Houston Area Road Runners Association
Board Meeting
February 16, 2004
Members present:
Roger Boak, Bill Dubinsky, Annie Hadow, Bob Hoekman, Tom McBrayer
Others Present: Ed Willsman
Reading of the minutes:
The meeting was called to order at 6:02 PM. The minutes were voted on and approved.
Reports of Directors and committees:
Membership Committee - Annie Hadow
We currently have 1428 members. Annie also was in contact with Jeremy concerning help with the website. Jeremy would be pleased to help as well as teach the appropriate individuals how they could maintain their respective pages on the website. This is a great help to HARRA and there was appreciation for his assistance.V.P. Of Clubs – Roger Boak
Runners of the season results are being submitted for FootPrints in Inside Texas Running (ITR). With any luck they’ll be published in their totality. As far as Footprints, there was general agreement that it looks pretty good in the new format. There are still some issues to be resolved. Roy Lira needs a little clarification as to his exact duties and tasks. John has talked to him and will pursue it further. As far as the financials, Roger noted an email from Lance at ITR in which he stated a fee of about $5 per household for the remainder of this year and a yearly fee of about $12 per household.
Medical Report – Bob Hoekman
CPR classes are beginning and there are two refresher courses slated for AED team members. Otherwise things are pretty well underway for the spring series.
Equipment – Tom McBrayer
Tom opened by alerting us to be on the lookout for the insurance bill. It should be coming soon, but he has not received it yet. With regards to insurance Bob noted that he added a new radio to the inventory. A question was also brought to the floor as to the history and whereabouts of the laptop computer and how much to insure it for.
The all purpose 5K course on Allen Parkway is beginning to develop. The Run for the Rose has been actively pursuing another course to get out of the medical center and is providing some impetus. There is talk of introducing a turnaround on the parkway at 2.5 K into the course.
PIM – The new program will begin in March and once again using the Scleroderma run as its conclusion.
There was some discussion regarding the residency rule; its history and requirements. The rule was put in place in the mid nineties in response to concerns of many HARRA members. Apparently there was a group of runners that were training with a local club that participated in the series. Since they were not local runners their legitimacy was questioned when considering the runner of the season and club points. A rule was established to limit participants to bona fide area runners (an 18 county area around Houston). Subsequently, some runners moved beyond those limits, or who were regular participants were granted exemptions from the rule. The reason for the reconsideration of the rule was to consider exemptions for Katherine Scarborough and Gannon White for Runner of the Season. The Marathon Committee is also interested in our decision since Gannon placed in the local runners and Joe Flores filed a protest.
Roger has sought out and gotten opinions from a number of sources, including the board. All were in favor of granting the exemptions.
Annie suggested that we institute a well organized exemption process in order to let people know what they should do to apply for one.
A motion was made to exempt both Katherine and Gannon from the residency requirement. A vote was taken and the motion passed unanimously.
Bob Hoekman offered to review the minute of past meetings in order to update us on relevant discussions concerning the residency rule.
John brought up the closing discussion regarding some of the problems raised at the last meeting and noted some of his concerns. He also noted that elections of officers are coming up and we should prepare for the elections.
The meeting was adjourned at 7:18
Respectfully submitted,
Bill Dubinsky