The BSF Executive held its monthly conference call meeting on the evening of Thursday 10 April. Below are highlights of discussions and decisions.
Attendance
Present: Darren Prouty (Administrator), Mike Jennings (Treasurer), Liz Graham and Fiona Thorley (Tournaments Officers), Mark Wigington (Marketing Officer), Mark Munnery (General Officer & Chair), Chris Moon (BASU Representative).
Apologies: Stella Ackrell (President), Beth Perkins (National Teams Officer), Claire Waldron (Youth & Schools Officer), James Clarke (Communications Officer).
Guests: Bob Fromer (BSUK).
Action points
Following acceptance of the Minutes from the previous meeting in March, the meeting began, as usual, with a review of action points assigned to Executive members. Some of the key ones are:
- Communications Officer James Clarke is working on a BSF Communications Strategy, in which social media will play a key role, and hopes to have this ready shortly.
- A request by the BSF for a softball container at Farnham Park has been taken by BSUK to South Bucks District Council and a reply is awaited. More storage is needed for the Great Britain Fastpitch League, GB Teams and local softball users. However, there is a possibility that planning permission will be needed if more containers are to be brought on site.
- At the request of the BSF, Bob Fromer has drafted a document explaining the relationship between BSUK, the BSF and the BBF, and the different functions of each organisation. This is currently under review at BSUK but should be ready to be published soon.
- BSUK has confirmed that diamonds are available at Farnham Park for the BSF to hold a Single-Sex Slowpitch Tournament on Saturday 21 June. The tournament will include three American Senior men's teams who will be in London at the time. BSUK will organise the tournament on behalf of the BSF. The BSF is looking at the possibilities for running additional single-sex slowpitch tournaments during the season.
- Tournaments Officer Liz Graham will shortly publish a list of tournament placings from last season on the BSF's Facebook page, to help with assessment of gradings for this year's National Championships.
- Liz Graham has notified all tournament organisers for this season of the need to comply with the BSF's mandatory regulations concerning under-18 players playing in adult teams and competitions.
- An announcement from Marketing Officer Mark Wigington will be published on the BSF website shortly on the arrangements that the BSF has made to subsidise the purchase of helmets and catcher's masks by teams with under-18 players. There will also be an announcement shortly on the BSF and GB merchandise that can be purchased through the BSF's partnership with Aswani Sports.
- Treasurer Mike Jennings is compiling a database of the leagues, clubs and teams that have been awarded BSF Development Grants in the past, to better inform decisions on future grant applications.
- Mike Jennings will also be meeting with BSUK National Development Manager Will Lintern to discuss how slowpitch coaching projects can be developed and extended.
- Mike Jennngs and Stella Ackrell have reviewed the non-development work that the BSF will purchase from BSUK this year under the Service Level Agreement between the two organisations with BSUK’s Jenny Fromer and Operations Manager Tim Stride. The BSF will pay the same amount for services this year as in the recent past, but will be provided with slightly fewer “free” hours by BSUK this year and in the future. The draft breakdown of how the hours will be spent will now be circulated to the Executive for approval.
- Flyers for the BSF's “Bring a Bat, Give a Glove” campaign to collect used equipment for refurbishment and then development use will shortly be sent to all tournament organisers, since the BSF hopes to collect such equipment mainly at tournaments. A banner advertising the campaign that can be displayed at tournaments is being created.
- Following a request from BSF President Stella Ackrell, BSUK Joint CEO and Head of Development John Boyd has provided the BSF with a list of the new slowpitch and fastpitch teams created through BSUK development work in 2013-14.
- Stella Ackrell is continuing to work on a BSF Code of Conduct, which will be presented to the Executive and then to the membership for comments.
- Former BSF Administrator Vicky Hall has distributed Incident Report Forms and information on how and when to use them to contacts in all BSF-affiliated leagues.
BSF registration
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings, who has been overseeing the project to update the registration system through the BSF website, reported that the system seems to be functioning and teams are registering: we have yet to see how many players will be fully rostered as required.
The BSF is committed to getting names and email addresses for close to 100% of players on affiliated teams. As the national governing body for Softball, the BSF needs to know who its members are and needs to be able to access and communicate with them.
This year, each team that registers through the BSF website will be assigned a unique number (visible on the team's sign-in page), and this will allow tournament organisers to confirm that teams that have entered their tournament are affiliated and thus covered by insurance.
Slowpitch coaching initiative
Mike Jennings reported that 14 teams or leagues have signed up to the BSF's slowpitch coaching programme for B-grade and C-grade teams, run in conjunction with the GB Slowpitch Team. This is almost double the number that took part last year and may be close to the limit that the BSF can cater for financially and that the GB Slowpitch Team can handle in terms of coach provision.
The programme includes a coaching session for the team or league delivered by a GB Slowpitch coach or player, and then game management support at a subsequent league or tournament competition event.
The first of this year's sessions will be delivered on 13 April for the Solent Softball League.
Further applications can still be made (see details here) but will be put on standby to see if resources are available.
Finance
Mike Jennings reported that all BSF national teams have had their allocations for this year from the National Teams Levy, and that a loan has been made to the GB Women's Fastpitch Team to pay a hotel deposit for their training camp before the World Championships in Holland later this year.
