AWSA – MIDWEST REGION

2004 SUMMER MEETING

Mystic Lakes, KS

August 2, 2007

The meeting was called to order by EVP Jeff Surdej at 1:03 at the Mystics Lake Ski Site

Present were, Dean Chappell, Tom Danford, Richard Williams, Kate Knafla, Dick Coss, Linda Coss, Jeff Lindsey, Janice Prociw, Cory Piercy, Jeff Surdej, Terry Dlugosh, Pat Cook, Brian Reed, Janet Piercy, Bud Piercy, Dave Clark, Steve Prociw, Dennis Downes, Scott Wright, Jim Beebe, Barb Lindy, Chris Kosek, Jack Daugherty, Bill Murbach, Don Bucher,

Richard Williams was duly appointed Parliamentarian

After review the Agenda was approved motion by Tom Danford moved seconded by Dar Leutz to accept. Motion carried

After review the Winter 2007 Board Meeting Minutes Tom Danford moved, seconded by Kate Knafla to approve the minutes.

Jeff Surdej presented his EVP report. He reminded everyone to get changes in for the directory if needed. After his first year Jeff is very happy with the progress and thanked everyone for their help. Definitely open to suggestions if anyone has new ideas. HQ is still working on finding a new executive director. They basically went through the whole process and after the final selection was made, that person declined to take another position they just got offered. A new selection committee is being formed. Membership is still down 668 people. Rankings system for qualification is going well, education continues to be key with our skiers. For our Regionals this year 61 new people qualified with the rankings list compared with 37 that actually made their rating but did not qualify based on rankings. It is being refined and refined again but the overall result has been very promising. Dave Clark has been getting the scores out very quickly and a huge thank you goes out to him. Continue to get your tournament results into him as soon as you can.

Tom Danford presented the Treasurer’s Report. Numbers at mid-year were showing revenues of $15,238.14 and expenditures of $19,063.30. These represented income and expenses as of July 31, 2007 and are considered comparable to previous years. Revenues pick up with donations to the Jr. Fund at Regionals.

State Council Reports

Missouri – Jeff Lindsey – We started with our winter meeting in Feb. This spring our Jr. Development had 14 kids with 2 or 3 clinics. Season started great but our numbers were down at State. NSL interest was down but like Dennis mentioned in KS, there was a new director. We need a scorers clinic bad in our state. Rankings list has been fun this year among the skiers. It has been hard to recruit new drivers on these tighter tolerances. Our collegiate teams have some good skiers coming up so it should be interesting how they do.

Illinois – Dar Leutz – Dar is the new Illinois rep as Dean Chappell will be running for the Director position. We have had 12 tourneys with entry levels unchanged. Competition has be good with some new faces at the tournaments. We are having a CFN tourney this fall plus several clinics. We had 108 pulls at this years State Championships with 8 state records broken.

Nebraska - Cory Piercy – We had 40 state skiers with 14 out of state skiers for our state tourney. About 120 pulls in a 3 rd, 5 pulls max format. Numbers are about the same and we have been trying to get some new officials upgraded for our tournaments.

Wisconsin - Jim Babcock (absent)– Jim was chief safety at the Division 2 Show Ski Nationals. Other State skiers at the meeting mentioned numbers were down a little but activity continues to be good in the state overall.

Ohio - Greg Chapman by Dick Coss – Rankings have been pushing the tourney numbers up. Jr. Development had 10 skiers sponsored by Correct Craft with a pro available for training. The state tournament was held at a site that had not hosted a tournament in 5 years. We also incorporated night skiing Friday night. We have had some state officers changed this year.

Indiana – Jim Beck (absent) – Tom Danford said their website has been used for a lot of good things. Don Bucher mentioned that the State tourney was a lot of fun and the Disabled Nationals was held in Indiana. The numbers were low for competitors but the coverage was excellent. They are having the Div 2 Show Nationals this weekend.

Iowa –Pat Cook – Waiting on the final report on Jr. Development , state was about average. The competition has been very good and hopefully the fall tournaments will have better numbers. We are also hosting a collegiate tournament this fall.

Kansas – Dennis Downes – Tournament schedule was full, we had a huge tourney this spring with 253 pulls. Junior team is growing and going very well. Officials clinic also went well this Spring. We have been trying to help the officials with their paperwork. NSL has dropped off a little.

