4. Executive and Officer reports

[Lyle Craver]

To Executive Members and Officers - please enter your reports here - please enter your report (e.g. 4C Secretary's Report) on the message title line

4. Reports (Executive members and Officers please post your reports here)

A. President
B. Vice President
C. Secretary
D. Woman’s Coordinator
E. FIDE Representative/Masters Representative
F. Youth Coordinator
G. Board Member at Large
H. Board Member at Large
I. Rating Auditor
J. Chess Foundation of Canada
K. Kalev Pugi Fund
L. Treasurer
M. Executive Director: Financial Report

[Lyle Craver]

4C. Secretary's Report

This is the Spring 2023 meeting of the CFC and it's provincial Annual General Meeting time - this is where most CFC Voting Members for 2023-2024 will be elected.

It would be very helpful to me if VMs (outside of BC and Ontario where I already have the information) would let me know the dates of their provincial AGMs so I don't have to be bothering them with their slate for 2023-2024.

The attachment to this message is the calculation spreadsheet for the 2023-2024 Assembly.

Distribution of 2023-2024 VMs is as follows:

ON 35, BC 15, AB 7, MB 3, NB 3, QC 3 (as per agreement), NS 2, SK 2, NL 1, NWT 1, PEI 1, YT 1

I have one "ask" - could someone from each province (excluding BC and Ontario for whom I already have the info) let me know the dates of your provincial AGM? (lcraver@shaw.ca)

Date for the AGM is not yet set but I'm trying to get a jump on 2023-2024 Assembly matters to prevent mayhem during the last week before the AGM.

Please remember to be a CFC VM you have to be:
- an CFC adult member (types O, L, H or F membership) current at the start of the meeting

- you must keep your membership current during your term of office. You do get a one month grace period but if your membership expires during your term and you don't renew you are deemed to have resigned your VM position, two months after your expiration date your provincial federation loses the right to replace you and we don't send out reminders

Provincial presidents - please make this known to prospective candidates at your AGM

Also, if you're a first time VM you will need to create an account here. That will give you basic access to the Forum but not posting access to here. To get that e-mail me at lcraver@shaw.ca requesting VM access and I'll upgrade you. Please note no pseudonyms are allowed in the Voting Member areas (though they are elsewhere in the Forum).

Many thanks, Lyle Craver, CFC Secretary

[Roger Langen]

Date of next Chess Nova Scotia AGM is March 31, 2024.

[Paul Leblanc]

4.I. Chess Foundation of Canada
Income from the Foundation in FY 2022/2024 was $15,713, an all-time high. Of this $923 is allocated to the Pugi Fund for junior players and a further $450 is allocated to female junior players.

[ian findlay]

4I. Rating Auditor

My first year as Rating Auditor has been quite uneventful. I have answered some rating queries and many thanks to Bob Armstrong for providing valuable guidance, although one could say 'The rating formula speaks for itself'. The biggest concern at the moment is deflation in the CFC rating system. Paul Leblanc did excellent work in producing statistics using Don Parakin's excellent rating calculator to show that our ratings have been deflated by about 100 points since 2017. Most likely caused by players improving online and not playing OTB due to the Pandemic. We are currently weighing our options and should make a recommendation to the CFC Executive shortly. A concern for me is that other ratings have also experienced deflation, so it may be better to stay in line with the other systems rather than just make an adjustment to everyone's CFC rating.

The good news is that COVID seems to be under control now and over the board chess is flourishing.

[Olga Mushtaler]

Vice President Report

◾ Organized the petition to recognize chess as a sport in Canada and to include chess into government funding for sports. With your help, gathered 2000 signatures.
◾ Hosted Hikaru Nakamura event in High Park
◾ promoted chess by organizing free weekly indoor and outdoor tournaments for Chess in the Park, Toronto
◾ helped to manage CFC Facebook page by sharing photos of different chess clubs
◾ helped to manage CFC chess.com page. Increased the number of members from 90 to 500 by hosting regular Friday Arena tournaments
◾ participated in CFC meetings and discussions

[Vladimir Drkulec]

Vice President Report

◾ Organized the petition to recognize chess as a sport in Canada and to include chess into government funding for sports. With your help, gathered 2000 signatures.
◾ Hosted Hikaru Nakamura event in High Park
◾ promoted chess by organizing free weekly indoor and outdoor tournaments for Chess in the Park, Toronto
◾ helped to manage CFC Facebook page by sharing photos of different chess clubs
◾ helped to manage CFC chess.com page. Increased the number of members from 90 to 500 by hosting regular Friday Arena tournaments
◾ participated in CFC meetings and discussions

You also showed excellent initiative when we had an issue with the chess.com club. You have shown yourself to be a valued member of the board with new ideas.

[Bob Gillanders]

Executive Directors Report – Interim May 2023

We have completed our first full year after the COVID shutdown, and over the board chess has made a full recovery and more. Our annual headcount as of May 1 this year stands at 4,046. We reached 2,790 after 2 strong years just before COVID. I kept believing a tsunami was coming and COVID just put a temporary pause on it. The tsunami is here.

The CFC office has been struggling since last summer to handle the flood. Part timer Brian Floyd is handling the invoicing and bookkeeping. Volunteer George Stajov is tackling the processing of new memberships and renewals and trouble shooting the JustGo membership system. Our webmaster Don Parakin continues to champion our IT challenges. Thank you, guys!

The CFC is in strong financial position. We will have significant growth in both our memberships and rating fees this year. The financial statements will be ready before the AGM this year.

This coming year I would like to see us invest in a new rating system. Our current rating system, developed by Troy Vail back in 1996, has certainly been a workhorse. But after 27 years, it is a dinosaur. We need to move forward and invest in a new rating program.

We’ll see you all over the board soon.

Bob

[Roger Langen]

Does this mean CFC ratings are lower than they should be?

[Lyle Craver]

I can't speak for Bob but I very much doubt the rating system directly influences ratings going up or down.

What it definitely DOES influence is ability to process memberships (both renewals and newcomers) as well as to shorten the turnaround time on rating an event. We don't mail out rating lists (or publish them in EP) anymore nor have for a long time. In 2023 fast turnaround is King. (no pun intended)