Ashu Jain talks with Barney Reed Sr. and Robert Blackwell Jr.
The entire member based USATT Board is dethroned by USOC's threat of de-sanctioning.
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Ashu Jain talks with Barney Reed Sr. and Robert Blackwell Jr.
The entire member based USATT Board is dethroned by USOC's threat of de-sanctioning. |
Robert Blackwell addresses the issue on About.com: "First I did not step down. The terms of all the board members were terminated by a change in the by-laws. I was one of the people pushing for a clean sweep of the board. Ashu had nothing to do with my not being on the board other than to vote in favor of the new by-laws."
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I play table tennis and compete. Now I hear the
sanctioning body is disbanded. (maybe by itself)
I would like to know more but don't even know what
questions to ask first.
Is this a good thing for table tennis in the U.S.?
Does the USOC control the USATT?
Will this help spread table tennis in the U.S.?
Will new officers for USATT be voted in?
Will new officers be assigned by USOC?
Will the "new" USATT work for expanding table
tennis in the U.S.?
Will the "new" USATT be for OSOC needs first?
Will there still be a USATT?
USATT was inaffective. In what ways?
What could be done better?
Will all the players in the U.S. be told more of what
is going on? I am sure it affects us in some way.
Reading what has been said so far could be compared to;
The president of the U.S. and staff quit today. Period.
I hope someone in the know continues to inform us just
what is going on. As a table tennis player, I want to know more.
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Killerspin's Robert Blackwell speaks
Robert Blackwell Jr. talks with Biba Golic while Diego Schaff directs Georgina Pota in the Killerspin Booth.
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USATT Direction - Member Based Organization Hijacked by USOC
Robert Blackwell, Obama, money laundering, EKI Consulting
Table
Tennis Pioneers Equipment Sales
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http://www.usatt.org/news1/MembershipBoardUpdate.pdf
I would like to provide you with a status report on the on-going efforts of the Nominating and Governance Committee’s (NGC) efforts to seat a new Board of Directors for USATT. As you may recall from a previous posting, you were informed that the simple interview process for all Independent and At Large candidates became problematic from a scheduling standpoint. That process is now nearing an end.
For the At-Large positions, the nomination timeline was extended with the hope of attracting more interested members to the candidate pool. At the end of the extended nomination period there were only two candidates eligible to fill the positions. As a result of their being only two (2) eligible candidates for the At Large Board seats, a general election is not needed at this time. Therefore, the NGC announces that Michael L. Babuin and Christian Lillieroos are At Large members of USATT’s Board of Directors. It is the hope of the NGC that in future years more individuals from within USATT will become candidates for the At Large Board seats.
The National Collegiate Table Tennis Association applied for recognition as a National Sports Organization and received that honor by the NGC. Subsequently, as the only NSO to have applied for recognition, the NCTTA submitted the name of David Del Vecchio as their designee for the NSO USATT Board seat.
The NGC is pleased to announce that the Club representative to the USATT Board of Directors is Linda Leaf. Linda is the President of the Shorewood Table Tennis Club in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. USATT Representative and Alternate to the USOC’s Athlete Advisory Council (Ashu Jain and Whitney Ping, respectively) have initiated a nomination and election process for seating the USATT Athlete Advisory Council. This eventual seven (7) person body will elect from amongst themselves the one (1) person to join Ashu Jain on the USATT Board of Directors as an Athlete Representative.
We can expect the Independent (3) and Athlete Board (1) members to be named and seated on or about May 15, 2008.
Thank you for your patience in this critical time of leadership transition within USATT.
If you have any questions on any aspect of this process, you can contact any one of the individuals listed below:
Chris Vadala – Chairman NGC
chris.vadala@usoc.orgAshu Jain – USATT/USOC AAC Representative – AJain@aol.com
Michael D. Cavanaugh – Interim CEO USATT
mike.cavanaugh@usoc.orged@usatt.org
6th May 2008
Please note that although the letter currently has my name as a co-author, my name is listed only as a point of contact. In fact, if I were to be contacted by anyone regarding this election, I would have no answer, as I have not been involved. This is as much news to me as it is to you (that the at large was concluded.)
I am disappointed to see that we only had the two members at the "At Large" position - after years/decades of blaming the administration, this was the time for our membership to step forward, rather than taking the apathetic approach. The At Large position was probably the position I fought hardest for, as I wanted to give the membership the option to select at least these two members. Unfortunately that is not the outcome.
As far as the athlete elections go, we had set an internal deadline of April 30th to receive athlete nominations for the AAC (we needed a total of 5). We did not receive the complete 5 by that time, so we extended the deadline. It is possible we will have more athletes interested, and there will be an athlete election (by other fellow athletes).
Ashu
Ashu,
Thanks for the posting. I appreciate your opinions. I accept your
belief that "now is the time" for the membership to step forward.
Maybe it is but maybe it isn't. I think your conclusion that the
membership is "apathetic" because only two people applied is an
assumption not necessarily a fact. I am anything but apathetic. But
I did not apply. It is likely there are many people that feel the same
way.
I was confused about part of the press release. It states that there were
"only two candidates eligible" for the positions. I am not sure
that means the same thing as saying "only two candidates applied to be on
the Board." When I was at the Arnold in Columbus, two different
people told me that they had applied to be on the board. Neither of those
two were the two mentioned in the press release so it makes me wonder if there
were more people who expressed an interest in being on the Board but for some
reason were determined to not be eligible. If so I would like to hear what
made them ineligible.
Why would the membership not step forward and ask to be on the USATT Board right
now? I can think of several reasons. For one it is a significant
time commitment that is in no way adequately compensated. The recent
history of Board ineffectiveness may make people think it would be a waste of
their time. There could be a perception that the USATT has been
"taken over" by the USOC (I am simply repeating what others have said
here, not giving a personal opinion) while at the same time the USOC has
withdrawn essentially all funding. So there is uncertainty about what
direction the Board is going in, but there is no doubt that there will be a lack
of money. Maybe people don't want to join a board that they do not know
who else is going to be their fellow Board members. Maybe people are
reluctant to be part of a Board that is going to be made up largely of people
who do not have a table tennis background (one of the prerequisites for some of
the main positions I believe.) So the membership is beiing asked to
"trust" that the Nominating and Governance Committee, made up of non
table tennis people (with the exception of Bob Fox) will pick good candidates
(also non- table tennis people) to be on the USATT Board, and that these good
candidates who have no vested interest in table tennis will be interested in
making a substantial personal sacrifice to help turn this dysfunctional
organization around. Are there a lot of good candidates out there willing
to do this? One of the primary reasons I could not in good faith stay on
the Nominating and Governance committee was that even though I know several
people outside of Table Tennis that I believe could be very good board
members, I could not ask them to serve in that function when I wouldn't be
willing to be on the Board right now myself.
Anyway I believe there are a lot of good people in the USATT membership that are
not apathetic, but want to see how this turns out before they stick their necks
out. in the meantime they are continuing to run clubs, tournaments,
leagues, clinics, lessons and the many other things they had been doing to try
and help promote this sport.
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