The BSF Executive held its latest monthly video conference meeting on the evening of Tuesday 8 December. Below is a journalistic account of the main discussions and decisions.
Attendance
Present: Jenny Fromer (President), Laura Burkhardt (Treasurer), Liz Graham (Competitions Officer), Mike Lott (Coaching Officer), Mike Jennings (General Officer), Ieuan Gale (Co-opted General Officer), Bob Fromer (Administrator).
Apologies: Alexis Markham-Hill (National Teams Officer), Chris Moon (Technical Officer).
AGM and League Heads Forum plans
There was a brief discussion of logistical issues for the 2021 BSF AGM and the 2021 League Heads Forum, both of which will take place as remote meetings in February. The League Heads Forum will be held on Saturday 13 February and the AGM on Saturday 27 February.
With regard to any matters requiring voting at the AGM, including election of Officers, the BSF will create and send a Google poll beforehand to those attending so that anonymity in voting can be preserved.
The BSF will try to find someone familiar with Google Meet to act as a technician for the meeting.
BSF Competitions and Membership Officer Liz Graham will shortly send out an invitation to leagues asking for one or two representatives to attend the League Heads Forum, and those that sign up will receive a log-in to access the meeting. A draft agenda and a call for additional items will be circulated before the meeting.
Finance Meeting on 7 January
The BSF Executive will hold a special meeting on 7 January to assess the Federation’s current financial situation, look at potential scenarios around the 2021 season, develop a budget for 2021 and decide on the membership fees it will bring to the AGM for approval at the end of February.
BSF Treasurer Laura Burkhardt has been asked to bring figures to the meeting for a number of scenarios based on variations in membership fee amounts, the potential number of member teams in 2021 and whether the state of the pandemic will allow a full or a partial season. The Executive will need to look carefully at areas of discretionary expenditure and where costs can, if necessary, be reduced.
Nominations to the Softball Europe Hall of Fame
The Softball Europe (formerly the ESF) Hall of Fame has inducted 37 members since it came into being in 1988, but only one of them – former BSF Executive member and ESF Licences Officer Libby Moss – is from British Softball. Libby was inducted as an Administrator at the 2020 Softball Europe Congress in Vilnius.
The BSF Executive feels that other British Softball members deserve recognition by Softball Europe, either as players or in other roles, and plans to make more nominations in future.
To start with, the BSF plans to nominate two players – the most you can nominate in a single year – for consideration by Softball Europe for induction into its Hall of Fame in 2021: former GB Slowpitch stars Brett Gibbens and Stephanie Jardine.
The BSF also plans to nominate former GB Women’s Fastpitch Team player Stacie Townsend for induction in 2022.
More nominations may be made in other categories in both those years, and suggestions from the playing community are welcome.
Categories in which nominations can be made apart from players are Umpires, Coaches, Managers, Administrators and Organisers.
Nominees must have been involved in international as well as domestic softball over a number of years.
Insurance
Mike Jennings told the meeting that, with help from BaseballSoftballUK, an alternative insurance provider has been found to supply Civil and Public Liability insurance for both the BSF and BSUK in 2021 after the previous provider had declined to renew cover.
Though the cost will be higher than in the past, there is little option but to take up this new provision as existing cover is about to run out.
With regard to Personal Accident and Injury insurance, which the BSF buys for leagues to take up on an optional basis on behalf of all their teams, the BSF has decided not renew the existing policy at this time, but to seek re-quotes from a range of suppliers and select a new policy for leagues to consider for purchase commencing in Spring 2021. Leagues and their teams who last opted for this cover in 2019 should be aware that it lapsed as of 1 December 2020, after a year of cover at no cost to them.
The cost of future cover will depend on the number of leagues and teams that opt in. The BSF will contact Leagues about this insurance early next year when quotes are available.
Farnham Park bookings for 2021
BaseballSoftballUK is requiring that all booking requests for fields at Farnham Park in 2021 be submitted by 14 December 2020.
Accordingly, the BSF has submitted requests for six fields for the Co-ed Slowpitch League National Championships in August and for four fields for both the NSL National Championships and the Softball World Series Tournament in September.
Next meetings
As mentioned above, the BSF Executive will hold a special Finance Meeting by video conference on the evening of Thursday 7 January.
The next monthly video conference meeting for the Executive will be on the evening of Thursday 21 January. Anyone with matters to raise at this meeting should contact BSF Administrator Bob Fromer.