The 2016 British Softball Federation AGM, along with the 2015 League Heads Forum meeting postponed from last November, was held on Saturday 20 February in Manchester. Although many important topics were covered, a National Softball League issue grabbed much of the time and attention.
At the end of the AGM, the BSF gave out five annual awards relating to the 2015 season and announced the induction of seven new members into the British Softball Federation Hall of Fame. Details are in the article below.
Following the AGM, the newly-elected BSF Executive held a meeting to review issues raised during the day and deal with other topics. A report on this meeting can be found in the “Latest News” column on the BSF website: [ADD LINK].
Reports on the AGM itself, and then on the League Heads Forum meeting, are below.
Annual General Meeting
The 2016 BSF AGM was attended by 56 people, of whom 47 were voting members.
Representatives attended from BSUK, BASU, the GB Women’s and Men’s Fastpitch Teams and the following BSF-affiliated leagues: Bristol, Cardiff, Central Scotland, East Midlands, Edinburgh, Greater London, London Advertising, National Softball League, Oxford, Leeds, Manchester, Sefton, Solent and Windsor.
Apologies were received from Vicky Hall (GB Management Committee) and Alex Catmur (Cardiff Softball League). Thanks were offered to Kellie Whitaker for organising the AGM Venue.
Minutes from 2015 AGM
The Minutes from the 2015 AGM, which were part of the 2016 AGM Pack, were approved unanimously. There were no matters arising.
Accounts and Budget
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings presented a summary of accounts for the BSF’s financial year ending 30 September 2015 and a budget for the current year that will end on 30 September 2016.
The accounts for 2015 have been approved and signed by the BSF’s auditors and the proposed budget for 2016 has been approved by the BSF Executive.
In 2015, the BSF planned an operating deficit of £6000 but this turned into an operating profit of just under £9,500 due to underspending in several areas, particularly development and legal costs. This has provided more flexibility for the budget in 2016, where an operating deficit of £9,500 is proposed that will still leave the BSF with over £44,000 in reserves. The aim is to end each year with reserves amounting to 75-80% of an average year’s income so that the BSF can still operate for a further year even in the event of a very sharp downturn in income.
Mike Jennings told the AGM that the BSF does not want to build up reserves for the sake of it – it wants to spend money for the good of the sport – and that to accumulate additional reserves would simply incur tax liability.
There were questions from the floor about why development spending had come in so far under budget in 2015. The response was that the BSF had had plans for schools development over the past two years that did not materialise, but the intention remains to spend as much money as possible on development projects that do not fall under the scope of BSUK’s work. This year, the BSF will be publicising the development grants it can make available to leagues and teams and it hopes to spend more money on the scheme to bring free high-level coaching to B-grade and C-grade teams in association with the GB Slowpitch Team. For more on this, see the League Heads Forum report below.
With regard to legal costs, the BSF had set aside money in 2015 to spend in connection with the outcomes of the Structural Review. This money was not required in 2015, but will be needed in 2016.
The accounts and budget were accepted unanimously.
Reports
A report from BSF President Stella Ackrell was available at the meeting along with a GB Slowpitch Team report written by Head Coach Stephen Patterson and Team Manager Sarah Vertigan. A report from Tournaments Officer Liz Graham and reports from all six GB Fastpitch Teams were included in the AGM Pack.
No questions were raised on any of these reports.
Constitutional motion
The BSF Executive brought a Constitutional motion to the AGM based on a new legal template for sports organisation governance which Sport England is promoting and which the BSF has adapted to its circumstances.
The motion, which can be viewed in full in the AGM Pack, proposes that the BSF Board shall consist of five Executive Officers who shall be Directors of BSF Ltd and no more than six further Officers whose titles and roles can be determined as needed by the Board. Officers serve for two years and can only be re-elected for a further two terms. After that, only the President can stand for further re-election, but only if there is no other candidate.
All prospective Officers are required to submit a CV demonstrating the skills that they will bring to their proposed roles.
Further elements of the motion concern when the election of Officers should be held and under what regulations.
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings told the meeting that the governance structure for softball may well change substantially during 2017 if proposals that have emerged from the Structural Review process are adopted (see below), but in the meantime this Constitutional motion would improve the organisation’s current governance.
The motion was adopted with one abstention.