Michigan – unknown representative – Doug Rooker/Mark Johnson/Mark Boehnder are going to kind of spearhead the job with Doug as the speaking position. Participation was down a little but collegiate challenge increased the fun level. The rankings list was accepted very well by the Michigan skiers.

Minnesota – Kate Knafla – Tourneys and participation were up. Steve Gallop was voted into the Hall of Fame. We have some new officers this year. Jr Development had 31 skiers and 3 lakes. Some tournaments had as many young skiers as adult skiers. Minnesota has a three lake site being developed and we dedicated a “Collegiate” position to our Board. There were also several clinics held this year.

National Directors Reports

Jeff Smith – Chairman of the Board – No Report

Dave Clark – The Can-Am challenge will be held in the Midwest this fall. Funding for our teams has been a very big issue this year. Some of our teams have had to support themselves to ski. There was some talk on adding a little more to dues and put the extra towards funding. Still a work in progress. Dave wanted to thank everyone for their support in the past. It was a tough decision to step down but there was just no time in Dave’s week anymore for all the waterskiing duties on his plate and it was even affecting his professional life. Something had to give and this was it. The council and all in attendance gave a Dave a standing ovation for his tireless dedication to our sport.

Tom Danford – Jim Grew has been doing a very good job keeping everything going at HQ. Team support has been really tough. Not enough sponsorship out there. Still looking for suggestions to improve the rankings list if we can. Bakersfield is the only Nationals bid that Tom was aware of. Tech Committee is looking at cumulative time issues for setting records. We are also looking at Pro versus Amateur status for record setting.

Committee Reports:

E&F – Don Bucher – Don explained the selection process for the new Executive Director and what happened. Athlete representative Mandy Nightengale is also having to step down so she will need to be replaced as well. Jim Grew is keeping things running while we try to get that new Executive Director position filled. Hopefully by the end of September we will have it narrowed down to 3. Amanda Wilson, Competition, is also going to be looking for something else. It’s going to be hard to replace so many good workers.

Judges and Scorers – Jeff Smith will be stepping down, Carol Boise has been asked to take over. If you want to be involved let someone know.

Rules – Tom Danford – Pretty quiet right now. If you have a proposal you need to get it to Tom quickly. We did approve a request for 2 tourneys in 3 days. Zero Off got a blanket exception as long as it has a magnetic timing backup. There is no difference now between AWSA and IWSF rules on full buoy scoring.

Skiers Rating – Jeff Surdej- Education is the key to inform skiers about the new Rankings list and how it works. Still looking at the Pro versus Amateur situation. There are no recommendations at this time. We are looking at breaking down the upper level of rankings list (7/8).

Technical – Dave Clark – Not a lot of new stuff. Jump driving and speed control is being studied. Especially the most important area, those 30 meters where speed affects the skier the most. George Lindy mentioned that determining the “Speed Profile” is almost impossible and has not been defined. The rules need to be looked at and compared with what is actually happening with the speed control.

Drivers – Jim Beebe – The addition of receiving the weekly boat times has been very educational. There is always room for improvement. Zero Off is going to help. Reassure the drivers in your state that we are not trying berate them by this time reporting. We want them to improve their skills. Richard Williams reminded everyone to make sure their scorers are sending in this information with all the other data.

Tow Boats – George Lindy – Testing the Zero Off took up most of our time. System works very well but they needed to add some refinements. Tolerances were tightened up very well. Usually the times for Zero off matched the magnetic back up times. The Tow Boat committee approved this system for use with the back up. Tom Danford mentioned that Rules would like to see 1000 slalom times and 500 jump times before they would be comfortable with the new system only. Our Council is comfortable based on George Lindy’s recommendation. The second week in October HQ is having a boat test so if you want to ski behind the Zero Off come on down. There was no change to the “added weights” rule.

International – Jeff Smith and Larry Downs – Cale Burdick mad the 17-20 Team.

Junior Development – Barb Lindy/Abbey Lorenz – Team has been listed, Minnesota had the most skiers on the team. The National Jr. Development team had 4 from the Midwest on it. We raised almost $8,000 for the team so we got shirts again. Abby Lorenz and her husband will be taking over for Barb and George Lindy. The Council and all in attendance gave them a standing ovation for all the hard work and great job the Lindy’s have done in the tenure with the Jr. Development team.

