CNSF October Board Meeting 10/5/15

**In attendance is Thomas Aquinas, Victoria Wilson, Jeanine Unger, Chris Montalvo, Jeff Sponder, DJ Ten Hoeve, Anthony Sciarrillo, Scott Schauer, AJ Garrido, Erik Whalen, Michael Jordan, Damon Albano, Maria Thompson, Wheezie - 13 people.

**Grievance in Basketball sent via email from Frank Cammarato - it was sent to Rob Hill, Chris Montalvo, Jeff Sponder, Michael jordan and Erik Whalen.

Set forth on the record - Jeff stated Rob Hill is away on business and not able to air his side of the story so we cannot resolve the issue. The Grievance is supposed to be dealt with in 3 days which is impossible since Rob is away. We will be giving Rob the opportunity to address the board with his side when he gets back - it will probably be when we have our next Board meeting.

Discussion back and forth between Frank and Jeff over Franks disbelief that since Rob is not here this cannot be dealt with tonight.

Jeff asked that we just gather the facts tonight.

Danielle Cammarato started playing basketball in 4th grade. Kathleen O'Connor was Coach - team wasnt very good but they had a decent year - her daughter was one of the best players. The next year - 5th grade Kathleen says she is on board to Coach, she picks the team and right before the season starts she pulls out and pulls her daughter off the team as well. Charles Braunstein stepped in and fulfilled the Role of Coach for last year but was not able to committ again this year. They asked Frank to step up = he offered to assist but could not committ to Coach. The tryouts were postponed from June to September in hopes that a Coach would emerge.

Rob Hill is the Coach of the 7th Grade team. There were 8 girls that tried out or were being accepted on the team. Rob ended up having Ashley try out for his 7th grade team in June - noone is told that he is having Ashley try out. At least 2 people that Frank knows pulled their kids from our travel program - fed up with how things are done here.

6 - 6th graders and 5 - 5th graders tried out. Frank confronted Rob on the fact that he was wrong in having Ashley try out for 7th grade without publishing the tryout or that he should not have allowed Ashley to play up.

There were 7 kids at 4th grade tryout - that's enough for a team.

Rule; Playing up is not encouraged and will not be allowed if there are enough people to field a team.

in some situations we might have an advanced player be part of tournaments or some games But not part of the team. (this part is completely paraphrased)

Franks grievance is that Ashley should not have been allowed to try out or to play up.

Franks daughter was one of the 6 girls that tried out and will not be playing on the travel team. There are 2 other girls who are good players - that were on the team last year that specifically walked away because of this issue.

Frank was the treasurer of the Basketball commission and has stepped down.

Erik Whalen said that as a result of Frank stepping down - within 72 hours they got a trainer Evelyn - to step in to work with the girls and Coach them.

Damon asked Frank "What is your ultimate ask with your grievance". Frank replied " he would like Ashley to be removed from the 7th grade team and given the opportunity to play for the 6th grade team if she would like.

Jeff asked "if Ashley were taken off the team would your child - Danielle and the other two girls who left consider coming back to play"? Frank said probably not and none of them tried out.

Anthony asked would there have been a 5th grade team if they didn't have to combine with 6th? No but there would have been a 4th and 5th combined - there would have been 12 kids and there would have been 8 - 10 on the 6th grade team.

Scott asked "did the basketball team have regular meetings to discuss issues"? Frank replied "not often but occasionally yes, we did have meetings.

Frank said he learned the rules last week when he picked up the guidelines.

**After the Grievance, Frank asked if he could discuss some financial info - parents have complained about the Basketball costs. We we are the most expensive basketball program in monmouth. Other towns are between 200 and 250. (Marlboro is 150 but the run a fundraiser to offset). We used to be 200 then raised up and up to finally $400. People say well soccer is $400 but soccer is fall and spring - 2 seasons. Basketball is for 1 season.

There is a 1200 stipend per year per team, which is excessive. Should be $500. many Coaches do not even use there whole stipend - like AJ - I believe he only used about 500 or so. Frank is also saying that numbers don't work if you look at the hours of Gym time.

Jeanine asked if anyone encourages the Coaches to use their stipends...Yes, they are all aware they have it but many cannot use it all - they cannot run more practices or play in tournaments.

Saturdays 9-1 for 10 Saturdays from Sept to Nov and it says 9 - 1 but then charge for 7 hours. Then it was asked why it even begins in Sept when Basketball hasn't even started. He also mentioned that last year gym time was $7,000 but this year it's $10,000.

Other towns charge 200 and then if they want outside training they talk to the parents and everyone splits the fees - they don't need huge stipends.

Michael Jordan did mention that Ref fees and gym time are going up.

Reduce the fee to $325, you still have $500 stipend for trainer fee's etc and IF you need a few extra bucks for tournaments then the parents kick in.

Erik Whalen is talking about how we need to get more girls to play in town. Setting up girls recreation clinics in early November to try to get more girls to come out and play for the town. Erik also thinks that Frank is upset because without Ashely O'Connor he was facing a total loosing season.

Jeff mentioned that while he appreciates Eriks thoughts he doesn’t necessarily agree, Frank was armed with good info and also complimented Rob and all of his time that he has dedicated. And that he felt so strongly about it, that he resigned from his position as Treasurer of the Basketball Commission.