Motion proposed by SPAM Softball Team (GLSML)
This motion was designed to clarify and facilitate qualification routes to the BSF’s Co-ed Slowpitch National Championships for teams under A-grade level that are attempting to qualify via tournament results rather than league rankings. The motion read:
“We propose that the British Softball Federation (BSF) requires sanctioned tournaments that have been designated as a qualification route to National Championships for teams that are qualifying via tournaments only to provide a spot for those teams that will be held open up to a published deadline. The deadline can be in advance of the standard deadline, but cannot be prohibitively early.”
After some discussion about how deadlines should be defined in the case of tournaments that fill up very quickly after registration is opened, the motion seemed to have been adopted without dissent, although no vote was taken.
Alan MacFarlane from the London Advertising League commented that because of the uncertainly surrounding Nationals qualification by independent B-grade teams, the requirement that such teams attend the AGM prior to Nationals in order to be eligible was putting a block on qualification.
BSF President Stella Ackrell told the meeting that these problems would be solved when the BSF puts an NSL 2 structure in place for B-grade teams, which it intends to do this year.
Motion proposed by Maniacs Softball Team (NSL)
This motion, concerning the number of teams to be included in the A-grade National Softball League in 2016, took up the majority of time at the meeting, and left very little room for a number of other items on the Agenda.
This report will consider those other items first and return to the Maniacs’ motion at the end.
Structural Review
This item concerns the current state of play in a Structural Review process that the BSF, the BBF and BSUK have been engaged in over the past two years to define the optimum structure for the joint governance of the sports.
This item was raised and discussed in some detail at the League Heads Forum meeting that preceded the AGM, and a report on that discussion is in the League Heads Forum report below.
BSF Affiliation Fees in 2016
The BSF gave notice at the 2015 AGM that team affiliation fees would be raised in 2016 for the first time in several years, and the BSF has proposed a £10 increase in almost all fee categories, which should bring in between £3000 and £4000 of additional income this year.
The new fees, which were agreed with three abstentions, are shown on Page 35 of the 2016 BSF AGM Pack.
Election of Officers
Officers were elected to the BSF Executive Board based on principles set out in the Constitutional motion described above, with five Executive Officers/Directors elected and three other General Officer positions filled – which means that three more General Officer roles can be designated and filled by co-optation.
In each case, only one person was running for each position, so members were voting either for that person or casting a vote for NOTA (None of the Above).
Those elected, with votes for them and NOTA votes in brackets, were:
Executive Positions
President: Stella Ackrell (45-2)
Administrator: Lesley Morisetti (47-0)
Treasurer: Laura Burkhardt (47-0)
National Teams Officer: Jana McCaskill (47-0)
National Competitions Officer: Liz Graham (46-1)
General Officer Positions
Farnham Park Liaison Officer: Steve Getraer (46-1)
Bookkeeping and Reporting: Mike Jennings (46-0; one blank vote)
London Liaison Officer: Alan MacFarlane (46-1)
The BASU representative on the BSF Executive is elected by BASU, and Chris Moon was re-elected at the recent BASU AGM to fill that role.
Laura Burkhardt and Jana McCaskill are new to the Executive; Lesley Morisetti returns to the Executive after a three-year absence; and Steve Getraer was co-opted in 2015.
The BSF Executive will welcome help from others who want to assist with particular projects or in general. Anyone who would like to volunteer should contact Stella Ackrell (stella.ackrell@britishsoftball.org).
Annual Awards
The BSF has up to nine annual awards that it can give out each year for achievements in the previous year or for long-standing service to softball, but it only gives out awards each year for which there have been nominations from the community.
Accordingly, five awards were made this year, with trophies to be presented to the recipients on an appropriate occasion. The awards were as follows:
- The Glover Cup for outstanding long-term service to softball was given to Vicky Hall, who formerly served as Administrator on the BSF Executive and has been a mainstay of the GB Management Committee for many years, providing dedicated support to many GB National Teams.
- The President’s Club Award for outstanding achievement by a club or team was given to Chromies for their achievements in developing top-level slowpitch players, which has enabled them to win eight of the last 12 National Championships as well as European trophies.