This is the time of year when BSF cash flow is at its lowest because fees are only starting to come in but a lot of expenditure will have been made. To date, one league and a few independent teams have paid, but more fees should be coming in shortly.
WBSC Congress
The World Baseball and Softball Confederation (WBSC), the joint governing body for baseball and softball created to help the sports regain Olympic status, will be holding its first Congress in Hammamet, Tunisia from May 10-11.
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings will attend on behalf of British softball.
While the Congress is expected to be concerned largely with ceremony and networking, there may be an issue over the organisation's Constitution. The draft WBSC Constitution was approved by the International Softball Federation Congress, but any subsequent changes to it were to be approved by the ISF Board. Drafting changes have been requested by the International Olympic Committee; whether this has been reviewed and signed off by the ISF Board, and whether member Federations would have a vote on the issue, remains to be determined.
National Championships
The BSF will publish an article shortly on the BSF website and/or in the Hot Corner Newsletter clarifying a number of issues around National Championships this year.
The Federation will announce that in 2014, for the last time, the Premier (NSL) Nationals will be played separately from the rest of the Co-ed National Championships. Both will be at Farnham Park, but the Co-ed Nationals for B-grade and C-grade teams will be on 9-10 August and the Premier Nationals on 30-31 August.
The BSF will also announce the routes to the Co-ed Nationals for independent tournament teams and clarify which tournaments this year will be used for National Softball League play.
The Executive is also considering whether uniform requirements for National Championships should be tightened along lines agreed three years ago but delayed at the time.
Up to now, the requirement has only been for team members playing in National Championships to all wear the same shirt. New regulations would require teams to also wear the same trousers or shorts, though it would be possible for women to all wear shorts and men trousers or vice-versa.
Reports from BSUK Committees
BSF Executive members sit on various BSUK committees along with representatives from the BBF and from BSUK's Board and staff, and reports from BSUK committee meetings are now a standard part of the agenda for BSF Executive meetings.
There have been no meetings of the BSUK Finance Committee or Governance Committee since the last BSF Executive meeting in March.
BSUK's Development Strategy Committee met on 9 April, and the main focus of the meeting was a presentation and paper by the BSF and the GB Management Committee (GBMC) on Fastpitch Softball Development. The paper and presentation were received positively by the Committee, though specific comments and responses from BSUK will be made later.
The Committee did, however, ask the BSF to prepare a parallel Slowpitch Development Plan by the time of its next meeting in June.
The reason for the submission of a Fastpitch Development Plan was that the BSF and the GBMC feel that fastpitch is less well established and therefore more vulnerable than baseball or slowpitch softball in the UK and that fastpitch needs more support and resources from BSUK if the format is to grow and develop.
BSF General Officer Mark Munnery, who attended the meeting along with Marketing Officer Mark Wigington and Youth and Schools Officer Claire Waldron (by phone) reported a feeling that DSC meetings are often dominated by concerns over Sport England targets and new participant numbers, whereas the paper on Fastpitch Development brought a welcome focus back to what BSUK should be doing for the sports.
BSF Marketing Officer Mark Wigington, who attended the meeting along with General Officer Mark Wigington and Youth and Schools Officer Claire Waldron (by phone) reported that it was refreshing to discuss the development needs of the actual sports disciplines at the DSC.
While BSUK is rightly focused on long-term strategies for development, the paper on Fastpitch Development was designed to emphasise a need for action now.
BSUK resources are, of course, limited, and the BSF may have to prioritise where it wants BSUK to spend money and use staff time on behalf of softball. Choices may need to be made.
The tripartite (BSUK, BBF, BSF) Commercial Committee also met on 9 April, following the DSC meeting. Mark Munnery reported that BSUK is seeking to retain a Commercial Consultant on a part-time and short-term basis (with the possibility of extension) to see if additional revenue streams can be developed through website advertising, commercial exploitation of Farnham Park and other sources.
The BBF and BSF are being asked to put a value on their various physical and IP assets.
It was re-emphasised at the meeting that it is imperative for both Federations to secure full registration and contact details from members.
The Farnham Park Committee met on 19 March, and the key discussion was around finalising Terms and Conditions for those hiring pitches at the facility. These have now been agreed and have been published on the BSUK website. The T&Cs can be viewed or downloaded here.
BSUK is hoping to appoint a Site Manager for Farnham Park in the near future, but in the meantime is advertising for paid casual help to help oversee and manage the facility on behalf of users.
Change in remit for GBMC
The GB Management Committee (GBMC) was originally formed in 2008 to provide an overview and support for all GB National Teams, both fastpitch and slowpitch.
However, as was made clear in the Fastpitch Development Plan drawn up by members of the GBMC and presented to BSUK's Development Strategy Committee (see above), for fastpitch the issues of national teams, the Academy and High Performance Academy, domestic competition, coaching, recruitment and development are all inter-related.
The question, therefore, was whether the GBMC should be regarded a fastpitch oversight body whose remit should be widened to take in all aspects of fastpitch development along with national teams. The consensus was that this should be the case, and that this could be an important first step towards the delivery, with BSUK, of the Fastpitch Development Plan.
Next meeting
The next BSF Executive conference call meeting will be held on Thursday 8 May. Anyone with items to raise at the meeting should contact BSF Administrator Darren Prouty.