H&D Executive Council Online Meeting

Tuesday 8th June 2020

Present: Peter Staddon, Jeff Watling, Sue Southcott, Steve Bull & Penny Budd

- Pete took part in the online British Rowing Seminar the previous day about getting rowing clubs back on the water. BR's main concern is the time that it will take for crew boats to be allowed back on the water due to the current social distancing restrictions, even if this is reduced to 1m, it will still prohibit crew boats unless other restrictions allowing people to be together are lifted for sport.

- Most of our region's clubs are taking to the water in small boats but not allowing juniors due to safety concerns. Look at the British Rowing website for latest safety guidelines and advice.

- The Executive Committee discussed the July and August regattas and with the current restrictions on i) no crew boats ii) social distancing and large gatherings of people, it is with sadness that we have taken the decision to cancel the remaining regattas with immediate effect. Therefore, there will be no Hants & Dorset Rowing Championships for 2020. We had decided to review the regattas on a month by month basis since the lockdown started with the hope that we may be able to hold some racing towards the end of summer. As we are now in June, this is now not going to be possible but we are still asking for clubs who wish to look at staging Head Races in the autumn - October / November to advise of any potential dates. Again, this will be subject to restrictions and government guidelines.

- We are planning to have the H&D AGM which should have been held in March at the end of October (when the usual delegates meeting would be held). Hopefully, we will be able to hold this face to face with clubs and officers, but if this is still not possible, we will organise an online meeting via Zoom conferencing. If this happens, we will reduce the agenda items and limit the number of participants to 2 per club. The two potential dates for this meeting will be either Sat 24th October or Sat 31st October. The delegates/AGM is usually held at BTC due to location for IOW clubs and being central but until fixtures for Southampton FC are available for October, we cannot confirm the date.

- We are keen to continue to host a H&D Dinner (obviously without the championship presentation this year) but see it as a chance to get together and celebrate and look forward to the forthcoming season. Can clubs indicate whether they and their members would want to attend the dinner if there is no championship presentation?

- The club membership forms have been sent out by Gary Joyce and some clubs have yet to submit them back. Please do so as this impacts on next year's affiliation fees. The H&D affiliation fee invoices have been sent out by Sue to all clubs, many thanks if you have provided payment.

- Following on from the meeting, this was communicated out to all clubs but in case you missed it: Some of the H&D Affiliated Clubs may have received a Statement of Accounts from British Rowing claiming that the club owes BR arrears of BR Affiliation fees sometimes amounting to thousands of pounds.

The BR statement of money owed relates to Hants & Dorset ARA Affiliation Fees that clubs have quite correctly deducted from their BR Affiliation fees in a long standing agreement with BR.

It was an error on BR's part to issue these statements and Hants & Dorset ARA Affiliated Clubs should NOT pay the statement. BR is aware of this situation. The BR Board had asked the accounts department to ensure that BR receives all the money it is due. Their accounts do not show that the Hants & Dorset ARA Affiliation fees were legitimately deducted from the BR Affiliation fees and that is why some clubs have received the statements.

The next meeting will be held on July 14th.

Steve Bull & Penny Budd. Joint Association Secretaries.

for the H&D Executive Committee.