- The Adult Coach of the Year Award was given to David Lee from the Bristol Softball Association and the GB Slowpitch programme for his coaching work in Bristol and elsewhere. David was one of two slowpitch coaches chosen to present at the recent BSUK Coach Summit.
- A one-off award for Long-Term Services to Coaching was given to Jim and Karen Murray for developing, coaching and nurturing both softball and baseball in Scotland since the early 1990s, particularly with young players.
- The award for Tournament Umpire of the Year, for outstanding and consistent work at national tournaments, was given to Shelley Craven.
Hall of Fame
The BSF inducts new members into its Softball Hall of Fame every two years. Nominations come from the softball community and decisions on those nominations are made by the BSF Executive.
This year, seven new members were inducted into the Hall of Fame. All of them are still active in the categories for which they were nominated, but are eligible because they have demonstrated performance of the highest order in their category for more than 10 years. They are:
Players
Emily Clifford
Moera Flett
Danny Gunn
Ruth Macintosh
Administrator
Andrew Burgess
Coach
Jocelyn Thompson
Manager
Sara Vertigan
Background information on all of these Hall of Fame inductees will appear soon on the BSF website.
Any Other Business
There was one AOB raised by BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings.
The ISF is in the process of revising its slowpitch rules in order to create a separate ISF Slowpitch Rulebook (in the past, slowpitch rules tended to be given as exceptions within the Fastpitch Rulebook).
Mike has received a draft of the new Slowpitch Rules and would like to put together a small focus group to review them. If interested, contact Mike (mike.jennings@britishsoftball.org).
The NSL Conundrum
As noted above, much of the AGM was taken up with discussion sparked by a motion submitted by the Manchester Maniacs Softball Team, a team made up of players from across the Manchester Softball League which has competed in the A-grade National Softball League (NSL) for the past five years.
The size of the NSL has varied from year to year since it began in 2009, but last year there were 14 teams in the league, playing out a league schedule across various tournaments to compete for eight places in the Premier Nationals. However, the size of the league itself was a problem, with some tournaments restricting entry to only 12 A-grade teams, and the result was that many NSL fixtures remained unplayed and had to be determined, for purposes of the standings, by other means.
The BSF had told NSL teams in the past, and did so again prior to last year’s AGM, that its eventual aim was to cap the NSL at 12 teams and to start an NSL 2 structure beneath it for B-grade teams, with a promotion and relegation mechanism between the two. But there was some confusion about the timetable for this, and no NSL 2 structure had yet been put in place.
At the end of the 2015 NSL season, the Maniacs found themselves in 13th place in the NSL standings, and shortly afterwards the BSF announced that it would indeed cap the NSL at 12 teams for 2016, relegating the Maniacs and the last-placed Warriors out of the league. The Maniacs objected and their motion called on the BSF to “reverse its decision to exclude A-Grade teams from the National Softball League” and to “provide a framework for forthcoming seasons for the future development and extension of the NSL".
Much discussion followed, then the meeting took a lengthy break so that BSF Executive members could consult with the Maniacs and others and among themselves. In the end, no vote was taken on the Maniacs’ motion, but the BSF assumed the assent of the meeting to the following:
- It is imperative to set up an NSL 2 in order that the main NSL competition can be capped at 12 teams but with a structure underneath it to support this and allow for further growth and development. The BSF has pledged to set up an NSL 2 structure for the 2016 season.
- The BSF will consider the situation and will send some options regarding NSL 1 for the current season, including an amended motion from the Maniacs, to those who attended the AGM for an email vote, with the whole situation to be resolved, one way or the other, within two weeks of the meeting.
One suggestion made -- that a separate NSL meeting be convened each year so that issues concerning only A-grade teams do not take up so much time at forthcoming AGMs -- will be acted on the by BSF, and an NSL Forum will be convened in the autumn.
League Heads Forum
The annual Softball League Heads Forum, a meeting involving slowpitch league heads, tournament organisers and members of the BSF Executive, normally takes place each November in Birmingham. However, the 2015 meeting had to be cancelled because of difficulty in finding a venue and was rescheduled for the morning of the AGM.
