- Roll Call
- Dave McPhail
- Ozzie Baya
- John Kurylas
- Drew Tomsak
- Whitney Ohmann-Wilson
- David Dodge
- Regrets
- Wendy Young
- Chris Hanson
- Zach Hiller
- Regrets
- Club Viability Fee –
- Collin County – Still working on getting RX access? Hansel?
- RRRC Sevens Chair Opening
- David has spoken with two individuals who had expressed interest.
- First has not responded to most recent attempts contact
- Second is discussing time commitments and preferred involvement with their spouse.
- Tentative / Proposed Qualifier Dates
- Bloodfest – June 15, 2024
- Choctaw – June 29, 2024
- Cross-over with Midwest July 13, 2024
- TBD July 27, 2024
- Open to clubs that would like to host a third qualifier- email D McPhail
- Nationals August 17-18, 2024
- David has spoken with two individuals who had expressed interest.
- DC Update from Zach
- CLOSED EXECUTIVE DISCUSSION ??? Update Zach?
- D McPhail reached out to Megan Braun (DC, USA Rugby) about hosting a JR (Judicial Review) course in Texas.
- Megan and I spoke today. Request is for a meeting space (hotel / conference room) near a major airport to cut down on need for rental vehicles and possibly use hotel shuttles and or cheap Ubers.
- Megan to send more details about the class and will advertise amongst USAR membership. Ideally, event be the last half of Jan-2024 to allow time for GU approvals and flight bookings.
- We need names for consideration to attend and we need prospective host. Discussion?
- Update on ByLaws and 501c3
- Message sent to K Tate- no update on 501c3. No updates from last month.
- Budget – Has been sent to Board via email on Sunday, Nov-19th.
- Discussion –
- Revenues:
- R egistrations lagging compared to this time last year. Registration revenues conservatively budgeted as flat.
- Interest revs increased slightly with increased interest rates.
- Reduced sponsorship revs., as no sponsor yet secured.
- Equity injection shores up difference between anticipated revenues and anticipated expenses.
- Expenses – Competitions:
- Referee expenses reduced, split difference between last year’s budget and last year’s actual expense.
- Increase in RRRC Championships based on prior year expenses.
- Gulf Coast SR – Net of anticipated grant from SCC / USA Club Rugby.
- Match Commish travel budget increased due to anticipated increase in travel.
- Expenses – Grants:
- Big change here is anticipated decrease. Had to travel to Super Regionals last year, and sent multiple teams, and 3 teams to finals. Also sent 4 teams to 7s Nationals.
- Expenses – Admin:
- All reasonably flat or reduced.
- Expenses – All Stars:
- Some increase in Mary Graham All Stars budget, with some offsetting grant revenue anticipated from SCC / USA Club Rugby.
- Discussion of a budget for men’s all-star activities. No program at present. Left open possibility of a draw on reserves to fund men’s all stars, if the program plan is submitted and approved.
- Other:
- HOF / Summit made $2K last year. Moving to Austin this year, so budgeting $2K loss.
- Question about budgeting for Red River Premiership discussed below.
- Revenues:
- Would like to have a CPA for 501c3 TR’s once we cross that bridge.
- Discussion –
- RX Schedule released –
- Matches have begun! Hansel sent out reminders to the clubs to load rosters by Friday night.
- Any still outstanding?
- Norton checked “name withheld” and there were none noted this past weekend.
- Any changes post 9/28 should be submitted to the Match CAD Form.
- All games are updated into WhosTheRef (WTR), and WTR is being updated as changes appear via the online form.
- Kind reminder to teams to periodically check date/times for accuracy, especially on WTR.
- Event Host Bids- please submit using this form by Nov 1st
- RRRC Championships April 20-21, 2024 – Houston SaberCats
- Gulf Coast Super Regionals May 4-5, 2024 – Initially only Austin Blacks. Subsequently, Dallas RFC came in a bid for RRRC but changed it to GCSR. The tracking sheet did not pick up the email change of intent and the RRRC sub-committee did not get copied on the change correspondence and only considered the one from Austin RFC. Dallas was after the Nov-1st deadline but since D McPhail requested additional budget information, the Dallas bid was ultimately allowed to be considered. All information should now be back with the RRRC sub-committee and they will take up the task again. Anticipate an answer in a week or so given the holiday.
- XVs National Championships May 17-19, 2024 – Per W Young, the USAR CCC is soliciting additional bids.
- Mary Graham All Stars December 7-8, 2024.
- Rugby Texas update
- Discussions have moved to USAR. No resolution known to date and no request for TRU to govern or intervene in any way at this time.
- D McPhail sat in on the SCC call as a guest last week and the discussion came up regarding the relationship between the Youth / College / Adult age grades. SCC seems to support a return to the old days where there is greater coordination and sharing of responsibilities between the groups. Memberships to their respective organization would remain but a path towards “rejoining the rugby tent” seemed to be gaining traction.
- USA Updates – Dodge
- Dodge –
- D McPhail spoke to Andrew King regarding the Gulf Coast MOU issue. Short answer is that we were the only region with a MOU. He likes the concept and wished others would adopt. For this year, the GDSCR date and location has been shared on multiple occasions and he does not anticipate any push back from the group. Andrew added that the 2024-25 cycle is the last year of the currently approved format. Thus, there will not need to be any kind of multiple year agreement until the next structure is rolled out. This document should be released in May/June 2024 so all clubs have a year to plan.
- Per, D Dodge the grant for Mary Graham has been approved. Final figure (roughly half of the budget) will be approved. This is included in the budget discussion.
- Budget for the 23-24 cycle will likely see a budget increase for the Super Regional grant. Final amount not provided but should be forthcoming. Again, assuming about half our total costs.
- Admin has been hired by SCC to report directly to EXCO. Any “work” requests would need to be funneled through Al Lucas, SCC Chair. USAR is also in the process of hiring a Dedicated Admin for Club Rugby. The job is primarily to interface between SCC and USAR.
- Division 1 Rebrand
- Looking at rebranding as Premiership. Would include men only at this time as the women’s teams have elected to wait another season while their D1 structure is still not formalized.
- Discussion held with D1 clubs regarding hiring of an “admin” to take on this work load. D McPhail
Proposed a cost sharing model for year one. Job would be 4-8 hours per week. TRU would pay half and the D1 clubs would be billed pro-rata for the other half. Need to finalize an hourly rate. Discussion.
- Other New Business
- D4 – reminder that Clubs need to have an actively registered Coach at each of the matches. This is a safety and liability issue for Coaches, Players, and match officials.
- WY / CH – Do we need to update the Board invite? Still has Martin and O’Gara as invitee’s. I looked at the Email list and commented on the two (RRRC & TRU) to CH over the weekend.
- Motion to adjourn the meeting: Dodge / Drew
- Meeting Adjourned 9:33