TRU Board Notes – 9/21/20 – Texas Rugby Union

At the request of our members the TRU Board will be releasing their monthly board call minutes and notes. View all of the TRU archived minutes or read on for the most recent notes:

Roll Call
1. Young
2. Roche
3. Hiller
4. Kurylas
5. Tate
6. Wilson
7. Dodge
8. Tomsak
USAR Reorg
1. Tate: A few of the club council committees have been finalized including Eligibility, Audit & Risk, Training & Development and Diversity Equity & Inclusion. Remaining committees are Competitions, Governance and Discipline. We have a few TRU folks that have been named to committees and we may have more:
  1. David Dodge – Audit & Risk (Dallas)
  2. Mary Swanstrom – Training & Development (Houston)
  3. Alex Campbell – Eligibility (Dallas)
2. Tate: There were multiple nominations for all of the committees and everyone was put into the process. GU Presidents reviewed nominations and could endorse or not as they chose. As a committee we worked to make choices on skill sets rather than perfect regional representation. As a result of that and opening the process up to more applicants, we’re getting more diverse committees than USA Rugby has had historically. While some committees had many many nominations, some of the committees did have fewer and we had to actively seek out additional folks to even fill the seats.
  1. Tate: One additional step for the Training & Development committee is to make sure there is a T&D liaison at every GU. Gordon Hanlon was also submitted for the T&D committee but wasn’t ultimately selected. But he is someone that we want to keep engaged and this may be a way to keep him involved. If you haven’t watched his Rugby Analysis series on Facebook and Youtube, you’re missing out.
3. Tate: We have another call tomorrow night and we are hoping to finish Governance and Discipline. Competitions may take another week or two.
  1. Dodge: Do we know if we’re going to try and have XVs Nationals this year?
  2. Tate: We continue to have discussions around this and the Club Council Committee is pretty split. Some folks are optimistic and some are pessimistic. Realistically if we have Nationals, it will look very different than in the past. In typical times, we would have had leagues that started 3-4 weeks ago but due to the pandemic, they’ve lost the time to complete their season. So if we have Nationals, it won’t be fully representative of the entire Nation. We’re fortunate in Texas that we can play in January & February. So we can keep pushing things back and still probably have a spring season.
  3. Dodge: I assume the Competitions committee will be giving flexibility on match minimums?
  4. Tate: Oh, yes. While we’re still in the beginning stages of planning, there are discussions around reducing match minimums. The word of the year is going to be flexibility.
RTP/Spring Schedule
1. Tate: Gov Abbott recently allowed more restaurant capacity but it doesn’t look like anything has changed for outdoor adult recreational activities. So for the moment, Texas remains in Stage 3. LA may have some upcoming changes as they are starting to allow some contact sports locally. Once we receive notice of any official change, the RTP task force will review and make a determination for Shreveport. There don’t seem to be any changes in OK or AR at this time and they remain in Stage 4.
  1. Tomsak: Yes, there will be some over-35 tournaments in New Orleans, Louisiana in October and I want to make sure we’re OK if we participate.
  2. Tate: Yes, appreciate that. If Louisiana does change their local and state government guidance, it could move you to Stage 4. The RTP task force will continue to monitor but feel free to reach out if you have additional questions.
2. Dodge: The RRRC is reviewing a draft schedule for the Spring. We do have an issue with some weekends being quite crowded and we may have referee resource issues. Kat, do we need to look at moving some matches to Sunday?
3. Roche: My experience with Sunday matches is that it’s not really solving any issues. If TRU matches are moved to Sunday, HS matches or D1A would just fill those spots. I am concerned about the women’s colleges, if they play on Saturday…that will stretch us.
4. Tate: If the women’s colleges could play on Friday nights and Sundays, that may let us utilize the dual player/referees.
5. Roche: We love Friday night matches and would be happy to cover them on Sunday as well.
6. Tate: Ok, so we’re saying we’re comfortable with club games on Saturday but we’d like to try and get women’s college matches on Fridays and Sundays.
  1. Roche: Correct. It would also provide more referee coaches and TO3 to those games so they’d get overall better officiating.
7. Dodge: Ok, so I’ll review it and send it out for approval.
8. Young: Hold on, we need to chat offline about the women.
  1. Dodge: Ok.
  2. Young: I’ll get a calendar invite out to you, Kat and the women’s reps.
9. Tate: Can I see the draft so I can work on a referee budget for the TRU?
  1. Dodge: Yes.
Sportlomo
1. Roche: We’re making progress and we know exactly where the issues are now. We need banking information so dues can be sent to us and we still have a few clubs that need to be added in. I need help from Wendy and Dave P on banking.
  1. Young: OK, I saw an email chain on that and I’ll reply.
2. Roche: We also have a few clubs that aren’t “activated”. I’ve added them in Sportlomo but we’re waiting on USAR/Sportlomo to activate them. Until they are activated, it won’t allow folks to register their club or any roles.
  1. Tate: I will reach out to USAR again.
  2. Roche: Yes, please, this is very frustrating.
3. Roche: There are also questions around CIPPing with multi-roles. You MUST register under Multi-Registration and complete registration. Then go back in and select additional roles and it should only charge you for the most expensive one. We don’t know what will need to happen as far as refunds if this isn’t done correctly…so heed that warning.