About 15 people plus members of the BSF Executive were in attendance when the meeting began shortly after 11.00 am, though numbers grew as the meeting progressed. The following topics were covered:
BSF Affiliation Fees for 2016
As announced at the 2015 AGM in order to give leagues plenty of notice for budgeting in 2016, team affiliation fees for 2016 are to go up for the first time in several years. The increase in almost all categories will be £10 per team – about 50p per player for the season. A schedule of the new fees and a comparison with previous fees can be found on Page 35 of the 2016 BSF AGM Pack.
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings explained that fees had been kept at the same level for as long as possible, but that costs were increasing even in a time of low inflation and that Sport England, as a requirement of funding, mandates governing bodies to keep fees at least in line with inflation and to ensure that they can cover the costs involved with running general adult participation.
During the AGM itself, as noted above, the proposal to increase fees was accepted with 44 votes in favour and three abstentions.
One question raised was why teams in Scotland continue to get preferential rates, which has been the case since 2006. Mike Jennings explained that this is in place because tournament play is mainly concentrated in England and particularly in the South and is expensive for Scottish teams to access, and also because, as BSUK’s funding comes from Sport England, it cannot carry out development work in Scotland using this funding.
Website registration
Website registration forms for 2016 will shortly be in place on the BSF website, and the BSF’s strong preference is that all affiliated teams register and roster their players, providing names and email addresses. Existing teams can simply update their rosters from last season and rosters can be further updated during the season.
While the Spawtz system behind the registration can also be used for team and league management – at no cost to teams and leagues – this is not mandatory and the BSF recognises that leagues and teams will often have their own websites and systems.
But BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings made a plea to the League Heads to ensure that teams are registered and rostered so that the governing body has the ability to communicate with all its members.
Under-18 guidelines
In 2013, the BSF published a set of Guidelines that are mandatory for leagues and tournaments in the case where players under the age of 18 are playing in adult teams.
Most tournaments include these rules in their Tournament Packs and some have additional regulations that go beyond the BSF guidelines.
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings stressed that these guidelines must be enforced by all BSF leagues and BSF-sanctioned tournaments from a safeguarding point of view. However, at the recent 2016 BASU AGM, an additional issue was raised around requirements when under-18s are umpiring in adult games.
This topic is discussed more fully in the BASU AGM Report, but the gist is that BASU requires that there be parental consent and there must be a second umpire involved in the game. There must also be a responsible person present (perhaps the second umpire or a team Welfare Officer) who can intervene if required to protect the young person involved from any kind of abuse.
Structural Review
On Pages 27-29 of the 2016 BSF AGM Pack, there is a summary of the current state of play in the ongoing Structural Review project that has been carried out by the BSF, the BBF and BSUK over the past two years.
The Structural Review has been undertaken because the leaders of all three organisations recognised that the current governance structure is too complex and that, as a result, the sports are over-governed for their size. A clear need to simplify the leadership and management structure was agreed to allow both BSUK staff and Federation volunteers to plan together rather than separately and to work more effectively on behalf of the sports.
At this point, after a great deal of consultation and discussion, including the use of focus groups, all three organisations are agreed on the need to move to a single structure that will present a clear integrated vision of both sports working together. The details for such a structure will be put in place over the next year, with 1 April 2017 the earliest target date for the new single organisation to begin operation.
There will be a single Board for the new organisation which will be smaller than the current BSUK Board, with both independent members and representatives from the two sports. Each sport will have its own Committee or Commission to which members will still be elected and which will run the day-to-date operations of the sport. But the new organisation, yet to be named, will be the recognised governing body for both sports, with a single CEO and a single AGM (with separate sections). In addition, a wider advisory group or Congress, made up of representatives from interest groups across both sports, will be created to provide advice and information to the Board and staff of the new organisation.
BSF Treasurer Mike Jennings said: “In some ways, on the ground, not a lot will change. But the new organisation should have better governance and credibility.”
In response to a question about how this new structure will help BSUK to grow the game, BSUK Joint CEO and Head of Operations Jenny Fromer said: “We will be able to work more efficiently, with better communication and more integrated systems. Resources will all be pointed at the same target.”
BSUK Chair John Walmsley told the meeting: “I have been pushing this process since 2011. The new structure and organisation will be transformative for the sports and can unlock their power and give us a unified outward face and voice to present to the rest of the country. We will be better able to integrate new participants and appeal to more people who want a different approach to sport.”