Coaches – Chris Kosek – Reminded every one that nominations were due for Coaches and Volunteers of the year.

Safety – Jim Babcock – No Report

Awards – Janice Prociw – We would like to change the voting to Saturday before the banquet so that award recipients could be recognized by all, not just the few remaining around the site at the end on Sunday. Nationals is the last tournament before we award Rankings List Champions.

Seeding – Dave Clark – Dave wanted to thank the scorers for getting their numbers in quickly. People have really been checking the list. 40% of the business on the USAWS website is rankings list related. We are still looking at some different variations on penalties and averages. Get them to Tom Danford to present them to the Rules Committee.

Bylaws – Bill Murbach – We are going to review the Midwest Bylaws for our winter meeting. Also looking at Policy and Procedures.

Nominating – Janet Piercy – Qualifications should be a 3 person committee for the Regional tournament. Tom Danford moved, seconded by Dar Leutz to add Dean’s name on the ballot for Director. Motion carried.

Announcers – Paul Volmers (absent) – It was suggested that we have Jerry Hosner take over this seat

Teller – Richard Williams – The ballot box for voting will be located by the Jr. Development tent on the site.

Other Reports:

AWSEF – Dick Nock- No activity

Regional Tournament – Dennis Downes –Dennis was ecstatic about the turnout and help they have gotten. Especially from Jeff Surdej. We will have our officials meeting tonight next door. There will be a waterslide out here to keep the kids entertained. There will be concessions on site. Friday night is the skiers meal. Jim Beebe and his band will be playing music Friday night as well. Banquet on Saturday and the officials hotel. Terry Dlugosh mentioned we need to the communication out that we had to move some jump events. We also need to communicate the L & E schedule.

Regional Guide – Jim Babcock – Jim wasn’t here but expressed his interest in doing the Guide again. Reminders will be sent out to all the host sites about the needed information. It was mentioned that it would be good to also get a PDF. file out on the website.

Regional Records – Jerry Hosner – Send the information to Jeff Surdej right away and you have to let Jerry know you broke a record.

Regional Website – Jeff Surdej – Keep up the good job getting the information to me. The pictures and stories are great reading for everyone.

NSL / NWL Leagues – Don Bucher – You need to report buoy count and placements so we can get these younger skiers and novice skiers on the system. The committee hasn’t been very active. There are some proposals out there, get with Don if you would like to discuss the issues.

Collegiate – Jeff Surdej for Chris Kodiak – Midwest is by far the largest group in the nation. We placed 2^nd at Nationals. The night jump was a huge success. We are having the next Nationals at Bennett’s sight. We can send appointed judges and drivers. If you know skiers in your state, let us know so we can get them information on colleges and teams. The 2008 All Stars are going to be held in DuQuoin. You can get more information at mcws.com

Other old business

New Business:

Regional Tournament Bids – 2008 – We have a bid from Mystic Lakes and the Kansas Water Ski Association. Dennis Downes presented all the facts about what they want to offer for 2008. The Duquoin site also submitted a packet. Committee voted in executive session to approve Mystic Lakes for the 2008 MW Regionals.

Dave Clark wants to lend support to a new scoring system. There is an offer out there that has a project team made up of previous skiers that have a lot of IT experience. It would be more like a Windows based program and hopefully easier to use.

Winter Meeting – 2008 – After some discussion it was voted to have the 2008 Winter Meeting in Chicago with the weekend to be determined at a later time.

It was also made known that we will be accepting bids for the 2009 Midwest Regionals at the Winter Meeting in Chicago. Jeff will disseminate this down to all the two lake sites that have an interest in hosting a Regionals. State representatives are to get a list of sites to Jeff as soon as they can.

Last topic was discussion on the rankings list for next year’s Regionals. Discussion was on making it level 6 for M1 and M2 across the board to qualify for competition. For M3 and M4 you would still need level 7 for one event and the other 2 events could be level 6. This was the motion from Dennis seconded by Dar. Motion carried. There was also discussion about increasing the State placement qualification for Regionals in M3 and M4 slalom to 1-5. This was tabled and will be discussed further at the Winter Meeting.

With no other business Dar Leutz moved seconded by Tom Danford to Adjourn. Motion carried.

Respectfully submitted,

Cory L Piercy

Midwest Council Secretary