  1. Dodge: There was talk of a discount if players CIPP with their club and TRRA. Did we make progress on that?
  2. Roche: Yes, we’re also waiting on USAR to activate TRRA in Sportlomo. All active players who register with their clubs as a player or coach will also get half off their TRRA dues – so have them contact me if they are interested in that.
TX Secretary of State Status
1. Tate: Dodge was working on the agreement with RugbyHTX and discovered that our TX Franchise status was currently in forfeiture. This happens when you haven’t done all of your filings with the Comptroller. We don’t have any taxes but we still need to file some paperwork. I’ve begun the work to get us back into active status and out of forfeiture; I had made a mistake with the Tax ID number I was using. I’ve filed all of our past due paperwork and they will review so I can move on to the next steps and get us back into good standing. This has happened to the TRU a few times and it’s apparently a pretty common thing.
  1. Tate: It also still has Dave McPhail as the registered agent, I did attempt to change that a few years but it apparently didn’t go through. I filled out the form for that and will file for that change as well.
Virtual Sessions
1. Young: The Virtual Sessions are going really really well, we’re having tons of engagement and lots of good feedback. This week we wrapped Speed School with Bryson Tucker and Dallen Stanford and Gordon Hanlon are hosting their Q&As (final sessions) this week. ARPTC entered week 2 and while we have a good number of folks signing up, we’re only having ~10% actually show up to the Zoom. So we want to keep driving folks to the Q&As this week and signing up for the ARPTC programming.
  1. Tate: I’ve been loving seeing these pop up on Facebook and Youtube, but I’m not seeing that for ARPTC. Did we change the format?
  2. Young: The current format is that you have to join the Zoom, as we’re really looking for these to be interactive sessions. Do we want to adjust?
  3. Wilson: I’m wondering if the 13 week syllabus is perhaps maybe overwhelming? I’ve been on the first two sessions and they’ve been fantastic.
  4. Tate: That could be part of it. Do we have all the content recorded?
  5. Young: Yes, I have all the files. Do we want to do a day after upload like we did for the others?
  6. Tate: Yes, I think we need to do that.
  7. Young: Ok, so we will keep pushing folks to the Zoom but then we will “premiere” the content the next day as well.
2. Young: I’ve also been talking to Justin Goonan (A&M and MLR) about doing some S&C sessions and Gordon has pitched a Coaching Philosophy/Style series. So we should have some more coming up in October!
New Business
1. Rugby HTX
  1. Dodge: I believe their application is complete. Do we need anything else?
  2. Tate: When I looked at their application materials, it looked complete to me. Wendy, is there anything outstanding?
  3. Young: We’re just waiting on the club viability fee and I believe that check has been sent. I will check with Dave P.
  4. Tomsak: I propose we approve their membership pending that the club viability fee is received.
    1. Dodge: The MD1 clubs are currently reviewing a written agreement that their matches against Rugby HTX are friendlies. There is a clause that if the agreement is breached in the first two seasons and any matches aren’t fulfilled, they could be “frozen out”. If that happens, the TRU may need to get involved. This is the same agreement that we’re seeking for Glendale.
    2. Tomsak: Are we letting MD1 teams dictate their terms to the TRU?
    3. Tate: No, Dodge and I have talked plenty about this. We don’t normally allow clubs to join the TRU and immediately play in D1. There have been numerous conversations between Dodge and I about how this might impact the TRU and D1 in the long run as well as conversations with the MD1 clubs themselves. Our concern is that if all the MLR teams create Academies it could really start to siphon off club players. We want competition but not at the expense of club rugby. So this is almost a beta to see how it goes.
    4. Tomsak: I think that’s a valid concern in regards to the potential for Academies and I’m glad that’s being thought about.
    5. Tate: We’ve seen MD1 shrinking around the country and our competition is one of the most healthy. To the extent that we can bolster that competition and add teams to it, provided that the D1 teams are on board with it, we’d like to do it. It’s also fair to say that the D1 teams aren’t unanimous in their feelings. The consensus of the group was that they wanted to move forward.
    6. Dodge: Yes, we’re moving forward but that we did need the TRU to be aware of potential enforcement needs in the future.
    7. Roche: If Rugby HTX doesn’t hold up their end of the agreement, are we saying that they can’t schedule friendlies with other teams in the TRU?
      1. Dodge: No, that would only mean that the D1 teams wouldn’t schedule matches with Rugby HTX.
      2. Tate: Right, it basically is the D1 teams saying that we’re going to do this together or not. So if the D1 teams sign the agreement, it’s all of them. But if someone changed their mind and doesn’t want to play Rugby HTX…the TRU may have to enforce the agreement.
  5. Dodge: I motion that Rugby HTX be admitted to TRU rugby membership, subject of their payment of the club viability fee and subject to their agreement with the MD1 clubs.
    1. Tomsak: Second.
    2. Tate: Any objections? None. APPROVED.
2. Fall Tournaments
  1. Dodge: The RRRC determined that we will have a bid process for these. That should be going out soon.
Meeting Adjournment (9:22 PM)

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