The next stage will be to solicit questions from the community and solidify details about how the new organisation will work. Anyone who has questions after reading this report and the Structural Review summary in the AGM Pack should email them to Jenny Fromer [jenny.fromer@bsuk.com]. A series of FAQs giving answers to the questions received will be published over time on the BSUK website and the issues involved will be the subject of a forthcoming issue of the Hot Corner E-Bulletin.
The next BBF and BSF AGMs will be asked to formally approve the changes so that the new structure can come into being.
Personal accident and injury insurance
All teams affiliated to the BSF have civil and public liability insurance through their BSF membership. Some years ago, the BSF began to offer low-cost personal accident and injury insurance to leagues as an optional extra, with the proviso that all teams in a given league had to take it up. Some leagues now buy this insurance through the BSF while others don’t.
At the 2014 League Heads Forum, it was asked whether cover could be improved, with higher benefits and more eventualities covered, including physiotherapy after injury as an option. The BSF put these questions to the insurers, who have come back with a proposal that is not quite what the BSF had asked for.
Mike Jennings told the meeting: “The new proposal would more than double the premiums in order to double the benefits, and the provision of physiotherapy, which not everyone would want, would be mandatory. It doesn’t seem like a good deal. So the basic policy will remain in place, but what we really want will probably be prohibitively expensive.” Nevertheless, the BSF will continue to look into possibilities.
The BSF will also look into a case brought to its attention by the Bristol Softball Association, where a player with a hand injury was denied accident and injury benefit. Unlike with public liability insurance, payment should not depend on negligence or other conditions.
Calendar
The meeting reviewed the 2016 Softball Calendar, as published in the AGM Pack, but no issues were raised.
A new all-grade event, the Blitz Tournament, had been proposed for this year, but only after the calendar had largely been set, so a suitable date could not be found. The organisers now plan to bring this tournament forward for 2017.
BSF Coaching Scheme for B-grade and C-grade teams
Two years ago, the BSF, in conjunction with the GB Slowpitch Team, started a scheme whereby B-grade and C-grade co-ed slowpitch teams with ambitions to improve could be assigned a coach from the GB Slowpitch squad to deliver a one-day player clinic and then to work with and mentor the team at a subsequent league or tournament competition.
The BSF covers all the costs, and the scheme, organised by then GB Slowpitch Team Manager Sara Vertigan, enables the GB Slowpitch squad to raise funds as well as help raise levels of play in the community.
In 2014, when the scheme was first announced and publicised, there was quite a high take-up, but with less promotion, this fell off in 2015. The BSF is keen to revive the project in 2016 and Sara Vertigan, though she has left the GB Slowpitch Team programme, is still willing to organise it.
The scheme is now being publicised on the BSF website, and any interested teams (or leagues) should contact Mike Jennings.
Report from BASU AGM​
Chris Moon, BASU’s Training Officer and representative on the BSF Executive, reported to the Forum on some of the issues discussed at BASU’s 2016 AGM, held on 6 February (a full report on this meeting can be found here).
BASU is keen to increase the quality of umpiring both at national level and within leagues, and will be encouraging leagues, and working with them, to put mentoring systems in place in 2016 for newly-qualified umpires officiating at league level only. Meanwhile, BASU intends to increase the mentoring and feedback it gives to umpires working at tournaments.
Next year, BASU plans to organise a meeting of league Umpire-in-Chiefs to evaluate mentoring systems and discuss any other issues that may arise.
Questions were raised from the floor about mechanisms for players, teams and leagues to provide feedback on umpire performance.
Chris Moon pointed out that there is a feedback form for this in the BASU section on the BSF website, but that he is more interested in feedback from other umpires and information produced through the mentoring process.
However, there was a general feeling from the League Heads that having team captains rate umpires at tournaments, perhaps with a scoring system plus comments, could help BASU identify those umpires who need more mentoring and perhaps additional training. Chris Moon will take this back to BASU for further discussion.
Development equipment
At the end of the League Heads Forum session, the BSF gave away three bats and a catcher’s mask to leagues for development purposes by drawing names out of a hat.
The catcher’s mask went to the Solent Softball League and the bats went to the Greater London Softball Mixed League, the Leeds Softball Association and the Windsor League.
Next meeting
The next Softball League Heads Forum meeting will be held in November 2016 in Birmingham and a date will be announced shortly.