Many discussions ensued about how everyone feels about the grievance and about Ashley being allowed to start with the 7th Grade team. Michael Jordan also suggested that we bring in the O'Connors to address the Board and just get there side of the story. Rob says that Kathleen O'Connor reached out to him the day of the tryouts to ask if Ashley could try out for him. We want to know her side we are assuming (according to Frank) that they believe Ashley is too good for the 6th grade team.

we have 3 days from that point to make a decision. What is being asked of us is that the Rule has been violated and that Ashley should not be allowed to be on the team.

**We will try to have a meeting either the 13 or 14th of October once Rob is back to deal with the grievance.

**Jeff asked if all read the minutes. Maria motioned to accept the minutes and Chris 2nd the motion.

**Jeff asked that Michael Jordan be given a 1 year extension to remain basketball commissioner - he will most likely stay through the Basketball season and then resign from the Board. Jeff set the motion on the table and Vicky 2nd the motion all were in favor.

**All who ran for the Board were elected. Zach Finch had the least amount of votes. Rob Hill offered to take the 1 year position but if he changes his mind then Zach would get the 1 year.

**New sheets for positions will be put out next month for all Board members

**Anthony -treasurer report - financial - we have finalized the audit report.

**Concussion report - we are all confused with where we are with it. Jeff will check with Star about it but he thinks we were going to put it on the website and offer it up to everyone. Maria said Monmouth Medical is offering it for free to everyone Oct 10.

**Rutgers certification - Michelle is not here but we had full class and did not have to pay. It went well.

**CPR class we paid a lot of money for it and not a good showing. On the Tuesday night Jeff went and there were only 4 people there. Damon said not all Head Coaches received CPR. Jeff said we have to get them certified or they cannot Coach..

**For Nov meeting would like Baseball Commissioners (Scott and the new incoming Commissioner - DJ) to get together and discuss Capital Expenses.

**Holiday party 12/7/15 at Colts Neck Inn.

**Basketball info:

If you register by 10/23 its the same amount as last time but after that it's 150.

11/11/15 there will be the Coaches draft night at Colts Neck Inn

11/14/15 will be our opening day. It will be different than previous - it will be a meet your Coach and get your uniform and have a practice.

We will have our first game 11/21/15 - before Thanksgiving this year.

Youth Ref intro on the 9th. We will now always have 2 adult refs for 7th and 8th grade boys.

**Baseball and Softball.

Baseball focus is on tryouts the next two Sundays and makeups are the 23rd. We made some changes to the guidelines. Big change is out of town kids part of the reason is not enough kids to fill certain teams. From 7U - 11U teams out of towners are only allowed if you don't have enough to field a team. You are supposed to have 12 on a team. If at least 12 kids try out and all are deamed to be travel ready you will not have any out of towners on that team.

For 12U and up, The top 8 are from Colts Neck and then the next 4 can be from Colts Neck or out of town. This is the ages where it becomes difficult to field teams.

Little league made the change of the birthdate to end of August but not USABL.

Tryouts are going to be more transparent and listed on the website will be who will be running the tryouts and who will be evaluating the different age groups.

Jeanine asked if two kids came out to play from Colts Neck would you field a team of all out of towners so that those two kids would have a team to play on. Scott was saying we had a team that just ended last year at 24 years old and those boys played together since 8U. They roster 15 kids so that they all can come together as often as they can to play ball and keep the team going.

**Softball is great but Jeff is looking for a new Director. It is conflict for him to be President and Softball Director.

**Soccer - all is going well. WE had to cancel 1 game due to the storm. A lot of good feed back. WE opened it up to 3 year olds. We had some issues with metal goals on 1st and 2nd grade and had to change some of the goals to 4x8's. We had to change for safety reasons, the metal ones were a safety hazard. We also had to change to help some of the younger kids to play on the small sided because there are things changing.

Pictures are on the 17th at the Rec Center we are waiting to hear back from TSS. Halloween will do something cool for the kids that are playing that day (won't interfere with trunk or treat). Best costume gets a prize etc.

Refs are doing a decent job - trying to help the Refs and teach them to call more fouls because there is a lot of elbowing and pushing going on.

Nov 14, 2015 will be party - last games of the seasons for all kids a 1:30 and 2:45 games and then 4:30 - 6 ish will be a pizza party and trophies maybe a DJ as well.

**Wrestling - nothing to report, Maria exchanged emails with Michele and Caro and she has not heard from either of them and Jeff asked that Maria reach out again.

**Fundraising - Trunk or Treat Maria spoke to Justine, they are getting a DJ and Ice cream Truck. We got fire and police to come. It will be from 1-4

**Jeff - when we do jobs next month, DJ is totally overloaded and needs some help at least 2 or 3 people that understand the website and can help out. Scott said that each sports group should have a person in charge of the website. But Jeff wants 2 or 3 people that all work together and can maybe DJ can delegate some of the work.

Jeff says (after Damon acknowledged that he had a bad week last week with sending too many emails) that there should be one email a week with all the info for each grade pertaining to that sport.

**Jeff thanked Scott and Thomas for their service on the Board. Both of them have finished there terms.

Jeff made a motion to end the meeting and Jeanine 2nd it and all were in favor.