kept low, we can not profit off the juniors, but we can hold an orienteering festival or other events in conjunction with the JWOC, and make money off those events. For example, we could hold the North American, U.S. Champs, or U.S. Sprint Champs at the same time and in the same location as the JWOC.
The proposed venue for the sprint is Golden Gate Park. The other events would be held at Tahoe, preferably on new maps of the Lake Independence area north of Truckee. The event center would be at Northstar.
For the event, we expect to have an overall director and meet directors for each day/event. It is anticipated that BOAC members would volunteer to staff the key positions.
This would be a national event. A large amount of organization is required and we would count on help from other U.S. clubs. We would need help with marketing, including getting media involved, and finding sponsors. We welcome any help that club members could provide.
Expected attendance would be 300–360 juniors, 100 coaches, 100 parents, 300 international visitors, and 300–500 additional U.S. orienteers. If we had 800 participants (300 juniors and 500 festival attendees), we would expect about $500,000 in expenses and $100,000 in profit.
The JWOC Task Force to consider a 2013 bid is comprised of Jay Hann, Nick Corsano, Ben Legg, Nancy Lindeman, Evan Custer, and Gavin Wyatt-Mair. The Task Force will present their recommendation to the BAOC board in September 2009.
If the board approves, USOF would present our bid to IOF in January 2010. The IOF creates a short list in February 2010, and awards the JWOC in August 2010. USOF hasn't put on a big international event in 15 years, and the IOF is putting pressure on USOF to hold events. This means it is likely they would accept our bid.
Discussion included:
  • Provide a cut of the profits to assisting clubs. There was some discussion on the complexity and fairness of giving money to some and not others. The expectation is that many individuals will volunteer rather than clubs volunteering as a whole. This lead to a discussion of how to split tasks and maybe giving a specific task to a specific club.
  • Survey western clubs and their willingness to help.
  • The discussion led to the realization that we can not resolve all issues during the meeting, but that the task force welcomes ideas.

5. Questions

The incorporation of the club is almost done.

A motion was moved and seconded that we adjourn. Motion passed. The meeting adjourned at 2:44 PM.


Trinka Gillis
BAOC Secretary

Reviewed by Steve Haas and Bob Strauss